Tag: Contracts

Thanks to a last-minute bill language tweak sought by police and firefighter unions, Governor Andrew Cuomo’s watered-down “reform” of New York’s compulsory arbitration law will not apply to a number of unsettled contracts that hadn’t even reached the arbitration stage before the law was extended just before the Legislature adjourned last month. Public Employment Relations Board (PERB) records now indicate that up to two dozen contract disputes may have been carved out of the new law (Ch. 67 of 2013), with the full impact ultimately depending on how many of these employers are considered fiscally distressed enough to otherwise qualify. Read More

State Comptroller Thomas DiNapoli just announced approval of a $3.14 billion contract for construction of a new Tappan Zee Bridge. Read More

In an effort to slash its liabilities, Stockton is notifying its employees that their retiree health insurance coverage is about to be cancelled. And, Nicole says, this is no coincidence Read More

The Empire Center for New York State Policy, a government watchdog group, is seeking to overturn mid-level appeals court rulings that blocked the release of information about how much money individual public employees were receiving from their taxpayer-funded pension funds. Read More

Cities and taxpayers have to decide what’s the best way to utilize tax dollars, said Tim Hoefer, executive director of the Empire Center. “I think generally speaking … in a perfect world, overtime is the result of extraordinary circumstances or poor management,” he said. “It’s about right-sizing government.” Read More

A few Albany City School District administrators are getting raises, but Empire Center Executive Director Tim Hoefer notes that these costs are just a drop in the bucket compared to what the district spends on teachers and their contract. Read More

In 2008 ... Albany schools had 31 employees making more than $100,000, according to SeeThroughNY, an online database maintained by the Empire Center for Public Policy. Read More

Despite the not-rosy fiscal status of the county, the Suffolk County Legislature approved the last outstanding contract for county police officers. (In January, Moody’s listed Suffolk County among the municipal bond issuers facing a credit rating downgrade.) Read More