Here’s a sampling of news
stories, editorials and video from around New York State
this week slamming the Democrat’s state budget, which
increases spending by an astounding 10 percent and
includes a tax increase of upwards of $9 billion –
the largest tax increase in New York State history.
Sen. Darrel Aubertine -- fighting
for farmers? ..."NO"
Senate Majority
Leader Malcolm Smith attempts to defend the State
Budget deal that taxes too much, spends too much
and crushes the people and businesses of
New York State.
Part I
Part II
Part III
Crazy Quotes...
Reform? What reform?
APRIL 23, 2009 -
Watertown Daily Times
Senate Democrats’ much-ballyhooed “reforms” fall
well short of the broad changes needed to erase
Albany’s “dysfunctional” label. “The Democratic
proposals are at best a modest beginning that put
off more meaningful changes to a later date.” Read the entire article at:http://www.watertowndailytimes.com/article/20090423/OPINION01/304239959/-1/OPINION
Paterson says Democrats rejected his offer to save
STAR
BY JAMES T. MADORE
- April 22, 2009 - Newsday
Gov. Paterson says Sen. Bill Stachowski and the
Senate Democrats rejected his offer to spare
property tax-cutting STAR rebates from the budget
ax, saying they preferred to spend the funds
elsewhere. Paterson said he would preserve the
rebate if Democrat leaders could find sufficient
savings elsewhere in the overloaded budget. Now,
Paterson—as well as the Assembly’s Democrat
leader—are casting doubt on a new “plan” by
Stachowski and the Senate Democrats to resurrect
the rebate program. Elimination of the STAR
rebates means hundreds of dollars in higher
property taxes for Western NY homeowners. Read the entire article at:
http://www.newsday.com/news/local/state/ny-ststar2312683467apr22,0,6223679.story
State Senate minority leader
explains budget impact
Carol
Thompson - 04-22-2009 - The Valley News Online
Local business owners, community
leaders, and county officials learned the details
of the state budget Thursday when New York State
Senate Minority Leader Dean Skelos addressed them
at Vona’s Restaurant in Oswego. The
2009-2010 budget includes a spending increase of
$10.5 billion, or seven times the rate of
inflation, Skelos said. The budget, Skelos
claimed, includes the largest tax increase in the
state’s history and will cost a typical New York
family approximately$2,400.
Business owners to visiting
senator: 'We are hurting'
Carol Thompson -
04-22-2009 - The Valley News Online
One after the other, they went
around the room and aired their concerns about the
economic climate in Oswego County and New York
State, and one after the other the message was the
same—“we are hurting.” Business owners,
agricultural representatives, and community
leaders gathered at Vona’s Restaurant last
Thursday for a question-and-answer luncheon with
New York State Senator Dean Skelos, who serves as
senate minority leader. Read the entire article at:
http://www.valleynewsonline.com/viewnews.php?newsid=85482&id=1
Setting NY Back 30 Years
Fred Dicker - March
31, 2009 - The New York Post
“The budget created by Gov.
Paterson, Assembly Speaker Sheldon Silver and
Senate Majority Leader Malcolm Smith is a
monstrously bloated, tax-and-spend plan that, in
one fell swoop, reverses a three-decade-long
effort to strengthen business and prevent
taxpayers from fleeing the state. The wrecking
ball of a new state budget, approved in
Kremlin-like secrecy by the troika, also ranks as
one of the biggest betrayals in process and
substance by a governor in New York history.”
In a sneaky move during their
back-room budget dealings, Albany's governing
troika blindsided New Yorkers with a $557 million
tax hike in their $131.8 billion budget plan. A
proposed 506 percent increase in the utility tax
will come out of the pockets of New Yorkers trying
to keep warm, light their homes and operate
job-creating businesses.
State spending, massive tax hikes
draw waves of protest
Tom Precious -
March 31, 2009 - The Buffalo News
ALBANY — Gov. David A. Paterson
emerged from behind closed doors Monday to defend
the state’s newly proposed $131.8 billion budget,
but business groups railed against its massive tax
hike package as education and health care special
interests complained it does not spend enough.
Critics of the 2009 budget rushed to the Capitol
and flooded lawmakers’ telephones to try to
unravel support, especially those from upstate.
Despite all of the talk of shared
sacrifice and of not filling in long-term gaps
with short-term federal stimulus dollars, Gov.
David Paterson of New York and other Democratic
leaders have produced a budget that is now up to
$131 billion — a whopping $10 billion more than
last year’s. This budget also is as crammed full
of favors as anything written in Albany for many
years. Republicans who are now in the minority and
had almost no voice in the secretive budget
negotiations are calling it simply: “The Big
Ugly.”
Their awful budget gives the GOP
perfect political ammo
WHammond - March
31, 2009 - Daily News
Gov. Paterson and his fellow
Democrats are confirming everyone's worst fears
about Albany becoming a one-party town. Instead of
demonstrating that they can be fiscally
responsible in a crisis, they are acting just like
stereotypical, out-of-control, big-government
liberals. They're using their newfound dominance
of state government to tax and spend with abandon,
shaft the middle class, let criminals out of jail
and cozy up to labor. Republicans - shut out of
the inner circle for the first time since the
1930s - can do little but gnash their teeth on the
sidelines. Inside, though, they're chuckling
diabolically. They know just how much political
dynamite the Democrats are handing them by passing
this ridiculously bloated, irresponsible budget.
Asked last fall whether he would
raise business or income taxes, Gov. David A.
Paterson had this to say: "We have ruled that out,
myself and all of the leaders of the legislature,
for the period this year and the budget process
next year. What we want to do is cut our
out-of-control spending." It is with a sense of
betrayal, then, that we regard this year's budget
of $131.8 billion, an 8 percent increase that
imposes $7 billion in new taxes and fees. This
editorial page cheered the governor many times for
his commitment to reduce spending to match revenue
- reversing a years-long trend in Albany of
borrowing to overspend. We believed him, and we
were wrong.
New Yorkers howl every year about
their state budget. This year it’s more visceral.
State leaders are about to assault the nation’s
highest-taxed state with a new round of taxes and
fees. In the middle of a recession, no less. “It’s
just a sad commentary on New York State that our
local representatives aren’t listening to their
constituents,” said Colleen C. DiPirro, president
and chief executive of the Amherst Chamber of
Commerce, a group with an ear to effects on the
upstate economy.
