1 week Ago By Post Editorial Board
Gov. Kathy Hochul needs to stick to her guns for as long as it takes to get her modest reforms locked in on involuntary commitment and discovery law — no matter how late the state budget winds up. No harm’s being done, as stopgap bills keep state government going at previous spending levels, and it’s ridiculous that lefty legislators are refusing to accept fixes that voters overwhelmingly back.
Again, she’s just trying to make these laws a bit less toxic: New York’s discovery rules will still be easily the most pro-defense in the nation; it still won’t be easy to get the seriously mentally ill off the streets and into psych hospitals. Yet the Legislature keeps coming back with “compromise” offers that fundamentally reject her tweaks. Oh, and legislators’ noses are out of joint because their paychecks get withheld during the impasse.
Tellingly, Assembly Speaker Carl Heastie has introduced a bill that would let lawmakers’ paychecks continue if they miss the April 1 deadline for a budget but the holdup centers on non-fiscal issues. Heastie now says the budget’s the wrong time to address that stuff, yet back in 2019 he was OK with passing the disastrous no-bail and discovery “reforms” in that year’s budget. Now state Senate No.
2 Michael Gianaris cites “frustration” over Hochul’s “continued insistence” on inserting “non-budgetary policy into this budget conversation,” but he and his prog pals would resist whenever the gov pushed these vital public-safety changes. They just want to lock in the $252 billion spending plan — with yet more tax hikes — before it becomes obvious it’s not truly balanced . The governor clearly has the vast majority of New Yorkers on her side; the longer the standoff goes, the more the public will realize how little the Legislature’s leaders want voters paying any attention.
Don’t bend, governor: Hold out to Labor Day if you need to, or even Christmas..
