In spite of threats from the NY State education commissioner that he'd "withhold tens of millions of dollars in federal grants to struggling schools" unless the districts and teachers union came to an agreement on teacher evaluations by January 1, the two parties failed to do so. Governor Cuomo said, "I am disappointed that agreements could not be reached. Students lose... because of this failure." Yes, they'll probably lose $100 million in federal money, $60 million of it meant for NYC schools. more ›

After a Tennessee resident was arrested on felony gun possession charges after checking her 0.38-caliber gun in at the National 9/11 Memorial, NY State politicians are now wondering if our gun laws are maybe a little too much. Medical student Meredith Graves did have a permit to carry the gun in Tennessee, but she didn't have a permit to carry it in New York (because that's what all tourists need in New York—their own guns), so she was in jail for days, including Christmas. And her plight has touched even Assembly Speaker Sheldon Silver. more ›

One employee at the state's Department of Transportation office in Buffalo took an unusual leave of absence: He went back to his native country of Somalia to be its prime minister. Mohamed Adullahi Mohamed spoke with the NY Times about being back in his war-torn homeland, "Every morning when I was brushing my teeth I heard bullets hitting the metal over my window. It was like, pop pop pop pop. The first day I was shocked. But after that I knew the bullets would not get through, so I continued brushing." more ›

Baruch College's afternoon classes (after 3 p.m.) are cancelled because the City University Board of Trustees is voting on tuitions hikes—$300/year for five years—and CUNY officials are concerned about another clash between protesting students and campus police. Still, students are taking the time to rally at 4 p.m., to criticize last week's chaotic confrontation as well as the hikes, "They make tuition increases over the summer knowing many students are not on campus, they continue to increase tuition, while cutting, resources (closing libraries, writing centers, etc), they have public meetings where students and faculty are denied admittance, then are beaten for attempting to peacefully assemble and have a voice." more ›

Remember how there was a beautiful—and huge—mountain lion killed by an SUV in Connecticut last month? And it turned out that the cat had walked all the way from South Dakota? Now it turns out the mountain lion made its way through NY State's Lake George—and that state Department of Environmental Conservation officials knew it was there but never told local officials that a 140-pound predatory cat was in their midst. Classic Albany! more ›

Governor Andrew Cuomo and the state's largest public workers' union agreed to five-year deal late last night which includes union concessions such as a pay freeze and high insurance costs, but the deal also avoids big layoffs. The NY Times says CSEA's cooperation was "a begrudging acknowledgment of the increasingly hostile mood toward public workers" and the NY Post reports, "It's a victory for Gov. Cuomo, who had threatened thousands of layoffs if the CSEA rank-and-file rejected the contract he had negotiated with union leaders." more ›

Remember last year, when Snooki-loving youngsters looking for that perfect bronze-from-a-box got a little scare? Not the cancer kind (as if), more like fun-hating lawmakers trying to ban teens from using tanning beds, like, ever. The measure didn't go through at the time, so pasty-skinned teens continued to get their glow on without fear—until now. more ›

NY State bus driver crackdown, which has been going on since the March 12 fatal Bronx bus crash, has now caught city school bus drivers. According to WABC 7, "The men, drivers in Queens, had reportedly been driving with suspended licenses, in one instance for more than 15 years. They were picked up by detectives with the Queens District Attorney's Office for obtaining new licenses by submitting false names and different dates of birth and social security numbers to the Department of Motor Vehicles." more ›

After an exciting morning for State Democrats, our newly minted Governor took to a podium in front of thousands to deliver his State of the State address. And where is our state? At a crossroads, according to Cuomo's 87 power point slides. more ›

The NY Times has an article about a galling situation: If mental patients at NY State psychiatric institutions win lawsuits against their facilities (e.g., hospital neglects them and they nearly die or assaults from fellow patients), the patients are expected to reimburse the state for their care. While inmates can keep winnings in lawsuits against prisons, "For patients in state-run mental hospitals — people too ill to live on their own and too poor to pay for their care — the state can drain court-awarded damages, effectively deducting the cost of their stays in the very hospitals that failed or abused them." One patient's lawyer said, "It’s a Catch-22, isn’t it? I need to go to this facility because I’m sick. But if they hurt me worse, they’re immune." more ›

