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Cuomo’s Tuition-Free Plan Must Be More Inclusive


Cuomo tuition-free college announcement

Gov. Cuomo (photo: Kevin P. Coughlin/Governor's Office)


Governor Cuomo’s plan to make tuition free for many New York State residents who attend SUNY or CUNY two- or four-year schools would be an exciting step toward ensuring students across the state can access New York’s prized public university systems. The newly-announced Excelsior Scholarship proposal could help 940,000 families who qualify for the state’s Tuition Assistance Program (TAP) with annual incomes less than $125,000. The program is designed to fill the gaps in tuition aid after state and federal grants have been used.

This is a big deal that New Yorkers should celebrate.

Yet, only increasing tuition aid is not enough alone to ensure true financial access. The proposal is a “last dollar” award, backfilling aid after state and federal grants, and therefore the program does not help low-income students who already have the full costs of their tuition covered by Pell and TAP but struggle to afford other expenses associated with earning a degree, such as books, child care, housing, transportation, and more.

In fact, non-tuition expenses make up the majority of the full cost of attending four-year and two-year public institutions. The Excelsior Scholarship program must come with a commitment to help cover these additional costs to allow students who enroll to actually stay in school, access the resources they need, and finish their degrees.

In addition to potentially leaving out the most at-need students who require more support than tuition coverage, the Excelsior Scholarship proposal turns a blind eye to some of New York’s neediest communities who would greatly benefit from a pathway to a free degree. Only students attending school full-time and who graduate on-time would be eligible to participate. This excludes part-time students, many of whom are balancing work and family responsibilities, requiring more than just free tuition to be able to attend college full-time. For the more than 84,000 undergraduate students at CUNY who attend part-time, representing almost 35 percent of undergraduate students, the Excelsior Scholarship falls short.

Another group excluded from this program are the more than 8,300 undocumented students currently attending SUNY or CUNY. The governor must hold true to his promises made to immigrant New Yorkers over the last few weeks by expanding the Excelsior Scholarship program to undocumented students and once and for all giving them access to state grants like the Tuition Assistance Program to access college.

The plan also claims it will increase on-time graduation rates by providing four years of tuition-free education, but we know being able to afford tuition doesn’t guarantee completion. It’s promising the governor is focused on improving graduation rates considering that less than 50 percent of four-year SUNY students and less than 30 percent of CUNY students graduate within four years. However, any plan to bolster timely completion must come with a commitment to significantly expanding opportunity programs that include academic and financial supports and services that support students while in school. This includes bringing to scale initiatives like CUNY’s Accelerated Study in Associate Programs (ASAP) to ensure that disadvantaged students from underserved communities can equitably access and make the most of a free public higher education when given the opportunity.

Addressing the cost of tuition is a critical step toward getting more young New Yorkers to complete college, but tuition is not the only barrier to success. To meet the needs of New York’s students, to make sure they get the skills and training needed to meet the demands of the economy and combat New York’s high young adult unemployment crisis, Governor Cuomo and state legislators need to expand this burgeoning plan to include the most vulnerable students.

The governor’s foundational investment and enthusiasm toward making college more accessible by making it more affordable is a promising step forward. However, we need to ensure this program is expanded to include those New Yorkers with the least access and with greatest challenges to earning a college degree.

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Kevin Stump is the Northeast Director for Young Invincibles, an advocacy and policy organization working on higher education, health, and jobs issues impacting 18-34 year olds. YI is also a part of President Obama's College Promise Task Force. On Twitter @KevinStump and @YoungInvincible.

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Protecting the Hudson: Federal-State Partnership or Conflict?


dec hudson river hudson falls upper hudson

Hudson Falls, upper Hudson River (photo: NY DEC)


Who is responsible for keeping the Hudson River free from pollution? Actually, it is a responsibility shared by Federal and State authorities. Sometimes they agree; other times, they may be at cross purposes. That can make for some interesting political debate and interplay between the federal and state governments.

Two current environmental issues are good examples.

