LANY Message on Gov. Cuomo's State of the State

Today the Governor gave his third State of the State address announcing that his agenda for the coming year represents his most ambitious yet.  Although the written background to the speech, New York Rising, includes some mention of health care issues, his spoken remarks focused on other areas.

In his speech, the Governor highlighted the following initiatives and proposals:

• A $1 billion initiative to produce or preserve 14,000 units of affordable housing;
• An increase in the State’s minimum wage to $8.75 per hour;
• The rebuilding of the economy of Upstate New York, including the expansion of casinos, tourism and “clean tech” development;
• Investment and upgrading of education, including expanding instructional time and teacher incentives;
• Bridging the gap between education and technology to create “academic commercialization”;
• A “woman’s equality act”;
• Stricter gun control laws directed towards limiting the risk from high capacity assault rifles;
• Worker’s compensation and unemployment insurance reform; and
• Implementation of a cabinet level “energy czar” and establishment of a “green bank” for energy investment.

Ongoing issues with Hurricane Sandy relief, which included strong comments regarding the current lack of federal relief, also featured prominently in the speech with a promise to “build back better”.  Also regarding Sandy, the Governor committed to taking the lessons learned and improving the State’s ability to respond to future emergencies.  In his written materials, the Governor also discussed the need to improve the resiliency of the health care infrastructure.

As in past years, economic development also featured prominently in the Governor’s remarks.  As noted, the challenge of bringing economic development to Upstate was at the core of his presentation and included additional initiatives such as innovation hot spots, an innovation capital venture fund, and workforce preparation.

Among health care issues in the New York Rising background material, the Governor focused on reforming local public health activities, including: administrative relief to counties, modernizing local programs, incentivizing good performance, and creating fiscal predictability.  He also spelled out a plan to improve hospital quality and safety by addressing the problem of nosocomial infection.  The plan also included an initiative to improve hospital pediatric care.

While the speech and the background materials do not specifically address any long-term or managed care issues, it is important to remember that these issues may still come up in the Governor’s formal budget presentation.

On the legislative side, it is of note that Rochester Democrat Joseph Morelle was officially introduced as the new Assembly Majority Leader.  In the introductions of Long Island Republican Senator Dean Skelos and NYC Democratic Senator Jeffrey Klein it became official that they will be instituting a daily Senate Majority Leader rotation, with Binghamton Republican Tom Libous and Syracuse Democrat David Valesky as their deputies.  NYC Democrat Sheldon Silver has been re-elected as Assembly Speaker.

For questions or comments please contact me, Ami Schnauber (aschnauber@leadingageny.org) or Alyssa Lovelace (alovelace@leadingageny.org).