Legislative Updates
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Memo
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| From: | Glenn T. Riddell |
| Date: | April 13, 2011 |
| Re: | Client Report |
Governor Cuomo readies campaign to push property tax cap and other issues
Effort will urge voters to pressure lawmakers
Believing both legislative houses are not serious about an effort to cap property tax growth in New York, Gov. Andrew M. Cuomo will launch a campaign to get voters to press lawmakers on the stalled measure, sources close to the administration said Monday.
The governor will seek to “raise the temperature” on the property tax issue —which he campaigned for during his gubernatorial race last year — in public- pressuring ways that Cuomo believes ultimately got lawmakers last week to go along with the major components of his 2011 budget proposal, a top Cuomo administration official said. “If you get the person in the supermarket to tug on their coat — they will follow the people,” the official said of lawmakers.
The Democratic-led Assembly has blocked the tax cap plan, which calls for property tax growth by schools and local governments to be restricted to 2 percent or less each year. Assembly Speaker Sheldon Silver, a Manhattan Democrat, has recently signaled his willingness to discuss the tax cap issue.
The Republican-led Senate has already approved Cuomo’s tax cap plan. But its members are under enormous pressure by local officials not to embrace a final deal with Cuomo and the Assembly. Localities are concerned that a tax cap, without accompanying relief from costly state mandates, will bust their future budgets.
A spokeswoman for Senate Majority Leader Dean Skelos on Monday dismissed suggestions by people close to Cuomo that the Senate has softened on a tax cap. Kelly Cummings noted that it was Cuomo’s own bill on the issue that the Senate GOP passed earlier this year. “A property tax cap does remain one of the main priorities of our conference this session to achieve,” Cummings said.
The governor will “give a lot of speeches and come up with 9,000 creative ways to communicate to the person in the supermarket” to press lawmakers to back the tax cap, said the top administration source, who spoke on condition of anonymity.
Another Cuomo priority is a measure to strengthen the ethics oversight of the Legislature. Cuomo wants more disclosure about outside income by lawmakers, as well as some sort of independent office to monitor the Legislature as opposed to the current in house system.
Cuomo is also pushing an effort — overwhelmingly backed in the Assembly but blocked in the Senate — to legalize gay marriage. But the administration is concerned about pushing a vote in the Senate, where the legalization effort was defeated in December 2009, if it is going to die again during a floor vote.
Locally, the governor will use an upcoming summit to try to bring warring sides together to pass the University at Buffalo’s UB 2020 plan. That program calls for regular tuition hikes as a partial funding mechanism for UB’s expensive downtown development plan, which it says will bring thousands of jobs to Buffalo.
The administration official said there is a concern about a “tuition differential” plan that would let some SUNY campuses raise tuition at levels different from others and the possible resulting “caste” system that could create. One approach being considered is to specifically carve out UB and not include other campuses in a UB 2020- like proposal, such as is being sought by the other three SUNY central universities at Stony Brook, Binghamton and Albany.
“We don’t have to make sweeping education policy to make UB 2020 a reality,” the Cuomo official said, noting that expanding the UB 2020 plan “unnecessarily complicates” the UB effort.
The UB 2020 plan was among the topics discussed Monday in meetings between Silver and Satish K. Tripathi, who has been recommended by SUNY Chancellor Nancy Zimpher to become the next UB president.
Showdown Looms After Assembly Votes to Extend Rent Regulation:
The State Assembly passed a bill on Monday that would strengthen rent regulation, while setting up a possible showdown with the Senate and the real estate industry.
State laws that limit the rent that landlords can charge on more than one million apartments in New York City and the suburbs are set to expire on June 15. Democratic legislators from the city and Gov. Andrew M. Cuomo had sought to extend and expand the laws during budget negotiations last month, until the Senate Republican leader, Dean G. Skelos, rejected the idea, threatening to delay the budget.