Cleaning up PCBs in the Hudson
GE dumped PCBs, toxic chemicals resulting from its manufacturing facilities in Hudson Falls and Fort Edward, into the Hudson for many years. Most of the chemicals settled to the bottom but some drifted downstream. They were ingested by fish, leading to a ban on eating fish caught in the river. After years of controversy and discussion, GE agreed to pay for dredging the river from Fort Edward to Troy, under supervision of the Federal Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) as a federal Superfund project. Dredging work began in 2009 and concluded in 2015 with the removal of some 310,000 pounds of PCBs. GE called it a "major environmental success" and declared it had met its cleanup responsibilities.  

EPA monitored the work and expressed satisfaction as it went along. EPA is scheduled to test sediment and fish mostly near the site once more in 2017 and then was expected to certify that GE had met its obligations. When the dredging concluded in 2015, EPA allowed GE to dismantle its PCB processing plant at Fort Edward with the implication that the work was done. The Cuomo administration did not object. Political pundits pointed out that at the time the administration was trying to convince GE to move its headquarters from Connecticut to New York. GE ended up moving to Boston instead.

But the PCB issue is not resolved.

In strongly-worded letters to the EPA in November and December, 2016, New York State Department of Environmental Conservation (DEC) Commissioner Basil Seggos expressed "significant concerns" and asserted that "EPA's work is not done." The river is still "much more contaminated than EPA originally predicted." He added, "it is clear that the dredging performed will not meet...targeted fish PCB concentrations and EPA will not be able to deliver on the projected benefits to public health and the environment from this cleanup unless additional actions are undertaken." Much more sampling and testing are needed, along the entire length of the river from Fort Edward all the way to New York City.

"It's simple," Seggos explained. "DEC is calling on the EPA to finish the job and hold GE accountable for cleaning up the Hudson River. If EPA won't do the job and protect New Yorkers and the environment, DEC is ready to step in and lead."

The war of words escalated in December. EPA Regional Administrator Judith Enck wrote Seggos on December 21 to say, "we strongly disagree" with the "baseless accusation" that EPA has not done its job. She rejected his demand for additional sampling beyond what EPA was already planning, adding that "NYSDEC is free to pursue that sampling itself if it so chooses."

EPA will make its decision early this year on whether GE needs to do more dredging.

Keeping oil off the Hudson
A consortium of maritime and oil companies has proposed construction of 10 "anchorages"  along the shores of the Hudson River, from Kingston to Yonkers, to store large barges carrying crude oil south from Albany. The anchorages would include a total of 40 berths, or parking spaces, for the ships. The proposal resulted from a decision by Congress last year ending a ban on export of oil produced in the lower 48 states.

Proponents say that the action by Congress will increase the amount of oil moving by rail to the Port of Albany and then down the Hudson by boat. Their proposal will produce jobs, help lower energy costs, and boost the economy, they say.

Opponents counter that the anchorages are unnecessary and will cause environmental damage to the river.

The U.S. Coast Guard has legal responsibility for reviewing and deciding on the proposal. It has received more than 10,000 comments from interested citizens, environmental groups, local governments, and others.

New York state government weighed in with two long letters in December.

A joint letter to the Coast Guard from the New York Secretary of State, Department of Environmental Conservation, Public Service Commission, and Office of Parks, Recreation and Historic Preservation, set forth a long list of concerns about the proposal and called for more study, concluding that the proposal "lacks sufficient justification and detail." The state agencies expressed concern about the number of anchorages, lack of specificity about how many barges would be accommodated or how long they would stay, impact on state parks and other state-owned lands, the risks of accidents and spills, and the impact on fish, particularly two species of endangered sturgeon that inhabit the Hudson. But they couched their reservations not as outright opposition but instead mostly in terms of assertions that there needs to be lots more study and consultation.

Attorney General Eric Schneiderman, who sometimes makes a point of expressing positions on public issues that are independent from those of the Cuomo administration, sent his own letter, not to the Coast Guard but to the head of its parent agency, the Secretary of Homeland Security.

