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From Albany, this is the legislative gazette, a weekly half-hour review of New York State government and politics.
Your host is political scientist and syndicated columnist, Dr. Alan Shartak, of the State University.
Hello and welcome to the legislative gazette.
It was controversy this week over the appointment of a new chancellor to the SUNY system.
Angry students say they had no input into that decision.
Some doctors have threatened to take the New York State Health Commissioner to court.
A call to take wine coolers off supermarket shells and New York State's tops when it comes to those who travel.
We'll have these stories and much, much more on this week's legislative gazette.
Angry students upset over the appointment of Bruce Johnstone as the new chancellor of the largest university system in the country protested in Albany this week.
David Galetli has the story.
The 47-year-old Johnstone has been president of Buffalo State College for the past nine years.
He was elected chancellor by the SUNY Board of Trustees to replace Clifton Wharton who resigned in February 1987.
About 45 students attended the trustees meeting in Albany where Johnstone was officially appointed.
The students have accused him of being insensitive to student needs and of failing to improve the lot of minorities at the Buffalo State campus.
Sarah Jean-Rezito is vice president for campus affairs of Sassou, the student association of the state university, and a student at purchase.
Really concerned about the issues of minority recruitment and retention.
We're really concerned about some interviews that he's done where he's talked about the phase out of tuition, being idealistic plan as well as the fact that he thinks that tuition increases should be much more, not necessarily yearly, but more regular.
We're concerned about that because we want higher education to be accessible to all students.
And we think that the federal government is not making the commitment through financial aid.
The state government isn't necessarily making the commitment by giving more money for better programs and that it should not necessarily come out of students' pockets because it has to be accessible to all people and that we're looking towards the economic future of New York State.
Johnstone says he hopes the differences can be worked out between himself and the students and denies their charges saying he has done a lot of work on behalf of minorities.
Again, in respect to the students who have demonstrated today, the fact that, for example, some felt my campus inadequate and therefore me inadequate because we only have about 11% minority students and they thought we should have 41% because they thought that was the appropriate catchment.
I think it's so clear that that's a mistaken bit of information, that I would hope that some of the students who based an initial view on what I think can be so quickly demonstrated to have been wrong would be willing to themselves grow and change that view.
I think if students knew which they clearly don't know, if the students knew what I had done in minority student recruitment, if students knew that I had been, I believe today, the only SUNY campus president recruiting among minority students and agencies in New York City.
If they knew of the special minority honors and scholars programs that we've formed in Buffalo State College, which I think they don't is not to their fault, they don't know that.
I think it is somewhat to their discredit that they don't seem to care.
Johnstone was chosen after a nationwide search.
Rosito says the students have objected to the selection process contending students should have had a say in the appointment.
The SUNY system has 64 campuses and 370,000 students.
Johnstone, who will take over in August, is the eighth chancellor in the university's 40-year history.
I'm Dave Galetteley in Albany.
Three surgeons groups have taken New York State Health Commissioner David Axelrod and Ultimodum.
Either declare AIDS a communicable or a sexually transmissible disease or face a lawsuit.
A report now from Bruce Robertson.
AIDS is currently considered a reportable disease.
That means that doctors and hospitals are required to report the incidence of AIDS to the state, and AIDS testing is not mandatory.
What may seem like just a question of wording has important public policy implications.
The surgeons say listing the disease as communicable would force health officials to take a more active role in stopping its spread.
Francis McKee is the executive director of the Societies of Surgeons, Orthopedic Surgeons, and Obstetricians and Gynecologists.
Our feeling is the AIDS is presently incurable.
There are no prospects on the horizon at this point to find a cure.
That being the case, the only thing that can be done at this point is to prevent transmission.
We feel that if you declare AIDS to be both sexually transmissible and communicable, and put it on that list,
all of the measures, the epidemiological measures that are set out in the public health law for those type of diseases would come into play.
And at least, even if we can't cure it, we can prevent its spread to some extent.
