ALBANY, N.Y. — The New York Legislature’s “extraordinary session” to try to pass the late state budget was anything but extraordinary Wednesday night, with nine senators not showing up and no agreements on which to vote. An angry Gov. David Paterson warned he will keep forcing lawmakers back to Albany until the budget that was due April 1 is passed....
ALBANY, N.Y. — The New York Legislature’s “extraordinary session” to try to pass the late state budget was anything but extraordinary Wednesday night, with nine senators not showing up and no agreements on which to vote.
An angry Gov. David Paterson warned he will keep forcing lawmakers back to Albany until the budget that was due April 1 is passed. The next session is Thursday.
Two days of session costs nearly $100,000 in per diem expense checks of about $170 a day for lawmakers, and the price of travel, staff lodging, meals, utilities and more.
The Senate’s Democratic majority was lacking five members in the rare summer session forced by Paterson. As a result, the majority didn’t have the necessary 32 votes to pass the last remaining bill needed to finish the state budget. Instead, the majority held a 12-minute session without taking up any of the nine bills Paterson compelled them back to Albany to consider.
The Republican minority also lacked four members. But the GOP has voted in a bloc against the Democrats’ previous budget bills and was expected to deny the Democrat any votes to pass the remaining revenue bill.
“Everybody else had to change their plans,” said an angry Sen. Joseph Griffo, an Oneida County Republican in a chamber marked by empty leather chairs. “This behavior is unacceptable. Normal people can’t operate like this.”
Senate leader John Sampson, a Brooklyn Democrat, said he believes negotiations with the governor and Assembly Speaker Sheldon Silver, a Manhattan Democrat, will soon result in a deal to finish the budget.
The Democrat-led Assembly also met for a few minutes, without action. But the Assembly passed all its budget bills in June.
In Albany, the Legislature usually isn’t called into extraordinary session unless the governor and legislative leaders have reached an agreement in closed-door negotiations. But Paterson said he called the extraordinary session to force action on the budget, left undone when the Legislature broke before July 4.
Lawmakers grumbled to reporters that Paterson called the session to draw attention away from a special prosecutor’s report issued Wednesday. That report looked into Paterson’s role in contacting a woman who accused one of the governor’s aides of domestic violence. The report found Paterson shouldn’t face any charges in the case stemming from Oct. 31 that hobbled his administration, but criticized the Democrat and his staff for failing to immediately look into the case and for failing to fully cooperate with the probe as promised.
Paterson said he didn’t know until 11 a.m. Wednesday that the report was being released. “They have performed horribly,” Paterson said. “They are being brought back because the budget is not passed and I don’t care how many of them don’t show up, I’m going to keep bringing them back until it is.”
A Quinnipiac University poll released Wednesday found 75 percent of New Yorkers questioned consider state government dysfunctional. The poll questioned 1,165 registered voters July 20 through Monday and has a margin of error of plus or minus 2.9 percentage points.
Missing from the Senate session were Democrats Malcolm Smith, George Onorato and Joseph Addabbo Jr. all of Queens, Bill Perkins of Harlem, and Thomas Duane of Manhattan. Missing Republican senators were George Maziarz of Niagara County, William Larkin of Orange County, Vincent Leibell of Dutchess County, and George Winner of Elmira.