We read the governor’s, Senate’s, and Assembly’s budget proposals — so you don’t have to.
We read the governor’s, Senate’s, and Assembly’s budget proposals — so you don’t have to. ·  View in browser
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Albany’s leaders will hash out hundreds of policies in the next three weeks as they craft the state budget. Photos: New York state Assembly; Billion Images/Canva; Bill Badzo/Flickr; Aidin Bharti/Office of Governor Kathy Hochul | Illustration: Leor Stylar
We read the governor’s, Senate’s, and Assembly’s budget proposals — so you don’t have to.
By New York Focus

Recent Stories

While budget proposals from the Senate and Assembly would beef up the state’s investments in health care and food security, neither would fully avert the fallout. Photos: New York State Assembly Majority; Kameleon007/Getty Images | Illustration: Leor Stylar
Senate and Assembly budget proposals would leave New Yorkers at risk of losing their benefits from federal cuts.
By Jie Jenny Zou and Chris Bragg

President Donald Trump’s historic cuts to federal benefits put massive holes in New York’s safety net. But while budget proposals from the Senate and Assembly would beef up the state’s investments in health care and food security, neither would fully avert the fallout.

Governor Kathy Hochul, whose agenda this year centers on affordability, has maintained that the state cannot afford to backfill federal cuts to Medicaid and the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program. Her January budget reflected that position.

The governor and legislature are negotiating over immigration legislation outside of the budget process.
By Liv Veazey

The state legislature is proposing a major increase in funding to help immigrants defend themselves in court amid President Donald Trump’s mass deportation campaign. The state Senate and Assembly each proposed a budget increase of $110.8 million to fund immigrant services, primarily legal assistance. But their proposals leave unresolved how far the state is willing to go to shield immigrants from federal enforcement.

The immigrant services funding boost would more than double last year’s allocation, bringing the total to $183 million. It would allow legal services providers to significantly increase the number of people they’re able to represent in immigration court.

“This is nation-leading funding,” said Kelsey Pirnak, advocacy manager for the Vera Institute of Justice. The money could pave the way for New York to pass legislation to give immigrants a right to legal representation, as exists in criminal court, Pirnak said.

The Senate and Assembly budget proposals included most of the governor’s ambitious child care plans — but lawmakers have other ideas for Foundation Aid.
By Melissa Manno

State lawmakers have signed off on the governor’s sweeping child care plan with few changes, but they remain divided on how to best fund New York schools.

Foundation Aid, the formula the state uses to fund more than 700 school districts, distributes money based on factors such as regional salaries, poverty rates, and student attendance. Last year, lawmakers approved two changes recommended in a state-commissioned study on modernizing the formula — adjusting the poverty metric and providing extra support for English language learners — while leaving dozens of other recommendations on the table.

Neither chamber, nor Hochul, included major prison reforms in their proposed budgets this year. Photos: Don Pollard/Office of Governor Kathy Hochul and Elvert Barnes/Flickr | Illustration: Leor Stylar
Amid a crisis in the state’s prison system, the governor’s and legislature’s budget proposals differ, but largely lack major reforms.
By Chris Gelardi

With the deadline to pass New York’s state budget legislation less than a month away, governing bodies aren’t battling over the criminal justice system as they have in the past. Yet they also aren’t proposing major reforms, even as the state’s prisons are enduring one of their most tumultuous periods in half a century.

Two killings by guards and a three-week corrections officer strike left the prison system in crisis last year. After the first killing, Governor Kathy Hochul called for reform, promising that she would “not be satisfied until there has been significant culture change” within the system. She expedited the rollout of body-worn cameras, hired consultancies to review prison operations, and signed into law a limited omnibus package that expanded outside oversight bodies’ powers and responsibilities.

While progressive legislators portrayed the measures as a first step toward broader policy changes, Hochul has treated them as the final word. Her budget proposal this year didn’t put forward any new measures to reform state prisons — though it included $535 million in additional funding for the National Guard to help staff the facilities, which remain operating on varying levels of lockdown. And while the executive budget re-upped last year’s funding increase for one oversight body, the State Commission of Correction, it sought to eliminate state funding for another, the Correctional Association of New York.

Senate and Assembly Democrats are so far rejecting Governor Kathy Hochul’s push for a budget-season rollback of the state’s climate mandates. Photos: Senate Media Services; M-SUR/Getty Images | Illustration: Leor Stylar
The Senate and Assembly are resisting Hochul’s push to relax New York’s emissions targets and are instead pressing for renewed clean energy funding.
By Colin Kinniburgh

New York state lawmakers want to keep their foot on the gas — er, accelerator pedal.

Senate and Assembly Democrats are so far rejecting Governor Kathy Hochul’s push for a budget-season rollback of the state’s climate mandates, and are instead seeking renewed funding to keep inching the state toward its emissions targets.

As expected, neither chamber included language in their responses to Hochul’s budget proposal — known as “one-house budgets” — that would amend New York’s flagship climate law. They are both seeking to add $1 billion in funding for the clean energy transition, renewing a major commitment from last year’s budget that Hochul left out this year.

The state Senate proposed several housing measures, some of which echoed the governor’s. Photos: New York State Assembly Majority; Artem Zhukov/Pexels | Illustration: Leor Stylar
It remains to be seen whether the Assembly will get on board.
By Sam Mellins

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Staying Focused is compiled and written by Alex Arriaga
Contact Alex at alex@nysfocus.com

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