If you haven't read much about the details of the "mandate relief" provisions approved by the Legislature as the session ended last week, there's a good reason for it: virtually none of the relief priorities cited by the state's major local government groups were included. Read More
from Wednesday's "Replacing The Tappan Zee Bridge" event is up. Speakers and panelists discussed why New York needs a new bridge -- the three-plus-mile span crosses the Hudson between Rockland and Westchester -- and how to build it. One of the mos Read More
A coalition of state government employee unions in Connecticut is about to reject a proposed no-layoff contract deal hammered out last month with Governor Dannel Molloy. It's difficult to compare the Connecticut pact with the agreement reached ye Read More
After sailing unscathed (with steady pay hikes, no less) through a severe recession and fiscal crisis, members of New York's largest state government union will belatedly make some relatively small, mostly temporary financial sacrifices under the ten Read More
A 2016 expiration date was, indeed, added to the agreed-upon property tax cap provisions of the monster omnibus bill now being cooked up in the Legislature. However, based on information provided in the past hour by the governor's office and the Se Read More
This quotes Assembly Speaker Sheldon Silver as saying the agreed-upon property tax cap will expire in five years. If that's true, the cap is not worth the paper it's written on--since, as explained and , one house of the Legislature will be able Read More
The Mercatus Center at George Mason University has released its index. New York is dead last overall, and last, too, on economic and fiscal freedom. The report, by William Ruger of Texas State University and Jason Sorens at the University of Buff Read More
The and Albany both report today that Governor Andrew Cuomo's proposed public pension changes may include an optional defined-contribution retirement plan. (See Update below.) Read More