|
|
||||||||||
Home / News / Press Releases
/ Testimony
/ Legislation
/ On the Issues
/ Newsletter
/ Resources /
|
||||||||||
|
|
To view previous Community Newsletters (going back until
April 2002), click here. To view May 2005 Senior Update, click here. To view September 2005 Albany Update, click here. To view October 2005 Housing Update, click here. News from STATE
SENATOR Liz Krueger COMMUNITY BULLETIN – April 2006 Message from Liz . . . The legislature has passed its second “on-time” budget in two years, although its only "sort of on time," as we passed it on March 31st and the Governor did not begin line-item vetoing the bills until April 11, 2006. The Governor has vetoed numerous parts of the budget, meaning final resolution of budget issues is unlikely to occur for several weeks, as the legislative leaders decide whether they will negotiate compromises with the Governor or simply attempt to override his vetoes. My overall impression is that this is the best budget we have passed since I became a State Senator. I will highlight a couple of key provisions of this years’ budget here, and offer some more extensive comments on specific areas of the budget in the policy spotlight at the end of this bulletin. I was particularly pleased with funding for higher
education, where we significantly improved funding levels for CUNY and SUNY
schools, and reversed the governors' cuts to TAP and other financial aid
programs. In fact we actually
increased some needs-based financial aid and transitional programs this year. At a time when a college education is
critical to success in the economy, I was pleased to see at least some
progress in recognizing the necessity of increasing the possibilities for
young New Yorkers to afford college.
Such an investment in our future also pays off in terms of economic
development, by ensuring that The legislature didn’t do quite as well in elementary and
secondary education. The budget did include significant increases in funding
for school construction throughout the state, which is especially critical
for I was also pleased with a couple of provisions in the State budget that should benefit small businesses. The legislature adopted language to improve the Minority and Women-owned Business Enterprise program (MWBE). The budget legislation streamlines the MWBE application and certification process, by providing for acceptance of federal and municipal corporation certifications, creates a MWBE ombudsman to assist businesses in navigating the program, and authorizes a MWBE Disparity Study to evaluate State procurement activities. I am hopeful that these changes will help create greater opportunities for expanding minority and women owned businesses throughout the state. The legislative budget also eliminated the S-Corporation tax differential, which will result in reduced taxes for many small businesses. Small business owners who pay under the State Personal Income Tax will no longer be required to pay the difference between their computed Corporate Franchise Tax liability. I believe this is a step toward a more rational business tax policy aimed at encouraging small businesses, unlike other recent changes to our tax policy, such as last years adoption of the single-sales factor model, which tend to reduce the taxes large corporations pay while negatively impacting smaller companies. This year I was pleased to be able to vote yes on more budget bills than in any previous year. I was also pleased that for the second straight year, budget bills were available three days before we had to vote on them, allowing legislators at least some time to absorb the thousands of pages we were going to vote on. While there is still much room for improvement, both in terms of process and substance, I am hopeful that under a new Governor we will be able to make more progress toward passing budgets that reduce pork and truly devote resources to meeting the needs of New Yorkers (see my editorial at the end of this report). There is much more to report on the budget, but I'll wait until the outstanding issues resulting from the Governor's vetoes are resolved. Community
Board 6 Neighborhood
Housing Clinic Cosponsored
by State Senator Liz Krueger and other elected officials • Regulated / Non-regulated Rentals • Mitchell Lama Buildings • Co-Ops / Condos Date: Tuesday, May 9th Time: 6PM Place: Call (212)
319-3750 for further information Community
Spotlight Small Business
Week: Resources for Small Business The Small Business Administration and the Service Corps of Retired Executives (SCORE) are sponsoring Small Business Week form April 9th to 15th. SCORE is a nonprofit organization devoted to providing small business counseling and training. SCORE offers free counseling as well as seminars for business owners. If you are interested in learning more about SCORE’s programs, or if you are a former executive or small business owner interested in volunteering your services. call 212-264-4507, or visit SCORE on the web at http://www.scorenyc.org/. Mentors Needed: The Tenant Blacklist
Settlement: Tenants who have been sued in You may request a copy of the settlement and make specific requests by contacting: Tenant Report Settlement The Garden City Group Inc. Claims Administrator You may also look at the file for this case, including the
Proposed Settlement, during regular business hours at the Office of the
Clerk, U.S. District Court for the Southern District of New York, Daniel
Patrick Moynihan United States Courthouse, Affordable
Senior Housing Opportunities in Met Council/33 West End Senior Resident is now accepting
applications for 119 affordable studio rental apartments under construction
at 33 West End Avenue in the Lincoln Center section of Manhattan. Rents for these units will be $616 per
month. To be eligible, applicants must
be 62 years of age or older at the time of application and must have incomes
between $24,640 to $29,760.
