Students in CUNY class pre-pandemic (photo: CUNY)
The New York City Council’s Committee on Civil Service and Labor and Committee on Higher Education held a joint hearing Thursday about the City University of New York’s layoffs earlier this year.
The hearing, which was co-chaired by Council Members I. Daneek Miller and Inez Barron, who chair the two committees, respectively, focused on questions about why nearly 3,000 adjunct professors were laid off from CUNY colleges over the summer and if the university system did enough to prevent the layoffs from happening.
CUNY Senior Vice Chancellor Matthew Sapienza testified, saying that a 5.1% drop in enrollment and unexpected expenses as a result of the coronavirus pandemic put a strain on CUNY’s budget. After long-threatening such a move, Governor Cuomo also withheld $2 billion from CUNY’s budget last month, further reducing the amount of money available to the public university system that educates hundreds of thousands of students. Sapienza said the layoffs were necessary if CUNY was going to be able to continue to offer courses in the Fall 2020 semester.
“Since about 80% of CUNY’s costs relate to personnel, any series of budget cuts will necessarily involve position reductions,” he said. CUNY instituted a hiring freeze in April and has been working on reducing payroll costs by “consolidating the responsibilities of existing positions,” which he said has saved CUNY $33 million.
According to Sapienza, budget cuts, reduced enrollment and a decrease in state aid made it obvious that it would be “impractical and irresponsible to continue operations as normal.”
CUNY received $250 million from the federal government as part of the CARES Act earlier this year and has since given about $118 million of the funding to students who need it. Sapienza said that there are no official plans for the remaining $132 million as of right now, but that it will be used in CUNY’s budget for the current fiscal year (2021).
The layoffs happened six months after CUNY came to an agreement with the Professional Staff Congress (PSC-CUNY), the union that represents over 30,000 faculty and staff members. According to President Barbara Bowen, over half of the classes at CUNY are taught by adjunct professors.
Bowen said that CUNY could have used some of the CARES Act funding to pay adjunct professors rather than moving straight to layoffs.
“[Senior Vice Chancellor Sapienza] left out the provision in the law itself, not just guidance that says that to the extent practicable, institutions that receive CARES Act money should keep employees on payroll,” she said in her testimony.
The contract, which was ratified late last year, includes a continuation of a pilot program that would give some adjuncts three-year appointments, bringing them greater job stability because they wouldn’t be up for reappointment every year.
According to Senior Vice Chancellor Pamela Silverblatt, college presidents were put in charge of layoffs for their campuses. She said that CUNY Chancellor Felix V. Matos Rodríguez told presidents that they should prioritize keeping adjuncts that were recommended for three-year appointments and those that could lose their health insurance. Despite this, every single adjunct that was recommended for a three-year appointment at Medgar Evers College was laid off.
At times during the hearing, CUNY officials sidestepped questions or lacked the data necessary to answer Council Members Barron and Miller. The senior vice chancellors repeatedly pinned the layoffs as the responsibility of the presidents of each school under the CUNY system. Silverblatt said that layoffs most likely start as recommendations made by department chairs but wasn’t fully able to explain the protocols at each school.
When asked about the Medgar Evers College layoffs by Council Member Helen Rosenthal, Silverblatt repeated that college presidents were given guidance by the chancellor and that who was laid off was ultimately up to them.
“The presidents were told what to prioritize. They are entrusted to manage their schools,” she said.
Rosenthal criticized the CUNY representatives for not doing enough to prevent the layoffs, saying that there were other ways to save money without increasing unemployment.
“What you didn't tell us was all the steps you took first, that was the lowest hanging fruit prior to having to lay-off people. So in other words, CUNY added to the unemployment problem in New York City,” she said.
Bowen said that her union went to CUNY earlier this year with a list of demands for impact bargaining, which included no layoffs, but that CUNY has refused to negotiate with the union over that and class sizes, which have drastically increased due to layoffs.
“The impact of changes in class size is a mandatory subject of bargaining. And CUNY has sat at the bargaining table, bargaining Zoom with us and refused to bargain over that,” she said.
Bowen went on to say that reducing the number of people to teach classes is harmful to students and that increased class sizes puts students at a disadvantage.
“CUNY exploited that structure in a moment of danger for the whole institution, instead of holding on to those folks for our students,” she said. “What's more important for students than to keep their faculty in the classroom?”
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by Caroline Leddy, Gotham Gazette
@caroline_leddy @GothamGazette
Gov. Cuomo and Chief Judge Difiore (photo: governor's office)
Members of the New York State Assembly’s Judiciary Committee held a virtual hearing on Thursday to examine the impacts of a proposed $300 million cut to the state judiciary’s budget. The reduction, which represents a 10% cut to the court system’s $3 billion budget for the current fiscal year, was announced by the Office of Court Administration (OAC) in September in response to Governor Andrew Cuomo’s directive that all state entities reduce their budgets by 10% to mitigate the budgetary effects of economic downturn caused by the COVID-19 pandemic. The governor has held off on finalizing more sweeping budget cuts while lobbying for a major aid package from Washington, hopes that were buoyed by Joe Biden’s victory in the presidential election.
Witnesses at the hearing, which was led by Committee Char Jeffrey Dinowitz, a Bronx Democrat, warned that the proposed budget reduction could have far-reaching effects on the state’s court system, from exacerbating case backlogs to accelerating staffing shortages. Testimony was focused in particular on the decision by the OCA‘s administrative board not to approve 46 of the 49 older judges who applied for recertification for the upcoming calendar year. Judges who wish to serve on the bench beyond the state’s mandatory retirement age of 70 must apply to the OCA for recertification every two years until they reach 76. Judges who are not granted recertification must vacate their positions by December 31, which is three-quarters of the way through the current fiscal year.
