Plans to build a milk-processing facility in Monroe County were announced last year to great fanfare but with few details on how such an energy-intensive operation could fit within Albany’s strict climate rules poised to hit homes and businesses. The answer: it won’t have to. Read More
Latest Work
Gov. Kathy Hochul has taken blistering criticism for postponing congestion pricing, a long-planned $15 toll on drivers entering lower Manhattan meant to reduce traffic — and collect $15 tolls. Most of the drama may be playing out in New York City, but pay attention, upstate: you stand to lose — or win — in this fight. Read More
Anyone wondering how New York consistently has the nation’s highest public school spending but below-average student outcomes got a succinct explanation from Albany earlier this month. Read More
So much for “no means no.” That’s the message from the state Court of Appeals, which ruled last week that New Yorkers don’t need an excuse to cast an absentee ballot by mail when they’re otherwise able to vote in person — even though the voters themselves have directly rejected such a measure. Read More
It’s a pity New York cannot power its economy on hubris, but state officials this week gave it a try. Read More
The start of a new school year finds New York’s public education system in a well-funded state of confusion and contradiction: flush with cash amid falling test scores and declining enrollment, spending more than ever as state-level bureaucrats plan to weaken graduation standards—but still can’t tell parents how their students performed in last spring’s assessments. Read More
Governor Hochul is taking heat after postponing the state’s years-old plan to charge drivers to enter lower Manhattan. As critics slam her for lacking “political courage,” it’s an appropriate time to examine some of the underlying issues that congestion pricing was meant to indirectly mitigate—because many if not most advocates were afraid to touch those issues themselves. And if congestion pricing proponents are to be taken at their word about their concern for MTA finances, or traffic, or air quality, they must show some of the same courage they’ve accused the governor of lacking. Read More
New York state lawmakers in recent years have surrendered some of their policymaking and taxing powers to the executive branch. With the 2024 legislative session coming to close, they’re poised to go even further and turn those powers over to an organization outside of government entirely. Read More