It’s that time of year again in Albany: “Budget Season”. Since health care is always one of the biggest items in the annual state budget, there’s always a lot of specifics to pay attention to and advocacy to do.
But first, it’s time to “change the game!” for the overall budget process so that we’re no longer at the mercy of powerful special interests, and no longer fighting over the leftover crumbs when it comes to the health care needs of everyday New Yorkers.
What needs to happen now, and what’s in play:
#1: Creating “Fair Elections” – Our coalition was founded 26 years ago to foster community and labor coalition in New York to fight for universal health care. The reality is that we would have achieved our goal YEARS AGO were it not for the inordinate influence of the vested special interest and big donor money in our political process. NOTHING would make more of a difference to advance our cause than combating, rebalancing, and ending that influence, BY FAR. If we want universal health care, we have to have major campaign finance reform — it’s that simple.
In his budget proposals released in mid-January, Gov. Cuomo called for a) drastically limiting the amount of election campaign donations that corporations and large donors can contribute to any candidate, and b) the creation of a “small donor matching” system of public financing of elections. You can read more all about it here: www.fairelectionsny.org. We’re proud to be part of the Fair Elections for New York campaign, and serving as a liaison to the broader health advocacy community about it.
A Fair Elections system has been in place here in New York City for two decades now, and it has dramatically transformed our city government in terms of who gets elected and what issues are taken up and acted upon. We now have a government that is much more reflective of the residents of our city, and that focuses on the needs of everyday New Yorkers when it comes to health care and so many other of our shared concerns. We can now do the same statewide in our elections for Governor, Attorney General, Comptroller, State Senate, and State Assembly.
#2: Creating “Shared Prosperity” – For nearly a decade now, Governors Paterson and Cuomo and the State Legislature have intentionally limited spending in and the annual growth of the state budget. While this may have made some fiscal sense in the immediate wake of the Financial Crisis of 2008 and the subsequent Great Recession of 2009-10, things have clearly changed in our state’s economy since then so that such strategies are no longer needed, yet they continue to be invoked by Gov. Cuomo year after year. New York can now easily afford to raise more and sufficient revenue and spend more on many public programs to benefit everyday people struggling to get by, particularly for those who are still suffering from the ramifications of the Great Recession. Further, the economic growth and assistance that has occurred over the past decade has been VERY skewed toward the already-very-well-off, so our tax and spending priorities now need to be significantly recalibrated to assist people and communities in need, and raise enough money to do so.
Accordingly, the “New Hope for New York Budget Principles” campaign was launched late last fall to lead the charge for our state government to change direction with regard to overall budget policy and take a new, more socially-just path. It is being jointly led by the New York State Council of Churches, the Fiscal Policy Institute, and Strong Economy for All, and many public interest groups and faith communities have joined in to support it. You can read more about this campaign and join in its efforts here: https://bit.ly/2SJ8knj We are proud to be participating in this campaign to help provide leadership and guidance to it as concerns health care issues such as coverage for all immigrants and universal health care.
Unfortunately, Gov. Cuomo continues to adhere to his budget austerity approach, and says he does not want to ask the ultra-wealthy to pay their fair share of taxes in order for the state to have enough money to meet the health and human service and other needs of struggling people, families, and communities which exist in every corner of our state. He claims the rich will up and leave the state, despite the fact of evidence to the contrary throughout this decade since the state instituted a “millionaires tax: on upper-income people. You can reach more all about that here: www.fiscalpolicy.org.
What’s happening now, and what you can do:
Right now, each house of the State Legislature is crafting their one-house budget bills which they will be releasing and voting on next week. These bills reflect changes each house wants to accept, change, or delete from what the Governor has proposed. We need to make sure that each of their bills contains provisions to a) create a “Fair Elections” program (so that we can move forward toward a universal health care program), and b) adopt a “Shared Prosperity” budget framework that promotes just economic recovery and growth to meet the broad range of human and community needs, including health care.
We urge New Yorkers to reach out to your State Senators and Assemblymembers now about these matters, and to share these ideas with friends, family, neighbors, and colleagues. Make a call, send an email, do a tweet! The state budget process will wrap-up by the end of this month, so NOW is the time to act.