Legislative Gazette Show 9035, 1990 August 31

From Albany, this is the Legislative Gazette, a weekly magazine on New York State government
and politics, your host is Dave Glelletley, with commentary by political scientist Dr. Alan
Sharkat.
Coming up, New York State's children are heading back to school, but what's the state of the
schools?
This contains some cause for worry.
Pierre in prey is in another confrontation with a fellow gubernatorial candidate, but this
time he's the confronted.
And a strong warning on what the current Gulf crisis could do to New York's economy.
Those stories, Alan Sharkat, and much, much more, coming up on this week's Legislative
Gazette.
New York State schools get a C for educational performance.
From the American Association of Parents and Children, a national parents group.
At group released as state-by-state report card based on recent studies by the federal
Department of Education and the Carnegie Foundation.
One of those studies found that nine out of ten teachers believe that parents do not
care about education.
Connecticut and Wyoming were the only two states to merit an A from the group.
Executive Director Scott Staff says the reports should be a wake-up call, telling parents
they play an important role in education.
But a top education official is disputing the Association's report.
Our Paul Rosenthal spoke with Lou Grumman, Executive Director of the New York State School
Boards Association.
I believe very much in parental altervation school districts and indeed accountability
for school districts.
I think that's very important.
One of the things you should do when you have accountability is some criteria that makes
sense.
From what I read about this study, and I haven't had a chance to read the entire study
yet, it seems to me that this is made up of clear thin air.
I'd like to tell you what I mean by that Paul.
The criteria they use to rate districts by which they put New York State as a sea average
in the middle.
They use parental apathy.
Apparently, their view of parental apathy is whether teachers think parents are supportive
enough of teachers.
I don't know how they grade that.
I don't know what that means.
I don't think they do either.
And it must be an awfully slow news day outside of the Middle East of this made a big story.
The rest of their participation of their points are head start participation, which New York
State has a high, when I believe.
Student teacher ratios where New York State has one of the lowest in the nation.
For students spending, where New York State is the highest in the nation except for Alaska,
which uses hydrofoils to get around, graduation rates where New York State outside of New
York City is one of the highest in the nation.
And standardized test scores were in New York State outside of New York City is one of
the highest in the nation.
Then they averaged all these to give us a sea.
They gave Connecticut the richest state in the union and A, and I would hope they would
do well.
And they gave Wyoming and A, and I'm not sure under what criteria.
I can't imagine how this group could be given any credibility based on what they put
out.
Do you think that on the whole there are too many of these studies possibly coming out,
which could be misleading at times?
We've heard no study which came out today showing the average SAT scores across the nation.
And every few months there's another study showing different things about education.
No, I think it's very healthy.
I think education basically is a way by which the children of America get prepared for
a future.
And I think that the beauty of the American public education system is that everyone
believes they're an expert and everyone has their views.
And I think that's great.
I think it's healthy, it's democracy.
I think it's also fair, however, for those of us who are professionals in the field to
separate those studies that make sense.
I think that when the college board comes out and says that they're worried about college
board scores, I think that's something we ought to pay a lot of attention to.
And we ought to find out what the story is.
I think when a group of self-styled advocates do a study and one of their major indices is
parental apathy, I think it's ridiculous.
I think they're really looking to make news.
And I think you have the right to ask these questions.
I think we have the right to help you separate the weeks from the staff.
Lou Grummitt, Executive Director of the New York State School Board's Association.
Meanwhile, the average scores for the Scholastic Attitude Test are out for states around the
country and New York scores are down once again, Brian Shields reports.
Students from the Empire State now score a combined 882 for the test many colleges used
to establish which students get into the schools and which students do not.
New Yorkers averaged 890 points last year, so who's to blame for another drop in the test
scores?
That's the question we put to Bob Rice, the spokesman for New York State United Teachers.
Rice says since a higher percentage of New York students take the test, the average
score is likely to be lower and that the small drop in the average is not as significant.
Rice says nice it is still very concerned.
I think in addition to the overall decline in the scores, an even more serious trend is
that among students who say they are considering going into teaching the SAT scores are even lower
than average.
So it doesn't look good for the future.
I think what people need to recognize is several things.
One is that we need to do more to attract the top students into teaching because that's
still not happening.
And another thing is that it's going to take time in order for the reforms that are taking
place in education to really have an effect.
But how long will it take for improvements to be seen in the school systems?
The experts have said that it's really going to take a whole generation of students.