The bill in the Democratic-controlled Assembly would extend rent regulations until 2016. It would do away with vacancy decontrol, which lets landlords deregulate apartments when they become vacant and their rent exceeds $2,000. It would alter luxury decontrol, which lets owners deregulate apartments when the tenants’ income exceeds $175,000 and the rent is at least $2,000. Those limits would rise to $300,000 and $3,000. The bill would also limit rent increases for new tenants to 10 percent, down from 20 percent.
“Every year more than 10,000 rent-regulated apartments are lost because of loopholes in the rent laws,” the Assembly speaker, Sheldon Silver, said in a statement.
Although a similar bill in the Republican-controlled Senate is unlikely to pass, Democratic legislators are pressing on a number of housing issues. On Monday morning, some Democrats, tenant advocates and members of the Working Families Party met with Mr. Cuomo.
But an aide to Mr. Cuomo said that he was seeking a deal that could pass in both houses. Other proposals in play include a property tax cap, an extension of tax breaks for new developments and relief for landlords from a 2009 court decision that said they could not deregulate apartments while also taking advantage of a certain tax incentive.
Joseph Strasburg, president of the Rent Stabilization Association, which represents landlords, called the bill the “opening salvo.”
“Rent regulation is an addiction, just like oil, that’s hard to wean off, especially in New York City,” he said. “The debate will be over what it ultimately looks like.” While he opposes many of the provisions, Mr. Strasburg conceded that rent regulations would be extended.
Assembly Speaker Sheldon Silver says fate of rent regulations is up to Governor Cuomo. "We need him to join us and use his clout to bring together the relevant stakeholders to make it happen," Silver said Monday.
Cuomo spokesman Josh Vlasto said the governor supports an expansion of rent regulations, which expire June15, but stopped short of endorsing the Assembly's proposal. The GOP-controlled state Senate opposes anything other than an extension of the existing rules.
Senate GOP spokesman Scott Reif said the Senate intends to "address the [rent] issue in the weeks ahead."
The Assembly's rent bill, approved by the Democrat-controlled chamber Monday, extends regulations for another five years and abolishes vacancy decontrol - which allows landlords to deregulate vacant apartments with rents of $2,000 or more.
Currently, landlords can deregulate apartments when a tenant's income reaches $175,000 for two consecutive years and the rent hits $2,000 a month.
Landlords welcome rent control debate:
With the state budget passed, and tenant protections sought by Democrats not included, the battle for renters' protection will continue this legislative session with June 15, the day the current laws expire, looming as the next deadline.
While Democrats accuse the opposition of wanting to take the battle down to the wire in hopes of simply extending what the Democrats see as woefully incomplete legislation, a group representing landlords also sees the current law as faulty and seeks a policy debate on the issue.
"Building owners in New York City have had extreme run-ups in property taxes, water and sewer rates, and fuel costs and they haven't gotten a reciprocal increase in rent because all the rents are created by the rent guidelines board," said Frank Ricci, director of government affairs for the Rent Stabilization Association, which represents landlords and property owners.
"Until government recognizes that it's a two-sided equation…then we're going to have to advocate for less and less controls," said Ricci.
Senate and Assembly Democrats made an eleventh-hour push to include renters' protection in the budget, saying the June deadline only serves to enhance the negotiating position of those opposed to rent control. However, both sides say they have issues with the law as it currently stands, with landlords saying rent control is abused by wealthy New Yorkers who can easily afford to pay market prices.
"The main problem is the subsidy provided by rent regulation is not targeted to the people who need it. Any way you can target it to the people who need it and then have everyone share in the subsidy, we're all for that. Right now it's very haphazard," said Ricci. Ricci contends that the ever-escalating cost of owning and maintaining properties in New York City demand attention of other sorts to the current law.
"We're just going to try and highlight the problems with the current system and what needs to be corrected," he said
Siena Poll Indicates Broad Support for Cuomo’s Post-Budget Agenda:
Today’s Siena poll finds Gov. Andrew Cuomo heading into post-budget policy negotiations with a very strong hand, as New Yorkers strongly support his top agenda items – from instituting a property tax cap (83 percent) to creating an independent redistricting commission and legalizing same-sex marriage (both 58 percent).
