Press Releases

Seventy-one percent of New York State’s public school teachers support giving new teachers a choice between a defined-contribution retirement plan and a traditional defined-benefit pension, according to a statewide poll conducted for the Empire Center for Public Policy. Read More

Today New Yorkers can search the complete 2011 state government payroll on SeeThroughNY.net, the Empire Center’s government transparency website. The database includes names, titles, base pay rates, and total pay received by the 288,539 people who worked in the state’s executive, legislative, or judicial branches at any point in calendar year 2011. Read More

A popular retirement plan first authorized almost 50 years ago for employees of the State University of New York (SUNY) can be a model for a defined-contribution option that would be offered to all new state and local employees under Governor Andrew Cuomo’s Tier 6 pension reform proposal, according to a report released today by the Empire Center for Public Policy. Read More

The case against New York’s 30-year-old “Triborough Amendment,” whose repeal has been a mandate relief priority of local and school officials throughout the state, is laid out in a new report issued today by the Empire Center for Public Policy. Read More

The Empire Center for Public Policy has asked the state’s highest court to review an appellate decision that would hide public information from public view. The Center’s efforts have been bolstered by an amicus brief filed on behalf of the state’s leading newspapers. Read More

New Yorkers can now search for the names, titles, base salaries and total wages of 394,443 individuals who were employed by the New York City government during 2010 at SeeThroughNY.net, the transparency website sponsored by the Empire Center for Public Policy. Read More

A searchable online database of earnings for 373,971 employees of New York State school districts outside New York City was posted today at www.SeeThroughNY.net, the transparency website sponsored by the Empire Center for Public Policy. Read More

New York’s State Legislature spent $105 million during the six-month period ending last March, according to the latest legislative expenditure data posted at SeeThroughNY, the Empire Center’s transparency website. SeeThroughNY includes expenditures dating back to October 1, 2006, in what has become the most extensive searchable database of its kind available to New Yorkers on the Internet. Read More

The Empire Center for Public Policy today posted updated municipal salaries on the newly revamped SeeThroughNY.net, the Center’s transparency website. The data include the names and earnings of the 168,748 people who worked for New York’s city, county, town and village governments in 2010-11. Read More