Legislative Gazette Show 1306, 2013 February 8

From WAMC in Albany, this is the legislative gazette.
A weekly magazine about New York State government and politics, your host is David Castina,
with political commentary by Dr. Alan Shartock, political scientist and professor emeritus
at the University at Albany.
Statewide distribution for the legislative gazette is made possible by New York State United
teachers, representing professionals in education and healthcare, online at nysut.org.
And NISCASA, the New York State Coalition against Sexual Assault, working to support men and
their decisions to end sexual violence with the My Strength is not for hurting campaign
online at nyscasa.org.
Coming up this week, we take a look at Governor Cuomo's proposed Women's Equality Act.
Our political observer Alan Shartock shares his thoughts on the latest unhydraulic fracturing
for natural gas and advocates for early childhood education lobby at the Capitol.
Those stories and more on the legislative gazette.
New York Governor Andrew Cuomo, as part of his proposed Women's Equality Act, wants
to enact policy changes that will increase penalties for human trafficking and make it
easier for sex trafficking victims, especially minors, to avoid being prosecuted for prostitution.
The legislative gazette's Allison Dunn takes a closer look now at how the state's trafficking
laws could be strengthened.
From 27 million people are victims of human trafficking worldwide, both sex and labor
trafficking.
That's according to the New York State Bar Association of New York, which has created
a special committee to address human trafficking.
The subject is also on Governor Andrew Cuomo's radar, as mentioned in his state of the state
address.
Sonio Sodio is the executive director of the New York City region of the National Organization
for Women, or now NYC, which is part of the New York State Anti-Trafficking Coalition.
She says she is thrilled that Governor Cuomo and his staff view cracking down on human trafficking
as a priority and says trafficking occurs throughout New York.
Whether it's the sex trafficking that happens on the track and Hunts Point, or in Hudson Valley
area, in massage parlors, or whether it's the labor trafficking that happens on the
pumpkin farms in Northern New York.
Hunts Point, by the way, is in the Bronx.
She says the issue of human trafficking in the U.S. is fairly new with the federal trafficking
victims protection act having been passed in 2000.
She says states started passing anti-trafficking laws in 2005.
Osorio says it's time to recognize sex trafficking as a violent crime in New York and convict
a person of sex trafficking on a class B violent crime up from a class B felony.
She would also like to see New York State address the following.
We'd like to see that if someone is a minor and they are trafficked or they're prostituted
by somebody, that that automatically is a case of human trafficking.
James Dull agrees and says such a provision would greatly strengthen New York's anti-trafficking
laws.
Eliminating the requirement of having to prove forced fraud or coercion for the sex trafficking
of minors and this is a big one that would bring the state's laws into parity, at least
the trafficking laws, into parity with federal anti-child sex trafficking laws.
The majority of laws across the nation with regards to making it easier to prosecuting
those who are engaged in the sex trafficking of a minor.
Dold is policy counsel for Polaris Project, a Washington DC based advocacy group that aims
to combat human trafficking and strengthen state and federal anti-trafficking legislation.
I think in the grand scheme of things and looking from a national perspective, I would feel
comfortable saying that New York has some of the best laws in the country.
He notes that Connecticut, Massachusetts, New Hampshire, New York and Vermont all have
anti-labor and anti-sex trafficking provisions on the books.
Pennsylvania however only has anti-labor trafficking provisions, though there is ongoing work
to strengthen the laws.
And says Dold even with strong laws in New York, there is still more to be done.
Making available the seizure and forfeiture of assets that are ill-gotten gains from traffickers
because of their trafficking enterprises is a huge component to any comprehensive legal
framework.
New York State Democratic Assemblymember Amy Paulin, who represents parts of Westchester
County and Republican State Senator Andrew Lanzza from Staten Island, are sponsoring
the Trafficking Victims Protection and Justice Act, part of which includes the following,
as described by now NYC's Sonia Osorio.
Create a new category of patronizing for prostitution that would be an aggravated patronizing of
a minor, or you could think of it as predatory patronizing of minor.
We think that the prostitution law should be in line with a lot of the sex offense laws.
You know, currently if a man is convicted of patronizing and having sex with a minor
in prostitution, money has exchanged hands, it should be a serious crime as statutory
rape.
And says Osorio.
If you just leave the laws like that on the books, you're making a real statement.
You're making a real statement that you know what?
It's just normal.
It's just normal for women and girls to be bottom-sold.
