Malloy Budget Czar: We’re gonna get union concessions … um … somehow…

During this morning’s media briefing on the proposed two-year state budget, a reporter asked Ben Barnes, Governor Dannel Malloy’s budget czar, how exactly the administration intends to obtain the $2 billion worth of proposed concessions from state workers.

The unions don’t, the reporter pointed out, have to open up their contracts.

After a few glances with Roy Occhiogrosso, Malloy’s chief advisor, Barnes replied, “The spending reductions the governor has proposed we intend to accomplish.”

A – skeptical? – chuckle rippled through the audience of reporters and lobbyists.

UPDATE: Malloy in his budget speech offered little more than Barnes. He said concessions are needed to avoid completely shredding the social service safety net and gutting Connecticut’s state workforce.

“There is no alternative. We have to get it done and I’m confident we will,” he said.

Brian Lockhart