There were kids who are just now entering the lower primary grades when they go through
their 12 years of schooling or 13 years.
There should be a significant improvement because a lot of the changes and improvements
that are taking place in the school will have had an effect on these students.
But it's very difficult to say the changes that are made now or last year are going to
have a significant impact on students who are graduating now.
Rice admits not drawing the best students into the teaching profession will hurt the next
generation of students.
Rice says there are ways in which the best students can be drawn into teaching.
I think that each school district independently is going to have to decide how it can attract
better quality teachers.
And there are several ways to do that, one obviously is salaries.
And that teacher salaries continue to be significantly below those and other professions, factors,
lawyers, accountants, business leaders, and so forth.
And obviously one factor that a student is looking at and choosing a career is how much
money can I make in a syrup.
If you are a bright young man or woman deciding what to go into, you probably are going
to look twice at a field that has a fairly good starting salary and good prospects of
increasing that salary.
And if teaching is not among those leaders and that's not going to attract the best students,
the salary is not the whole answer and working conditions and expectations for the future
certainly for a role too.
And I think again, schools need to look and see what they can do in order to improve
the working conditions that teachers have and also to increase the role of teachers in
the overall decision making process in the school.
That's New York State United Teachers spokesman Bob Rice.
Before the legislative gazette, I'm Brian Shields.
Since starting his campaign, Republican gubernatorial candidate Pierre in Frey has made
his positions known in a series of what he calls letters to the citizens of New York.
Some of the letters have concerned the death penalty and the environment.
The latest was about the economy, Lee Farbman reports.
An economist himself, Ren Frey, called the state's economic health the most important issue
of the election.
Throughout the press conference, Ren Frey painted a gloomy picture of the state's economy
and added that the conditions would only get worse if he weren't put into office.
To start off the press conference, he read from two recent articles, one of them from
the Wall Street Journal.
States with the heaviest tax burdens have been losing population of the states with the
lightest.
Between 1975 and 1988, New York had the heaviest tax burden in the country, 62.6% above
the national average.
New York will have lost more electoral votes between 1972 and 1992 than any other states.
Another one from the New York Post.
We feel New York's biggest growth industries are taxes, begging crime and welfare in that
order.
A Mr. Sparando told Carousel.
The budget deficits are going to increase in New York, so that will mean more taxes.
There will be more crime.
The place is run by liberal politicians and I don't mean that negatively.
It's the reality.
They won't change so we're going to move.
Saying the United States is built on small companies and individual initiatives, Ren Frey
added New York State is close to an economic decline because it's hurting the small business
people.
He said New York State should be a place which would welcome private industry, so taxes should
be lowered in four years.
I think we've got to get the, if you will, the tax burden off the back of the people.
And I'm dead serious about that.
Now I'm going to make you a very blunt statement.
If the people of the state of New York make a mistake, horrible mistake, and put Mr. Cuomo
back in office, I will guarantee you in the fiscal year 1992, there will be a $3 billion
tax increase and probably an additional $2 billion in borrowing outside the tax increase.
More than saying.
We're looking at the budget currently, it's in trouble.
And now, the way we look at it, I'm not looking to find it in trouble.
I don't want to pay more taxes next year.
So what we're saying is a fundamental part of the concepts that I want to bring to the
governorship is number one, promote free enterprise, turn loose the power of the people,
the imagination, the drive.
Do the monoconomic environment which they can thrive?
Other suggestions are in frame made for improving the state's economic health included, repealing
the business tax surcharge, reducing 1991 taxes, making liability laws reasonable, so businesses
will not have to pay out so many million dollar settlements and giving special attention
to the state's entrepreneurs.
Renfrey then took some time to answer some questions from the press.
The issue of debating came up.
Renfrey wants to debate Cuomo one on one before including conservative Herb London and
right to life in Lewis Wien.
Cuomo London and Wien have already agreed to two debates and who brought up the issue?
It was Wien himself who had stopped into here and Frey.
By playing these kind of games here, the only people who suffer are the people of the
state of New York, where the Cuomo shows up if we're soon wants to come in.
Why don't we just get out there one on one, two on one?
Whatever it is, debate our issue.
I think today this would have been a much more meaningful press conference called meeting
of your ideas because I agree with a lot of things you say.
As does Herb London, I'm sure I'm sure Cuomo does also want something.
But if we would offer planned specific ideas, not just pying the sky, wishes at all, I'm
going to bring taxes down seven percent.
