(The Center Square) — Good government groups are blasting New York’s Democratic-controlled New York Legislature for its least productive session in years and for pushing through hundreds of special interest bills without public hearings.
The state Assembly and Senate wrapped up its annual session last week after frantically pushing through a slew of bills, but the New York Public Interest Group, or NYPIRG, said the more than month-late budget and a logjam of unfinished legislation made it one of the least productive gatherings in years.
A NYPIRG analysis found the Senate and Assembly approved 759 bills this session, more than 100 less than last year’s legislative session.
That’s also the lowest number of bills approved by the legislature since Democrats took control of it in 2019, aside from a pause in lawmaking during the COVID-19 pandemic, according to NYPIRG. In 2022, for example, lawmakers passed more than 1,000 bills.
“Of course, the Legislature could have stayed beyond the scheduled end of the session, but that would have cut into campaign time,” NYPIRG said. “With many legislators facing primaries at the end of the month, few wanted to hang around and miss time on the campaign trail.”
Tardy budgets have become common practice in Albany, but NYPIRG said this year’s spending package, which was due April 1st, was so late that it impacted the Legislature’s ability to deliberate over non-budget-related legislation.
“If the budget had been on time, according to the Legislature’s calendar, lawmakers would have had two months to tackle non-budget issues,” the group said. “This year, the Legislature had one week.”
The group also criticized Hochul, who is also seeking reelection in November, for using her executive budget powers “to get what she wants” saying the practice adds to a logjam of unfinished business and “squeezes out solutions to problems that could have been addressed.”
“New Yorkers will never know whether if state lawmakers had more time they would have addressed the issues mentioned, or other important unaddressed legislation,” the report’s authors wrote. “When common-sense legislation stalls year-after-year, the explanation that ‘the clock ran out’ gets stale.”
Meanwhile, in the rush to push through bills in the final weeks of the session lawmakers also held fewer public hearings to vet proposals, according to the group Reinvent Albany, which called the most recent session “dismal.”
“For example, New York’s Senate and Assembly just voted for a resolution to amend the State Constitution to allow the extreme gerrymandering of state legislative districts,” the group said Tuesday in a statement. “Would they have passed the resolution after a public hearing where it was assailed by concerned citizens and then editorial boards?
By contrast, California, a much larger state, passes more bills every year and requires that all bills be considered at a public hearing before passage, and around 90% ultimately are, Reinvent Albany noted.
“Public hearings may seem arcane, but shining a bright light on proposed legislation is immensely helpful to the public interest,” the group said. “New York’s democracy is stagnating under the weight of big dog special interests maximizing their gains and crushing attempts to make our state government more responsive, transparent, and accountable to the broader public.”
