ALBANY—Democrats in the State Senate are acknowledging (at least temporary) rejection in their offer of three committee chairmanships to Republicans.
“We will not have a formal announcement this week but we will be making an announcement shortly about one of our proposals to create a more bi-partisan chamber,” said Austin Shafran, a Democratic spokesman. Read More
ALBANY—Dean Skelos, the Republican leader in the State Senate, is putting the brakes on a Democratic proposal to give members of his conference committee chairmanships.
“Senator [John] Sampson’s proposal to appoint new chairs should be considered along with these other recommendations, by the bipartisan committee, before any action is taken,” Skelos said in a Read More
ALBANY—John Sampson and Dean Skelos, the leaders of their party’s respective conferences in the State Senate, met this morning to discuss the prospect of Republicans taking over the chairmanship of several committees, a Democratic spokesman said.
“Because the discussions are still ongoing, I cannot confirm the members of the committees,” said Austin Shafran, the spokesman, Read More
ALBANY—Forget noon–there’s no bill codifying the supposed deal to bridge $2.8 billion of deficit.
“We have not seen that bill,” Senate Republican Leader Dean Skelos just said on WGDJ. He has scheduled a conference of his members at 10:30 to review a bill he was told existed. The session was scheduled for noon.
ALBANY—David Paterson has succeeded in uniting the State Senate.
“As I said, Leader Sampson and I have been working very well together, we will continue to do that,” Republican Senate Leader Dean Skelos said in a joint scrum with Democratic Senate Leader John Sampson on the chamber floor. “We just need the governor to Read More
ALBANY—Dean Skelos, the Senate Republican leader, just suggested that David Paterson doesn’t really want to act on something that would plug the state’s budget deficit.
“We need the governor to stop the hysterics, to stop looking at his poll numbers,” Skelos told Fred Dicker on WGDJ. “I think, quite frankly, he hopes that Moody’s Read More
ALBANY—It’s official — they’re gone.
The Assembly just recessed until Monday at 2 p.m. State Senators did not bother to gavel into session today; at least half a dozen of the members of the Democratic majority left last night. The Senate is expected to return to session Monday afternoon.
Republicans in both chambers have Read More
ALBANY—Is this a shift toward Senator Giuliani?
Ed Cox, the Republican State Committee chairman, has suggested as much. He won the chairmanship over Henry Wojtaszek, who was backed by Giuliani and his surrogates Jake Menges and Tony Carbonetti. (Menges told Liz Benjamin that a Times report that Giuliani will not Read More
ALBANY—State Senator Ruben Diaz Sr. is “sorry” he missed a vote on Leandra’s Law, which cracks down on people who drive drunk with kids in their car, but he has other business to attend to.
“I am distributing turkeys to my seniors in the Bronx,” Diaz told me by phone. He said he’s distributing Read More
ALBANY—It seems the State Senate Democrats are coalescing around a deficit reduction proposal–the question is whether it will be acceptable to everyone else.
“I said last night we’re only $200 million apart on a $3.2 billion DRP,” State Senator Liz Krueger said this morning. We’ve gone back in this morning with a number of Read More