The New York State Anti-Trafficking Coalition has launched a statewide effort to raise awareness
of human trafficking.
For the Legislative Gazette, I'm Allison Dunn.
Joining us now, Legislative Gazette political observer Alan Sharttokkown, I'd like to remind
folks at least once during the year that this program isn't free.
The Legislative Gazette comes out of WAMC public radio and it goes across the state, many
public stations, XXI and others, and commercial stations take the show.
But we're in the midst of a million dollar fund drive.
You've been on the air constantly raising money and it's amazing what we hear about.
The programs at WAMC produces like the Legislative Gazette.
I think David to some degree, you're offering a pre-apology for the fact that I could push
a marble across the floor with my nose.
I'm so tired.
But yes, it's been a very interesting week.
I just had a wonderful interview with a new state senator named Cecilia Ketchik and she
is the most extraordinary woman.
She raises sheep.
She sits on her board of education and she's just a wonderful, wonderful voice.
You know that in New York State, we practice democracy in a very funny way.
We let the leaders of the majority parties draw their own districts.
And then we send our kids to fight for democracy in Afghanistan and Iraq in all those places,
which is insane.
I mean, the idea is you don't let George Steinbrenner umpire the Yankee games, as I have said,
for so many years.
Or do you?
You let the Yankees of course are allowed to, I digress, but allowed to buy anybody
in sight, you know, money talks.
So what happened here is that Cecilia Ketchik decided she was going to run in a seat that
had been designed for a sitting Republican assemblyman, a guy by the name of George Amador.
And she takes it on and she came in here and we actually had her on several of our shows
and we said to her, I turned around to her people and said, how is she going to win?
Where's the money coming from?
Well in the end, there was money, there was Soros money and there was some other money
that came into help her.
Although she is wildly for campaign financing so that everybody has an equal chance.
And it looked like she had won.
And the Republicans took the votes that had been cast and cast out on them and said, you
know, you didn't really win and so they counted and they counted and they counted and
in the end she lost by 30 votes but she knew she had won.
And it was a Republican judge by the way.
So she went to the New York State Appellate Division and they told her that, no you're
right, we should count more of the votes and she won.
And then the Amador dropped out after having been formally sworn in as a state senator.
This of course has tremendous implications.
I asked her if Governor Cuomo, quite a bit after she had won, had reached out to congratulator
and he had in some of his people, but not him.
This did not speak well.
I have often thought by the way and I will say it again that Cuomo really wanted the Republicans
to win.
There's all kinds of evidence about that.
He did not veto that very famous bill which he said he would veto the bill that allowed
them to continue to draw their own districts reprehensible.
And so one in one makes two.
So she won and now she's sitting there and she's sitting there with the regular Democrats.
Those are the people who are still the regular Democrats as opposed to the Klein group of
people who made a separate deal, separately arrived at with the Republicans.
Some people call them traders, some people just say, well, they are what they are, the IDC
or the independent Democratic caucus.
They got payoffs or another.
I mean, I don't mean to say payoffs is in money, but some of them got committee chairmanship
and some of them got other things.
You know, it was really unseemly.
So now there are more Democrats in the New York State Senate than there are Republicans.
But the Republicans and this Klein group are sharing the running of the state Senate.
In the meantime, I sense a guy in a dark cloak sitting behind them all sort of pulling
all of the strings.
That's the governor.
Of course, gets pretty much what he wants out of them.
That's how he got gun controlled.
Good thing as far as I'm concerned.
And if they want to stay in the majority, the Republicans have to go along.
So the Cuomo people are always telling me, well, you know, he can't get everything in
one.
So I said, yes, he can because if he doesn't get what he wants, he pulls the string.
The Democrats all get back together.
And then the Democrats are running the legislature.
I don't think that's something he wants because as you know, he's a little bit of a blue
dog Democrat.
In addition to some of his liberal causes, he also believes in a strict financial string
in team.
And from where I'm watching and what I'm thinking, you know, the last thing he wants is a
bunch of progressive Democrats in there, spending a lot of money that he doesn't want them
to spend.
And so that's where we are right now.
We won.
And God bless her because I'll tell you right now, not a lot of people thought she would.
Let's go to the other big issue that was at the Capitol this week and that had to do with
it and cut budget hearing in which the Department of Environmental Conservation Commissioner,
Joe Martin's sat in the hearing and said, did no timetable for a decision on hydrofracking,
still waiting on the Health Department report.
Alongside that, a new CNN poll this week shows New Yorker split over the issue 40% 40%
against.
