From WXXI news.

This is connections.

I'm Evan Dawson.

This is the second in our series of conversations with state lawmakers discussing the recently passed New York state budget.

That budget passed near the end of May, the latest budget in nearly 20 years.

It's a $269 billion budget plan.

And there were contentious issues that in some ways help things up throughout the spring.

In the end, Governor Hochul won some reforms to auto insurance.

She was able to push back some of the climate targets and environmental goals, set previous years.

Much to the chagrin of some in her party.

And in fact, there's been some conversation that we've had with lawmakers already, and there's a lot of frustration and a lot of sides about the process that led to a late budget and how things got done.

It didn't leave a lot of time for the actual session of policy and legislating.

So there's a lot to discuss with Assembly member Andrea Bailey, who is from district number 133, legislating from the minority, but still always has a lot to say and I think high hopes for a better process.

We'll talk about that.

Nice to see you back here.

Thank you very much.

Evan.

Yes.

High hopes.

High, high hopes.

But but, yes, it this budget process, I think, was frustrating for everybody involved.

Whether you were in the minority or the majority, I definitely think, you know, a 57 day late budget, the latest, as you mentioned, and almost 20 years, I think it actually ends up being like 16 years that it was the latest budget.

And, you know, then we we also had the holiday in there.

We had Memorial Day.

So we were out of session obviously for the holiday.

And then we came back and we tried to jam pack so much into the last seven days of session.

So absolutely, it was very frustrating.

Yeah.

I talked to your colleague, a Democrat, Jen Lunsford, earlier this week, and she said, look, a late budget by a week, okay?

A late budget by a few days.

But when you're this late, it just leaves almost no time before the end of session to, to get things done, to attack meaningful ideas and to actually have the debate and discussion.

And so you, in her words, you end up doing smaller things because the big things are hard to get done at all or even addressed here.

Do you agree with that?

Absolutely.

I would agree with that.

And and you know, I definitely sense that frustration as you walk the halls of the Capitol or the Legislative Office building.

You know, just the the chatter that goes on.

That definitely was was the sense this year and the frustration.

So, one of the things I asked her in that in response to that is, well, what what do you do about this?

Because you can't go through this again next year.

I understand again, budgets are always quote unquote laid around here, but this is really, really late.

And this is really, really difficult.

We'll talk in a moment with you about some of the specific items, that maybe get shelved or not even addressed.

But, you know, I said, well, what do you do about that?

And she said, look, she thinks that there has been an understanding in the governor's office that this can't be this late again.

And if this happens again in a year, there's going to be a mechanism of some kind put in place to take some of either the power to change the power dynamic or to to make this happen earlier.

Do you think anything could happen?

I have hope that something could happen, to be quite honest with you.

I'm a firm believer that I don't think we should be legislating in the budget process coming from local government, coming from the private sector.

And, you know, coming from the county government, when you're looking at a budget, you're not legislating.

You're looking at your your expenses, and you're looking at your revenue streams and making sure that fiscally, you are being responsible for those, whether it be in the private business, you know, for for the company in which you are working for and in the public sector, it's for the the taxpayers.

I think this is a really important point, and I don't want to I want you to elaborate a little bit more.

So when you say that we we shouldn't be legislating through a budget, you know, sometimes you hear and I've heard this in the Monroe County Legislature, the idea that, well, you know, budgets are statements of priorities.

So to some degree, a budget is a statement of legislative priority.

But what's the distinction for you?

What's an example of legislating through the budget that you don't like.

So I mean, I think this budget cycle is a great example of that.

We weren't even talking the financial pieces of this budget until the very last few days.

We didn't know what number we were looking at.

There was, you know, there could be projections out there during the budget hearings.

Different conversations are being taken place.

You know, you're you're hearing different things.

But as far as the final numbers, you don't know what you're looking at in in this year, we started approving budget bills and still did not know what the how.

Can we do that?

That's a great question.

Therefore, I was not in favor of the bills that were brought forward based on that.

The other thing that's a bit concerning is we left Albany and the budget was the $268 billion.

And then a couple weeks later, the director of the Office of Budget came out and said with the federal government, approving things.

So there was an additional $9 in revenue.

So we're looking at a $277 billion budget, this year, which is astronomical when you look at that's 23 billion more than last year.

So we left Albany thinking it was one number, when in all actuality, it becomes another number.

Is there a hard cap in your mind that says, look, we've got hard decisions to make, but we should not be spending over X?

I think what it is, is we have to take a look at how are we spending those money, those funds.

I don't know if there's, a specific dollar amount that it's, it's X over this, but when you look at the budget, that we just passed, I believe we are looking at spending is projected to continue to grow at 7%, but revenues are pretty flat at about 1%.

That's not sustainable.

When you look at the eight year budget gap, we're looking at a $31 billion budget gap.

