Lt. Governor Kathy Hochul Presents NY State Budget on Campus
When Lieutenant Governor of New York State Kathy Hochul checked into an Albany hotel last year, the young man working at the night desk shared the news that he’d be attending college on the Excelsior Scholarship in the next few months.
“He told me, ‘I would not have been able to go to college until you had this program...I told my cousins about it, and none of us were going to go to college without this,’” Hochul said. The student told her that he’d be starting university to study criminal justice and work for the FBI.
“And that’s why we do what we do,” Hochul said. “We are putting a premium on investing in our young people.”
Lt. Gov. Hochul visited Marist on Wednesday, Jan. 29 to deliver the 2021 Fiscal Year State Budget Presentation to the Dutchess County community. “It’s not just a monetary document, it shows our values as New Yorkers,” she said.
“We want to make sure that universities and colleges, and exceptional ones like Marist, do well and we want to continue supporting them — while also opening up the doors to public education, because that can be a great equalizer for many individuals to have a better shot in life.
”
The State's fiscal year begins Apr. 1 and ends on Mar. 31. According to a Jan. 5 New York Post report by Marist alumna Bernadette Hogan ‘17 and reporter Carl Campanile, the state’s projected $6 billion budget deficit for 2020 is Governor Andrew Cuomo’s biggest budget challenge since he took office in 2011.
The budget includes a $275 billion infrastructure program, a $133 million program for the Homeless Housing and Assistance Program, $2 million funding for the State Police Hate Crimes Task Force, capping insulin co-payments at $100 per month, and a $28.5 billion education reform program, among many others.
The budget also includes $28.5 billion in school aid, increasing by three percent, or $826 million, including $54.8 million for the Hudson Valley.
January 29, 2020 - Lieutenant Governor Kathy Hochul presents the fiscal year 20-21 New York state budget during a visit to Marist College. Photo by Carlo de Jesus/Marist College
One of the opening presentation slides read, “Despite the absence of federal leadership, New York will continue to lead as the nation’s progressive capital.” Hochul echoed this attitude while speaking on the Excelsior Scholarship program.
“There is so much pressure on families today, and the whole concept is that we could open the doors to higher education for more young people,” Hochul said in an exclusive interview with the Marist Circle. “And to make sure that universities and colleges, and exceptional ones like Marist, do well and we want to continue supporting them — while also opening up the doors to public education because that can be a great equalizer for many individuals to have a better shot in life.”
“In many cases, New York State leads and the rest of the U.S. follows,” said the Democrat who has served as Gov. Cuomo’s second-in-command since 2015. “So we are hoping that this will be part of the conversation at the highest political levels, where they see what we are doing here in New York.”
January 29, 2020 - Lieutenant Governor Kathy Hochul meets with Tara Guaimano ’20 editor of the Marist circle. The Lieutenant Gover presented the fiscal year 20-21 New York state budget during a visit to Marist College. Photo by Carlo de Jesus/Marist College
The current budget proposal includes $146 million to support the entire Excelsior program, an increase of $28 million from the current year. It proposes to raise the Excelsior eligibility threshold from $125,000 to $150,000 of adjusted gross income for New York’s families.
According to an analysis of New York State higher education data released by the Center for an Urban Future, over 20,000 students received the Excelsior Scholarship during the 2017-2018 academic year — about 3.2 percent of the state’s 633,543 undergraduates.
“It’s about creating opportunity for all students,” Hochul said, addressing the $150,000 annual income cap for the scholarship program. “Other parts of our state, that is a middle or lower income in terms of your cost of living — particularly downstate where the cost of housing and taxes are so high.”
“We realize that we have had families for the last two generations who have struggled with the high cost of tuition, who are trying to figure out when they can send one or two children to college — some of them have to wait, some have to keep working,” Hochul said.
With the 2021 Fiscal Year Budget calling for $33 billion, 5-year plan to combat climate change, Hochul also took the opportunity of speaking on a college campus to address environmental protection as a priority. “For those of you who are students, I am going to give you a very strong call to action,” she said.
Hochul outlined that young people are staying or coming back to the Hudson Valley, as well as lowering unemployment rates and new economic developments in the area. According to the state’s presentation, they will continue middle class tax cuts that “have already benefited 511,000 Hudson Valley residents,” and “saved taxpayers $1.8 billion.”
January 29, 2020 - Lieutenant Governor Kathy Hochul presents the fiscal year 20-21 New York state budget during a visit to Marist College. Photo by Carlo de Jesus/Marist College
“In the Hudson Valley, young people are coming back. From 8.7% decrease a decade ago to 6.5% increase now, more millennials want to stay & live here,” Hochul said in a Tweet about her state budget presentation at Marist.
“We’re seeing a real rebirth in towns that were left behind in the last 30 to 40 years,” Hochul said, mentioning the “live, work and play,” development strategy that the State is implementing in the Hudson Valley.
“The number of tourist dollars being spent here is phenomenal compared to what it had been in the past,” Hochul said. “There are a lot of projects when you head downtown that weren’t there before, and it comes from money determined not by bureaucrats in Albany, but by the people of this community — and that is the beauty of it, the genius of it.”
The budget also includes $10 million for the New York State Census, with $2.2 million for the Hudson Valley in addition to a $60 million statewide campaign for a complete census count.
“You don’t have to be a citizen — people are afraid because they think that when they fill out this form that the ICE enforcement officers are going to be at their door the next day,” Hochul said. “People are living in the shadows, living in fear and not being counted, and we have to change that.”