Mayor Bloomberg and City Council Speaker Christine Quinn released the 2010 New York City fiscal year budget last week, but not without angering at least one group of city workers — school support staff.

 In a press release, Bloomberg said the proposed budget of $59.4 billion has been balanced by “reducing city spending while still protecting the core services that so many New Yorkers rely on.”

With a decline of nearly $5 billion in tax revenue, the financial plan includes a half percentage point increase in sales tax and applying the full city sales tax to electric and natural gas customers who purchase energy from non-utility companies.

Many feared that library services would be cut, but the budget includes funding to keep them open six days a week. Also included is a tax break for freelancers and small businesses.  

Councilman Oliver Koppell said he was mostly pleased with the budget, which included a $100,000 grant for Williamsbridge Oval Park. He was not happy, however, with the sales tax hike and said he thought they could have raised revenue some other way. Koppell said that because of federal stimulus money, education funding would mostly be unaffected.

But local unions say the city’s budget will force the Department of Education to lay off an estimated 2,600 school support staffers, including crossing guards, school aides and family counselors.

“All of the support staff in the schools are just as important as the teachers, it takes all of us to get it done,” said Lillian Roberts, executive director of DC 37, one of the school support staff unions.

There was a rally scheduled to protest the cuts on Wednesday, June 23.