So what we are doing is not going to work in the future.

There were a few different pieces this year where they were specific bailouts for, cities in local governments based on shoring up their budget.

My concern is, how do those, municipalities balance the budget come next year or the year after?

Because the state can't continue to just give out that funding when when there are things that we have to be taking a look at at the state level.

So part of what you're talking about, I think, is a what we would call one shots a one time.

So a tobacco settlement fund years ago in Monroe County, for example, that money comes in one time and you can't then create new spending plans, because the next year that the mechanism to pay for that is gone.

So some of your colleagues on the Democratic side would say, okay, sure.

So we we've we should have had taxes on the richest.

There are other ways to improve or increase revenues.

I'm guessing you would say don't increase the revenues.

Cut the spending.

Is that where you are?

I would I would be the individual that says we need to take a hard look at the spending and and where that is going.

As far as the revenue piece of things, looking at true revenues when I was in local government and, you know, the county specifically, it was kind of what can we do from a service standpoint to help generate the revenues?

A big portion of the revenues that we saw this year, in the state budget came off of, out of the stock market because there were good trends.

And they performed, they outpaced what was being projected.

So continuing to make smart investments can help generate revenue.

So I wouldn't necessarily say don't go after revenue.

It's what type of revenue are we doing and what is the return on investment when you do go after that revenue?

And my, my concern with, with putting additional taxes on one of the already most tax states in the country is we are going to continue to see outmigration.

So I need to amend my notes.

Is what you're telling me?

It's the $277 billion budget?

Yes.

That is that is what the number is.

Yes.

Okay.

Are there items that you look at within that 277 billion.

And you say, there's no way we should be spending this or that?

Well, I mean, there's there's a few different pieces.

One of the big hang ups, in the budget this year came out of some of the, pullbacks in some of the, for the, the CLC for, you know, the Climate Initiative piece.

And then we infused $1 billion in there.

And that was kind of the the negotiating mechanism to.

Make good, what you're talking about $1 billion for renewable energy in the future.

And it looked like a, hey, we're going to put some of these goals off, or we're going to we're going to kind of pull back a little.

And some, especially in the political left, are not going to like it.

So here's $1 billion for renewables.

That's, that's.

That's exactly what it looks like.

Okay.

And from where I sit, that's exactly what it looks like.

And if we are pulling it back because we know we can't meet that standard, we were in the middle of, you know, the lawsuit was going on that basically said you either have to meet the criteria or legislatively something has to be done.

So legislatively, something was done.

And we also are in an affordability crisis.

And I think we all can look at, our energy and some of the pieces that we have taken to to move forward, in going all electric has not been more affordable.

It has been less affordable for you.

And I, for the most part, across the state.

The governor seemed to agree with that.

She's from a different party.

But do you think that you and the governor are on the same place on this?

I, I haven't talked to the governor.

I would never say I I'm on the same place with the governor.

I think this is a drum that I've been beating since day one, when I got into the legislature, is that some of these mandates that are unfunded or, you know, as we take energy sources offline and we're looking at renewable energy, that it's not keeping up with what we have removed from the grid.

We look at demand.

Demand continues to increase.

And when you look at what renewable energy right now is contributing to the grid, it's not sustainable.

You know, we import so much electric.

We've I think we've discussed this before.

You know, and right now in the summer, we often think of our heating bills.

And, you know, the increase that we saw February, March with, with our heating, bills in our electric bills that were coming in.

But the summer really is when we start cranking.

And, I mean, you have individuals who are now putting pool filters on online, air conditioners are running, you know, and the heat that we've had this year, you know, air conditioners are running pretty much 24 seven.

So personally, I've always seen an increase in our summer electric bill versus our winter electric bill.

And and I am fearful, fearful of what is going to happen over the next couple of months as folks get their, utility bills in the mail.

Does the state have a role to play in, in reducing energy costs for the average New Yorker?

I believe we do.

I mean, if you stop and look at, our.

Oh, how electric rates are implemented, we have the PSC.

That is a hand appointed commission.

So there are things already in place that we could be doing to, to help minimize some of some of the, the crunch that folks are feeling.

And what we saw in the budget with the, The, the rebates that are going to go out to ratepayers to the tune of $200, that's not going to make the difference.

When you look at what that some of the taxes that we're paying on our utility bills, if we could carve those out to show individuals what we're paying on our utility bills today for the renewable energy or the CPA initiatives, I think it would be very eye opening for folks.

And you and I are paying that as the ratepayer.

So we're going to cover a lot this hour.

And I want to mention to the audience here, if you want to weigh in with questions, comments, you can do that.

It's 84429528442958255263 WXXI.

If you call from Rochester 2639994, you can email the program.

As always, it's connections at Sorg.

