Category: Media Coverage

The state Thruway Authority on Friday passed a 2015 budget that leaves a funding gap, and the agency refused to answer questions about whether a toll hike is imminent. Read More

New York State put up the Cuomo Wall last week to keep the natural gas boom from spilling over into the Southern Tier. Read More

New York had the slowest growth in the country in millionaires between 2011 and 2012, said E.J. McMahon, president of the Empire Center for State Policy. Read More

Conservative groups said the increase in those making $1 million or more a year in New York doesn't tell the full picture. New York had the slowest growth in the country in millionaires between 2011 and 2012, said E.J. McMahon, president of the Empire Center for State Policy. 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

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