New York state lawmakers from Saratoga County say there’s still work to be done now that the budget is passed.
The $237 billion plan was finished three weeks late amid debate over hot-button issues like housing, education funding, and public safety.
Governor Kathy Hochul had proposed ending “Hold harmless,” a school funding practice that ensures districts don’t see a decrease in funds from year to year. Assemblywoman Carrie Woerner of the 113th District, a fellow Democrat, says she was happy to see it stay while the funding formula is reevaluated by the legislature.
“We are going to work on the funding formula. Because, it hasn’t been revisited in a long time and I personally have always felt that it doesn’t really reflect the realities in a rural community. So, the funding formula takes into account ow much capacity in a local community to locally support education – and it looks at land value, so how much is your property worth as a proxy for how wealthy your community is. Well, in a rural community there’s a lot of value in the land but that doesn’t translate to cash in the pocket. And so, that’s how we pay property taxes, that’s how we fund local education is by the cash in the pocket. And so, I’ve long felt the formula needed to be revisited to better reflect what wealth looked like, or what capacity looks like in rural communities.”
Woerner says the $150 million New York Housing for the Future program, which subsidizes the construction of cooperative properties for renters and first-time homeowners, directly meets her constituents’ concerns around affordable housing.
“It’s a program that, when it’s fully defined, should work as an ability to build equity without having to make a big down payment. So, you have a monthly payment, some of that is rent, some of that is equity,” said Woerner. “And when you’re ready to move out of that small place into something larger, you can sell your interest in it and now you have a down payment. And that enables you then to buy—you’ve gone from having two parents and one kid and you’re ready for your second kid and you need a bigger house. Like that’s what allows you to get into that bigger house and let that next young couple move in there and start to build their life.”
Republican Assemblywoman Mary Beth Walsh of the 112th district says the budget should have done more to address the state’s population problems.
“Overall, I think we really have to get real about the affordability crisis and the out migration and realize that when 51% of the people polled say that they believe the New York state economy is getting worse. That should be a hair on fire situation where the government, the governor is really going to try to provide some relief. And in that way I think the budget was a complete fail,” said Walsh.
Walsh says she remains concerned about the downstream impacts environmental regulations will have on residents and commercial businesses.
“If you asked the people from Quad Graphics why they pulled out and why they’re consolidating their operations out of state, one of the big things they talked about, I believe, was the CLCPA the Climate Leadership and Community Protection Act,” said Walsh. “I mean, if that gets more fully ramped up, there are going to be significant costs that are going to be borne by New York taxpayers and businesses. And I think that we really need to get real about that. There’s nothing wrong with aspirationally wanting a cleaner environment and having New York do our share but I believe it’s really going to cripple our economy. And I really worked hard to try to give voice to the concerns of our school districts this year as far as the electrification of school buses and that mandate that’s coming right around the corner. But, that’s just one example.”
The session is scheduled to run through the first week of June.