If you're on the YouTube channel, you can watch us there and join the chat there and we'll welcome your comments as well.

My guest this hour is Assembly Member Andrea Bailey from district number 133.

Remind the audience the geographic coverage of your district.

Absolutely.

So it covers all of Livingston County.

There are three towns in Wyoming County, one town in Monroe County, nine in Ontario County, and six down in Steuben County.

And so one of the one of the debates about energy is the energy usage of data centers.

Well, this is actually a kind of a new piece of a newer piece of news because now that the budget is the end of May, we'll get back to the budget in a second.

But the governor has been pretty vocal in defending the idea that New York State should ban or put a moratorium on data centers, new data centers.

And she's on social media this morning defending New York's plan to put that moratorium on data centers.

Where were you on that?

So there was a bill that came forward on, moratorium.

And it was an omnibus bill when you actually break it down.

I was not in favor of it for for many reasons.

And many of them were based on some of the criteria that were required.

If data centers were to come in.

And this is going to kind of go back to the energy piece of it and it was requiring on a on a sliding scale, if data centers came in for utilization of renewable energies, and I think it started out at 30% and then went up to 90%, if I'm not mistaken, and there and there were date ranges that were in there.

That is truly concerning to me.

And, and part of the reason why and I know we've had this conversation, when you look at some of the industrialized solar projects that we have in our area right now, one very large one that is owned by an investment company of over 3000 acres that they own, was just bought out by another investment company in in the press release for that investment.

For that acquisition indicated that it was that it would help because looking to forward forward initiatives i.e.

renewable energy, AI data centers in water and where this project is located, I have true concern that that's exactly what's going to come in.

We've already had some concerns with with, you know, hitting some of our water ways in that project.

And I just, I think it's a recipe for disaster.

That we say that we're going to put a moratorium on the data centers so we can collect the information, but then we are incentivizing in other avenues if they do come in.

And that's how I felt with that, that bill that came forward.

Okay.

If we had no requirements that x amount, X percentage would be renewable.

If those were gone, would you oppose or support data centers?

So I guess what I mean, at the end of the day, this is what I say to everybody.

If we want to look at and study the impacts of data centers in areas.

And I think that that is what the true concern is right now, I would support that every local municipality right now has the ability to put a moratorium on.

So by doing it via an executive order, I don't believe is the proper way of doing that.

Let more home rule.

Absolutely.

Each local municipality should be able to take that because they can do that right now.

The governor in her, press conference yesterday in in I believe it was back in February, coming out of her state of the state, she had already charged the PSC with coming up with investigating and looking into data centers in energy usage and so on and so forth.

And I it is a concern, but I also look at it and I challenge it back in the sense that.

There are data centers right now all around us at a smaller scale.

If we are going to indicate that we are close for business in New York State for this, then I would suggest that everybody put their cell phone, their computers, all of that off to the side, because at the end of the day, we are we are gathering so much data.

I mean, when you stop and look at, you know, folks throw into ChatGPT constantly, now even Google has an AI, you know, piece of it.

So what does all of that mean?

So I am all for looking at the impacts locally, without a doubt.

I think that that's very important.

And I think the individuals in each community should have a say in that.

And that goes back to how I feel about renewable energy projects as well, where they have been left out of the equation.

And the governor did say yesterday, you know, always put the needs of the local residents first.

Full stop.

I wish we had that same mindset prior to creating or as or, you know, coming in from the renewable energy piece of things.

So do you expect that there would be some communities that say no data centers and some who would say, sure, thumbs up.

I absolutely think that there would be.

Yes.

And that to you, that makes more sense than a blanket moratorium or a blanket policy.

I think that that makes more sense while we're gathering the data.

I mean, the no pun intended.

No.

Sure.

We're getting more information about.

How badly I think that we need more information.

And when you stop and look at technology and how technology has grown so fast, you know, even a few years ago, when we were first starting about talking about renewable energies, you know, there were many smaller municipalities that did not have the wherewithal to be able to get the information that they needed.

And I don't want to see, you know, folks be taken advantage of either.

So, you know, obviously the governor's moratorium, it'll be interesting to see what happens with the legislation that did pass that was looking at a 20 megawatt as being, the threshold the governor's, moratorium is a 50 when you're looking at a size of the data center.

So, I really feel it needs to go back to the local.

The local.

Level.

Yeah.

And back in 2014, when there was the conversation about fracking, I thought, I'm always wrong about politics.

Let's stipulate that.

Let's also stipulate I don't know much about AI and data centers.

And I'm probably like a lot of folks who it's hard to really kind of gauge the possible impact.

I, I would like to read more about I'd like to see more, but I really did think in 2014 with what governor then Cuomo was going to do was say, we're not going to ban fracking and we're not going to greenlight fracking, we're going to allow for home rule, and we're going to let communities decide if they want this.

