Businesses in Albany are welcoming the start of the state legislative session, as lawmakers, staffers, and others flock to New York’s capital city.
Lawmakers returned to Albany Wednesday for a six-month legislative session.
For businesses in the Empire State Plaza concourse, where shops and restaurants line the underground passageway between the capitol and agency buildings, that means more foot traffic.
Ben Houck is Marketing Manager for Mazzone Hospitality, which runs many of the Plaza’s restaurants. He says the businesses, including the Albany Room banquet facility, see the most traffic while legislators, and the staff and lobbyists who come with them, are back in town.
“January, February, March, April, May. We're excited to have everybody back. And our chefs are busier than ever,” Houck said.
Houck says rallies and conferences hosted by lawmakers and special interest groups bring customers.
“Some of our biggest days are days, like when the Black and Puerto Rican Caucus come to town, and they just bus in tons and tons of people, obviously, that's a huge catering event in the conference, center in the concourse. But also, yeah, they're here for lunch. They're here for breakfast, they're getting their cup of coffee, they're getting that snack to get back on the bus back to New York City, or Buffalo, or Rochester, or whoever brought them here to Albany for the legislative session,” Houck said.
Selma Ogresevic is co-owner of Green Sugar Leaf Farms, a tea shop and health supply store on the concourse. Though the halls of the capitol are buzzing once again, the state complex is not as busy as years past. Staggered work schedules introduced during the COVID-19 pandemic are still keeping many state employees away from the office during the workweek.
“So we rely on state workers to come down here on their breaks, or when you know, session is back to keep that foot traffic because otherwise after like 3, 4 o'clock, it's dead. There's weekends, sometimes there's events, but not that much,” Ogresevic said.
The concourse also has its own gym. The return of workers to their desks, many with renewed fitness goals, means treadmills and ellipticals will fire back up.
Nadine Lewis is Director of Operations for Retro Fitness Albany.
“I would say it's only busier because it's our busiest time of the year. A lot of those that all busy in the workday aren't necessarily coming during that time. A lot of times their memberships slow down, if that makes sense, just because they've got a heavy workload and sometimes they're just trying to get home at the end of a long day,” Lewis said.
Lewis says a lot of the traffic this time of the year is driven by people trying to keep up with their New Year’s resolutions.
But she says many will hit the gym during stressful times of the session, including the upcoming State of the State and budget period.
“Sometimes we’re used as a stress release during those times. And sometimes the membership is paused in a sense, allowing, you know, all of the new January gymgoers a little extra opportunity to get in here until they would turn after the State of the State has concluded,” Lewis said.
The regular session began runs until June 6th.