And along with that hearing came a big anti-fracking rally.
On that day, you spoke with Mark Ruffalo, the actor, the Hulk.
Well, I asked the Hulk.
I said to him, Mark, he's just making you angry and clearly it is that, you know, people's
health might be endangered, he's thinking.
And I said, well, why don't you just turn into the Hulk?
I suppose I was the first person to ask him that.
So I think for those people who are opposed to it, the pose may be fairly even.
I think for the people who are opposed to it, it's a much more salient issue.
They understand this to say, how can you proceed with something until you know what exactly
it's going to do?
I think the governor has lost his taste for this thing.
In the beginning, I could have sworn that we're going to do it.
And I think almost everybody agreed with that.
They had Joe Martin's, the Environmental Commissioner, all lined up to do it.
They had a whole bunch of studies and then they got all of these people writing in and
yelling at them and thousands and thousands and thousands of people.
And I think the governor said to himself, who needs this?
So I think that they keep saying we're going to take all the time we need to assure that
the people, I don't think he's lost his taste for the whole thing.
I wouldn't be surprised to see no fracking in New York State.
Well, just let it Gazette political, it was a rally in Charlottesville.
You are listening to the Legislative Gazette, a program about New York State government and
politics.
I'm David Gistina.
A big push for pre-K funding in Albany as parents, educators and law enforcement officials
voiced their support for Governor Andrew Cuomo's $25 million proposed budget allocation
for pre-K that would establish full day programs in high need districts.
Albany Police Chief Stephen Krokov says that early childhood education is a key tactic
for crime prevention.
It's already a proven fact there is a clear nexus between education and poverty and crime.
The advocates stress that full day pre-K reduces incarceration rates while increasing student
outcomes in schools which in turn results in more success in college and the job market.
It also financially boosts households where both parents must work.
Rahim Smith is a father of four from Long Island.
We're also between housing and cost of long Island and the price to put one child in pre-K.
And we're talking if they go half a day at that point we were paying $860 a month for
them to go three days a week.
If you got one, you're about to be broke.
If you got two, you're in the cousin.
If you got four, you're going to be looking for a job just to work your regular job.
You understand what I'm saying?
This is very important.
And I'm glad to see the governor behind it and I came in today to make sure that everybody
we get out and we rally and we go ahead and make sure that legislators, the assembly members,
that everybody is behind making sure that we get a full day pre-K program.
Hopefully they take care of the high needs districts.
But we wanted to see it in every district ultimately because we know as parents everybody
needs it.
For education purposes and for economics.
Next week in Rentsler County, Dr. Rick Timns, the executive director of the statewide school
finance consortium, addressed a crowd gathered at Columbia High School, warning districts
and parents to brace for future teacher layoffs.
He finds the problem with the pre-K initiative is that there is only $25 million available.
So this grant will be awarded based on factors, includes measures of district and student
need, target services to the highest need schools and students, and maximize the number
of children served in the quality of their proposal.
The problem therefore will be most tool districts will not be eligible for this grant.
The other problem of course is that many schools are cutting back or cutting back in some
way on full day kindergarten which is not mandated.
We believe full day pre-K is a great idea and full day K is a great idea.
But neither one is mandated and neither one is actually supported by the budget.
So what we need is some full funding and I think these programs will be worthwhile.
If they're good enough for some kids, they're good enough for all kids.
The funding must be available.
If the state wants them, then they must fund them fully.
Cliff Bird, principal of Abram Lansing Elementary School in Cahose, attended the Columbia High
Rally and explains the most important thing for the moment is that the conversation is
on the table.
Last year when we were here for this very same program, we were going out cold trying
to get people to understand how important pre-K was.
It wasn't in the governor's radar, it wasn't in except for Shelley Silver, it wasn't
on very many other people's radar as well.
The seeds must have been planted in the right place because the governor is talking about
it now.
I think it's a separate issue what was going on at Columbia High School because every
school district is in fiscal crisis.
So pre-K is not going to be important if you don't have a school system for it to feed
into.
Bird recognizes that some schools can't even afford kindergarten, let alone pre-K.
This need for pre-K goes well beyond social and economic standards.
You just heard, if we have parents that have two working parents, they're not at home.
Our school system is set up for kids to be ready when they walk in the door.
Our society's not set up for that anymore.
Karen Sharf, executive director of Citizen Action of New York, is calling on legislators
to support additional state aid funding beyond what Governor Cuomo proposed to protect
full-day kindergarten.