I'd like to bring taxes down to two percent, but I have people out there, I have a legislature,
I have other interests.
The idea is that everybody deserves if we speak openly with each other before different
force.
The other thing that struck me here, and I say this very sincerely, he presented a very
instructive, well not today, a very impressive, your content of your, of your background.
What I can't reconcile is why do you have to base your campaigns and main calling when
you don't have to?
You call me an insignificant nothing, Cuomo a coward and a chicken, people on the
other side of the way, you're just a bit stupid, you're not.
Why do you have to do that?
Why do you have so much more to offer?
Don't get excited.
Don't get excited.
Calm down.
Calm down.
Don't get excited.
I've laid out my conditions, I stay with it, that's the only one.
For the legislative Gazette, I'm Lee Farpman.
The recent convictions of three New York City teenagers in the Central Park jogger case
has brought renewed calls for tougher penalties for the state's juvenile criminals.
When sentence next month, the teens could receive from five to ten years.
Editorial pages say the possible sentences are too light.
We discuss the juvenile offender laws with state senator Christopher Mega.
The Brooklyn Republican is chair of the Senate Crime and Corrections Committee, and he says
the laws should be rewritten.
Yes, I think it's time to do that.
I think that they can be tried as adults, they should be sentenced as adults.
It's interesting to note that under the existing law, the judge in the case could move the
case to family court if he wished, and they could be sentenced as youthful offenders.
I'm sure that the judge in his case will not do that, but he does have that option.
So why shouldn't the judge also have the option of sentencing a juvenile as an adult, where
you have a terrible crime, such as we did involving the Central Park jogger?
When the current criminal justice laws for juveniles were rewritten in 1978, do you think
that there have been changes in such crimes committed by juveniles in the past 12 years
that you that would warrant changes?
Yes, I do.
The situation known as wilding where juveniles moroid and assault and commit rape and so
on would indicate that society is now ready for an additional change in a juvenile laws.
If you remember, in 1978, the laws were changed involving murder committed by juveniles because
of a fellow named Willie Bosket, it was 13 years of age, and I think it killed about three
or four times.
So it took a Willie Bosket to get us to change the law as far as murder was concerned, and
maybe the situation now involving wilding, we should also change the structure and treason
of juveniles as adults, not only during a trial, but also as far as sentencing is concerned.
But remember, the problem that we have in New York State is called the New York State Assembly.
New York State Assembly will not increase penalties.
It's very difficult to get them to increase penalties.
I'm sure that as a state senator, I could put a bill in tomorrow increasing penalties
and treating juveniles and try them as adults and increase penalties, but it'll never
see the light of day in the New York State Assembly, unfortunately.
Do you have any plans to put anything forward to, as calls for such changes in the justice
system come about, do you have a plan to put something forward?
I think we'll take a very serious look at it, put together a piece of legislation and
see if we can convince the New York State Assembly to take a look at it and become serious
about making some changes in the area of juvenile justice.
Mainly in the penalty area?
Yes, mainly in the penalty area.
You've got to remember also, under the existing law, while the maximum sentence for the
defendants in a jogger case is five to ten, there is a law could be one and a half to
three.
I'm sure that the judge would not do that, but if we had a judge who felt that maybe they
did want to give them the five to ten, he could do one and a half to three.
State Senator Christopher Mega of Brooklyn.
The current deployment of troops in the Persian Gulf is a costly proposition, but while Americans
rally around the flag, some are thinking of the economic danger of a war, not just to
the U.S., but to New York State as well.
Gerald Cillenty is director of the socio-economic research institute of America in the Hudson
Valley community of Rhinebeck.
He discuss the economic perils of war.
New York State is already in a recession.
We have a recession and retail sales.
We have a recession and auto sales.
We have a recession in real estate.
The state is in a recession.
A prolonged crisis is only going to deplete money from the treasuries, take money out
of the financial system, and in fact make an already-bed situation worse.
We have to understand that, of course, a lot of money to fight wars.
If we're going to put our money in the military, and we're not saying, by the way, whether
we should or shouldn't, what we're doing is showing the implications of this kind of
conflict, then we could understand that our economies are going to decline even more.
You remember that during the past several months, the major news stories have been the
SNL crisis, banking crisis, commercial banking as well.
The continuing decline, the recessionary decline, tax issues, budget deficits, well, those
stories are off the pages now.
But those problems haven't gone away, and in fact, they're becoming worse because they're
not being addressed.