Dr. David Axelrod has opposed the legislation and Health Department spokeswoman Francis Tarleton says it could be dangerous to declare AIDS communicable,
because it would give local health directors broad powers, for instance, to quarantine AIDS sufferers and prevent children from going to school.
She says the department has, however, listened to the surgeon's groups.
Basically, a lot of the issues that have been raised by the society, I think have already been taken into account in the state's AIDS policies.
We do allow county health departments to carry out contact tracing with the consent of the individual.
Mandatory testing is something that has not been adopted in New York State for a number of reasons.
I think we're encouraging physicians if they have a high risk patient, particularly a woman who might be pregnant to counsel her about testing and encourage her to get tested.
We also would feel the same way about other patients who might be undergoing medical procedures that could cause harm.
So we don't feel that mandatory testing would be positive in efforts to prevent AIDS.
It would drive people who are perhaps infected away from the medical system.
Francis Tarleton of the New York State Health Department, the surgeon's groups, however, according to McKee, would like to see more frequent AIDS testing done in the state.
Representatives of the surgeon's groups, claiming they represent 2,000 members, say they'll take Dr. David Axelrod to court by May 10th if he doesn't make the change.
For the legislative gazette, this is Bruce Robertson.
The thing that reports that New York State lawmakers are up in arms over a survey that shows children are drinking wine coolers.
More than 1 quarter of 4th graders, 1 third of 5th graders, and 4 and 10 sixth graders, say their peers drink wine coolers on a regular basis.
That's according to a recently released National Survey by the classroom newspaper Weekly Reader.
This has one New York State lawmaker up in arms and he's doing what he can to get the sweet soda-like alcoholic beverage off the grocery store shelves.
State Senator Frank Pativan has introduced a bill to repeal an existing law which allows the presence of this product in our supermarkets.
At DeConsmo spokesman for the senator says that wine coolers are practically marketed toward the children.
The wine cooler seems to be a product that is consumed and used very heavily by very young children.
We're talking about 4th and 5th and 6th graders who have identified that reported that they and their peers are drinking wine coolers.
So this is a very young group that seems to be attracted to it.
And the whole marketing of the wine cooler seems to be the type of marketing that appeals to children.
The law passed in 1985 was designed to help New York State grape growers.
DeConsmo says though that what it's done is introduced children to alcohol.
The law allowing wine cooler sales and grocery stores was passed specifically to assist the New York wine industry.
Growers as well as distributors. It resulted in increased per ton cost or per ton price of grapes in New York State.
The problem that they had maybe five no longer exists.
We Senator Pativan expects a strong opposition to it not just from the growers but also from the producers of wine in New York which are large companies for the most part.
And also from the industry today the way that the conglomerates are established you've got large corporations are selling both or selling liquor and also distributing and selling wine as well.
So they're all involved in wine coolers now the opposition is expected to be strong.
That was Ed DeConsmo spokesman for Senator Frank Pativan.
And there are others who feel the same way.
Harry Dock-Majin the chairman of the Federation of New York State Package Stores Association had this reaction to the news.
We told you so we said this initially when this legislation was being promoted several years back on these wine coolers that a new category of drinker would be created.
It would be a category of those probably under illegal drinking age because they could acquire it so readily.
And outlets where this product shouldn't be. And now it's a situation of we told you so.
Dock-Majin says that wine coolers never should have been sold in supermarkets in the first place and he supports a movement to remove them from the shelves.
For the legislative gazette I'm Beth Angler.
As always I had my stimulating chat with Fred Dicker, state editor of the New York Post this week.
Does there a post-partum depression going on since the since it has become clear Cuomo ain't going to be it?
Well you combine that with the fact that this budget agreement that just took place here Allen really wasn't much of an agreement on anything except to put off some serious decisions.
And you do have something of I wouldn't know about post-partum but you do have a post-budget depression with a lot of people walking around saying, oh it's terrible we're not getting our spring recess.
And oh it's terrible we're not doing anything of consequence. I heard on the radio today that up here in Albany some New York City assemblyman apparently was running around some shopping centers trying to get arrested to make his point that you can't hand out leaflets in shopping centers legally.
