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NEWS FLASH

New York Times Forgets About Marriage Equality Law | Though same-sex marriage has been legal in New York for six months, even the New York Times is still catching up with the times. The newspaper issued a correction today for a photo caption of New York City Council Speaker Christine Quinn, which included lobbyist Emily Giske with her wife, Anne Washburn. The caption originally described Washburn as Giske’s “partner,” but has been adjusted to properly identify her as Giske’s “spouse.”

 

 

Green

Old Yellow Goes Green: New York School District Will Start Using Electric School Bus

By Tanya Somanader on Feb 1, 2012 at 4:19 pm

As politicians and pundits continue to deny the existence of climate change, one New York school district is not only teaching students about climate science but taking it to the streets. CBS 2 reports that the Plainview-Old Bethpage school district’s yellow buses are going green with a new eco-friendly bus that doesn’t use fuel of any kind but is powered solely by rechargeable batteries. What’s more, they cost the same as the traditional bus but “are quieter, cleaner, and cheaper to maintain”:

The new eco-friendly buses have electric motors, and don’t use fuel of any kind, meaning they don’t produce emissions. Instead they are powered by a network of rechargeable batteries.

The buses cost $100,000, about the same as traditional buses, but they are quieter, cleaner, and cheaper to maintain.

“It doesn’t have a transmission. It has very few moving parts, and the vehicle is charged up overnight when the electric grid is being used the least so it’s off-peak,” said Bart Marksohn of WE Transport Inc.

The district is starting out with a one-bust test run over the next 60 days. If approved, the first electric buses will be on the roads in September 2012. The decision to go green was simple for district officials. As one put it, “In implementing this we’re only echoing what the students are learning — to care about their environment. So we’re just building upon what’s being taught in the classroom on a daily basis.”

NEWS FLASH

New York Republicans Who Voted For Marriage Equality See Sharp Increase In Fund Raising | The four Republicans who broke ranks and voted for same-sex marriage in the New York Senate have “sharply increased their fund-raising in the six months after the marriage bill passed, in many cases raising money from people they had never met,” the New York Times reports this morning. According to financial disclosures filed Tuesday night, State Sen. Roy J. McDonald raised “about $447,000 in the six months following the vote, about 27 times more than he had raised in the same period in 2009,” Stephen M. Saland took in $425,000, Mark Grisanti raised $325,000 in the six months after the vote and James Alesi “said more than half of his new donations came from same-sex marriage supporters.” Conservative groups like the National Organization for Marriage (NOM) have pledged millions to unseat the Republicans and are still predicting defeat. “All the money in the world isn’t going to buy them out of the fact that they’re about to lose an election,” said Brian Brown, the president of NOM. “People are outraged by what they’ve done, and they are going to be held accountable,” he said. A majority of New Yorkers still support the state’s marriage equality law and a recent Sienna College poll found that Gov. Andrew Cuomo — who lobbied for the same-sex marriage bill — remains overwhelmingly popular among registered voters in New York, with a solid 73 percent approval rating.

NEWS FLASH

New York Republican Marriage Equality Supporter Raising Ample Campaign Donations | New York state Sen. Steve Saland (R) crafted the religious protections that helped the state’s marriage equality law pass last year and was one of four Republican senators to vote for it. Groups like the National Organization for Marriage have tried to counter their reelection, but Saland’s latest campaign finance disclosure report indicates that his vote hasn’t hurt him. He has raised over $425,000, from pro-equality donors like Robert Ziff and Proposition 8 attorney Ted Olson as well as conservative business interests like David Koch.

Green

Natural Gas Industry Pumps $1.34 Million To New York Politicians To Push Fracking

By Guest Blogger on Jan 12, 2012 at 12:05 pm

Andrew Cuomo

The New York State legislature is debating whether to allow hydrofracking in the state. The natural gas industry is hoping to have its say, contributing $1.34 million to state politicians and parties over the last four years, including Governor Andrew Cuomo.

The industry is pushing for the drilling process, also known as fracking, to take place not far from the Syracuse and New York City watersheds. This has caused some concern since fracking can harm the surrounding environment, poison nearby water sources, and even cause earthquakes. But the New York Daily News reports that drillers and utilities really want this to get started:

In pushing for state approval of hydrofracking, the natural gas industry has pumped $1.34 million into the coffers of New York politicians and their parties, a new study revealed. The donations were sprinkled around over the last four years as lawmakers and state officials debated whether to allow the controversial drilling process, formally known as hydraulic fracturing, in the gas-rich Marcellus Shale formation upstate, Common Cause New York said in its report.[...]

Common Cause’s study included not only gas drillers and producers, but some public utilities — including Con Edison and National Grid — that have stakes in gas distribution networks, Lerner said. The bulk of gas industry donations — some 75% — went to candidates for state legislature, including $448,359 given to Republican state Senate candidates and their campaign organizations. Another $217,901 was spent on Democratic candidates for state Senate and their campaign organizations. Gov. Cuomo’s campaign committee took in $153,816 from the gas industry, according to Common Cause.

The top ten recipients combined took in $231,557 in industry cash from January 2007 to October 2011, including $38,532 to the George Maziarz (R-Buffalo-Rochester), chair of the Senate’s Energy Committee, and $26,800 to Kevin Cahill (D-Ulster County), the chair of the Assembly’s Energy Committee.

The industry says it is only making these contributions to combat a well-funded effort on the other side. But as the donations show, they are also having to deal with a hesitant legislature which is discussing the extension of a fracking moratorium, not to mention some public pressure against the procedure.

