State Assembly Republicans kicked off a statewide-petition drive and a series of public forums to build grass-roots public support of their plan to assure on-time adoption of the state budget.

"For the past 17 years, New York has not had a budget that has met the April 1 deadline," said Assemblyman Steve Labriola. "There is no reason why both the Assembly and Senate cannot work together to achieve an on-time budget."

Assemblyman John J. Flanagan, the ranking Republican on the Assembly Ways and Means Committee, said "Because of late budgets, funding for our schools, road improvement programs and vital not-for-profit organizations is delayed, the state's ability to address other pressing issues is undermined and the public's confidence in their government is damaged. This must change."

"There is no question that the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks had a severe negative impact on our state's economy," said Flanagan. "Now, more than ever, it is critical that we have an on-time state budget so that local governments and community-based not-for-profit organizations know the budget's details so they can go about their business, too," Flanagan said.

The Assembly Republican budget reform plan would fix the historically flawed budget adoption process, assure on-time adoption of the state budget and open the entire process to public scrutiny, permanently ending the "three men in a room" practice, the lawmakers agreed, referring to the way many past budgets have been arrived at through the efforts of only the governor, Senate majority leader and Assembly speaker, without input from legislators.

"These common-sense changes are designed to expedite the budget-making process. However, until these common-sense reforms are adopted, late budgets will continue to be a fact of life, and this is unfair to the residents of this great state," concluded Labriola.

"In 2001, the Assembly Republican reform plan fell just two votes short of passage. If these petitions help the public convince just two more assembly members to vote for reform, late budgets will be a bad memory," said State Assembly Republican Leader John F. Faso.

According to Labriola, petitions can be obtained from his district office located at 200 Boundary Avenue in Massapequa. For additional information call his office at 844-0635.

Elements of the Assembly Republican proposal are:

* Permanently end the so-called "three men in a room" practice by opening up the process to press and public scrutiny; setting strict timelines, reporting and meeting requirements for the budget conference committee, including public meetings and written reports. No later than March 15, both houses would appoint members of budget conference committees and subcommittees and begin the process of finalizing the budget in time for the April 1 deadline.

* Establish binding revenue estimate by requiring the comptroller to provide a preliminary economic and revenue forecast on or before March 1. If an agreement on the economy and revenues were not reached by the statutory deadline of March 10, the comptroller would establish a binding revenue number on March 11 that would be the final revenue number upon which the budget would be based.

* Prohibit the Legislature from considering non-budget bills after April 1 until a budget is adopted.

* Implement a fail-safe mechanism through a constitutional amendment mandating the use of the prior fiscal year's state budget if no budget is agreed to within 60 days of the April 1 deadline. The governor would be granted additional powers to control spending and make adjustments for entitlements and revenue shortfalls; and,

* Enact a sunshine requirement calling for a plain-language summary of the final budget to be prepared by the Division of Budget and made available to the Legislature and the public at least 48 hours prior to passage of the budget.

"It is our job to pass an on-time state budget. Soon school districts, local governments, not-for-profits and community groups have to pass their own budgets. Our budget reform plan would finally fix the state's dysfunctional budget process," said Labriola.