As the clock ticks down towards Thursday’s adjournment of the state Legislature, Senate Republican leaders apparently are blocking a vote on a bill designed to ensure that the names of New York’s public pension recipients are (once again) unequivocally treated as public information. Read More
Nineteen school districts that attempted to override the tax cap in last month's school budget votes will present revised budgets to voters tomorrow. Nine of those districts are resubmitting budgets below the cap, seven have budgets at the cap and three districts will try again to override the cap. Read More
Perhaps the most consequential proposed legislation to fly almost completely under news media radar at the end of session has been a bipartisan bill that would amend and upgrade Kendra’s Law, which allows judges in certain situations to force people with serious mental illness to undergo treatment. Read More
Governor Andrew Cuomo understandably is touting a U.S. Chamber of Commerce study that ranks New York in tenth place for growth, productivity and livability among the 50 states. The governor said the Empire State had moved up 11 places from its position in last year’s “Enterprising States” study. Read More
It seems like everyone who counts in Albany could get a pay bump before the year's out. Read More
Adding a fresh chapter to the seemingly never-ending saga of government excess and regulatory insanity, New York’s state Labor Department reportedly will use federal emergency funds to pay $51.71 an hour to temporary workers hired to clean up Poughkeepsie’s Fallkill Creek Read More
Assemblyman Harvey Weisenberg (D-Long Beach) has just introduced a bill (A.10676) that would exclude court-ordered tax certiorari refund payments from Nassau County school district tax levy limits under the state’s property tax cap. It’s the same measure introduced in the Senate a month ago by Sen. Jack Martins (R-Mineola). Read More
Governor Andrew Cuomo is urging youth to sign up for available jobs, basically hanging out a "help wanted" sign for the state's NY Youth Works and Summer Youth Programs. Read More
Governor Andrew Cuomo is betting the house on Medicaid managed care ringing up estimated savings of $34 billion, to be split between New York and the federal government over the next five years. Read More
Publicly traded financial firms put out a lot of reports, and they're long. But you don't get to learn what really happens inside such companies until something's gone wrong. Read More
Reversing decades of precedent, all but one of the state's public pension funds are now refusing to release the names of hundreds of thousands of retired employees who collect billions of dollars a year in taxpayer-guaranteed pensions. Read More
The enactment of New York’s local property tax cap has touched off a valuable ongoing debate on the role of state mandates in pushing up county, municipal and school costs. However, while local officials can make a compelling case for repeal of mandates like the Triborough amendment, they shouldn’t be let off the hook when it comes to self-inflicted wounds. Read More