City News: State Budget In for a Loss
WASHINGTON -- New York's budget took another blow on Monday, as Congress pulled away from providing more than $1 billion in expected health-care funding. If the money doesn't show up soon, officials warn, there will be layoffs.</br></br>Senate aides said Monday that a measure to extend unemployment benefits is likely to pass this week, but won't include the extra Medicaid money that Gov. David Paterson and Mayor Michael Bloomberg had been seeking to plug budget holes.</br></br>In previous versions of the bill, the money had been included along with unemployment benefits. Now, Senate Democrats have decided the only way to get the unemployment bill passed is to strip out the other spending. Democrats had tried to gather enough support for a stripped-down version of the health-care funding measure, but even that did not have enough support.</br></br>Sen. Kirsten Gillibrand (D., N.Y.) blamed lawmakers who "feel it is in their best political interest to obstruct everything right now, even critical medical assistance for communities in New York and across the country.""</br></br>New York officials weren't giving up hope of getting the money in the next few months, but that possibility is receding fast as lawmakers, fearing the wrath of voters in an election year, retreat from most new spending proposals.