Cuomo saw both his job performance and favorability ratings jump following the budget battle, even though voters believe their local schools and hospitals lost out as a result of the on-time spending plan passed by the Legislature.
The governor is viewed favorably by 73 percent of voters and unfavorably by 18 percent, up from 69-20 last month. Fifty-four percent say he is doing an excellent or good job – up from 51 percent last month – and 41 percent say he’s doing a fair or poor job (unchanged)
Governor Cuomo Announces Unanimous Senate Confirmation of Courtney Burke as Commissioner of OPWDD and Roger Bearden as Chair of CQCAPD:
Governor Andrew M. Cuomo today announced that the State Senate unanimously confirmed Courtney Burke as Commissioner of the Office for People with Developmental Disabilities (OPWDD) and Roger Bearden as Chair of the Commission on Quality of Care and Advocacy for Persons with Disabilities (CQC).
OPWDD provides services, support and advocacy to approximately 126,000 individuals with developmental disabilities and their families. CQC is charged with overseeing and improving the quality of care for people with disabilities and other vulnerable persons.
"These are the right people to lead these agencies and bring the needed reforms to the care of the developmentally disabled in our community," Governor Cuomo said. "I thank Senators McDonald, Huntley, DeFrancisco and Majority Leader Skelos for their swift confirmation of Commissioner Burke and Chairman Bearden."
Commissioner Burke said, "I am honored to be confirmed as Commissioner of the Office for People With Developmental Disabilities and I want to thank Governor Cuomo, Senators DeFrancisco, McDonald and Huntley, as well as the members of the Senate for the trust they have now placed with me to lead this agency. I look forward to working with stakeholders and government partners as we implement the needed reforms that will support the highest-quality services for individuals with developmental disabilities."
Most recently, Courtney Burke was the Director of the Rockefeller Institute's New York State Health Policy Research Center, where she oversaw all health policy research projects at the Institute and was the project director for the Institute's recent research on county variations in Medicaid long-term care. The Rockefeller Institute is the public policy research arm of the State University of New York. Ms. Burke previously worked for six years as the senior research scientist in the health and Medicaid studies program at the Institute. Her research focuses primarily on health policy issues related to Medicaid and the Children's Health Insurance Program (CHIP), health reform and private insurance coverage. She also has written about nonprofit organizations' dependence on Medicaid funding and the effects of the state fiscal crises on nonprofits.
Chairman Bearden said, "It is an honor and privilege to be chosen to serve. I look forward to working with the Governor, the Legislature, advocates and families to ensure that New York meets its fundamental responsibility to ensure that people with disabilities receive the highest possible quality of care. I would like to thank the Governor for this nomination and Senators DeFrancisco, McDonald and Huntley for the speedy confirmation."
Roger Bearden previously served as the Director of the Disability Law Center of the New York Lawyers for the Public Interest in New York City, where he supervised project directors and program staff and was the lead attorney on major law reform cases, including cases seeking community integration for persons with mental illness in nursing homes and adult homes.
From March to August 2009, Mr. Bearden was Chief Health Counsel to New York State Senator Thomas K. Duane, then serving as Chair of the Senate Health Committee. In that role, Mr. Bearden led Senate staff negotiations on the Family Health Care Decisions Act, which allows family members or other surrogates to make major medical decisions for incapacitated individuals who did not previously designate a health care agent or provide instructions.
Previously, Mr. Bearden was a staff attorney with Disability Advocates, Inc., a nonprofit law firm in Albany, where he advocated and litigated on behalf of thousands of individuals with mental illness and other disabilities in some of the largest and most complex federal cases in the field. Mr. Bearden graduated from Brown University and Harvard Law School before clerking for the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Seventh Circuit.