Therefore, we can expect the financial problems to increase in severity as our human and
natural resources are focused on the Gulf crisis.
How would corporate America react to this, especially Manhattan and especially Wall Street?
If the prolonged crisis continues between the United States and Iraq, it's going to have
a very negative effect on Wall Street, on Manhattan, on all types of corporate business.
You will see from time to time, there are going to be rebounds in the stock market as there's
more peace to up.
Peace brings prosperity, not war, war only depletes economies.
We mentioned the corporations and of course the big businessmen.
How about the small businesses?
Will they also be affected?
Everyone is going to be negatively affected by a prolonged Gulf crisis.
And not only business people, it's going to affect everyone across the board.
We already have problems with education, we have problems with healthcare costs, we
have problems with drugs and homeless.
When you fight a prolonged war that depletes your treasury, and right now our treasury is
already depleted, our politicians have put us into a deficit spending spiral over the
last 10 years that forbids us actually from borrowing more money to support a war effort.
So we really have to address these domestic issues as well.
They're not being addressed now.
The major focus is primarily on the Gulf crisis.
So in the meantime we have a recessionary attitude or a recessionary in fact, developments
in the Northeast, in New York, and they're going to get worse if the economic social problems
are not addressed.
There's going to be long and strong support for our involvement in the Middle East.
We don't see it waning at all for the President.
You see as the U.S. declines economically our military power is proving appealing to those
who love to chant wear number one.
And in our analysis we find many people saying that they are tired of the U.S. being kicked
around.
Therefore, while issues such as the SNL crisis, budget deficits, entry, crease taxes, skyrocketing,
healthcare costs, and declining education system are difficult for many to solve or comprehend.
Kicking butt is clear and simple.
Gerald Cilente of the Socioeconomic Research Institute, speaking with the Legislative Gazette
Smike Fund to Carro.
With about three months to go until election day, our Brian Shield spoke with Fred Dicker
of the New York Post to evaluate a gubernatorial campaign which many regard as a foregone conclusion.
I mean, it's like they're giving an election but nobody's coming.
There really are no issues.
And to the extent that debates are an issue, I think Pia Redifred, a Republican challenger
who's got the most to lose by not having the public focus on the governor's race has
made a major tactical error because frankly, I think nobody cares about this debate, about
debates.
I've seen Governor Cuomo on television but not necessarily an ad for Governor Cuomo.
It's an ad for the Environmental Bond Act.
Do you think we'll be seeing some actual Cuomo for Governor ads later on?
Well, let me just say that you are seeing Cuomo ads but they're the kind of ads that
political consultants have put together.
What the governor is doing, and I guess he's doing it skillfully, is putting on ads reportedly
in favor of the $1.9 billion bond issue that will be on the November election.
He's paying for them with this campaign committee.
So you see the governor and you see him talking about the environmental bond issue.
They don't mention the election but what's going on here is that there's an effort on the
way to associate the governor with the bond issue, with the environment which every political
poll these days shows is a popular issue with the public.
So at a time when many polls are showing the governor's popularity declining and at a
time when there are great many issues that have left New Yorkers unhappy in the state from
crime to the declining business community, instead of going on the air and saying, well,
you know, this is my record on crime which wouldn't look very good right now or this is
my record on the economy which many people think wouldn't look very good now.
He's going on the air and saying, look, I love the environment.
It is a political ad.
It's just a subtle one which tries to link the governor with a very popular issue in
the environment.
Another allegation made against state controller net Reagan last week.
This time he allegedly took some investment advice from a contributor that advice didn't
work out.
The Boston office building which he invested state pension money in lost value.
Is this really going to hurt Reagan, do you think?
I think it's going to hurt him.
I think it's also a cheap shot.
I think Reagan has done nothing that Bob Abrams, Mario Cuomo and legislators around
the state have been doing for years.
Reagan though, I think, didn't handle that well and of course he got caught up in a scandal
a couple of years ago in which one of his political employees had written a very damaging
memo which said that the controller's office, Reagan's office should convince people doing
business with a controller's office because the controller's office gives out a lot of business
that they should give contributions in order to get state business.
Now that was investigated by the New York County Attorney, District Attorney, excuse me,
Bob Morgan thought and it was a finding that nothing wrong had been done but the impression
was created and understandably so that Reagan was tainted by a desire to extort money from
contributors.
This story that came out last week was along the same line but there's no evidence of criminal
conduct.