The deadline for public comments on proposed fracking plans was Wednesday, January 11th. Environmental and pro-drilling groups submitted thousands of comments to the state’s Department of Environmental Conservation. A report is expected from the agency some time this year.

– Zachary Bernstein

LGBT

Cuomo: Legislative Momentum Played Big Role In Marriage Equality Victory

By Igor Volsky on Dec 14, 2011 at 1:32 pm

New York Gov. Andrew Cuomo talks about his success in bringing marriage equality to the Empire State in the January issue of GQ magazine, emphasizing the role legislative momentum from past accomplishments played in pushing the measure over the top. “First, the budget worked,” Cuomo explained. “The budget comes up first—this was February. After the budget, you go through what’s called the legislative session, which is passing the normal bills. That worked. So now you had a sense of momentum. And the body politic was enjoying the success.” He added: “And then we did marriage equality last, which was the hardest of the session issues. But I think at that point there was a lot of energy, a lot of momentum. People—the legislature—liked getting things done.”

Cuomo described his achievement on marriage as a “continuation of a legacy that I learned from Mario Cuomo as a progressive pioneer” and likened it to his father’s “fight on the death penalty, his fight on a woman’s right to choose”:

GQ: Let’s go back to marriage equality. So the timing was good. You had the momentum. You just said, “This has to be done”?

CUOMO: Look, there are issues that come across your desk…that you just say, “This is absurd.” Marriage equality changed life for people. When we did the gay-pride parade after the passage? I can’t tell you how many family members, friends, sisters, and brothers… It provided a level of acceptance for millions of people. And their families.

GQ: And you got the activists to work together—

CUOMO: Yeah. Because they were a fractured group. But I mean, you look at the injustice of the issue. [switches voices, mimicking the opposition] “You can’t get married if you’re gay.” Why? “Well, because you’re gay.” And? “And, well, you can’t make babies.” That’s the argument. Oh, really? So then we should change the law to say, “Only people who can and want to make babies can get married.” So an infertile man can’t. A woman who can’t, she can’t get married. People who don’t want to make a baby, they can’t get married. So let’s change the law so it says, “Only people who can and will make babies.” “Well, we don’t want to do that. You can get married if you don’t want to make a baby or if you can’t—except if you’re gay!” There’s no logic.

Once the state senate approved same-sex marriage on June 24, 2011, the number of Americans living in a state where gay and lesbian people can marry doubled.

Economy

Did New York Gov. Andrew Cuomo Really Agree To Raise Taxes On The Rich?

By Zaid Jilani on Dec 10, 2011 at 9:00 am

The plan the legislature and Cuomo agreed on would have the rich paying less than they pay now.

It was widely celebrated earlier this week when New York Gov. Andrew Cuomo (D) appeared to strike a deal “to raise taxes on the wealthy and slightly reduce them for the middle class.” “The deal reflects the first restructuring of the New York tax code in years and will net an additional $1.9 billion in revenues for the state in 2012,” the Los Angeles Times reported.

But ProPublica’s Marian Wang points out that Cuomo didn’t really agree to raise taxes on the rich. For the past few years, millionaires in New York have been paying a 6.85 percent state income tax rate rate plus a special surtax. The controversy over Cuomo resisting taxing the rich at a higher rate revolves around this special “millionaire’s tax” that had been put in place before he came into office.

Under the agreement between Cuomo and the legislature, high income New Yorkers will no longer be paying the surtax, though their rate will be higher than it would have been if the surtax had simply expired. But at the end of the day, they will be paying less than they were when the surtax was in place — meaning that they are actually getting a tax cut.

In fact, Wang noted that “individuals making between $500,000 and $2 million will pay 2.12 percent less in state income taxes for 2012.” She demonstrated this with the following chart:

So while it is true that the rich will be paying more than they would if the previous “millionaire’s tax” had simply expired, they will also be paying less than if that tax had been extended and less than they paid this year.

Health

Survey: New York Small Businesses More Likely To Offer Health Insurance If Exchange Is Available

By Igor Volsky on Dec 7, 2011 at 9:00 am

The New York state Senate is dragging its feet in implementing the Affordable Care Act’s state exchange, but a new survey from HealthPass finds that New York’s small businesses strongly support the measure and say they may be “more likely to offer health insurance if such a health insurance exchange were available”:

The survey found that more than eight in ten (84%) respondents describe health insurance exchanges as a “good idea” after reading a description of the proposed New York State SHOP (small business) Exchange. Additionally, more than three-fourths of respondents (76%) would consider using such a health insurance exchange when enrolling their employees in a health benefits program. Even more striking, among businesses that do not currently provide health insurance to their employees, 60% said they would be more likely to offer coverage if an exchange was available.

Look:

Interestingly, despite increasing health care costs, small businesses say they would consider providing health insurance in the future, with 75 percent of respondents agreeing “that offering health care benefits helps them attract and retain quality employees.”

The Department of Health and Human Services estimates that 29 states “are making significant progress in creating Affordable Insurance Exchanges.”

NEWS FLASH

The Tax-Dodging Owners Of Zuccotti Park Owe The City $139,000 In Back Taxes | It turns out that the owners of Zuccotti Park — the historic site of Occupy Wall Street — have been engaged in some of the very same tax-dodging that many of the protesters were enraged about. The “city Finance Department says park owner Brookfield Properties and its parent company, Brookfield US Corp., currently owe the city more than $139,000 in unpaid business taxes from 2006, 2007, 2008 and 2009.”

By Zaid Jilani on Dec 5, 2011 at 8:45 am

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