It's reached that kind of point of desperation where to get attention and I'll even try to get arrested these days at shopping centers.
So they say you got to walk naked through the legislature leading an elephant?
Well sad but true at times most of these people here are basically ciphers there's very little creativity and as we both know I think there's an awful lot of ego and frustration on the part of politicians who want attention.
Freddie this week there was an AP story perhaps part of the same syndrome of nothing else to write about.
He said that indicated Warren Anderson had indicated he was thinking about either running or not running again as the case may be.
And I talked to several of his people and they said don't count on it.
Well look it's like these swallows coming back to Capastrano every two years around this time Warren Anderson plays the little game and hints that maybe he won't seek reelection.
I wouldn't be surprised if he's trying to see who will come out with a premature press release applauding his statesmen like decision not to run so he can get even with that person.
I don't think there's any doubt that Warren Anderson will seek reelection. I mean on the one hand you can't concede as we all do that is the most powerful republican in New York state.
And then on the other hand he's just going to walk away from that I think he enjoys what he's doing too much.
And some of the unfinished business of the legislature minority contracts.
Sure. Well there are a variety of things we could talk about them individually.
One of the biggest that I may remember from two or three years ago was the whole issue of medical malpractice insurance and the runaway costs for doctors of that.
That's supposed to be resolved this year and it hasn't.
You I know we're saying that the big issue of this session was going to be solid waste management.
Now I think we both know we haven't heard too much about it yet and I'm sure you won't turn out to be wrong Alan because I can't rare.
I really only rarely remember when you've been wrong but I suspect that's going to come up in a whole bunch of other things.
Budget allocations have them in dealt with minority business enterprise. Sure.
I mean a lot of people think that's an invitation to to crime and fraud because there aren't enough business minority owned businesses to go around now.
If you try mandating on local governments as this bill would do requirement that they hire even more minority businesses you're going to wind up perhaps with another wedtech type scandal at reference to that big Bronx.
Military contract which is a minority owned firm. Yes. Some people think. Some people think.
So that if there are areas where there are not if there are areas where there are contracts but not minority firms they have to get made specially sometimes a white entrepreneurs specifically set up black sort of dummy corporations to do that.
I've seen that kind of thing in the parents. It's a confused session. I mean the mood the sort of zeitgeist of the universe that we travel in here of the legislature and the executive branch is very unusual this year.
It's almost sort of like a reaction to the intensity of last year's scandals and there just seem to be to some degree a paralysis of leadership here on everybody's part including including a governor who for a while seem to be a bit preoccupied with the national politics.
And the less so what was going on here. There's a rumor going around that the district attorney in New York Robert Morgan.
Is looking at the other house the assembly now. Do you know anything about that? Yeah. I mean that he has been doing that he's been admitting it. I think what you've picked up is this fact that in the last three or four weeks.
There have been a coin to people I speak with some new subpoenas issued for documents out of the state assembly and that once again is fueling speculation that we haven't heard the last of indictments of state lawmakers from the Manhattan district attorney.
And in fact you know in the next month or two while the legislature is here many insiders believe that there may be some more indictments. Now if that happens then the mood down here as we both know will change radically and very quickly.
And the guessing game of course is when they go home. Yeah I mean right now the governor was joking that he's prepared to be here in August. I'm not so sure it's joke.
The latest session and I think probably in history but certainly in recent history was I believe last year's which went to around July 15th.
But there's nothing automatically that prevents it from going to July 20th to July 30th. This summer we have the national political conventions.
But there's no reason why the legislature can't take a week off and let the Democrats go to Atlanta and then the Republicans go to New Orleans and then come back.
My dollar would say June 15th. Well I think it's a very good bet. I'd say June 16th.
As you know as you know Warren Anderson has in the past put on his coat and say okay we're going home. That could happen this year too.
Yeah well I mean the question is not will he put it on but when he puts it on he always puts it on no matter how late or how early.
There are many many serious issues that these lawmakers are divided over and unless there's a crisis they usually like to put decisions off.
Fred Dicker you're the guy who has been credited by many with having raised the entire ethics question that has swept the legislature last year.