Governor Cuomo Repeats need to dismiss 10,000 N.Y. State Workers:
Governor Andrew Cuomo, who produced New York’s first on-time budget in five years last week, is standing by the need to fire almost 10,000 workers unless they agree to provide the state with $450 million of savings.
Labor contracts that increased state workers’ pay almost 14 percent over four years expired March 31, 10 days after formal negotiations with unions began. Cuomo has said he spoke with labor leaders about his goals before talks started. Negotiations are ongoing and obviously if we don’t reach an agreement, we would need to proceed with layoffs,” said Joshua Vlasto, a spokesman for Cuomo.
Governor Cuomo, reached agreement with top lawmakers March 27 to close a $10 billion gap in the $132.5 billion budget. The Legislature approved the plan March 31, a day before the start of the fiscal year. Included in the package is a wage freeze on the base pay of about 130,000 workers the governor controls and $450 million in additional labor savings.
Cost cuts sought by Cuomo may come from increasing workers’ share of health-care spending, freezing automatic pay increases based on longevity and changing rules for overtime, Howard Glaser, an adviser to the governor and director of state operations, said at a March 3 legislative hearing in Albany.
If there is no agreement with unions, worker dismissals may begin soon after the April 1 start of the fiscal year, he said then. Changing health benefits may produce savings that exceed New York’s goal by a third, Glaser said.
Negotiations with unions includes the Civil Service Employees Association, the largest state workers’ union, which represents about 66,000 employees
Governor vows veto for pension increases:
Gov. Cuomo yesterday vowed to veto a blizzard of bills introduced by lawmakers that would boost pensions for government workers and cost taxpayers with nearly $1 billion in additional costs.
"We need to reduce the costs of pensions, not increase them. I would not support any legislation that increases pension costs for the state or localities,” Governor Cuomo said.
Cuomo instead is pushing a new "Tier VI" pension plan that would require new public employees to contribute more toward their pensions to reduce the burden on taxpayers. The Governor's stand comes a day after the business-backed Citizens Budget Commission issued a report that found legislators introduced 55 pieces of legislation this year to give government workers more benefits.
Mayor Bloomberg has called on Albany lawmakers to reform pensions to save money -- not to inflate benefits and costs. His budget projects that city taxpayers will have to shell out $8.4 billion next year to cover escalating pension costs.
Indications are that the city pays a larger share of pension and health benefits for city workers than many private firms pay for their employees.
Cops and firefighters can retire with pensions worth at least half their final-year salary after 20 years, regardless of age. Most private-sector workers can't retire until age 65 or later with a full pension, and they often contribute more of their own money through 401(k) accounts.
Like Governor Cuomo, Bloomberg has proposed a legislative package that would require workers to contribute more toward their pensions and work longer before they can collect.
Top Silver Aide Fuleihan Departing:
Dean Fuleihan, a 33-year veteran of the Assembly who has served as Sheldon Silver’s right-hand man – if not an outright extension of his brain – for the entire duration of his speakership (which started in 1994), is departing his post at the end of the month.
He’ll likely keep his hand in government, but is not yet sure about his next move.
Silver has announced an internal shuffling to fill the considerable gap that Fuleihan will leave behind. The new team – and there will be more than one person stepping up to take over Fuleihan’s duties – includes Lou Ann Ciccone, who is being promoted to Secretary to the Speaker for Program and Policy; and Matthew Howard, who is being promoted to Secretary to the Ways and Means Committee. Howard helped Fuleihan with budget negotiations over the past decade.
Fuleihan started working for the Assembly back in 1978 under then-Speaker Stanley Steingut. Fueled on endless cups of coffee and the ability to function at high levels on very little sleep, he has been the Assembly Democrats’ point man for the last decade.
Silver issued a lengthy goodbye press release to Dean Fuleihan, a 33-year veteran of the Assembly.“He has been one of the most brilliant, one of the most loyal, one of the most giving of his time in his job and it is really like I’m losing my right arm at this point,”