$16 million in state aid for Bristol could vanish

The alternative budget that Gov. Dannel Malloy is eyeing should state workers refuse concessions would leave cities and towns reeling.Bristol alone would lose $16 million in state aid for the coming fiscal year -- enough to devastate services and cripple education.Raising that much locally would require a property tax hike of nearly 4 mills, which nobody would try to do in an election year, so the only way to cope would be layoffs and axing services.Frankly, I'm not sure what Bristol would do. It's a scenario so dire that nobody's ever talked about how they'd deal with such a hit.Of course, the legislature might well refuse to go along with such a large cut.But lawmakers have shown time and again that they don't like to deal with fiscal realities. Malloy at least is looking at the ugly necessity of either slashing spending or raising taxes. He's not just punting.
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