Lingle orders unpaid days off for workers - San Antonio Business Journal:

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In an address broadcast from theStated Capitol, Lingle also said she would scal e back free Medicaid benefits to low-income adultsw and said the state woulde delay paying some of its large r bills until July. The governor is also asking the Judiciary, the and the Office of Hawaiiahn Affairs to implement equivalent furloughj days or restricttheir budgets. Hawaii law does not allos ordering furloughs for the Departmentyof Education, the University of Hawaio or the Hawaii Health Systemas Corporation, but Lingle said their spendint will be restricted in an amount equivalent to the three-days-per-monthb furlough. The furloughs, whichb start July 1, amount to abouty a 13.
8 percent pay cut, or abou t $5,500 for a worker making $40,000 a As with layoffs, Lingle does not have to negotiate the furloughs with any of the unionx representingstate workers. Lingle has said she doesn’tt want to lay off worker because of the disruptive effectr of contract rules that would enable senior workerato “bump” junior even if they worked in different state agencies. The furloughs will save $688 Lingle said the savings are needed to close a gapof $730 million between now and June 30, as forecast by the state’s Council on Revenues May 28. All Hawaii is expected to see tax revenue fallby $2.7 billionj over the next two years.
“Id we do not implement the furlougbh plan, we would have to lay off up to 10,000 employees to realizr an equivalent amountof savings,” Lingle The state has about 46,0090 workers, including 21,000 employees of the Departmenf of Education. Lingle blamerd the fiscal shortfall on thelingering recession, risin unemployment, dropping visitor arrivals, a decline in private buildingg permits, a doubling of foreclosures, and record bankruptcyt levels. The state Legislature ended its sessionm last month by raising tax rates onhotel high-income earners, luxury home transactionz and tobacco to help meet the budgeft shortfall.
But Lingle, a Republican whos vetoes of those measures were overriddem bymajority Democrats, said she would not ask for additional tax increases. She also rejected calls for legalizinvg gambling. However, Lingle noted that 70 percent of state operating fundw go to labor costs and that the statr had provided employee wage increase of between 16 and 29 percent over the past four years “when our economy was