Republican Harry J. Wilson hasn’t generated a whole lot of attention in his young campaign for state comptroller, but Lt.Gov. Richard Ravitch’s new deficit reduction plan, which hinges on $6 billion worth of borrowing, now grants him the bulliest of pulpits to criticize what he calls Albany’s overspending ways.

The former Wall Street executive who served on the auto industry task force that restructured Chrysler and General Motors appears to be the GOP choice to challenge Democratic incumbent Thomas P. DiNapoli in November.

And while comptroller campaigns often fall into the afterthought category, Wilson’s Buffalo visit Thursday proved especially timely one day after Ravitch unveiled a plan that Wilson says only sharpens the state’s appetite for borrowing.

The real answer, Wilson said during an interview with The Buffalo News, is to cut spending and brighten the business climate to attract companies and “grow” the state out of its worsening financial woes.

“It will just create a backdoor exit to avoid the tough decisions,” he said of the Ravitch plan. “If we can’t make tough choices during a crisis, when can we make tough decisions?”

Wilson, a Harvard MBA graduate who managed hedge funds for Goldman Sachs and other high-profile Wall Street firms, has been quietly building support among Republican organizations around the state. Erie County Republican Chairman James P. Domagalski is an enthusiastic supporter, although Onondaga County Comptroller Robert E. Antonacci II is also exploring a run.

But now Wilson is cranking up his campaign as the Ravitch plan moves to center stage. At Gov. David A. Paterson’s direction, the lieutenant governor has recommended borrowing $6 billion over the next three years to avoid fiscal “cataclysm.” He also called for an advisory board with review powers only to declare a budget in or out of balance and for enabling governors to impound money in emergencies.

In turn, the State Legislature would agree to balance the budget over the next five years.

Wilson said Thursday he agrees with Ravitch’s identification of long-term structural issues and his call to abide by Generally Accepted Accounting Principles. But he still called the plan a product of “credit card mentality.”

And if the plan is not adopted, Wilson said, Paterson’s call for cuts across the board ignores a thoughtful study of which programs are working and which aren’t. “That hurts the good programs as well as the bad programs,” he said.

Wilson, 38, is a Westchester County resident who grew up in the Mohawk Valley city of Johnstown. He emphasizes that he is the son of Greek immigrants who ran a Johnstown restaurant and that he embraces working-class values that helped him become successful on Wall Street.

President Obama appointed him last year to the panel that oversaw restructuring of the U. S. auto industry, especially GM and Chrysler. That involved extensive negotiations with the United Auto Workers, with favorable results, especially at GM.

“I thought the Chrysler investment was not good use of taxpayer money,” he said. “But GM now has the lowest costs of the auto industry and a balance sheet with more cash than debt.”

Like New York State, GM had always adopted “halfway measures” that never solved the problem, Wilson said. When bankruptcy forced the company to accept the drastic plan advanced by the auto task force, the company entered a new era of profitability, he said.

Wilson wants to reshape the comptroller’s office to use its audit powers to weed out the bad programs and call for the structural changes needed to rein in state spending.

He criticized DiNapoli as an unelected state official who was appointed by the Legislature to fill a vacancy and is beholden to the Legislature.

“He owes his job to the people in the Legislature who overspend,” he said.

Wilson, who acknowledged he has spent little time in Buffalo in the past, spent much of Thursday meeting with Republican and Conservative leaders as well as local business people. He said he feels confident he will eventually receive enough party backing to capture the Republican nomination for comptroller at the Republican State Convention in May.