The pork may be returning to the state budget. State lawmakers and Gov. Andrew Cuomo quietly have stashed away $1.2 billion for pet projects, and they are starting to spend it: about $187 million for 588 projects across New York, a report from the Empire Center, a watchdog group in Albany found. Read More
State leaders are planning to borrow $5 million to help CBS pay for renovations at the Ed Sullivan Theatre, the home for the "Late Show with Stephen Colbert," according to state records. That means state taxpayers are on the hook for $5 million, plus interest. Read More
A fiscal watchdog group says it’s uncovered what it calls a “secret slush fund”, used by Governor Cuomo and state legislators to fund pet projects around the state, but the governor’s budget office says the grants are subject to oversight. Read More
Gov. Cuomo’s payment of $16 million to keep CBS’s “The Late Show” in New York, when there was zero real threat of it leaving, is the kind of boondoggle Stephen Colbert might mock in his monologue — if he weren’t the one cashing the check. But that gratuitous giveaway of tax dollars, announced last year, turns out to have been the tip of a very big and ugly iceberg. Read More
New York State’s $1 billion capital project slush fund is dispensing borrowed money across the state outside public scrutiny, but two local governments have inadvertently given New Yorkers a glimpse of its inner workings. Read More
The Cuomo administration and the state Legislature have begun dishing out grants from a secretive $1.1 billion capital slush fund—all of which will be borrowed money—with no disclosure of project sponsorship or award criteria. Read More
If you’ve spent any time at a little league baseball or soccer game, or any children's sporting event, you know the cry of "hustle up" means move faster. It’s a way adults try to keep the game moving—and remind the players of what they ought to be doing. Read More
A legislative proposal aimed at the heart of Albany power seeks to address the increase in six-figure public pensions by barring the use of overtime pay and unused sick time and vacation days in their calculation. Read More