Personal Statement on the Passage of an On-Time, Fiscally Responsible Budget
As a result of the economic downturn affecting the entire nation, New York State was faced with a $10 billion deficit requiring Governor Andrew Cuomo and the Legislature to make difficult decisions on the path to a balanced budget. This session, my Assembly Majority colleagues and I worked successfully with Governor Cuomo to close a record deficit, cut spending by $3 billion over last year's budget, and preserve vital programs for New Yorkers. I am proud to have taken part in an effort to effectively address New York State's fiscal crisis while simultaneously protecting senior centers, public education and many social service programs.
In an effort to ensure senior centers receive adequate funding, I strongly advocated for the Legislature to restore proposed cuts to Title XX funding. These cuts would have closed over one hundred senior centers in New York City, including Lenox Hill Neighborhood House's program on the Upper East Side. The final budget fully restores Title XX funding, securing $36 million for New York City senior centers. I will continue to monitor this issue to ensure that this funding is dedicated to saving senior centers in New York City's budget for the next fiscal year.
The budget process also reaffirmed the Assembly Majority's commitment to public education. The final budget increases public education funding by $272 million over the Executive budget proposal -- for a total of $19.6 billion in school funding for the 2011-2012 school year -- and includes a two-year appropriation for school aid. The 2011-12 budget makes key investments to ensure quality public education at all levels, including maintaining $384 million in funding for Universal Pre-Kindergarten for the 2011-12 and 2012-13 school years, increasing funding for the School Lunch and Breakfast Program to $33.1 million, restoring $57 million to the Summer School Special Education program, and maintaining funding for state-supported schools for the blind and deaf.
As the former chairman of the Assembly Libraries and Education Technology Committee, I am pleased that the final budget added $3 million to statewide library funding over the Executive budget proposal. Further, the adopted budget fully restored funding for Early Intervention programs to assist children who have or may develop disabilities.
While the final budget preserved our duty to protect the most vulnerable New Yorkers, it is an honest testament to economic reality and has set New York on a path of fiscal responsibility. The budget includes historic reforms that cap automatic spending increases for the largest components of the state budget, streamline and consolidate state government and transform the future budgeting process. The 2011-12 budget reduced spending overall by more than two percent from the previous year and will cut the 2012-13 projected budget deficit from $15 billion to $2 billion.
It was imperative that state government address New York's structural budget problems which had previously served as roadblocks to true fiscal reform. As I wrote in a January 28 op-ed in the New York Daily News (available here ), these structural economic problems were too great, and the state budget previously too embedded in unrealistic economic projections, to ignore. Not addressing the underlying reasons for why spending was out-of-control would have hampered our economic recovery, stifled job growth and forced businesses out of New York. Yet, despite the largest budget deficit in the state's history and the difficult decisions that were made in this budget, the Assembly Majority rose to the fiscal challenge of setting the State on a course of fiscal solvency while protecting vital services.
There remain significant issues not addressed by the budget that must be resolved before the end of the legislative session in June, including the extension of rent regulations, property tax relief, the "millionaire's tax," and the role of seniority in teacher layoffs, otherwise known as "last in, first out." In addition, there are sources of revenue which New York does not currently utilize, such as licensing mixed martial arts competitions and allowing for the sale of wine in grocery stores, which would add millions of dollars to our economy. I look forward to working with Governor Cuomo on these and other issues in the remaining months of the 2011 legislative session.