Republican pols in New York’s downstate suburbs loudly celebrated last week’scourt ruling tossing out a payroll tax enacted by the Legislature in 2009 to subsidize mass transit in the 12-county Metropolitan Transportation Authority (MTA) region. Read More
The growing fiscal problems of many local governments in New York State are prompting more talk about consolidation of services and mergers of local governments. Some influential voices in western New York, echoing former Erie County Executive Joel Giambra, continue to push for a regional approach. Read More
New York State’s Common Retirement Fund, which underwrites state and local pensions, returned a negative 0.92 percent on its assets during the quarter ending June 30, Comptroller Thomas DiNapoli just announced. That would translate into a loss of about $1.2 billion on an asset base of roughly $148 billion. Read More
By lopping two years off a tentative decade-long contract withSuffolk County's police union, County Executive Steve Bellone at least has curtailed some of the long-term financial risk the original agreement posed to taxpayers. Read More
The movement of people in and out of New York over the past two decades, including the combined effects of foreign immigration and domestic migration, has produced significant changes in the Empire State’s age profile. Read More
The Obama administration quietly issued a new waiver last month that allows states to change the rules of how success is measured in welfare reform. Read More
Suffolk County's proposed contract with the county Police Benevolent Association, featuring an extraordinary 10-year term, calls to mind the New York Yankees' equally long 2007 deal with Alex Rodriguez. Read More
City governments throughout New York “are stressed and have to work hard to keep their fiscal houses in order,” says a new report from the office of state Comptroller Thomas DiNapoli. Read More