Governor Andrew Cuomo last week announced a new "Innovation Venture Capital Fund" to invest up to $50 million in public funds into start-up companies. Meanwhile, the state’s existing venture fund, known as Innovate NY, is the subject of a federal audit focused on a firm whose managing director was named by Cuomo to his 2010 gubernatorial transition team and to a regional economic development council. Read More
Showing contempt for the public — if not also for the courts — retirement funds representing the city’s cops and firefighters are stonewalling a judicial order to make public the names of all their pensioners. Read More
Two days after the Empire Center highlighted looming deficits in the state Thruway Authority budget, the authority's board has put off the meeting at which it was expected to adopt a final budget for 2015. Read More
We try not to be too cynical about Albany. Really, we do. Voters are cynical enough, what with dozens of legislators being led off in handcuffs and Election Day turnout hitting new lows. Meanwhile, lawmakers contemplate voting themselves a pay raise while fending off more reports of shenanigans. Go ahead, hand the cynics a baseball bat. Read More
To make the 2015 proposed $2 billion budget balance without any toll increase, the Thruway is depending on more drivers than its own traffic consultant estimates, according to E.J. McMahon, an Albany budget watchdog who is president and founder of the Empire Center for Public Policy. That means the Thruway is counting on $31 million more in toll revenues in 2015 than forecasted in its traffic study, McMahon says. Read More
As some New York’s state legislators talk about holding a special session this month to give themselves a raise, a review of payroll data shows that more than three-quarters of them already earn more than their $79,500 base salary. Read More
State Senator Mike Nozzolio is calling on Congress to block President Obama's immigration order, which he says could cost the state $2 billion a year, a much higher figure than what most experts predict. Read More
As New York’s state legislators consider holding a special session to give themselves a raise, an Albany–based think tank reports that most of them are already paid more than their often-cited base pay of $79,500. Read More