The state has moved $90 million from theNew York Power Authority budget to programs benefiting New York businesses in the 2015-16 legislative budget approved last week, according to reports from Capital New York and the New York Post.

According to Capital, the $90 million will go toward global trade missions and advertising for Gov. Andrew Cuomo’s Start-Up NY and Global NY programs.

The Global NY program launched in 2014 to expand New York businesses abroad in places like Canada, China, Israel, Mexico, South Africa and the United Kingdom. The program will also provide loans and grants to help small- and medium-sized businesses export.

Start-Up NY allows businesses to operate tax free for a decade by expanding or relocating to select college and university campuses. The program is meant to offset New York’s notoriously high taxes.

The state spent $24 million on advertising for the Start-Up NY program last year.

The budget also includes a $50 million investment in an enhanced marketing effort to “demonstrate the benefits of investing and doing business in New York” through programs like Start-Up NY.

The first report of the Start-Up NY program was released just hours after the state budget was approved. In 2014 – the first full year of the program – it yielded just 76 new jobs. Of the 80 companies approved so far, 30 have moved into the tax-free offices, investing $1,683,956 and using $56,560 in tax breaks.

“I don’t think the numbers are a surprise unless you believe the commercials,” said E.J. McMahon, president of the Empire Center for Public Policy. “The ads show it as a broad, comprehensive power house of a program when it’s really a niche program.”

© 2015 Albany Business Review