Hochul Releases Budget Proposal + Potential MTA Strike
No. 308 | Monday, February 6, 2023
The NYC Thorn is a weekly roundup of local political news compiled by members of NYC-DSA.
Local News
Governor Kathy Hochul released a $227 billion budget plan this week, which included increased funding for schools and renewable energy. The budget includes only a three-year extension of the corporate tax increase and a proposal to index the minimum wage.
Governor Hochul's budget proposal to expand charter schools in New York City will face stiff opposition in the state legislature.
Socialist and progressive senators are pushing Governor Hochul to include tax increases on the wealthiest New Yorkers in this year's state budget.
New York Police Department and the City’s Department of Sanitation workers swept an encampment of migrants outside the Watson Hotel in midtown Manhattan on February 1. The migrants had been protesting the City's efforts to relocate them to a shelter at the Brooklyn Cruise Terminal, where residents have reported inhumane living conditions.
Marvin Pines, a 65-year-old man, was the first Rikers Island inmate to die in 2023. Pines was awaiting sentencing.
One thousand members of the union International Brotherhood of Electrical Workers employed by Metro North railroad are considering a strike, which would be the railroad’s first strike in forty years.
Election News
Brooklyn District Attorney Eric Gonzalez is looking into complaints that the Brooklyn Democratic Party included fraudulent signatures in official paperwork, as well as reports that the party offered paid poll work based on potential hires’ history of volunteering for or loyalty to party establishment.
City dwellers are largely displeased with Eric Adams’s performance as their mayor, according to a recent Quinnipiac University poll.
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