State Senator Eric Schneiderman won his bid to be New York's next "sheriff" by defeating Staten Island DA Dan Donovan in the Attorney General race. Schneiderman, who got 55% of the vote to Donovan's 44%, said, "This was a campaign of activism, and boy, did we show what activists can do!... I'm ready to go. I've stood up against powerful forces before and, Ladies and Gentleman, you may have noticed I'm hard to kill." That's total Sheriff-speak! more ›

The Human Rights Campaign, a gay rights organization, has released a series of ads featuring celebrities and well-known New Yorkers offering their support for gay marriage. This week's video has Mayor Bloomberg saying, "I'm Mayor Mike Bloomberg. I'm a New Yorker and I support marriage equality because government shouldn't tell you who to love or who to marry." more ›

Thanks to our craptastic state revenue situation, the NY State sales tax exemption for clothing and shoes under $110 ends on Thursday—which means you'll be paying 4.375%—4% for NY State, 0.375% for the commuter tax—starting on Friday. (The city's 4.5% tax is still exempt for items under $110.) Then, on April 1, 2011, the state exemption returns, but only for items under $55; in other words, clothing and shoes under $55 will be tax free in NYC. more ›

From a NY Times article about the state's problems with the city's controversial, $3 billion Willets Point redeveopment plans: "Michael Bergmann, a structural engineer for the State Department of Transportation who was part of the team reviewing the city’s application, wrote to the department’s regional director and other colleagues on Dec. 28: 'Unless the preparers of this report start accepting the idea that it is seriously flawed, we are going nowhere.'; About a month later, after pointing out a mistake in a document that put the development’s completion date as 2107 instead of 2017, Peter King, a project manager for the state, wrote to a colleague, 'Perhaps that reference to 2107 may have been closer to the truth than anyone realizes.'" more ›

The NY State Department of Labor released the June unemployment numbers (PDF): NY State's rate dropped from 8.3% in May to 8.2% in June, "This was the state’s lowest unemployment rate since April 2009, when it was 8.1%. The number of unemployed New Yorkers also dropped, falling from 806,200 in May to 798,600 in June 2010, its lowest level since April 2009." NYC unemployment rate also dropped to 9.5% in June, from May's 9.6%, adding 8,300 jobs; the NY Times reports, "The strongest gains came in two of the most economically sensitive sectors: construction, and leisure and hospitality." more ›

Because Albany is facing a $9.2 billion budget deficit (and is over 80 days on a budget), state leaders are now circling around reinstating the 4% sales tax for retail items under $110. The Times Union reports that two "state officials, speaking on condition of anonymity, said the proposal would indeed increase sales taxes on clothing, but that there would be tax-free periods such as the time before school starts in the fall and around the December holidays. Clothing and footwear that costs less than $110 became exempt from the state's 4 percent sales tax in 2007, although most counties and some cities tax the sales." more ›

The State Senate and Assembly may think they are close to a budget, but Governor Paterson said on the radio this morning, "I think we'll have to do it again next week." "It" being the whole "threatening a government shutdown" thing, because the Legislature is still 76 days late on delivering a budget. The Daily News reports, "The permanent state budget is now 76 days overdue. Lawmakers are battling Paterson over closing a $9.2 billion spending gap." Paterson's wish: "I just want to see a balanced budget pass and I don't want to see it encumber the next administration, as I'm leaving at the end of the year, or the next generation that will inherit the debt that they will unless we act and act now." more ›

Assuming the government doesn't shut down, numerous NY State agency leaders, plus state and federal government officials, will be discussing the NY State Summit on Rail Transportation. Not only will the summit discuss NY state's position as "the premier location for rail manufacturing and servicing in the country," there's also going to be talk of high speed rail potential. According to WCBS 2, "State officials said high-speed passenger rail service will create jobs, boost tourism and help New York's economy, especially along Amtrak's Empire Corridor between Albany and Buffalo. New York State has been awarded $151 million of the $8 billion in federal stimulus funds set aside for rail projects," most along the east-west corridor. more ›

