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State government will operate in a limited fashion through April 10, but Assemblyman Andrew Goodell, R-Jamestown, doesn't expect a state budget to be finished when the continuing budget resolution adopted Monday expires.
"Some of us think perhaps this week we might pass over a final budget even though this Friday would be a Good Friday," Goodell joked. "And sadly I suspect we'll be resurrecting this continuing resolution next Monday."
Goodell asked Assemblywoman Helene Weinstein, D-Brooklyn and chair of the Assembly Ways and Means Committee, several questions about the $592,372,000 temporary spending authorization, particularly if school districts could expect their regular payments. Weinstein said schools will not see regularly scheduled state aid payments until a budget is approved. Medicaid payments to hospitals will be paid because Medicaid is approved in two-year cycles, meaning last year's state budget appropriated this year's Medicaid spending, which Goodell said struck him as unconstitutional despite it being longstanding practice.
Legislative salaries won't be paid until the budget is approved, but Hochul's salary will continue to be paid. Goodell asked if the legislature could have withheld Hochul's salary or other statewide officers in the emergency budget bill, but Weinstein said there was no mechanism for that bill.
"In theory we could, but this is the bill we have before us and the bill we received the message on," Weinstein said in response to Goodell's question.
Goodell also questioned the need for a message of necessity since the April 1 deadline has long been established in state law. He said the emergency appropriation for April 1-10 could have been introduced in order to meet the three-day waiting period so legislators would have had a chance to deliberate on the bill.
"Couldn't this bill, it's just a continuing resolution, couldn't it have been introduced timely last week?" Goodell asked.
"We were hoping to have as the negotiations continue to be able to have a resolution and to have had a full final budget in place which would avoid the necessity of a continuing resolution," Weinstein responded.
The state Senate also approved the emergency budget legislation Monday, a decision with which Sen. George Borrello, R-Sunset Bay, disagreed.
"Over and over again, we see the dysfunction of one-party rule in New York state disrupt the critical functions of government and undermine New Yorkers' confidence in their leaders." Borrello said. "Nothing illustrates those failures more plainly than the inability to get a budget passed on time. While those in power regularly proclaim New York state to be a model for its peers, a corrupt, behind-closed-doors budget process and irresponsible, unsustainable $230 billion budget is hardly an example to follow. As always, the biggest losers in this scenario are state residents, whose hard-earned tax dollars finance this embarrassing fiasco and whose interests routinely come behind those of the radicals who exert outsized influence over Albany's agenda. I will continue to use my voice to advocate for the things New Yorkers want the most: a safer and more affordable state and greater transparency and accountability from those in public service."