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Today is Senate President Jeff Atwater’s birthday, but before the legislative leader blows out all 52 candles, retired state workers want to give him their birthday wishes. Today they held a birthday party for Atwater complete with cake outside the Senate Chamber. Atwater didn’t show, but the retirees are getting their message out anyway. They want Atwater to fight cuts to health insurance benefits the House passed last week. Senator Al Lawson is helping them get their message to leadership.

“Health insurance for a family is over a thousand dollars a month. The average pay for state employees who are retires is around 14-thousand dollar a year, so the health insurance subside is just a small portion that we pay, that the state gives to retires to help with retirement who are not on Medicare,” said Lawson.

The House budget cuts the subsidy by about 150 dollars a month. The cut is expected to save between 40 and 200 million dollars annually, but recent developments with the Seminole Gaming compact could pump enough money into the state coffers to help lawmakers to restore the subsidies in their final budget proposal.