By Dan Janison, Staff Writer, Newsday
October 29, 2002

The following article has been edited from the original newspaper story.

Mayor Michael Bloomberg Tuesday acknowledged that tensions are rippling his administration over his demand for deeper spending cuts but warned "there will be an enormous amount of pain" still to come.

The details of the cutbacks, though still being worked out, are no Halloween scare. They could include reductions to some services, such as trash pickups, school bus service and preventive health programs, some city officials said.

A major portion of city expenses, of course, cover salaries, but Bloomberg's fiscal aides so far appear to have no detailed plans to generate labor savings other than attrition - a hiring freeze is now in effect - or, as a last resort, layoffs.

The city has a $1 billion deficit in the current budget year, which ends June 30, and officials envision gaps as large as $5 billion in succeeding years.

There also have been only general discussions with the municipal unions about such money'saving vehicles as schedule changes.

In that context, commissioners for police, fire and other big agencies have been slow to meet the 7.5 percent cutback target ordered earlier by City Hall, let alone the additional cuts demanded Monday.

Bloomberg estimates the additional cutback of 2 percent would save the city $300 million this year.

"I don't think there's any question they-re having a hard time," Bloomberg said of city agencies, adding that the departments he is most familiar with "work very efficiently and nobody wants to cut back on any services." While there is competition for resources and while he may at times overrule commissioners on where to make cuts, he said "you won-t see a lot of fighting in the newspapers. We-re not going to do that.

"The commissioners work for the city of New York and will affect the cuts the mayor says," he added.

With the city by most accounts facing its most severe fiscal crisis in a generation, Bloomberg cited an "enormous problem" he termed unique to the region: the Medicaid burden.

It is rare around the nation for cities to pay part of Medicaid costs, with most states picking up the full expense. "For New York City that's $3 billion a year," he said in discussing possible state help. He did not elaborate on how this might be addressed.

As pressed by Silver, Bloomberg agreed not to slash classroom resources, but said "we-re hopeful" that his new Department of Education will be able to meet targeted cuts anyway.

"There's part of that bureaucracy that provides services to the classrooms. There's part of that bureaucracy you absolutely have to have and part you obviously don't have to have," the mayor said.

"You don't want to just blindly go and cut," he said. "You have to understand what you-re doing. We-re going to cut intelligently, we-re going to have to make difficult choices."

Copyright © 2002, Newsday, Inc.