Schneiderman asserted that the Coast Guard should discontinue consideration of the proposal until it is reviewed by the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers, which Schneiderman asserts is required by law. But he went on to express more direct opposition than his colleagues in the other New York State agencies. “No one has demonstrated a manifest need for so many new anchorage sites along the river; no one has demonstrated a need for long-term anchorage at any of those specific locations...." The barges "would create significant security and hazard risks" particularly since the anchorages "would essentially allow barges to serve as oil storage facilities on the river,” he wrote.

The Coast Guard will decide on the barge anchorage proposal early in 2017.

The Hudson River and public policy
The Hudson River's extraordinary historical importance magnifies the importance of these issues. "Far more than a short river flowing through New York State, the Hudson is a thread that runs through the fabric of four centuries of American civilization -- its culture, its community, and its consciousness," wrote Tom Lewis in The Hudson: A History. It is "the valley where nature's creation and human creation meet, the river that connects so much of America's past with its present and future, unchangeable in presence yet always changing."

The PCB and oil barge issues illustrate a number of themes. Public opinion recognizes the commercial importance of the Hudson River. But people seem more concerned these days with the river's historical, aesthetic, scenic, and recreational values. Commercial exploitation has been at least partially upstaged by insistence on preservation for public benefit. There is a consensus that public authorities need to enforce policies to keep the river clean and, to the degree practical, that polluters need to clean up their pollution under government supervision.

But major policy decisions turn primarily on scientific evidence, and some imprecision is inevitable. When has there been "enough" dredging of PCBs? How much harm will giant oil barges cause to protected fish habitats? When federal and state perspectives and standards differ, which should prevail? How should economic and commercial benefits be balanced against environmental concerns?

These questions will be debated as the two issues discussed above play out in 2017. They are judgment calls that, inevitably, whether we admit it or not, are tinged with political considerations. But they are the sorts of issues that will continue to reverberate in environmental discussions here in New York, and indeed across the nation, in coming years.

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Dr. Bruce W. Dearstyne's latest book is The Spirit of New York: Defining Events in the Empire State's History, published in 2015 by SUNY Press.

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New Year’s Resolutions for Mayor de Blasio


de blasio nypd new year

Mayor de Blasio (photo: Michael Appleton/ Mayor's Office)


At the end of his first year in office, Mayor Bill de Blasio said his new year’s resolution for 2015 was to be on time more often. The chronically late mayor mostly made good on that resolution. At the end of 2015, NY1’s Errol Louis asked de Blasio for a resolution and the mayor didn’t come up with anything on the spot -- I subsequently offered several to him in a Daily News column.

He accomplished few of them.

As 2016 came to a close, de Blasio didn't make an explicit resolution, but he seems to have settled on better addressing the city’s homelessness crisis as his major area for improvement in 2017.

On multiple occasions recently, the mayor has acknowledged that the city has been unsuccessful driving down the shelter census, which has increased significantly during de Blasio’s three years in office, to about 60,000, continuing an upward trend over decades that accelerated under Mayor Michael Bloomberg. While admitting the need to do better, de Blasio has also said the crisis would be even worse but for his administration’s actions, such as increasing rent subsidies and providing lawyers for thousands of tenants facing eviction.

When I asked the mayor at a December 29 press conference what mistakes he’s made in 2016 and what he hopes to do differently in 2017, he cited homelessness, but also said, “I’m very tough on myself. I’m very tough on my team...I want perfection from myself, I want perfection from them. But I make mistakes all the time and then I try and fix them. I try and figure out how I can do better. But I don’t make it a point to sort of self-flagellate nor to exaggerate when something goes right. I try and keep an even keel.”

He did not offer anything specific beyond homelessness.

So, like last year, I am suggesting several new year’s resolutions for Mayor de Blasio. The list would have been slightly different had de Blasio not moved in 2016 to clean up some of his messes: closing down the Campaign for One New York, limiting his meetings with lobbyists, and cutting top outside advisors (“agents of the city”) from government meetings, for example.