Applications will be selected by lottery with preference given to New
York City Seniors. In addition,
applicants residing in Community Board 7 will receive priority for 50% of the
units. In addition, visual/hearing
impaired applicants will receive priority for 2% of the units, applicants
with mobility impairment will receive priority for 5% of the units, and
applicants who are New Ovarian
Cancer Hotline SHARE, Self-help for Women with breast or Ovarian Cancer, in cooperation with the American Cancer Society, has established an Ovarian Cancer Support Hotline. Women diagnosed with Ovarian cancer, or those with suspicious symptoms can call the hotline to receive peer support, information and access to statewide, regional and local resources. The hotline is staffed by trained volunteers who are themselves ovarian cancer survivors. The hotline number is 1-866-53SHARE (1-866-537-4237). Spotlight
on Policy Access
to Hospital Care Two provisions I was most pleased to see included in the
recently passed State budget are new rules regarding the amount hospitals can
charge uninsured patients of modest means, and requirements that hospitals
clearly outline their obligations to provide care to those without means to
pay. Assemblymember Pete Grannis led
the fight for these changes, which will help protect the health of millions
of New Yorkers with low and moderate incomes.
Under the new rules, hospitals will be required to charge uninsured patients with incomes at or below 100 percent of the federal poverty level ($9,8000 for one person) “a nominal payment amount.” Hospitals must also use a sliding fee scale for uninsured patients with incomes between 100 and 250 percent of the poverty level, and they must charge the uninsured with incomes between 250 and 300 percent of the poverty level (up to 29,400 for a single person) no more than what the largest group insurer has negotiated with the hospital for the service. Prior to this new rule, it was not unusual for hospitals to bill uninsured patients many times more for services than they were reimbursed by Medicaid or private insurance for the same services. The new rules also require that hospitals clearly spell out to patients their charity care policies. It also requires hospitals to report to the state how many patients applied for financial help through the bad debt and charity case fund and the hospital’s cost of providing the care. These provisions were one important victory in this years’ budget, and they were one reason that I was happy to be able to vote yes on the health portion of the budget. Pork
Barrel Spending Below is an editorial I recently published on The Empire
Page, a website devoted to coverage of No doubt, every State in the union has “pork-barrel
politics,” but as is so often the case with The process works like this: The two legislative leaders and the Governor agree to insert into annual budget bills multimillion-dollar lump-sum funds for projects to be determined at a later date. After the budget is passed and signed, the three then decide the details in private, backroom deals with no vote or participation of other legislators. These deals are formalized through Memoranda of Understanding (MOUs) -- agreed to and signed by the three men without either the public or the legislature’s input or approval. The "understanding" they reach is that each one gets a share of the funds to distribute as choose. Recent examples of spending approved through such MOUs
type deals include funding for the Centers of Excellence, the GenNYsis
program, the Community Capital Assistance Program (CCAP), Empire Opportunity
Fund, Multi-Modal Transportation Projects, and RESTORE. Even a 2004 stand
alone bill providing authorization to expand the A recent study by the Institute for Competitive Government
(Capital Pork: How State Politicians Divvy Up Billions For Favored Capital
Projects, March 2006) found that in just one category of MOU deals funded by
State borrowing since 1997, the Governor and Legislature have authorized
borrowing up to $3.2 billion for these programs, Of this, $1.7 billion has
been allocated, leaving $1.5 billion to be spent in future years. There also
seems to be significant regional disparities in the funding authorized
through MOUs, ranging from a high of $1,000 per capita in some upstate
regions to a low of just $29 per capita in The three leaders have never fully disclosed to the
public, or even their own legislators, how they spend this borrowed money.
Millions of dollars fly around Not ironically, attempts to learn the details of these deals are not even available through the State’s Freedom of Information Law (FOIL) because both the legislature and the Governor’s office claim to be exempt from these rules when it comes to sharing signed MOUs. Additionally, many of these projects are funded through off-budget Public Authorities, with further obscure the process. Money flows back and forth with little regulation between the state budget and the authorities' budgets, largely because authorities can borrow money without the public's permission. In effect, the authorities serve as little more than piggy banks for the leaders' pork projects. The State Comptroller’s office has complained that it can take years to determine how these funds are spent – long after the fact. Shining a Light on
Secret Spending This is why I have proposed a common-sense measure that would bring much needed transparency to the state budget. The legislation I am currently drafting would make MOUs public documents under the Freedom of Information Law (FOIL) and would require that these documents be made available for public review. It would require the disclosure of documents that indicate the specific project to be funded, who was involved in selecting the project, and the selection criteria. It would also require all MOUs to be put before the State Legislature for a vote, giving elected officials (the representatives of the public) a role in the decision making process. Legislation that shines light on MOUs would go a long way toward limiting some of the more outrageous examples of pork-barrel spending. In fact there is already important evidence of progress. After I and my Democratic colleagues highlighted the problem of MOU’s in the budget process earlier this year, the legislative leaders were embarrassed into moving away from this model in this year’s budget. While there are still over $2 billion in reappropriations from previous years covered by MOU’s in the 2006-2007 budget, the budget passed by the legislature on March 31, 2006 included no new MOU deals, and many more dollars were actually line-itemized for individual named projects. This will allow for public review of these projects, and create accountability by requiring legislators to vote yes or no on specific expenditures. Unfortunately, the budget also introduces a new model, giving both the Speaker and the Majority Leader undefined new pots of money to distribute as they desire through “a Plan with the Department of Budget.” These pots total approximately $77 million in this year’s budget. Lack of accountability in the budget process and undisclosed
Pork spending are only some of numerous problems in the State Capitol; it is
a symptom of a government that has become addicted to its own excesses and
cannot seem to kick its habit. While the rules seem to have changed slightly
for the better this year, it is also clear that we have a long way to go in
creating real accountability over State government spending decisions. |
||||||||
