Council Speaker Christine Quinn may have negotiated a more business-friendly paid sick day bill than advocates wanted, but Mayor Michael Bloomberg is not satisfied. Indeed, in a statement released earlier this morning, Mr. Bloomberg castigated the legislation’s latest iteration as “short-sighted economic policy” and declared his intention to veto it. Read More
With great fanfare and ceremony earlier today, Mayor Michael Bloomberg vetoed the City Council’s prevailing wage bill, which would have mandated higher wages for buildings that receive tax breaks from the city. His passionate speech before vetoing the bill even referenced the World Trade Center attacks in the opening sentence in order to discuss the city’s economic history over the past decade.
Nevertheless, as can be expected when the mayor takes such a firm step against progressive legislation, unions and ambitious elected officials have sent out a barrage of statements reacting to the move, which The Politicker has assembled below.
Long story short: They would like the City Council to override Mr. Bloomberg’s veto, which is almost sure to happen as Council Speaker Christine Quinn has vowed to do so. Read More
Last night, the State Legislature released a new batch of gerrymandered legislative lines and a constitutional amendment to reform the process in the future, and, further revealing his intentions this morning, Governor Andrew Cuomo trashed the alternative to him signing the Legislature’s proposal, the courts intervening and drawing their own map.
(Mr. Cuomo had previously vowed to send the maps to the courts unless an independent commission drew them.)
“I’ll tell you this, for those people who are arguing, ‘Well, the best thing we can do is let the courts draw the lines.’ We saw what happened when the court draws the lines, we have the congressional lines,” he said on Fred Dicker’s radio show today, referring to the court releasing its first draft of the congressional map. Read More