I thought that was sort of going to be the politically wise thing to do.

And, he didn't do that.

They went with a full ban.

And, you know, there was some political risk.

And really, the governor governing Democrats in Albany are not very popular in the Southern Tier and in rural counties.

You know, this.

But he became even less so than in some of those communities.

The difference this time is that AI is not very popular.

And when you look at polling, how Americans feel about especially younger Americans who are worried about their jobs and futures, and so I don't know the political calculation here, I really don't it's interesting to me that you say you think there are some communities who would say, yeah, bring bring a data center or do it, and some would say no.

But to you, it seems like to me at least you're saying the principles the same allow for that local decision making.

Don't make it in Albany fair.

Absolutely.

Okay.

Do you do you have any thoughts about why AI is so unpopular right now?

I think it's the unknown.

And, you know, I have traveled and, you know, toured various locations and I looked at FCC, you know, they have a whole area, you know, about AI now educating and stuff in and what they're doing is phenomenal.

You know, kind of what does that look like?

How can it be used for the good?

You know, because obviously it could be used poorly as well.

I think there is a there is a huge, concern from the workforce perspective.

You know, it wasn't AI, but, you know, when you look at self checkouts, you know, when self checkouts first came out, every time you have a self checkout, that's one less individual who is there interacting on a personal level with you when you're checking out at a store, from the business end, I understand why folks do that, but at the end of the day, it's also where we're eroding our workforce, and we have to be very cautious on that.

I just read something yesterday.

I don't know enough about it, but one of the schools, in the Southern Tier is going to have a robot teacher.

Excuse me?

I fell over dead for a second.

Did you say a robot teacher?

Yes.

Okay.

I read it last night.

So I don't know much about it.

I can't I can't speak to it when I read that.

That was extremely concerning.

Yeah, I agree, you know, I understand the data that a robot might be able to to maintain, but it's not the personal contact that I think our youth need.

My best teachers and your best teachers, you remember because of who they were as people?

Absolutely.

Yeah, absolutely.

So I absolutely agree that that I, I'll be honest with you.

I don't know enough about it myself.

I have not been to, you know, Virginia or, you know, some of the states that have larger data centers to actually go in here.

That's something that I, I want to go and experience.

So then I can, I can better, speak to it.

And that's why I say understanding in, in doing the, the studies, I think is a good thing.

Just how we go about that and what that means for the long term.

I have concerns.

When you hear from constituents, is I on the list of things that people are getting in touch with you about?

It's not I it's the data center data.

Yeah.

Okay.

Yeah.

And in general, what are people saying.

They are it's the unknown and they are not in favor of of the data centers.

Okay.

And is there an issue that you hear the most about from your constituents?

Affordability, in general is probably, the biggest thing that that I hear on, you know, that's been consistent.

I mean, it kind of, you know, we all will have, you know, an uptick.

It might be unemployment or, you know what I mean, needing help getting through to the unemployment office at the state or something.

But consistently it's folks with, affordability and and where are we going?

Because if it continues on this trajectory, they will not be able to stay in the state.

So so two questions on affordability.

The first, on energy.

We talked about energy.

And obviously the reason gas prices are very high is not because of any state policy right now.

Well, look, different states have different policies that relate to gas prices.

But in general, everyone is seeing higher gas prices because of all that we've learned about the Strait of Hormuz and the war in Iran, etc.. But does that at all give you any pause?

Does that make you say, look, we're pretty reliant on those fossil fuels.

The more we get away from fossil fuels, the better.

Not necessarily.

Now, I believe in the all of the above approach.

And, you know, we we can talk about gas prices for a quick second.

It's amazing when you just travel across the state, the difference in gas prices, it can be anywhere from 20 to $0.30 less.

And when you always thought you wanted to fill up your gas tank before you got on the New York State Thruway because the New York State Thruway always had the highest gas price.

Well, I was just in Albany.

I went down on Sunday night and I paid $3.99.

When I come back home, it is $4.29.

So, The way in which it's, it's purchased and the way in which it's marketed, I mean, as soon as you hear that a barrel has gone up, you see the, the, the ticker on the gas tanks automatically go up.

But then when you hear that that's come back down, we don't see the same, downward trend when it comes to gas prices.

So that would be my concern is, is really at the end of the day, digging into what's the what's the true meaning behind all of that.

And I've had folks in the Southern Tier, you know, say, hey, I can drive up, you know, to another town and it's $0.20 less.

Why is that, Andrea?

Some of it has to do with supply and demand.

Some of it has to do with, obviously, the the rate in which it's being purchased, if it's a smaller individual, location versus a larger one when it comes to sourcing pricing.

But those would be some of my concerns.

Okay.

And then when I, before I grab some phone calls, because the phones are ringing now, when it comes to affordability, the governor said this year that the top thing she wanted to do with this budget to address affordability is related to auto insurance.