Still, there are a number of things the mayor can resolve to do better in 2017, if he so chooses:

Show, Don’t Tell
De Blasio has struggled to portray a strong image as an in-charge, on-top-of-things Mayor. He’s shown more interest in broad themes than nuts-and-bolts operations, though he’s recognized the need to be more present in neighborhoods. While de Blasio has started to hold town hall meetings throughout the city, he is still not as active as he could or should be on-site as city employees carry out essential tasks and provide public services.

It doesn’t have to be as hokey as helping fill a pothole, but more activity along those lines would be helpful to New Yorkers, city workers, and de Blasio himself -- both practically and politically. The mayor doesn’t even have to do any of the work, but he could more regularly visit what is happening “in the field,” see how it’s being done, thank those doing it, and show New Yorkers he’s overseeing things up-close.

Own Your Accomplishments
The mayor should hold more events to showcase his administration’s many accomplishments. Right now the mayor is known for his impressive implementation of universal pre-kindergarten. But, he could be known for much more if he were to put forth a sustained effort to promote and own what his administration is devoting resources to in order to create the more equal city de Blasio wants.

Instead of being known solely as The Pre-K Mayor, de Blasio could fairly easily also be known as The Affordable Housing Mayor; The Small Business Mayor; The Gender Equity Mayor; The Street Safety Mayor; The NYCHA Mayor; The Renewable Energy Mayor.

Can you imagine de Blasio holding 10 events on one subject within a month? (As, for example, Governor Cuomo just did on the Second Avenue Subway.)

I’m not sure de Blasio ever did that on pre-K. And, somehow, he still hasn’t done it on crime, despite the fact that crime has continued to trend downward during his tenure (while he’s also implemented several aspects of criminal justice reform). There are many opportunities to own these accomplishments and others. De Blasio may be closest on street safety (Vision Zero), affordable housing, and crime, but he’s nowhere near “there,” and could be in 2017.

Circle the Wagons at the City Council
The City Council is key to de Blasio accomplishing some of his goals. The mayor has some stalwart allies in the Council: seven members already endorsed him for re-election, and others are sure to follow. And, de Blasio has made holding a town hall in every Council district a goal and has done a good number so far.

But, he’s also faced some tough resistance to certain affordable housing projects, criticism of his management, and other pushback. It’s only natural that as a mayor’s tenure extends some relationships will fray while others blossom. De Blasio needs to make sure that he maintains key relationships, that he works with new Council allies, and that he doesn’t allow too many relationships to deteriorate. It could also benefit him to work on some of the already-frayed relationships -- with, say, City Council Member Rory Lancman, a steady de Blasio critic.

Explain Your Plans Better
De Blasio has promised a new outline of his fight against homelessness. Why don’t New Yorkers have a better sense of what’s already happening?

And, there are other plenty of other problems to tackle, whether citywide, by borough, or in specific neighborhoods. The mayor will surely announce new initiatives during his February State of the City speech, and he has a re-election platform to lay out.

Even before he announces new homelessness-fighting measures and puts them together with ongoing programs to show a more complete picture, there has been an avoidable deficiency in how the city’s efforts are presented.

Why not hold a press conference to make a detailed, clear presentation of the different pieces and how they fit together -- on homelessness, or transportation equity, or any number of complex subjects? The mayor does this each year for his budget address and he has given multiple education-focused speeches, with accompanying presentation slides. He could easily do this type of thing more often to showcase the steps his administration is taking on key policy issues.

Stop Blurring the Lines
As with the Campaign for One New York, other efforts that have resulted in law enforcement investigations, and his “agents of the city” declaration, de Blasio has made a pattern of blurring ethical lines, if not crossing legal ones. Even as he’s moved away from some of the more troublesome practices -- like allowing a consultant who has clients with city business to sit in on government meetings -- It happened again when City Hall released a video touting the de Blasio administration’s accomplishments and praising the mayor himself.

Instead of taking all kinds of action that require conflicts-of-interest and legal guidance, not to mention rhetorical tap-dancing, de Blasio should resolve to a higher standard.