So we want to make sure that in addition to this specific pre-K program that as we're
talking to legislators, if they're conscious of the fact that we've got to deal with school
aid as well, because it does no good to have full day.
It does very little good to have a full day pre-K and then have a half day kindergarten.
Advocates fears certain school districts may have to roll kindergarten back to half-day
sessions to accommodate full day pre-K.
Kindergarten is not mandatory in New York State.
A handful of districts already have cut kindergarten back to half-day sessions.
LowHud.com reports that 13 districts in the Hudson Valley considered cutting back or
eliminating kindergarten as they drew up new spending plans in 2012.
For the legislative Gazette, I'm Dave Lucas.
You are listening to the legislative Gazette, a program about New York State government and
politics.
I'm David Castina.
The state has lost a $2.5 million federal grant that would have helped pay for the acquisition
of an Adirondack Land Track.
The state says it can't afford the cost share and the Adirondack Council points to that
as a reason to increase funding to the Environmental Protection Fund.
More now from the legislative Gazette's Pat Bradley.
The New York State Department of Environmental Conservation had been awarded a $2.5 million
federal forest legacy grant from the federal government to help buy the $14,600 acre
fallens be pond trekked in the Adirondacks if the state could come up with $13.5 million
to complete the purchase.
That did not happen.
A New York State has lost the federal grant funds.
Adirondack Council legislative director Scott Laurie says he used the loss of the grant
during a hearing on environmental priorities in the New York State budget as an example
of the need to add money to the Environmental Protection Fund.
The state's Environmental Protection Fund has been slashed, particularly the open space
protection portion of the EPF has been slashed over the last five years.
We weren't able to complete the land acquisition projects as fast as we had hoped and therefore
this grant money had to be returned because it had not been used in the last three years.
Any money that is added to the open space protection line in the EPF is good.
A small increase probably wouldn't have been able to recoup or to make sure that the state
had been able to use this federal grant this year but I think it's a symptom of what's
happened to the EPF over the last five and six years because it's been cut so dramatically
that a lot of these projects have been backlogged and this is the result of that reduction
in funding.
The fallens be tracked is currently owned by the Nature Conservancy which intends to
eventually sell it to the state.
At around that chapter executive director Mike Carr is not concerned about the loss of
the grant funds.
We employ a caretaker there and we're using it for our scientific research and some
of our programmatic work.
In the interim we're paying property taxes and managing the property, the department,
Gilmore Ten, the department did the right thing in returning the grant.
They're free to reapply when the time is right but they have some other acquisition
priorities in front of fallens be and the current funding situation within the EPF is
such that we put it on the back burner for now so I do think the department did the right
thing.
Our priority now is working with the governor and the department Gilmore Ten, the Ms.
People, to move part of the Adirondek's former provincial land into the forest reserve
over the next several years.
Scott Laurie says the Adirondek Council wants the fallens be pond land classified wilderness
if the state obtains it.
Adirondek Park local government review board executive director Fred Monroe says the way
the council wants the land surrounding fallens be pond used is counter to the federal
forest legacy concept and he's not surprised that the grant was not forthcoming.
I know the Adirondek council complained that the state lost the opportunity to use federal
forest legacy money to purchase the fallens be pond property.
If the state just bought the land right around fallens be pond the site of philosophers camp
maybe 2000 acres and they could leave the rest of it in forest products production we
failed to understand why the state doesn't just follow what stated in the state land master
plan which specifically says don't buy highly productive forest lands because the forest
production industry is so important to the economy of the Adirondek's environmental protection
fund money should focus on hard environmental problems which also have an economic component.
And what money there is for land acquisition I think local government's believe it could
be used much more wisely than it has been.
New York state will receive federal forest legacy grant funds for conservation easement
projects on the rents of the year plateau and Mount Lebanon in new Lebanon and Canaan.
For the legislative Gazette I'm Pat Bradlite.
With that about does it for this week's show we had helped from the New York state public
radio network copies of the program are available call 1-800-3239262 that number 1-800-3239262
as for program number 1306 or just listen or podcast on the web at wamc.org and join
us again next week at this same time for more news on New York state government and politics
for the legislative Gazette I'm David Gazstina.
Statewide distribution for the legislative Gazette is made possible by New York State United
teachers representing professionals in education and healthcare online at nysu.org.
And Nisqaça the New York state coalition against sexual assault working to support men
and their decisions to end sexual violence with the my strength is not for hurting campaign
online at nysu.org.