On Thursday, April 27, Governor Kathy Hochul announced a tentative budget agreement between Republicans and Democrats in the New York State Assembly. The agreement would allow a budget to be adopted about one month past the normal deadline.
Hochul’s press release announced, “The total budget for FY 2024 is currently estimated at $229 billion, based on a preliminary assessment of the negotiated changes to the Executive proposal.” The details remain to be defined, a final bill printed, and then enacted by both chambers of the assembly.
Of interest to Cornell, authorized capital spending includes $2.4 billion for transformation, maintenance, and preservation projects at SUNY and CUNY campuses across the state. However, the legislature did not agree to a proposal by the Governor to raise tuition at public colleges and universities. For context, Cornell’s operating budget is $5.5 billion this year.
Contrary to earlier vows by Republicans to exclude any gas appliance ban from the budget, the agreement includes a ban on gas hookups of new homes by 2025 and for all new buildings by 2028. Cornell Professor Robert Howarth had wanted these dates moved up by a year.
The budget will also include $400 million in subsidies to low-income households struggling to pay utility bills and to help upgrade to more energy-efficient heating systems. It is unclear whether these provisions will preempt the more aggressive provisions in the Ithaca Green New Deal ordinance. Nor is it clear whether buildings with existing gas hookups can repair or replace their gas appliances as they wear out after the deadlines.
Additionally, the budget proposes greater powers for state agencies to close down illegal cannabis shops operating across the state. Nationwide, New Frontier Data estimates unlicensed sales in 2022 totalled $8.1 billion and legal sales totalled $5.4 billion. Hochul said they are unfairly competing with the emerging state-created legal cannabis industry, where just five retail outlets are currently allowed to sell the recreational drug. Legal dispensaries are reserved for owners whose family members had previously been convicted of cannabis-related offenses, making authorization of new stores very slow. Cannabis-related fines will increase.
