Taxpayers, whose side are you on?

It’s not even February yet, but so far it looks like 2011 will finally be the year New York gets moving in the right direction.

Then again, it’s not even February.

Our elected officials are finally saying what should’ve been said a long time ago. Gov. Andrew Cuomo, Mayor Mike Bloomberg and the new State Senate majority leader, Dean Skelos, are determined to eliminate the state’s $10 billion deficit and have come out swinging against special-interest groups.

On Jan. 19, Skelos announced that the Senate had passed the Job Creation and Taxpayer Protection Act of 2011. The bill would offer businesses a three-year tax credit of up to $5,000 for every new job they create. It would also freeze any new business taxes or fees and eliminate the franchise tax for small businesses and manufacturers with less than $2 million in net income or with 50 or fewer employees. The bill would cap state spending increases at 2 percent annually.

In the past, the State Legislature has resorted to higher taxes and borrowing in desperate attempts to solve New York’s financial woes. “For the last two years these priorities have been ignored,” Skelos said, “and the result was $14 billion in new taxes and fees to pay for spending that taxpayers simply cannot afford, and now we are faced with a deficit that could be as high as $11 billion.” Tax-payers have been unfairly punished by the state’s political leadership, which has failed to exercise fiscal responsibility.

Finally, and perhaps most important, Skelos’s bill would require a super-majority, or a two-thirds vote, in both houses of the State Legislature to raise taxes. Currently, only a majority vote is needed. The super-majority would make it more difficult for the Legislature to increase taxes.

Newly elected State Sen. Lee Zeldin spoke in support of the bill, saying, “This legislation sets the tone for what we have to do this session in Albany. New Yorkers have spoken and the message is loud and clear: reduce taxes, reduce spending, create jobs and reform government.”

Bravo to Skelos and the Republican majority! These measures will help ensure that New York will no longer spend more than taxpayers can afford.

Unfortunately, the bill will be subjected to a bitter partisan debate, and may not pass in the Democratic-controlled Assembly.

Meanwhile, in New York City, Bloomberg delivered his State of the City address and came out swinging against city unions, declaring that pensions would be slashed and there would be no negotiating. He went so far as to say that he won’t sign contracts with salary increases unless they are accompanied by reformed pension and benefit packages.

Bloomberg also proposed lower pension tiers for new employees and an increase in the retirement age from 55 to 65 for new non-uniform workers.

For years the city’s municipal workers’ pension system has bled New Yorkers dry. You can’t stop the bleeding without cuts.

Lastly, Cuomo is playing hardball. He created panels of top specialists to discuss ways to significantly cut state worker salaries, school spending and Medicaid funding by April 1, the beginning of the new fiscal year.

He even went so far as to warn state legislators that government will be shut down if they don’t pass a new budget with $10 billion in spending cuts. Legislators would be foolish to balk at this number. It can be done. In Texas, lawmakers proposed a budget that reduced state spending by almost $14 billion. They did it by eliminating jobs, slashing $5 billion in school aid and imposing a 10 percent cut for physicians, hospitals and nursing homes that participate in Medicaid.

Senate Republicans are willing to partner with Cuomo in the fight against runaway taxes, fraud and waste. Right now, the only thing standing in their way is the Democrats in the Assembly who are vowing to support the “millionaire’s tax” and threatening to topple suburban property-tax relief initiatives.

It would be truly disappointing if we let the hard work of Cuomo and the Senate Republicans become fruitless efforts. As taxpayers, we must stand up and fight for our right to live, work and enjoy our homes without the burden of a confiscatory tax system.

Al D’Amato, a former U.S. senator from New York, is the founder of Park Strategies LLC, a public policy and business development firm. Comments about this column? ADAmato@liherald.com.