And so that became a bit of a contentious debate about, you know, where what are the insurance industry want?

What did lawyers want?

And the governor ultimately came out pretty successful with this.

There are some changes to what we describe in accidents as essentially serious injuries and what can be covered, but also it's about the percentage of fault.

So in the past, if you and I are both driving, we get an accident and and you're deemed 60% at fault and I'm 40% at fault.

You know, we both can get you're going to get less, I'm going to get more.

But we're both going to get some support.

Now, if you're 51% at fault and then 49% at fault, you get nothing because you can't.

You're more to blame for the accident.

The governor says that should bring rates down, etc.

she's gotten a lot of pushback from people in the industry, trial lawyers, etc.

she's pointing to other states that do things differently.

Where were you on this?

And do you tell your constituents, hey, this is going to be about affordability.

Is this a real affordability issue?

I do not see this budget addressed the affordability issue on any measure.

When you come out with a $277 billion budget, we're not addressing affordability.

At the end of the day, is is kind of where I look at it.

We're talking 23 billion more than it was last year.

So as far as the insurance thing, it's quite funny you say that because I have pictures.

It became the battle of the billboard trucks out on State Street in front of my office building, and I would look out every day to see, you know, is it the folks in favor of the changes, or is it the folks who want to counter those changes?

What was change there?

In my mind, we are not going to see a huge reduction in our, insurance premiums.

And if it does lead to a reduction in our insurance premiums, it's going to be years down the road when when you're looking at it because this it's all tied to pretty much cases that go through the court or, you know, payouts from that standpoint.

So there's nothing immediate there.

You know, I really look at some of the other laws that we have on the books that have increased individuals car premiums.

And when you look at that, you know, we can we can sit here and talk about, you know, some of the, the, the choirboys come to mind, you know, where we were going out and we were stealing cars and trashing them.

I had a friend who had a vehicle twice.

The first time the insurance company repaired it.

The second time they had to total it.

So what happens to their insurance premium?

It goes up.

So I think there are other mechanisms that we could, address the increase in our insurance premiums.

And I don't think we're going to see this.

It's not going to be an immediate fix.

And I think that individuals were hoping that whatever came out of the insurance conversation, it was going to be an immediate fix in nothing that I see is going to lead to.

That, to be clear, do you think I want to make sure I heard this correctly, though?

There are state laws that lead our insurance premiums to go up that you'd like changed.

I think one specifically would be raise the Age, to be honest with you.

When you look at when all of those, thefts were happening with, with certain vehicles were being stolen, it was, the the individual was at a certain age, those cases go through our family court, and then they were returned back out, you know, to their to their family and stuff.

There were really no they weren't held accountable, I guess.

And it was constantly, you know, victimizing, residents.

The insurance companies, in some cases, insurance companies wouldn't write certain types of vehicles in certain zip codes, you know, for various reasons.

So I think that it's, it's there is no one fix.

I think, you know, I fly at the 30,000ft range.

You got to get through the clouds.

Once you get through the clouds, you can kind of see what's happening.

And I think we have to if we really want to look at insurance premiums, we have to look at things in totality.

It can't be picking and choosing one thing over another.

All right.

After we take this long break, Jack, we'll take your phone call.

I've got some emails to share for some member.

Andrea Bailey from district number 133.

We are talking about the recently passed state budget nearly two months late.

But it is done and we'll come back with your feedback next.

Coming up in our second hour, it's the connection summer sessions, and I've chosen some of my favorite interviews of the last decade for this week and this day.

It's a conversation with Vladimir Kara-Murza, a Russian dissident who conceivably could be the next president or leader of Russia in a post Putin era.

He was imprisoned by Putin for criticizing the war in Ukraine, but released as part of a prisoner swap.

And he joined us a year ago.

That conversation next hour.

Support for your public radio station comes from our members and from Mary Carolla Center, proud supporter of connections with Evan Dawson, believing an informed and engaged community is a connected one.

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This is connections.

I'm Evan Dawson now Greece is not in your district.

It is not.

But Jack is a regular and he's got a question for you and he is in Greece.

Hey Jack, go ahead.

Thanks, Evan.

I Andrej, I was Devin said you're not my representative.

I get that, but still I look at all our elected officials, state level or even at the national level, to be trying to do the right thing for everybody, not just for their party.

But I hear a lot of today is my it's my party first, and then it's that it's the common good and, and and I see that more and more.

And I hear some of that in your comments, quite honestly.

So but let me I want to touch on.

The hold on Jack.

Yeah.

What's the example where, where what have you heard from the assembly.

The idea of, renewable energy?

Well, that's clearly a conservative bet.

So that type of thing versus, you know, the the my point of view is, we got to do something.

I expected representatives to work together to address both.

