Politics on the Hudson

Lawmakers from upstate and suburban districts are unhappy that the proposed two-way budget agreement between the Assembly and Senate does not include a property-tax cap, as proposed by Gov. David Paterson.

The Legislature’s plan would restore $600 million in school aid, which the Democratic leadership said could be used to lower local school taxes. Paterson had initially proposed cutting $1.4 billion, but his revised emergency appropriation bill would store $300 million of that.

Democratic senators, who met privately for several hours, were seen storming out of the meeting and said little to reporters when they left.

Sen. Darrel Aubertine, D-Cape Vincent, Jefferson County however, said he has “concerns about the lack of a property-tax cap.

“At this point, we’re working to get the budget closed down in a fashion that, you know, is acceptable that everybody has to vote on,” Aubertine said.

Aubertine said he hadn’t made a final decision yet on voting for the bills as they stand.

“I’m a proponent of the tax cap, that’s not there at the moment,” Aubertine said. “But we’re trying to work it out, trying to find that middle ground.”

Sen. Ruben Diaz angrily left the meeting saying, “Stupid, stupid, stupid” and added that the Democrats have “32 minus 1.”

Assembly Speaker Sheldon Silver, D-Manhattan, left his meeting with Democratic Assembly members to say that he was confident the budget bills would pass today.

“I have no reason to believe the Senate will not do the same,” he said of passing the budget.

It’s coming down to three men in a room. In New York City.

Assembly Speaker Sheldon Silver, D-Manhattan and his counterpart in the Senate, John Sampson, D-Brooklyn are driving down to New York City this afternoon to meet with Gov. David Paterson in an attempt to develop a three-way budget agreement, said Travis Proulx, a spokesman for the Senate Democrats.

“Unfortunately the governor’s absence from Albany has forced the legislative leaders to travel to New York City to meet with him in order to close down final budget negotiations,” he said.

A Paterson spokesman did not immediately return calls seeking comment.

The governor was in Albany Thursday morning and left later that day. He hasn’t met with the legislative leaders since.

Paterson’s budget director, Robert Megna, is expected to reveal the final emergency-appropriation later today that is expected to include a host of spending cuts and new taxes. The budget is already about 70 percent completed; this bill will likely include the rest of the state’s spending plan for the 2010-11 fiscal year.

Paterson gave lawmakers until Monday to finalize a budget or he would submit the proposal which cannot be altered. Legislators must approve this budget on Monday or the state risks a government shutdown. Speculation of what would be in the bill includes a possible excise tax for sugary drinks, a contentious plan that would allow individual state university campuses to set their own tuition rates and cuts to K-12 education and the suspension of the sales tax cap for clothing and footwear.

The budget was due on April 1, but state leaders have failed to come to a solution that would close a $9.2 billion deficit.

The state Assembly didn’t gavel into session until after 1 a.m. Friday morning, but lawmakers there finally passed a spending bill that would free up $11 million in funding for the state parks system while also approving cuts to the Environmental Protection Fund.

The Legislature had fought with Gov. David Paterson over keeping the state’s 55 parks and historic sites closed. Paterson had sought deeper spending cuts for the yet-to-be-approved 2010-11 budget, which was due on April 1.

Paterson had said Thursday morning that a tentative agreement was in place to fund the parks and open them in time for the Memorial Day weekend. The agreement would keep the parks open for the season.

The Senate expects to take up the measure later today.

Here’s the bill, sent out by Paterson’s office late last night:

Gov. David Paterson lamented the charged political environment state legislative leaders are in while the budget negotiations move forward at a snail’s pace.

Paterson, along with Republican and Democratic leaders from the state Assembly and Senate, met for nearly an hour this morning to hash out their disagreements on the state budget, now two months late.

He urged lawmakers to resist the pressures they face back in their districts.

“I think that the whole sense of reaching decisions is impaired by obviously the political environment,” Paterson said at the conclusion of the meeting. “But we did not take our oath of office in a political environment.”

The steps taken to reduce spending—such as closing the state park system—are unpopular in an election year. But they’re necessary, Paterson said.

“It’s very easy to say it was a bad decision to close the parks,” said Paterson, who is not running for a full term. “It was a bad decision to move up the time for the state license plates. All of these decisions in another period of time would make people scratch their heads. But we are in this period of time.”

The New York State County Executives Association plans a telephone press conference tomorrow to urge state senators “to get back to the people’s work” and deal with “end of session priorities pending before the New York State Legislature.”

Those expected to participate include:

Andrew Spano, Westchester County Executive

Scott Vanderhoef, Rockland County Executive

and

Putnam’s Deputy County Executive John Tully

   There are just two days to go until the start of a new legislative term, and three Democratic senators from New York City have not publicly said who they will support to lead the upper chamber. Democrats won a majority of Senate seats for the first time since 1965. But members of the so-called ”Gang of Three” (originally a “Gang of Four”) have considered backing Sen. Dean Skelos, R-Nassau County, so the GOP leader would continue as head of the Senate. They forged a deal with Sen. Malcolm Smith, D-Queens, to get some prestigious leadership posts in the Senate, but that quickly fell apart. The trio’s votes are so important because the margin between Democrats and Republicans is so close (32-30).

   Sen. Ruben Diaz, D-Bronx, who is one of the three, said today that he didn’t know who he was going to support as leader. “By Wednesday, maybe I’ll know what I’m going to do,” he said.

   Sen. Carl Kruger, D-Brooklyn, and Pedro Espada, D-Bronx, could not immediately be reached for comment today.

   Smith met with Diaz, Kruger and Espada on Sunday. Democrats and Republicans are scheduled to hold conference meetings tomorrow night. The session begins Wednesday in Albany.

