Wow, there's only nine more days left on the New York legislative calendar! It is already June....where'd the year go? Well, it was full of scandal, that's for sure...forget all the local NYC stuff, we had the Spitzer debacle, Diane Gordon's illegalities, trooper-gate and so on. So with all of this craziness, you'd think this might be a good year for campaign finance reform and opening up the business of Albany to those that send legislators up there. Wrong.
Of course David Paterson was supposed to champion our cause of reform. He was all for it as a State Senator. So what has he done? He issued a press release in lieu of reform groups showing up in Albany yesterday. If you were one that took the time to go up, down or across New York to work for a more open state government, how would you feel?
From The NY Times:
“These issues are not new to the governor; the role of governor may be, but he now needs to stand up and act like a governor,” said Dick Dadey, the executive director of Citizens Union, who lamented that the legislative session was coming to “an abysmal end” with “no real progress on reform.”
Blair Horner, the legislative director of the New York Public Interest Research Group, said of the governor, “It’s his job to get things done.
“The people of New York don’t send elected officials to Albany to hang out. They send them here to solve problems.”
He added, “If this were a report card, the report card would be an F.”
The news conference comes as the governor continues to struggle to pull his administration together and form his own agenda, leaving the legislative session to wind down with what critics have said are precious few accomplishments.
The order for state agencies to observe gay marriages consummated in other statesm but beyond that I can;t think of much he has done in his first year. Sure, he's new to the Governor's Mansion, but certainly not to Albany. Shame on Paterson for not doing more to clean up a state government that is known for its corruption and cronyism.
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