Metro

Cuomo’s pension warning

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ALBANY — Gov. Cuomo warned public-employee unions yesterday that “thousands and thousands” of their members could be thrown out of work and taxes could spike if their legislative pals fail to support pension reform.

And Cuomo’s business allies backed him up; the Committee to Save New York launched a new, seven-figure TV ad blitz urging lawmakers to “rein in soaring pension costs to avoid crippling tax hikes and massive layoffs in public safety and education.”

Cuomo used some of his strongest language yet in threatening to scuttle the state budget if it doesn’t include measures to cut the skyrocketing cost of public pensions that is forcing government cutbacks.

“You’ll be laying off thousands and thousands of public employees, period, and you’ll be raising taxes,” Cuomo warned on Albany’s Talk 1300 AM radio.

That could trigger a showdown in which Cuomo forces lawmakers to choose between passing emergency budget extenders that include pension reform and shutting state government.

“I have said clearly, if we don’t have pension reform, I’m not going to pass the budget, period,” Cuomo added. “If they [legislators] believe in their position that we don’t need pension reform, fine, bring it to a head.”

“You stand up and you make your case and I’ll make my case and we’ll see who the people of the state of New York agree with,” he said.

Cuomo charged that for lawmakers who oppose his plan, “it’s about the [union campaign] donations . . . on both sides of the aisle. The dominance of these interests has been clear for years.”

Meanwhile, the AFL-CIO, which postponed its own ads slamming the Cuomo plan last week to give negotiations a chance, planned to strike back today, unleashing its ad barrage.

The Civil Service Employees Association — the state’s largest public-employee union — and the American Federation of State, County and Municipal Employees are already on the air charging the Cuomo plan will slash retirement benefits by 40 percent.

“We were trying to let the process play out a little bit and see if there was some softening,” a labor source said of the AFL-CIO’s decision to delay its ads last week. “But the administration insists on calling for cuts.”

Cuomo calculates his proposal will save state and local governments $113 billion over 30 years.