   A group of doctors, nurses, labor unions, faith and community groups gathered in Albany today to call on President-elect Barack Obama to propose a single-payer universal health-care system in the country. About 50 million Americans don’t have health insurance.

   A single-payer system, an idea that has been controversial in this country, means everyone would be covered for medically necessary services and physicians would be paid on a fee-for-service basis or receive a salary from a hospital or non-profit HMO/group practice, the coalition said. It would be financed by eliminating private insurers and replacing premiums and out-of-pocket payments with a new tax. One program would pay all the bills, like Medicare does for senior citizens.

   According to the coalition, Obama has supported a single-payer system in the past but recently has backtracked, saying he would set one up only if he was “starting from scratch” and was concerned about employees of insurance companies. Sen. Tom Daschle, named by Obama today to be health and human services secretary, has supported a single-payer model.

   “The bottom line is that single payer is the one proposal that guarantees quality, affordable health care to every American,” Troy Area Labor Council President Mike Keenan said in a statement. “This would also be a great benefit to our economy in our time of crisis, helping to control costs for taxpayers, consumers and employers.”

   Opponents of a single-payer system have said it would lower the quality of care, prevent people from choosing physicians, and result in long waits for care.

   New York is reviewing ways of providing universal health care. Former Gov. Eliot Spitzer formed a panel to explore solutions, and a report commissioned by the group is supposed to come out by Dec. 31. A single-payer system is one option that is being studied. It has widespread support in the Democrat-controlled Senate but hasn’t been voted on in the GOP-led Senate.

   Gov. David Paterson touched on a range of topics in answering questions from the news media at the National Governor’s Association meeting in Philadelphia this week.

  —On U.S. Sen. Hillary Clinton, who has been nominated to be President-elect Barack Obama’s secretary of state, Paterson said taking time to select a replacement does not deprive New York of seniority in the Senate. Characteristics he wants in a successor include seeing the imagination as being more important than history, and thinking in terms of what is possible rather than what isn’t possible.

   “One thing that any business leader, any government official or any bride or groom every learned is it never hurts to take a little more time in the selection process,” he said.

   Paterson said he has been receiving calls from “concerned citizens that think they can lead.” One person interested in the position waited for him outside an event at a local university (he did not say which one).

  —On the president-elect, Paterson said he was impressed that Barack Obama spent 1.5 hours speaking with governors and there were no restrictions on questions. Obama made a point to speak out to GOP governors and tell them that he thinks disagreement enhances the political process.

   Paterson said he spoke with Obama after the meeting about the economy, and that President Franklin Roosevelt reversed the deflationary problem during the Great Depression through an economic-stimulus package. New York has nearly 100 wastewater-treatment and road and transportation projects that could benefit from federal funds, he said.

  —On Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin, who ran unsuccessfully for vice president on the GOP ticket, the governor said he spoke with her about oil drilling and natural resources. Palin believes oil companies sometimes squander oil, Paterson said, but he thinks the tax code drives what they do. They’re not always holding oil back to drive prices up, but to get a better tax deal, he said.

   The governor described Palin as “very forthright, very outgoing and very direct.” (more…)

   Gov. David Paterson vetoed two bills this week, one of which would have enacted the Omnibus Alzheimer’s Services Act of 2008. It would have set up a system similar to the “Amber Alert” system for missing children. It would help locate missing people with cognitive impairments. Other states, including Illinois, West Virginia, North Carolina and Texas have done this.

   The governor said in his veto that the goal of the bill is laudable, but it would mandate programs that are costly, and there are “better and more fic  sally responsible ways to achieve this goal.” The legislation could have led to several hundred “Silver Alert” programs in the state. Paterson suggested the state Department of Criminal Justice Services, which runs the “Amber Alert” system, could modify it to include people with Alzheimer’s and other dementia.

   The other bill he vetoed would have removed the power of Societies for the Prevention of Cruelty to Children to take children into protective custody, conduct investigations and visit/inspect group homes. According to the bill’s sponsors, the societies were created in the mid-1870s to protect children, but they now conflict with the authority of state and local child protective services. The state took over these responsibilities in 1973. A state Commmission of Investigation probe into the SPCCs found that agents in the societies had abused their powers.

   The governor wrote in his veto that he supports the legislation, but Erie County currently contracts with an SPCC to provide child protective services outside of county business hours. Enacting the legislation would create an emergency situation for the county, the governor said. Paterson added that he wants to work with lawmakers to correct the “fatally flawed” bill.

Assembly Speaker Sheldon Silver, D-Manhattan, took some jabs at his Senate counterpart this morning on Talk 1300 Radio in Albany. Silver and Senate Majority Leader Dean Skelos, R-Nassau County, have both been criticized for not taking action last week on an emergency budget-cutting plan proposed by Gov. David Paterson.

Paterson called for a special session to vote on his $2 billion in budget reductions and he asked for input from lawmakers. Neither Silver nor Skelos presented ideas to the governor, and they decided against putting Paterson’s plan up for a vote in their chambers.

Silver said on the radio that he was willing to work with the governor and had told Paterson and others that “everything is on the table.” Silver said Skelos “effectively killed” the deal because he said he would need to see Paterson’s 2009-10 proposal before voting on this one. Silver said he thinks Skelos may want to leave everything to Democrats so his party doesn’t get blamed. The Republicans lost the majority in the Senate last month, the first time in more than 40 years, but the GOP is pushing several conservative Democrats to vote for a Republican majority leader and keep the party in power.

Skelos has expressed concern throughout the process that cuts in state funding not affect aid to schools and government and potentially create a need for property tax increases.