That is senators I it's consuming.

When you look at the amount of energy those things are going to consume, it's crazy.

And now and on the Democratic side, I hate them legislating.

Everything's got to be electric.

So I expect a representative you guys should work together to come up with a solution.

I'm an engineer.

We worked for solving problems.

I expect my representatives to work on the political issues for all of us.

So we'll find a way to work together.

Don't just blame the other side.

I get that from both sides.

And I'm quite honestly, I'm tired of it.

I so is that.

Does that answer your question, Evan?

Well, I'm.

I will let the assembly member respond in a moment.

Is there anything else you want to add before we let you go?

Oh, yeah.

Yeah.

My taxes.

I pay over $13,000 a year property tax.

I don't live in a mansion.

When I tell this to my relatives of other states, they just laugh at me and I look at it.

A lot of my property taxes are driven by the state well, and I don't even understand some of the minutia around how we're paying for the schools in our state.

But my my school taxes are more than anything.

The other thing I'm looking at is the, the gun legislation budget, even recently, you had on representatives in the city of Rochester talking about the illegal guns that are pouring into us, into our into people's hands that shouldn't have guns.

Yeah.

I expect my state legislators to do something at the advocate at the national level to do something about these other states that are allowing these guns to pour in.

I would hope both Democrats and Republicans at every level come up for the common good.

And I see the decline in our state's population.

And, I see our tax base over my lifetime of the industrial tax base has declined dramatically.

Places like Kodak.

And, well, have you saw the companies that picked up a lot of our bills, but now we're left to people like me paying for that.

Yeah.

I mean, 65,000 people worked at Kodak in the 1980s, Jack.

And almost nothing left, and I understand that.

So there's a couple things there.

First of all, I do suspect Assembly Member Bailey will agree with you about your property tax bill.

Absolutely.

You want to start with that one there.

What would you say to him about that?

Yeah.

So I mean, I, I completely agree with you.

And there are many mandates and you know, I call them unfunded mandates that come out of the state that that have impact on your property taxes.

You know, there's different services that the county must, provide.

You know, obviously, that's going to, to tie into your your property taxes there.

And when you look at it, the bulk of that is services that the state is telling them that must be provided.

So but I do want to go back to your point on working together.

And I you know, I don't believe I have said anything to say we versus they.

And that's one thing that I won't say.

Jack.

I tend not to say that I, I don't believe in that.

I represent all of the folks from the 1/33 Assembly District and, you know, from a from an arm perspective of that.

All of the folks of, of the New York State and I will speak with anyone, and I have conversations with folks.

I have spoken with, groups who we are idle ideology on the far end, and we can always find common ground somewhere.

And that's that's who I am.

That's what I am rooted in.

And I leave indicating, you know, we can agree to disagree.

So, you know, if you if you send something coming out of me, you know, when I'm talking about renewable energy and that one project specific that I'm talking about that is farmland that I grew up around in, it is some of the most prime farmland in the area.

And that is where where my angst comes with that specific project.

And you mentioned guns, by the way, how do you feel about the flow of firearms in, in New York State?

Is there anything that should be done to change anything there?

So I think what we what we need to is we need to see what New York state is one of the you know, when you look at gun regulation in New York state, it has some of the strictest gun regulation.

And.

If there are weapons coming in from outside, you know, the tracking of them and finding out where they are coming from, how they are getting here.

I mean, if you go back a couple, what's it two years ago where that individual was going through in Livingston County, they they found them and there were multiple guns that were being illegally shipped in.

Absolutely.

We need to stop that.

But we need the data in the information as to where that is coming from.

And there are some reports out there that we have been asking to get that information.

Steve.

Thank you.

Jack.

Steven Rochester emails, more information said the assembly.

The Assembly member is right.

Sends me an article.

Thank you.

New York focus.

Rural New York school district will be one of the first to bring a humanoid robot into the classroom.

By the way, a robot can't be a humanoid.

I don't think.

Right.

Isn't that a contradiction in terms?

This is in Salamanca.

It's happening down in Salamanca.

And this article is really interesting.

Salamanca plans to introduce the robot in its high school AI and robotics courses.

And, that's going to start this fall.

The part this is all weird to me.

I'm just going to be honest.

But the weirdest part is the female robot will be named Sally, will have a lifelike appearance with silicone skin and long brown hair, said the CEO of Real Biotics, and said that this deployment, in a working school district represents a landmark moment in this country for both AI and humanoid robotics.

So when we say humanoid robotics, we mean robots meant to look like humans.

So anyway, that's in Salamanca.

Okay, I guess we'll be we'll see how that goes.

We will.

See.

I guess you don't seem like a big optimist, I my cards are on the table.

I find this very, very dystopian.

I don't really like it.

