Skelos: $250M to be added to school aid

ALBANY -- Lawmakers would add about $250 million to soften the sting of Gov. Andrew M. Cuomo's proposed school-aid cuts under a deal beginning to take shape at the Capitol, the state's top senator said Friday.

Although agreement on an overall state budget remained elusive, Senate Majority Leader Dean Skelos (R-Rockville Centre) said discussions about school aid are "pretty much closing down," meaning a settlement was near on one of the most contentious budget issues.

Cuomo has proposed reducing school aid to $19.4 billion for 2011-12 -- a $1.5 billion, or 7 percent, reduction from the current academic year. He also proposed shifting some costs from the state to local school districts, such as funding for schools for the deaf, blind and severely disabled. Lawmakers have been skirmishing about those details as well as the geographic distribution of aid and a competitive grants program Cuomo wants.

Rank-and-file senators said the education agreement would restore state funding for the schools for the deaf, blind and severely disabled.

They also said that they would modify Cuomo's proposal to create regional economic development councils funded to the tune of $150 million and headed by Lt. Gov. Robert Duffy. The change would give the legislature a role in approving projects.

Cuomo, Skelos and Assembly Speaker Sheldon Silver (D-Manhattan) declined to provide details, after a day that saw the legislators shuttling back and forth to the governor's office. A spending plan is supposed to be in place for April 1, the start of the state's fiscal year.

Skelos repeatedly said the budget would be completed by then, although Cuomo sounded more skeptical, if not a tad frustrated.

"In Albany," the freshman governor said, "people are good about talking about agreements, making progress toward agreements. But then they are very good at tiptoeing along the goal line but never stepping over. I've seen football players who don't have the same skills."

Cuomo said his focus wasn't so much an on-time budget as it was "a good budget that changes the trajectory of this state."

Silver sounded a bit at odds with Skelos, omitting the Republican when he told reporters: "The governor and I are pretty much in tandem as far as where we're going."

Still, the leaders indicated they would be in Albany on Sunday and staffs would continue to hash out details over the weekend.

Along with school aid, Cuomo's call to close a handful of state prisons, reduce Medicaid spending, cap medical malpractice awards and cut overall state spending $3.7 billion -- which would mark the first spending reduction in 15 years -- remain major sticking points.

With Michael Amon