It's almost as if it never happened this year. There was an ethics bill that people on both reform and do something to help us sides have said that ought to be changed.
Is there any mood for changing last year's ethics bill?
No it's not at all. There was no real mood for passing last year's ethics bill until the egregious violations of ethical standards became clear last year.
I would feel certain now and I think you would agree with me on this. That behind the scenes there are a little tinkering going on.
There are some small changes with the ethics bill of last year to probably make it a bit more rational but there's no effort of any significance.
Not they're led by the governor nor led by anybody else to strengthen the bill to address probably the most blatant conflicts of interest and potential egregalities that go on in this place.
Lawyers, big shot lawyers who were also state lawmakers who were making hundreds of thousands of millions of dollars through their private law firms by doing business with businesses that do business with New York state.
I think there's probably no better example than a story that I'm pleased to say I just close just a couple of months ago which showed that assembly speaker Melvin Miller of Brooklyn through his law firm was actively soliciting business from Citibank, the nation's largest bank at the same time when Miller and New York state was in the state of New York state.
I think there's a great time when Miller and Miller's people are handling legislation right this this minute, right this year that affects Citibank's ability to make profits.
I mean if there's ever a more blatant conflict of interest than that I can't think of it.
And finally Fred a report card on his speaker Mel Miller.
Well you know just the other day I was a prize of some very interesting comments made by a someone who is more he's hinty of Ulster County a Democrat who obviously is part of speaker Miller's Democratic team in which he said that he's an early supporter of Miller.
That's right and he indicated from this interview which I think was with the Kingston Freeman that Miller if he makes one more mistake might find himself being ousted and I think Maurice Hintzhi also said that he was embarrassed every time or embarrassed for Miller every time Miller appeared in court.
Because he seemed to be sort of so maladroit at it.
I don't know nobody wants a challenge to speaker the way the system works here Alan as we both know is that if you express any independence publicly you can get your head cut off figuratively you can be stripped of certain benefits you have financial benefits prestige benefits and therefore it's a system which sort of compels sheepishness.
And that's one of the explanations for the lack of mavericks around the New York State Legislature basically it's the speaker the assembly and the majority leader of the Senate who control everything.
However if Miller really messes up even worse than he did last year there's always a chance for an uprising.
Fred Dicker State Editor of the New York Post. In other news this week the New York State true authority is remaining quiet on the federal report that says that the April 1987 bridge collapse on the state true a
probably wouldn't have happened if the thrue a authority had properly maintained the bridge support. Bernard Loeb is deputy director of the National Transportation Safety Board's Bureau of Accident Investigation.
He said that the thrue a authority knew for years that Stone Ripwrap had washed away from the bridge's pier footings but he said the agency didn't replace the boulders when it rehabilitated the bridge in 1981.
The NTSB concluded that the probable cause of the bridge collapse was the failure to replace the ripwrap boulders.
The board urged the inspection of similar bridges. Loeb estimated that there are 10,000 to 40,000 similar bridges around the country.
In other news the New York State Senate has approved a controversial new measure that could mean more handguns might show up on the streets of New York City.
Bruce Robertson is back now with this report.
Sponsors of the bill in the Senate have argued that special prohibitions against handgun possession created by New York City are both arbitrary and unfair.
Newberg Republican Senator Richard Scurmerhorn maintains it's a constitutional issue.
If you get a city pestil permit you can carry it in my county.
But if I get a state permit I can't carry it in the city.
So why should the city be different?
Current law dictates that a license to carry a firearm outside of New York City is not valid in the city unless a special permit is issued by the police commissioner.
Scurmerhorn says the right to protection is just as necessary in New York City as in any other part of the state.
If you're walking in the streets at night it's not the safest place in this world.
And I see no reason why you shouldn't have it for protection.
Just for protection at all.
James Brenner, New York City Mayor Ed Koch's legislative representative says the city is opposed to the bill because of the unique problems in the city.
We've won has to take into consideration the density of the population.
40% of the state's population are concentrated into a very small area.