The State Legislature is slowly edging towards agreement on a budget as state lawmakers agreed to Governor Paterson's emergency bill which has $775 million in cuts and other actions in the state's health care budget, a move that keeps the government open for another week. Of course, the Times Union notes how one Assembly member called it "gubernatorial blackmail," because of how hard it'll hit hospitals. more ›

The State Assembly has reportedly agreed to lift the cap on charter schools from 200 to 460 over four years, which would enable NY to compete for "Race to the Top" funds. Assembly Speaker Sheldon Silver says the Assembly will vote on the contentious issue this morning (well, the Senate had passed raising the cap, while the Assembly opposed it). The Daily News reports, "Senate Democratic Conference Leader John Sampson (D-Brooklyn) met with Assembly Speaker Sheldon Silver at about 2 a.m. to discuss the measure and afterward said only 'we’re working on it.'" Wow, lawmakers actually working! How's that budget coming along? more ›

NY State budget problems have claimed another victim: Communities that benefit from the state's I Love NY tourism marketing efforts. According to the Poughkeepsie Journal, the state is "dumping plans for a summer advertising campaign to lure tourists to New York, cutting tourism funding and not sending a representative to the travel industry's premier international conference...where companies from around the globe will consider where to send vacationers." A Binghamton travel information center may close this month, and the Chamber of Commerce president worried, "What are visitors to our community going to say when they enter New York state, stop to use the bathroom, and there's a sign up of (travel) information and it says, 'Closed for Business'?" more ›

New York State Assemblyman Richard Brodsky almost lost his daughter, Willie, at 4 years old when she needed a kidney transplant, and again a decade later when her other kidney failed. Her struggle to find a donor was hardly unusual; some 10,000 New Yorkers are currently waiting on a list for donors, and part of the reason finding them is so challenging is because many people don't consent to organ donation on their licenses. So this week Brodsky introduced a bill that would automatically enroll all New Yorkers as organ donors, unless they opt out. Such a "presumed consent" law would be the first of its kind in the U.S. more ›

According to new estimates made by MTA officials yesterday, the broke transit agency may be anywhere from $50 million to $72 million further in debt. That puts the MTA's grand total deficit at somewhere around $450 million, even after implementing service cuts and laying off station agents. WTF MTA? more ›

Weeks after NY State lost out on the first round of "Race to the Top" federal education funding, it seems unlikely officials will try again. Apparently the state doesn't have its act together to fight for potentially hundreds of millions of dollars: Merryl Tisch, the NYS Board of Regents chancellor, said, "We will not submit an application that we do not believe is going to be competitive" and Governor Paterson told NY1, "Right now, I am trying to get legislature to pass a budget. They were very resistant to the whole 'Race To The Top' concept." A few weeks ago, the city was rumored to be considering a solo "Race to the Top" bid. more ›

State Comptroller Thomas DiNapoli issued a report, New York's Deficit Shuffle (PDF; not to be confused with the Truffle Shuffle) showing how NY State has hidden its budget deficits and ever-increasing spending by moving money around between accounts and other accounting "sleight of hand." DiNapoli is worried, "New York needs to stop playing games with the deficit. The state dips into dedicated funds here and shifts money over there, all to cover cash shortfalls and avoid making the difficult decisions needed to align spending with revenues. The end result is the state’s real fiscal condition is impossible to pin down. Every time the game is played, taxpayers lose." more ›

The NY State Legislature did not manage to meet the annual April 1st deadline for a state budget. But at least there's precedent—they didn't meet the deadline for the three years before this one either! While Governor Paterson has delayed payments to schools and stopped construction projects, there's one small, teeny, slight silver lining: According to the NY Times, "Starting Thursday, no statewide official or legislator — from Mr. Paterson on down — will be paid their salaries until a budget is approved, under a 1998 law." Too bad many lawmakers have other jobs (we're looking at you, Sheldon Silver!) more ›

On April 4, 46,000 New Yorkers across the state (about half are in the city) will lose their unemployment benefits this week. The NY State Department of Labor's John Moye told WCBS 2, "It's unprecedented, absolutely. It's a reflection of the economic challenges we're facing in the country, particularly in our state." more ›