I hey, I, there again, it's the unknown and, you know, I just there's nothing like speaking with a human, though.

And I think, you know, in our school, our school settings, that is ever so important.

And that is where my skepticism would come into play.

Yeah, I totally understand that.

Thank you, Steve, for the link to that article.

And I in general.

So there has been a debate among some states.

One of your colleagues, Alex, Boris, in the Assembly, has talked about regulating more from the state level.

And the white House has said they don't think that we should be regulating from the state level.

It should be this should be not a home rule situation.

This should be a national policy.

What is allowed?

Where are you on that question?

I honestly, you know, this is this is something that, you know, I've thought about.

I shame on me.

I probably haven't thought about it.

It in itself, the problem is when you start to have each state kind of, pigeonhole or legislate on certain things, then you, it's much harder.

For.

I don't want to say from an enforcement perspective, but what could seep in, you know, so you think you have these rules in place, but there's something else coming in.

So just how does that all interface on a broader scale, from one to another?

You know, many times if you start to see that there's rules in New York State that were the first in that, you know, maybe it's a package labeling a little bit different than I. But what does that mean for across the the country?

And what does that mean for us.

So I have to do some more research on that.

In, in really what does that mean and what what are we looking at specifically.

And Alex was a champion of, you know, advocating for that.

In the Assembly.

Sarah has two questions.

She wants to know if there is still a requirement for school busses to go all electric.

So that was part of the rollback that we saw.

So what what happened was there's a rollback for five years.

So for schools to start purchasing all electric school busses, I asked on the assembly floor when we were debating that bill, specifically if the two year extensions were still available.

So there's two two year extensions that the school last year we had added the second extension, could, put in for two kind of.

So basically what we've done is we've kicked the can down the road a little bit further, five years out technically nine with those two two year extensions.

And, you know, hopefully at some point in time that can will fall off the, the cliff.

I would, I would really like it to be where schools can opt in to do it, because I think you would have schools that that chose to do that.

And I cover Naples and Ontario County, and I think Naples did a great job with the analysis on what it cost them for the busses that they did have.

And what that means, you know, out here in rural upstate New York.

Do you want to just briefly character characterize what they found?

They found that it was more expensive, that there were several days that they were unable to utilize the busses due to the cold, and that there were bus runs that the busses could not make.

Sarah, let me get to your second question in a minute.

But because we're talking about schools, before the program even began, you were talking about how difficult it was to get anything done legislatively.

Because of this late budget, you end up with a very, very short session.

And in fact, school budgets are up for a vote.

And then what happens?

What happened there?

So this year, I got home on Friday.

I requested my absentee ballot from our school district.

My husband returned it on Monday for us.

The schools went to vote for their school budgets.

On Tuesday, we in the legislature took up the Alpha budget bill, which includes education.

So it would be what the school aid for the schools are going to have all of that.

We started taking that up on Wednesday after the school budget had passed.

I had two schools.

Once I saw the runs for the school aid runs that were actually less than what came out in the original.

When the governor brought her budget forward.

So, you know, we had schools going out to the voters with the school budget where they were kind of just, you know, shooting the darts at the board with their eyes closed.

You know, so some cuts were made and in some cases those cuts might not of had to have been made.

I'm, I'm just stunned that there could be voting at all on school budgets without knowing what the state funding is going to be.

And I understand most budgets are not this late, but shouldn't there be something that prevents this?

I mean, this is a very hard situation for school districts.

Absolutely.

I could not agree with you more.

You know, the school statutorily has to hit deadlines.

Yeah.

To bring that budget forward.

In all honesty, we should have the same mindset in the state legislature.

You know, in in the unfortunate pieces, you do have three individuals in a room, and it's the state budget process that the governor is able to legislate.

And that tends to be the holdup.

You know, speaking with my peers, on both sides, the frustration was real this year.

Yeah, maybe that's the mechanism in the future that says, you got to get this a budget going to be done a week, two weeks before school budget voting.

And if it's not done, then you go to austerity.

I mean, nobody probably wants austerity, but something has to be done right to to stop schools from being in this very difficult position.

I agree, you know, and we pass extenders and, and they're clean extenders and we passed 16 extenders this year to get us through to, you know, to the budget finally being passed.

But once you take up one but, I mean, there are ten budget bills that get passed.

It's not just one budget, you know, it's just not one bill that we're debating.

So, you know, that takes time as well.

So Alissa and David wants to know he's he's listened to Assembly Member Lunsford and your conversation and he's saying, well, why was the session so short?

Why not just work longer?

Why not extend your session?

So what's the answer?

So this is just my I haven't asked anybody about this, okay?

This is just my thought on it.

You know, it's an election year, so we did extend by a day, in the assembly.

So we were supposed to leave Albany on Thursday.

We actually left on Friday.