And the interest to public safety, the police commissioner feels that it is mandatory on him to have control over all of the licensing.
Provisions for the to carry handguns in the city.
Senator Scurmerhorn argues that handgun licenses are granted by the state only after an applicant meets a certain number of requirements and then the license is approved by a judge.
However Brenner says that just because a person is licensed in one jurisdiction that does not mean that he or she meets the requirements in another jurisdiction.
I believe that the uniqueness of the density of the population and the closeness in which people travel and move about the city particularly on the transportation systems clearly promotes a different rule for that kind of an area.
The bill will now go to the assembly and if approved there it then must be signed by Governor Cuomo.
Its chances of final passage in the assembly however are not considered good. This is Bruce Robertson.
I love New York and apparently so do many other people.
Paul Rosenthal prepared this report on the popularity of the Empire State.
New York State is the king of the hill and the top of the heap or least tied with Florida as the number one visited state by Americans who decide to travel this country.
A study by American Demographics magazine shows that some 63% of all Americans have either visited or lived in New York the same figure holds for Florida.
Pennsylvania and Illinois were close behind with 59% California rounded out the top five with 57%.
Bern Rotman spokesman for the I love New York program says that the results are wonderful.
Well every time we hear people saying I love New York we are filled with a flood of happiness and gratitude obviously.
We feel that New York State has such infinite variety for visitors that it doesn't surprise us terribly that most people in the United States feel that way as well.
I think when one also contrasts what New York State's attraction is versus what Florida's attraction because we're ranked up there on top together.
I think it's particularly gratifying to note that Florida is what's known as a 12 month vacation destination that is it's a warm weather destination.
New York State is a cold weather destination meaning that we have four seasons that the vast majority of the travelers who come to the state do so in the summer months.
It's carried on through the few months the few weeks I should say of the beautiful foliage season.
But after that the early spring and the winter time except for those people who've loved the outdoor sports of a downhill skiing, cross country skiing and so forth.
It's relatively quiet. Now that's one side of it and the other side of course that is particularly advantageous to New York State is that we happen to have New York City in New York State.
New York City is the number one destination worldwide for travelers from many places in the world leveled on the United States both for pleasure and for business.
The combination of the two a tremendously interesting pleasurable state for recreational travel of the kind of people who like mountains and waters and getting away from it all.
And the people who like the glitz and the glamour and the excitement and the attractions that make up New York City makes for a combination of a vacation and business destination that's an unparalleled.
Robman says that most people come to the Empire State from other northeastern states and Quebec and Ontario provinces.
Robman says this is because nearly 85% of Americans who travel in the US do so by automobile and do not drive for more than a day or two.
And what about the price? Robman says New York State is very competitive with other states.
Cost of doing business and the price for having a vacation in many parts of the state are absolutely competitive with almost any part of the country.
And you get what you pay for. If you want to have a very rustic vacation in New York State believe me it will cost you no more than a rustic vacation almost any place else in the country.
As far as New York City goes, Robman says package tours and airline competition can make the big apple quite reasonable and competitive with other major cities.
Being number one is a nice place to be says, Robman, but attaining that position is just half the battle. Staying there is the hard part.
Robman says that I love New York will now attempt to get the remaining 37% to come to the Empire State.
And if they've never stepped foot in New York State before those 37 people we say we love New York and we know that if you'll make the trip you'll love it too.
Burn Robman of the I love New York program. For the Legislative Gazette, I'm Paul Rosenthal.
And that's it for this week's Legislative Gazette. The show was produced by Beth Angler.
She had helped this week from Bruce Robertson, Paul Rosenthal and David Galetli. We hope you enjoyed the show and we'll tune in again next week to hear what's happening in and around the Empire State. Until then I'm Alan Chartock.
The Legislative Gazette is a production of WAMC News. Dr. Alan Chartock is executive producer. This program is made possible with funds provided by the Legislative Gazette, a weekly newspaper on state politics with two different types of programs.
And the state politics with student internships available.
Statewide satellite distribution of this program was made possible by the Lawrence Group providing residents throughout New York State with total insurance coverage.
