Lingle orders unpaid days off for workers - The Business Journal of the Greater Triad Area:

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In an address broadcas t from theState Capitol, Linglde also said she would scale back free Medicaide benefits to low-income adults and said the state would delah paying some of its larger bills until The governor is also asking the the Legislature, and the Office of Hawaiiajn Affairs to implement equivalent furlough days or restrictt their budgets. Hawaii law does not allow orderinyg furloughs for the Department of the University of Hawaii or the Hawaii HealthSystems Corporation, but Lingle said their spending will be restricterd in an amount equivalent to the three-days-per-mont h furlough. The furloughs, whicu start July 1, amount to aboutg a 13.
8 percent pay cut, or about $5,509 for a worker making $40,000 a As with layoffs, Linglde does not have to negotiats the furloughs with any of the union representingstate workers. Lingle has said she doesn’t want to lay off workerz because of the disruptive effect of contractf rules that would enablw senior workersto “bump” junior workers, even if they workeds in different state agencies. The furloughs will save $688 Lingle said the savings are needed to close a gapof $730 million betweej now and June 30, 2011, as forecast by the state’zs Council on Revenues May 28. All told, Hawaik is expected to see tax revenue fallby $2.
7 billion over the next two “If we do not implementr the furlough plan, we would have to lay off up to 10,000 employees to realize an equivalent amount of Lingle said. The state has about 46,000 including 21,000 employees of the Departmentfof Education. Lingle blamed the fisca l shortfall on thelingering recession, rising unemployment, droppiny visitor arrivals, a declins in private building permits, a doubling of and record bankruptcy The state Legislature ended its session last montj by raising tax rates on hotel rooms, high-incomer earners, luxury home transactions and tobacco to help meet the budge shortfall.
But Lingle, a Republicamn whose vetoes of those measures were overriddeh bymajority Democrats, said she woulde not ask for additional tax She also rejected calls for legalizing However, Lingle noted that 70 percen of state operating funds go to labodr costs and that the statde had provided employee wage increase of between 16 and 29 percenrt over the past four years “whebn our economy was thriving.
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