E.J. McMahon, with the fiscal watchdog group the Empire Center, said it makes sense for the state to replace plates that are peeling and hard to read, in an era where toll collections are increasingly dependent on electronic scanners. "We’re in an era now where the state increasingly is literally banking on the legibility of license plates to enforce tolling," McMahon said. Read More
But a recession wouldn't be good for New York State, either. It could mean less funding for schools or higher taxes. The state budget relies heavily on the personal income tax, drawn mainly from wealthy individuals, says EJ McMahon of the Empire Center. Read More
"The 'current' $25 fee was for an optional plate choice," said E.J. McMahon, research director at the Empire Center for Public Policy. "The new fee will be mandatory -- the first time ever. This is a revenue grab under the guise of a PR stunt. Yes, the plates need replacement. But they don’t cost $25 apiece to manufacture." Read More
“A little series of mistakes in a program this big can add up to a lot of money in a hurry,” Hammond told The Post. “A quarter of a million dollars is a lot of money. It’s important that the auditors are looking at this and are pointing to things that could be fixed.” Read More
MTA overtime jumped by $119 million, or 16%, from 2017 to 2018, the Empire Center for Public Policy reported a month before Cohen was hired.. The Empire Center’s report irked MTA board member Larry Schwartz. He demanded a special investigation into the “constant” abuse of overtime. Read More
“The low average work-year helps explain the overtime surge,” says E.J. McMahon of the Empire Center for Public Policy. Turns out, paying high OT rates is cheaper than hiring enough staff to fill in for missing workers. That’s because of all the perks employees get, not to mention the difficulty in letting workers go if they’re no longer needed. Read More
That's well above the $81,260 average for the 1,322 new retirees who are part of the state's Police and Fire Retirement System (PFRS) with at least 20 years of service, according to the Empire Center for Public Policy, a fiscally conservative think tank in Albany that tracks the data. Read More
Both the agency’s inspector general and the feds are reportedly probing OT abuse at the railroad after the Empire Center revealed workers logging seemingly impossible hours last year. Read More