Build and Repair Other Relationships
Things are probably beyond repair with Governor Cuomo, but it can only help to inch things in a more positive direction. Likewise Scott Stringer, another fellow Democrat, but the mayor should figure out ways to pull the city comptroller closer -- see, for example, how Cuomo made Attorney General Eric Schneiderman a special prosecutor in police killings of unarmed individuals. One easy way is the private-sector retirement savings program that the city is developing. There are a host of other potential collaborations that may give the comptroller a little more pause before excoriating the de Blasio administration at every possible turn.

There are less far-fetched opportunities for the mayor to build and repair other non-City Council relationships, though. Which state lawmakers should de Blasio look to partner with beyond Assembly Speaker Carl Heastie, who must remain a major de Blasio ally? Assemblymembers Michael Blake, Nily Rozic, and Brian Kavanagh make sense; State Senator Liz Krueger is an incredibly obvious ally the mayor should do more with, as is Senator Gustavo Rivera; and why not embrace the handful of Brooklyn state Senators who represent much of the mayor’s base, as well as other Democratic state legislators from across the five boroughs.

Then there is the quaint notion of bipartisanship. De Blasio has found some common ground with State Senator Martin Golden, he should find other opportunities to work with Republicans in both city and state government. Staten Island is always a good place for this type of effort. City Council Minority Leader Steve Matteo is the type of elected official who cares far less about political party than he does about getting things done for his constituents -- plenty that can be done with him. This type of work may even help improve the mayor's standing with white New Yorkers, who, according to opinion polls, have strongly unfavorable views of him.

Manage Better Before Crises
It’s the nature of government (and other sectors) that reforms are made in response to crisis. But, it’s clear from de Blasio’s management style, the city’s ballooning budget, and other evidence, that de Blasio has not made priorities of operational and organizational reforms.

Has he asked his deputy mayors and agency commissioners for reimagined org charts, with explanations? Has he asked commissioners to trim the fat at their agencies where they have shifted focus from the prior administration? A little of the latter, but not enough.

It can be good to look like you're responding to a crisis with reform, but it's also important to not always look or be so reactive when being more proactive can help prevent problems.

The Rivington House sage made it clear that First Deputy Mayor Tony Shorris has too much on his plate. And while Shorris’ office is bringing in a new high-level administrator, there may be room in 2017 for restructuring the upper management of City Hall, perhaps adding a deputy mayor, which could then lead to a new look at every city agency, how each is being managed, and where improvements can be made. Some new policy ideas could also emerge, and that wouldn’t be half-bad, for the mayor or New Yorkers.

Figure Out Your Media Strategy
De Blasio has said several times over the years that he has struggled to communicate. He’s rearranged his press strategy several times, made a number of changes to his communications team (a new communications director, his third, is about to start mid-January), and failed to develop any semblance of good will among the City Hall press corps (he hasn’t really tried). De Blasio has significantly limited the occasions on which he takes questions from members of that press corps, and rarely hosts press conferences at City Hall.

Most, if not all, members of the media think de Blasio should be more available to the press, of course. The mayor thinks the City Hall press corps ‘doesn’t get it’ and is often stuck on trivial matters, like the mayor’s helicopter rides or law enforcement investigations that de Blasio thinks shouldn’t overshadow the noble work he’s doing. Speaking of something de Blasio finds trivial, there’s been little press attention of late on the mayor’s gym routine, but that’s another good resolution for de Blasio in 2017: find a gym near Gracie Mansion or City Hall, and only visit the Park Slope Y on the weekends. Unfortunately, doing this in 2017 would look like a cynical re-election year ploy, but it would be welcome by many anyway.

De Blasio should be more open and frank, with the press and the public. He should hold more press conferences and take more questions when he does hold them. The mayor should give more one-on-one interviews to more outlets, especially if he’s going to continue to limit his press conference Q&As, and he should do more quick "gaggles" with reporters who follow him to public events where he's giving remarks or marching in a parade. And, City Hall should make a more concerted effort to get city commissioners in front of reporters and onto the airwaves.

The mayor regularly misses opportunities for “good news” press events, a mystifying pattern since he took office, and another thing that is easily fixable.

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by Ben Max, Gotham Gazette
     

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