Last year it got extended three days because the budget was late, and we kind of ran into the same thing, but it wasn't as late as it was this year.

But it's an election year, and there were some pretty contentious primaries that were that were, playing out across the state, many down in the New York City area.

And, you know, if we get out on the 6th of June, 7th of June and the primaries are on the 24th, I really think that that probably had some play in there.

Okay.

Interesting.

On Tuesday this week, we had one of our guests was, former state assembly member Mark Johns, a Republican.

And and, you know, Mark is never afraid to tell you what he thinks, which is I appreciate that very much about him.

And he said, you know, look, assembly work is basically a part time job anyway.

And I'm, I'm, I don't know, I mean, I've never been an Assembly member, but just because you're not in session doesn't mean you're not working.

Do you consider it a part time job?

I would not consider it a part time job.

You know what?

While others do and how they choose to, you know, manage their time is is their own, business.

Is Albany frustrating?

Absolutely.

Albany is frustrating.

Just, you know, sometimes it's like watching paint dry when you're waiting.

And we might only be in session for an hour or two, but it's what you make of it when you're there.

So I try to take as many meetings as I possibly can.

I work on stuff, I work with my district office and, you know, and meet with constituents.

Once I'm out in the district, I, I do mobile office hours and I'm trying to get, you know, all across the district.

It is a geographically it is a large district.

Yeah.

It is and and most recently, you know, I've, I've been to we start at 8:00 in the morning, 9:00 in the morning, going to a few different places and then we are doing mobile office hours in the afternoon evening.

And then I've attended a couple, town board meetings.

So it's all what you make of it.

But I can tell you that, my family would not tell you that it is a part time job.

I think my husband actually just told somebody they're like, oh, she's home from Albany, so she's out.

She's on vacation now.

He goes, now I see her less now than I did when she was in Albany.

So it's it's what you make of it.

Sarah, second question, by the way, she wanted to know, and this may be misunderstanding how bills and issues get lumped together.

She want to know how you voted on the new requirement?

The state is trying to require Ice agents to not be able to mask when they're in the field.

That's not something you get an individual vote on, correct?

Correct.

So that was actually part of, what is called the PG or the the Public Protection, general Government.

I do believe, it was part of that bill.

So what ends up happening during the budget bills is, as I indicated, there are ten bills and there are article seven bills, which are the legislative language.

So inside that, you know, the immigration reform bill, there were many other pieces that fell into that.

So when I debated, I did not ask questions specifically on that.

Right.

Because we only get a maximum of four hours to debate any one bill.

And when there are a laundry list of items that are packed into that bill.

So I was a no on that bill in totality.

In totality, on the issue just of telling ice they cannot mask in the state.

Where would you have been if you could vote up or down just on that?

So a blanketed they cannot mask I would be no.

Okay.

And the reason why is you know and also in there indicated about the you know the 287 G agreement so on and so forth.

And one thing that I am very cautious on, and I have talked about this, but, you know, when you look at the gun violence that we had on the streets here and in the city of Rochester, you know, the last probably two years, it was our relationship with our federal partners.

The federal marshals are the ones that we partnered with to come in because we could arrest someone on a federal charge, a federal weapons charge, if we arrested them, based on the New York state law.

That individual very well could have been getting an appearance ticket because it's not bail eligible and then released.

So.

But is that about masking?

That's not about masking.

What I'm saying is my concern is if you just blanket things out there, what happens to that erosion of the relationship with our federal partners?

When it comes to law enforcement, when it comes to protection and when we do need them, you know, I don't know, you know what?

Why someone is masking, why someone is not masking.

Is it right?

Is it wrong?

I don't oversee that agency.

I'm not making those decisions.

If if someone were to approach me and had a mask on, would I feel differently?

I can't answer that question, to be quite honest with you.

But I think to blanket come out and state that that is where my problem is.

I guess each situation needs to be handled based on what is it that is being done at that time.

All right.

We've done our last 20 30s or so.

Is there anything in this budget that you liked.

That I liked?

I there actually were good things in this budget, unfortunately.

Like I said, they get lumped into other pieces.

You know, I think it was as much as it was a point of contentious contention and why we were 57 days late, I think we needed to admit that some of that CLC piece was not going to be achievable, and we had to be more realistic on it.

I think it was a win for the schools on the the electric, bus mandate, you know, pushing that out and, and I just overall think that.

There is good in the budget, you know, making sure that we have funding for the agencies that need it.

You know, I visited many here that the governor takes out money and then the legislator puts back in, those are wins, you know, Rochester School for the deaf, whatever it might be.

Those are huge wins.

But unfortunately, it gets mixed in with some some bad stuff as well.

Assembly member Andrea Bailey I know it is a lot of miles on that odometer.

Thanks for coming in.

Thank you.

We always appreciate having you.

I think more connections coming up.

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