Archive for May, 2008

Universal Health Care Advocates Applaud Assembly Passage of Resolution in Support of Federal Universal Health Care

New Yorkers for Single Payer Universal Healthcare Hunger Action Network of New York State

Universal Health Care Advocates Applaud State Assembly Passage of Resolution in Support of a federal Single Payer Universal Health Care system (HR676)The New York State Assembly yesterday overwhelmingly passed a resolution (Assm. Ortiz) calling upon Congress to enact a single payer universal health care system.

HR 676 (Conyers), known as Medicare for all, has 90 cosponsors, including NY Congressional representatives Engel, Hinchey, Maloney, McNulty, Nader, Owens, Rangel, Serrano, Towns, Weiner and Velazquez.

June 12th Forum to Focus on New York’s Health Care Pulse

June 12, 2008; 8:30 a.m. - 11:00 a.m.

Co-sponsored by
BALCONY / AMERICAN CANCER SOCIETY / BARUCH COLLEGE / NYAAPOR

New York, NY (May 23, 2008) – BALCONY, The Business and Labor Coalition of New York, the American Cancer Society, Baruch College, and the New York American Association of Public Opinion Research (NYAAPOR) announced today that they are co-sponsoring a Forum on New York’s Public Opinion Trends in the critical issue of Health Care Coverage.

The forum will be held from 8:30 – 11:00 AM on Thursday, June 12, at Baruch College at 55 Lexington Avenue and East 24th Street, 14th Floor, Conference Room 14-220.

Admission to the event is free.

Continental breakfast will be served.

Read the Press Release, click here: Research Forum Press Release

For registration information, click here: Research Forum

State report on property tax relief delayed

by James T. Madore

ALBANY - Release of a much-anticipated report from the state commission studying how to ease the property tax burden was delayed yesterday until June 3, but officials said it was still likely to embrace a cap on tax hikes and linking bills to the ability to pay.

Nassau County Executive Thomas Suozzi, who is chairman of the Commission on Property Tax Relief, blamed the postponement on a “host of factors,” including Gov. David A. Paterson’s call for belt-tightening because of the recession, the crowded schedules of commissioners and Paterson, and the Memorial Day holiday.

SUNY endowment needed

Fund would help schools weather annual budget battle.

State University of New York presidents and finance officers have been tying themselves in knots the past month trying to figure out how to deal with Gov. Paterson’s demand that all state departments and agencies, including SUNY, cut spending by 3.5 percent.

As a consequence of the belt-tightening in Albany, more than $100 million in tuition and fees could be frozen. The schools reasonably argue that taking that much money out of the system will force major retrenchment at a critical time for SUNY and the upstate economy.

There’s no question of that. Too many of New York’s brightest kids leave the state for college, and too many of those never return to live and work. New York’s public higher-education system lags, in terms of quality, behind those in states such as California, Michigan and North Carolina.

It’s time to get to the top shelf. That’s where New York belongs.

But the answer isn’t exemption from a budget-cutting directive necessary to put the state on a decent financial footing.

The deficit is growing and it will do SUNY or any state entity no good if next year’s budget picture is markedly worse than this year’s. Now is the time to deal with out-of-whack spending.

What SUNY needs is what former Gov. Spitzer proposed before he left office: an endowment.

If schools had access to an income source outside the budget, it could deal with year-to-year cuts with less angst.

Spitzer’s idea of leasing lottery proceeds to seed a SUNY-wide endowment hasn’t yet flown — Paterson has ordered a study.

The results may say whether a lottery deal is the way to go. But building a SUNY fund or endowment designed to insulate the system somewhat from the vagaries of budget-cutting makes sense.

Otherwise, the angst over revenue and costs will continue to be an annual event.

The Working Families Party is calling for New York to return to a progressive taxation system.

By Tom Wanamaker
TIMES ALBANY CORRESPONDENT

At a Monday press conference in Albany, party leaders, tax advocates and a bipartisan group of almost three dozen members of the Assembly outlined a two-part strategy to ease the state’s increasingly heavy local property tax burden, while simultaneously maintaining the revenue stream supported by these taxes.