In fact there's no evidence that Reagan did anything that, as I said, Mario Cuomo or Bob
Abrams hasn't done in the past.
On the other hand, since the image has been created and the story got very big play including
a front page story in the New York Times, there's no question that Reagan has been damaged
and you can be sure that his Democratic opponent, Carol Bellamy, will be raising the ethics
or sleaze issue during her campaign to play on the impression that's been created at
Ned Reagan is less than 100 percent honest.
You're tuned to the legislative gazette on public radio.
I'm Dave Galatle.
Joining us now is our political analyst, Dr. Alan Shartot.
Alan, this week at the state camp at Lennon Albany, a rally to legalize hemp.
Where is this going?
Well, it's going nowhere in my opinion.
We have such an anti-drug ethic being developed in this culture that you don't turn around
and send another signal, David, and say it's okay and we're going to take one drug and
we're going to legalize it.
Now I think there are cases in which legalization should be.
It should occur.
For example, I think by medical prescription, if the only thing that can help a terminally
ill cancer patient or somebody who's in chemo and the doctor's know it and it's been
proven in some cases, I think, okay, good.
Do it by prescription the same way you would do other substances which you don't want
people to take in excess and give doctors the right to prescribe it.
I'm for that, but I am not for sending the wrong kind of signal to the society that we're
going to turn around now.
I am also not for over punishment.
I'm not for putting anybody in jail for smoking marijuana.
Unless, of course, they smoke marijuana and drove their car into somebody in which case
you punished them for that particular crime and doing it under the influence.
I am for giving them a speedy, what amounts to a speeding ticket for having done it.
If that's the signal that the society wants to take, we'll give.
Are we looking at a 15-year cycle here because it seems like the last time that this whole
thing went around was back in the mid-70s?
Except that I think that there was more of a tendency to permit that kind of experimentation
and not to pay attention to the real subliminal signal that we were giving to the young people
in this country.
But when you're staffing up, you're putting police officers in school, paying them good
money, having drug experts saying just saying no, having national campaigns, this isn't the
time to do that.
So if you compare what happened in the 70s with what's happening now, I think basically
you have a very different situation.
Legislative Gazenz, analyst, Dr. Alan Shartak.
Joining us now with a look at some of the other events taking place in state government
this week is Paul Rosenthal with our legislative notebook.
Superintorial candidate Pierre Rinfre says Governor Cuomo may be taking advantage of taxpayers
each time he goes campaigning.
Their public can ask the state board of elections to investigate Cuomo's use of state-funded
aircraft and employees for political campaign trips.
Rinfre says Democrat Cuomo is taking taxpayers for a ride by charging the state treasury for
trips in which the governor makes state business with politics.
But Cuomo spokesman Gary Fryer says the governor pays for the political portion of his trips
out of political accounts.
Rinfre complained about Cuomo's recent appearance in Buffalo, where the governor presented a check
to General Mills during the day and attended a Democratic Party fundraiser in the evening.
Rinfre says Cuomo attended both events in the state's Grumman Gulf Stream Airplane operated
by state employees.
In his complaint to the Board of Elections, Rinfre said taxpayers should not be forced
to pay for the portion of the trip relating to the political fundraiser.
State Board of Elections spokesman David Flanagan says the complaint will be reviewed and
they will recommend any possible penalties within the next few weeks.
The state Liberal Party and the New Alliance Party are joining forces in opposing nominating
petitions filed by controversial activists G2WUC.
WUC is the gubernatorial candidate of the Independent Unity Party, who has been called
the most very lent anti-Semite in state history by state Liberal Party vice chairman Raymond
Harding.
Liberal Party executive director Carl Grillo says WUC only filed 16,700 signatures, 20,000
ballot signatures are needed to get on the ballot.
WUC's campaign officials say he filed 20,250 signatures.
This is Paul Rosenthal.
And that about does it for this week's show, The Legislative Gazette is produced by WAMC,
the program made possible with grants from the Legislative Gazette, the newspaper about
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And Empire Information Services, serving New York and New England with electronic news
release distribution.
For the Legislative Gazette, I'm Dave Galethi.
As New York state's children get ready for their first week back at school, two reports
suggest the state's quality of education is continuing to decline.
I'm Dave Galethi.
On this week's edition of the Legislative Gazette, we'll look at those reports as well
as Pierre-Rin Frey's latest confrontation.
Join us each week for the Legislative Gazette.