GOP offers ‘tough medicine’ in budget cuts, layoffs - Len Lazarick, Maryland Reporter

Republican leaders are asking legislative budgeters to swallow “a bitter pill” of 1,500 layoffs and over $800 million in education spending cuts to fix “the long term affliction” of overspending and deficits. “This is tough medicine,” House Minority Leader Tony O’Donnell told a special hearing of the House and Senate budget committees Tuesday. “We must take the medicine to get rid of the illness long-term.” Democratic legislators, union representatives and university officials were already choking on the proposals that came from the House GOP caucus and two Republican senators that included laying off about 500 state workers.