Lawmakers met with Governor Dan Malloy Tuesday for the first time since the Regular Legislative Session ended.
Rep. Themis Klarides, the top Republican in the House of Representatives, said no new progress had made, just that the sides have continued to talk, but it appeared to be a veil for some of the growing tensions inside the negotiating room.
When Sen. Cathy Osten, the Democratic Chair of Appropriations Committee, made glowing remarks about the proposed union concessions deal with state employees, the top Republican in the Senate quickly rebutted those comments, calling them "union talking points".
Osten countered later, criticizing GOP claims that they’ve provided a balanced budget. Osten said flatly that she believes the GOP House and Senate proposals, "do not balance".
Sen. Len Fasano said he’s already prepared not to have a budget to conclude the 2017 fiscal year that ends on June 30.
"My gut is we are going to get past July first even if we have conversations," Fasano told reporters.
Malloy said he remains hopeful, but once again acknowledged that the two sides remain far apart. The biggest difference is the savings targets for union pension and benefit concessions. The governor has already provided a negotiated framework with state unions that comes up with $1.3 billion in combined savings over the next two years while Republicans want to see closer to $2 billion in savings.
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Republicans said a bigger deficit requires more savings.
Union executive boards need to approve opening up their contracts for renegotiation, and then rank and file members must approve the changes.
As for entering the 2018 fiscal year without a budget, Malloy said his administration is still working on a plan for that scenario, which he said could be released next week.
"There are thousands of decisions that are made in a budgetary document," Malloy said. "I will speak to how we make those decisions without such a document."
The governor also hinted that some policy changes could be in that plan.
"What I want to do is protect the state from expending too much money with the appreciation that this is a very tight budget, so I will speak to that issue," Malloy said.
