“There is no question that the Governor and Legislature understand the gravity of the situation our state is facing. These are going to be tough choices and we must work together in order to find real solutions.

“I look forward to working with the Governor to quickly fix the problem, but don’t agree with his proposal to borrow money from local governments. I will continue to work towards solutions that minimize the pain in my district, to our schools and to working families.

“Budget negotiations are continuing to be done in a very public way and I am paying close attention to the comments and suggestions being offered by my constituents as we move forward.

“In addition, while it is easy to get distracted with short term fixes to the state’s problems, we cannot let this opportunity to produce long term reforms go wasted or we will only find ourselves back in this same dilemma years down the road.”