Threatened OCFS Cuts Lead CSEA to Cease Role on Task Force

The Civil Service Employees Association has ended participation in a labor-management task force designed to help transform New York's juvenile justice system after Governor Paterson proposed deep cuts to the Office of Children and Family Services, including the closure of six residential youth facilities.

DANNY DONOHUE: OCFS being 'underhanded.'

"It is simply impossible for CSEA to continue to work cooperatively with OCFS when they have not been honest with us," said the union's president, Danny Donohue. "To go ahead and systematically and intentionally empty out facilities under the guise of a policy shift, and then use that as a reason for closing those very same facilities is deceptive and underhanded."

The facilities, though, are not scheduled to close just yet because the Governor's proposed budget cuts were not acted on by the State Legislature last week. Senate Republicans, who will lose the majority in January, scheduled a vote before Democrats could line up support in the Assembly. Governor Paterson then killed the Special Legislative Session Nov. 18.

CSEA spokesman Stephen Madarasz said, "There are no good choices. We are very concerned that this could lead to quicker action by the Governor on state operations." OCFS, the Department of Correctional Services, the Office of Mental Health and other agencies slated for cuts are outside the Legislature's control, meaning Mr. Paterson can unilaterally reduce their spending.

OCFS spokeswoman Susan Steele said Nov. 19 that she did not know what the postponed budget cuts would mean for her agency. "In terms of where we go from here, I don't know," she said of OCFS, which was set to cut $1 million this fiscal year and $16.4 million during the one that begins April 1. Mr. Madarasz said under state law, the agency needed to give a year's notice for closing facilities.

250 Jobs At Stake

Public Employees Federation President Kenneth Brynien said the cuts, which would cost 250 jobs, would compromise the newly assembled task force put together earlier this year to fix the agency. "The Governor's Task Force on Transforming New York's Juvenile Justice System has barely gotten off the ground and the system is already being dismantled," he said. The union alleged that OCFS Commissioner Gladys Carrion has been determined to empty some facilities.

"Governor Paterson decided to take another approach: to rely on the expertise of task force members to determine the future of the juvenile justice system," he said. "This latest announcement by Commissioner Carrion is a clear contradiction of that decision."

Ms. Steele said many of the facilities set for closure were close to empty and one currently had no residents because the department has been trying to use more of a community-based model with less residential treatment. "The justification for closing them includes they are underutilized and we have had success in the community-based programs."

If these facilities — the Adirondack Residential Center in Clinton County, the Cattaraugus Residential Center and the Great Valley Residential Center in Cattaraugus County, the Pyramid Reception Center in The Bronx, the Rochester Community Residential Home in Monroe County, and the Syracuse Community Residential Home in Onondaga County — were to close, patients would be transitioned to return home, not transferred, so as not to interrupt the continuity of treatment. The Allen Residential Center in Delaware County and the Tryon Residential Center in Fulton County were scheduled for downsizing.