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| Home / College Guide / State lawmakers start to vote on NY budget Wednesday, $254 billion spending plan |
| Posted on Friday, May 09 @ 00:00:42 PDT |
ALBANY — More than a month after the constitutional deadline, state legislators started to vote on the nine component bills that make up the New York state budget on Wednesday — topline spending has been cited at $254 billion, although recent conversations among lawmakers may have raised that number.
In the late hours of Tuesday, the first three bills addressing major parts of the state spending plan were printed and made public — and a fourth was printed midway through Wednesday afternoon.
Details are still trickling out, but in the four budget bills available for public review, a number of key policy issues were settled.
In the bill related to public protection, the state prisons and general government, language that would authorize the governor to close up to three state prisons with 90 days of notice was included. Gov. Kathleen C. Hochul has sought the power to close prisons in most of the state budget plans she’s presented, usually seeking the power to close up to five on a faster timeline than the year’s notice she’s normally required to offer.
Hochul asked for, and got, the power to close five prisons last year, but in the end only shuttered three. This year, she asked for five and was given only three.
A push the governor launched last month to lower the hiring age for state corrections officers is also included in the budget this year; the minimum age will be lowered to 18, but underage COs will be primarily used for roles that do not interact directly with incarcerated people. In the event a CO under 21 is asked to do a job with contact, they will be supervised by a senior officer. The budget bill also raises the mandatory retirement age for COs from 60 to 63, but would let COs collect their benefits between age 60 and 63 provided they continue working for the state Department of Corrections for those three years.
There’s also language that eliminates the requirement that COs be in-state residents, and additional changes to raise the maximum age for someone to start the process of becoming a New York state trooper, bumping the max from 29 to 43.
The bill including changes to state prison and police policies also includes some general government changes; it includes Hochul’s push to give gubernatorial candidates the power to handpick their Lieutenant candidates, breaking from the system where the two positions run separately in the party primaries. It also includes some changes to the state’s nascent public campaign financing program — smaller changes than what was originally proposed, but allowing for the first $250 of donations up to $1,050 for public matching.
The current rules stipulate that only individual donations up to $250 get matching funds — this would allow larger donations to get at least some matching funds as well.
The budget bill also includes a two year delay to the controversial ban on outside income for sitting legislators — meant to go into effect this year, lawmakers approved a ban on lawmakers earning more than $35,000 per year outside of their employment with the state, under penalty of loss of their voting privileges. A judge ruled earlier this year that the removal of voting privileges was unlawful, but courts have upheld the wider bar on outside earnings.
The budget bill related to transportation, economic development and environmental conservation included some changes to the state cannabis markets, requiring companies that operate recreational and medical programs to pay for multi-million dollar special licenses.
That bill also permits New York-based companies to implement algorithmic pricing models — where they can raise or lower prices based on time of day and customer-specific data collected by the company. Companies like Wendy’s have floated using algorithmic pricing to dynamically adjust their menu prices throughout the day — and the state budget would permit that provided the company include a clear disclaimer that the pricing was set using customer’s personal data.
In the health and mental hygiene bill, a wide-ranging expansion to the state rules on involuntarily committing someone with clear signs of mental illness was included. Under the terms of the new legislation, people who demonstrate that they are at risk of physical harm because of their inability or refusal to secure their own clothing, shelter, medical care, safety or shelter. This push, originating with the Governor, was a response to the sharp increase in people living on the streets who demonstrate outward evidence of mental illness — the problem is worse in New York City, but communities across the state have seen increases in the number of homeless people on the streets since the COVID-19 pandemic. The bill also includes language to allow the mentally ill person being considered for involuntary commitment to a mental hospital to request their transportation be done by an ambulance rather than police. The legislation would also allow for a psychiatric nurse practitioner to be one of the two medical professionals who evaluate a patient before referring them for involuntary commitment, and would require a more concrete continuation of care after a person is discharged from an involuntary commitment.
The healthcare law also makes changes to the state system for reporting infant morality — making changes to allow for electronic paperwork filing on the subject and updating some language in the provision to be more sensitive to the parents of the deceased baby.
In the education, labor and family assistance bill printed on Wednesday afternoon, lawmakers outlined a slew of updates to the state’s Foundation Aid formula, which is the calculation used to determine how much state assistance each public school district receives each year.
Hochul had pushed last year for sweeping changes that would have cut individual district’s aid for the first time in 20 years, but failed to achieve that goal and walked away from it this year. This year’s budget makes smaller, but still significant changes to the Foundation Aid formula, updating the metrics by which a community is deemed rural or economically disadvantaged with modern Census data.
Once this bill is agreed to by lawmakers in Albany, the state education department will provide “school aid runs” to the districts that will outline how much state money they should expect for the coming school year. Many districts have already drafted and finalized their spending plans, following the Governor’s conservative funding plan outlined in January.
The education bill also makes some concessions on the state-mandated timeline for when districts should transition to fully electric school bus fleets; current law requires that districts be fully transitioned by 2035, and need to start buying only electric busses by 2027. The changes made in this year’s budget bill would allow for school districts to apply for two 24-month extensions to those deadlines, but requires that a district engage with the New York State Energy Research and Development Authority if they want a second extension. The law requires NYSERDA certify the district can’t meet their deadline before allowing them to get that second extension.
The bill also outlines a new requirement for companies selling electric busses in New York; they’ll need to secure independent range ratings and battery evaluations.
The law also makes changes to the state’s requirements for private schools — lawmakers a few years ago approved a law change that required private schools demonstrate they are providing a “substantially equivalent” education to the public school curriculum for their local district, to be evaluated by the district. The education budget bill would set more specific standards for that equivalency check, allowing private schools to compare student performance on state tests or other types of exams, or educational content.
The bill also expands the state’s free school meals program to include every district, essentially making school breakfast and lunch free for all New Yorkers in public schools.
And the bill includes one of Governor Hochul’s priorities, a ban on the use of smartphones by schoolkids at all districts in the state, from “bell to bell.” The legislation bars districts from suspending students for violating the cell phone ban.
The education bill also provides for free community college education for all New Yorkers between the age of 25 and 55 who don’t already have a degree.
Lawmakers were voting on the state budget bills that had been printed over the course of Wednesday — and all that came before the legislature were passed. The education bill will see action on Thursday, and lawmakers have yet to see the revenue bills. Language on discovery reform — which Hochul has spend significant political capital pushing for this year, remains unpublished — and reports indicate that lawmakers are also looking to include language to pay legal bills racked up by Attorney General Letitia A. James, who is currently defending charges that she committed mortgage fraud. Democrats in Albany contend the federal investigation into her financial dealings is retaliation for her legal efforts against President Donald J.
Trump — but a breaking report from the New York Post got significant pushback from Republicans across the state and federal governments. Congresswoman Elise M. Stefanik, R-Schuylerville, responded to the report on social media calling the move “corrupt.” It remains to be seen if the plan, which has not been included in published budget bills yet, will remain in the state spending plan.
Johnson Newspapers will continue reviewing all the budget bills, those printed and those to come, and will follow up with a series of articles in the coming days and weeks as the details emerge.
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