Report: New York Tax Revenues Down
More Than $1.275 Billion
 

 
State Comptroller Thomas P. DiNapoli recently announced that Wall Street Bonuses Fell 44% to $18 billion in 2008.  The Comptroller predicted that tax revenues for New York State would decrease by more than $1 billion and City revenue by more than $275 million as a result.

Last week, referring to these bonuses, President Barack Obama stated, "it is the height of irresponsibility ... it is shameful and part of what we are going to need is for the folks on Wall Street who are asking for help to show some restraint and show some discipline and show some sense of responsibility."

 

 

Midyear cuts threatened for SUNY and CUNY community colleges have been averted thanks to vigorous and persuasive advocacy by NYSUT and its higher education affiliates.

As state lawmakers prepared to act on a deficit reduction plan Tuesday, NYSUT legislative staff were reporting that the union's concerted push on behalf of community colleges has staved off Gov. David Paterson's proposal to impose 10 percent midyear cuts on community colleges.

 

NYSUT Executive Vice President Alan Lubin reported that the union's message - that community colleges are needed more than ever in an economic downturn - found a receptive response from lawmakers, who refused to go along with mid-year cuts of $11 million at SUNY and $4.2 million at CUNY. "Now our work will focus on the governor's proposed cuts for the 2009-10 budget," Lubin said.

  

 

by: James M. Odato and Irene Jay Liu

ALBANY -- In their first real test since taking control of state government, Democratic leaders passed budget bills Tuesday that will close the $1.6 billion budget deficit in the current fiscal year. At the same time, their actions raise concerns that closed-door dealmaking remains the status quo at the Capitol.

 

 

MTA Announces $30 Billion will be Needed Between 2010 and 2014 and Another $1.2 Billion to Offset the 2009 Shortfall.
 

 

Jerome Ringo, President, Apollo Alliance

"The new color of urban renewal is green," stated keynote speaker Jerome Ringo at a conference hosted by the New York City District Council of Carpenters and the Urban Agenda on Monday, February 2nd.  Mr. Ringo, president of the national Apollo Alliance, shared his thoughts on the new green-collar jobs plan and on how the pending economic stimulus will affect workers and job-seekers in New York City.  BALCONY, the Business and Labor Coalition of New York, has long backed the Apollo Alliance and the green programs that have emerged from the national energy self-sufficiency debate.  "Green collar jobs are the new highway to middle class stability, just as unionized blue and white collar jobs were right after World War II," said BALCONY director Lou Gordon.

Mr. Ringo, who worked in the Gulf Coast petrochemical industry for twenty years, primarily as a shop steward pressing issues of environmental justice and workplace safety, is the first African-American head of a national environmental organization.  He told of attending various events during the Obama Inauguration, where he heard Obama's loud and clear message, "Labor, Welcome back to Washington, D.C."

 

 

 

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 Click Here: Feb2009

 

e-mail broadcast produced by Kevin R. Weaver

$12 Billion Stimulus Plan Saves 435,000 Jobs and Strengthens
New York State Infrastructure

 

(click here for details)

 

 

 

 

BALCONY
Co-Chairman Alan Lubin
To Speak at National Higher Education Conference.