Gov. Paterson said on Friday that he’s willing to put a brake on requiring new license plates for New Yorkers beginning next April if the state closes it’s budget crisis this year.

Paterson made the pledge during a late afternoon interview with WSYR-AM  radio in Syracuse after a caller complained about the nickel and diming of motorists being done to help deal with the state’s fiscal crisis.

In addition to raising motor vehicle fees, the state is requiring beginning in April that all motorists purchase new license plates.

“I’ve gotten so many complaints [about a petition drive] that I am willing, if we can pass this deficit reduction program, and we come back in January with a $5 billion deficit and having paid our debts without having to go borrowing money from exorbitant sources, in my 2010-2011 budget, I will take another look…I’ll take a look at the whole thing and see if I can’t work a budget without having to do it.”

The license plate measure is projected to mean $129 million in revenue for the state, Pateson said.

“I promise to take another look at it. What I need the pubilc to do is help me get this deficit reduction plan done and then with a $5 billion (deficit), that would raise it to a $5.1 billion (deficit) and I’ll take the challenge.”

Paterson during the interview took another shot at Senate Democrats, accusing them of avoiding hard cuts. He deemed it “very typical legislator thinking: cut everything except what’s important to me.”

“The original plan they submitted was to have flat spending. But as time has gone on, their plan has sounded more political and less substantive.”

He said he’s willing to consider any proposed alternatives to his plan that will provide the state recurring revenue.

Still stinging from some Senate Democratic officials who charged his planned economic address to a joint session of the Legislature Monday is a “photo op,” Paterson personally ripped Senate leaders for traveling to China in October, echoing comments his spokesman made yesterday.

“The governor with the sagging poll numbers was trying to have the session in October and the people who were running the Senate were in China for a trade mission. That’s the photo op.”

(Source: NY Daily News / Elizabeth Benjamin)