Lingle orders unpaid days off for workers - Pacific Business News (Honolulu):

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In an address broadcast from the State Lingle also said she would scale back free Medicaid benefitzto low-income adults and said the stated would delay paying some of its larger billx until July. The governor is also asking the the Legislature, and the Office of Hawaiian Affairs to implementy equivalent furlough days or restrict their Hawaii law does not allow orderinb furloughs for the Department of Education, the University of Hawaik or the Hawaii Health Systems Corporation, but Linglee said their spending will be restricted in an amounft equivalent to the three-days-per-month furlough. The furloughs, whicbh start July 1, amount to about a 13.
8 perceng pay cut, or about $5,500 for a worke r making $40,000 a year. As with layoffs, Lingle does not have to negotiat e the furloughs with any of the unionsx representingstate workers. Lingle has said she doesn’ t want to lay off workers because of the disruptive effectt of contract rules that would enabled senior workersto “bump” junior workers, even if they worke in different state The furloughs will save $688 million. Lingls said the savings are needec to close a gapof $730 million betweenj now and June 30, 2011, as forecast by the state’sa Council on Revenues May 28. All told, Hawaik is expected to see tax revenue fallby $2.7 billiomn over the next two years.
“Ifv we do not implement the furlough plan, we wouldf have to lay off up to 10,000 employeews to realize an equivalent amountof savings,” Linglse said. The state has about 46,00p workers, including 21,000 employees of the Departmenytof Education. Lingle blamed the fiscalk shortfall on thelingerinbg recession, rising unemployment, dropping visitor a decline in private buildingy permits, a doubling of foreclosures, and recorxd bankruptcy levels. The state Legislature ended its sessiomn last month by raisin tax rates onhotel rooms, high-income earners, luxury home transactione and tobacco to help meet the budgert shortfall.
But Lingle, a Republican whose vetoes of thosed measures were overridden bymajoritt Democrats, said she would not ask for additiona l tax increases. She also rejected calls for legalizing However, Lingle noted that 70 percent of statr operating funds go to labor costs and that the state had provide d employee wage increase of between 16 and 29 percentg over the past fouryears “wheh our economy was thriving.
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