From Max Page of PHENOM (Public Higher Education Network of Massachusetts):

The Massachusetts Budget – A Work of Shame

Democrats all – the Speaker, Senate President, and Governor – are patting themselves on the back for passing a budget that had three main features: crushing cuts to virtually every aspect of state government that services regular people, a major attack on public employee unions and their collective bargaining rights, and – best for last – not a dime of “shared sacrifice” from the wealthiest in our state.

Yes, those “crazy liberals” from Massachusetts have for the third year of this recession failed to ask for a single dime of “share sacrifice” – the favorite phrase of the political class who seek to undermine government and its duty to enrich our public life and lift up the neediest in our society – from those who have the most in our society.  The last time the state raised taxes, what did it do?  It raised the wrong tax – the sales tax – the one that is most regressive, affecting the poor more than the wealthy.  And before the budget debate even began this year, those good Democratic leaders decided that no amount of cuts to libraries, schools, parks, services for the mentally ill would be painful enough to get them to violate the sacred commitment to the wealthy – no tax increases.

We have a bill to raise $1.4 billion a year, mainly from the wealthiest in our state. See ourcommunities.org.  Now we just need the movement to get our “representatives” to see the light.

-Max Page

P.S. Public higher education was cut by $60 million, and financial aid by another $2 million.  The catalogue of shame is detailed at our reliable friend, the Massachusetts Budget and Policy Center.

The praise from Patrick’s supporters is nauseating, and the breakdown of what he’s actually accomplished for vulnerable workers and retirees is quite weak.

From Gatehouse News Service:

   According to the Mass. Municipal Association, the amendments will:

   · Tweak how mitigation funds for retirees, employees with major health care needs and low-income workers are calculated. Towns and cities that opt into the new plan would set aside up to 25 percent of the insurance savings they see in the first year after changing copays and deductibles and use that money to help offset the impact on vulnerable workers.

   · Require communities that want to switch employees to the state’s Group Insurance Commission to demonstrate that the move would save 5 percent more than possible by making the maximum changes to local insurance plans.

   · Freezes any increases to the percentage that retirees contribute toward their health care plans until mid-2014.

   · A change in language meant to clarify that municipalities cannot unilaterally change basic coverage, such as mental health or chiropractic services, under the new plan. Such changes would still be subject to bargaining with unions.

And now this move is being used against the Democrats by the Republican Governors Association. From the Boston Herald:

“Deval Patrick has done, in some ways, more radical things than I’ve done in Ohio,” Kasich said, as he described his efforts to stabilize his state’s budget, in part by curbing collective bargaining rights for public employees.

Republicans in Washington and across the country are betting that Gov. Deval Patrick’s recent move to restrict some collective bargaining power for municipal employees – no matter how nuanced, limited or supported by unions – will neutralize a 2012 campaign issue for President Obama, who has used it as a bludgeon against Republicans as he ramps up his reelection bid.

“There is no doubt that the White House took a special interest in Gov. Patrick’s efforts to reform collective bargaining powers, and the Obama campaign hopes that the national media overlooks what has happened in Massachusetts,” said Michael Schrimpf, spokesman for the Republican Governors Association.