When Superior Court Judge Dennis Pearson issued his ruling Friday on the state job cuts, he said court procedure obligated him to avoid weighing into the constitutional issues if at all possible.
Thus, those remain unexplored.
At issue is whether the Legislature is over-stepping its authority by requiring the administration to receive approval of the Legislature's Joint Fiscal Committee it cuts more than 1 percent of the state workforce.
The supplemental bill that the Legislature passed last week lays out some pretty specific details on what that plan can look like:
(d) In the event that the $13,400,000 expenditure reductions are not
achieved as described in subsection (c) of this section, the secretary of
administration shall develop an alternate savings plan for submission to the
legislative joint fiscal committee on or before July 10, 2009. If the secretary’s
alternate savings plan results in reductions in force greater than one percent of
the entire state workforce, meaning all full-time, permanent, classified and
exempt state employees, as measured cumulatively from June 2, 2009, the
alternate savings plan shall not become effective unless approved or deemed
approved by the joint fiscal committee under subsection (g) of this section.
The secretary’s alternate savings plan may include alternatives to position
reductions and shall not be limited to positions already submitted to the
legislature in list development.
There more to it, which you can read
HERE (search for the word joint to get there).
Play judge for a bit and you decide. Is the Legislature interfering with the executive branch's powers? To some extent, legislators tell them executive branch what to do all the time. Is this micro-managing or guiding?
- Terri Hallenbeck
Labels: politics, vermont legislature