Michael Regan, Chair of the New York City Bar Association’s Council on Judicial Administration, said the impending loss of the 46 judges will further hinder the courts’ ability to process the case backlog created by the pandemic. As of August, the state courts were facing a backlog of nearly 200,000 pre-pandemic cases.
“The loss of these 46 senior and experienced judges will have an immediate and significant impact on our court system,” said Regan. “As proceedings have already been delayed by the pandemic, caseloads and backlogs are rising, there is an increasing demand for access to the courts, and there is a need for an adequate number of experienced judges to handle the growing inventory of old and new cases.”
Representatives of the OCA declined to participate in the hearing, citing ongoing litigation over its decision not to recertify judges.
On November 5, five of the judges who were denied recertification filed a lawsuit against the OCA in Suffolk County State Supreme Court, alleging that the OCA’s “arbitrary and capricious” decision violated New York’s prohibition on age-based discrimination.
Assemblymember Dinowitz and other members of the committee expressed their frustration with the OCA’s absence.
“I am disappointed that OCA has chosen not to participate this morning in the hearting,” said Dinowitz in his opening remarks before the committee. “Time is of the essence on some of the issues, certainly concerning the termination of 46 judges, and waiting several weeks might make the issue moot. And as they say, justice delayed is justice denied.”
New York is currently facing a budget deficit of roughly $14.5 billion for the current fiscal year, with the state’s budget office expecting the deficit to expand to nearly $62 billion between now and 2024. If approved by Governor Cuomo, the proposed reduction would be the largest to the judiciary’s budget since the 2011-2012 fiscal year, when the judiciary lost $170 million from its budget amid a different state budget crisis.
In a letter announcing the planned cuts, Judge Marks said that the OCA’s decision not to recertify the 46 judges would trim $55 million from the judiciary’s expenditures. The court system has also implemented a hiring freeze, eliminated all “non-personal service” spending, and deferred all substantial payments in an effort to limit spending.
Critics of the OCA’s decision charged that the board’s choice not to recertify the judges was premature, given that the proposed budget reductions have not been finalized by the governor and that the state is still waiting to learn if it will receive fiscal aid from the U.S. Congress through a proposed federal stimulus package.
Witnesses also said that the OCA’s decision came at a particularly inopportune moment, as state courts struggle to navigate the legal and logistical difficulties created by the coronavirus pandemic.
“Reducing the number of judges on the bench and their staff should be [the administration’s] last resort when considering budget cuts,” said Hon. Charles C. Merrell, the president of Association of Justices of the Supreme Court of the State of New York. “The courts are overburdened especially with imposed delays and suspensions imposed by the pandemic. When [these restrictions] are lifted, the influx of cases is expected to be staggering. This is not a good time to slash the judiciary by 10%.”
Jesus Zeno, a representative of the Puerto Rican Bar Association, said that loss of the 46 judges, 17% of whom were people of color, also risks exacerbating racial and other demographic disparities on the bench. A study released in October by the Special Advisor on Equal Justice in the New York State Courts found that 58.1% of New York City judges are white, while only 31.7% of the city’s population identifies as white.
“Collectively, the loss of these seven to eight judges of color will diminish the strides that have been made to diversify the judicial positions in the New York State court system,” Zeno said. “As a result, the ripple effects of their loss will remain with us for many years to come.”
Zeno also warned that the budget reductions could create new difficulties for litigants and defendants, including delayed court dates, longer processing periods, and diminished access to state-sponsored legal services. According to Zeno, these difficulties would disproportionately affect low-income communities and people of color who have already been hit hardest by the pandemic.
“It’s going to be devastating to the minority community and to those people who do not have the means for adequate representation,” said Zeno. “Those cases may take longer because many of the individuals who appear in family court are pro se, and many of the defendants in tenant court are pro se, so those pro se litigants who do not have the skills or the means to defend a case, they’re going to put on the back burner.”
The budget reduction would also put a burden on the court system’s approximately 15,000 non-judicial employees, including court reporters, court officers, and judicial clerks, many of whom fear layoffs, pay reductions, or further staffing decreases.
“The reason the judicial system has not been crushed during the pandemic is because we, the court employees, are there,” said Eric Allen, President of the Association of Supreme Court Reporters Within the City of New York. “If layoffs were to occur, and employees are not there, Lady Justice would not only be blind, she would be rendered paralyzed."
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by Ian Ward for Gotham Gazette
@GothamGazette
Note: this article has been corrected to accurately note the demographics for New York City judges dound in the October report.
Gov. Cuomo with now-State Senator Andrew Gounardes in Oct. 2018 (photo: Cuomo/Flickr)
After flipping several State Senate seats in 2018 and taking control of the upper legislative chamber and therefore all of state government, Democrats sought to hold onto their wide majority this year even with a Republican president atop the ticket. They believed they might be able to win a supermajority in the chamber to match that of Democrats in the Assembly by picking up at least two additional Senate seats, if not more.
But as Senate Democrats faced tough races in a number of districts, including some they had won by narrow margins amid a “blue wave” two years ago, New York’s top Democrat seemed to take a relatively hands off approach and did what some believe is the bare minimum to help his party-mates defend or win new seats.
Though in 2018, when he was on top of the ticket seeking a third term, Governor Andrew Cuomo was active helping Democrats flip State Senate seats in swing districts from Brooklyn to Long Island to the Hudson Valley, this year he was absent but for a handful of virtual fundraising events and robocalls. Some Democrats believe he mostly prefers the split Legislature he had for his first two terms and very much wanted to avoid the possibility of veto-proof majorities in the two legislative houses.
As the vote-counting moves to absentee ballots, which are expected to significantly favor Democrats, there is a long list of State Senate races that haven’t been called. Overall, Democrats are confident that while they may lose a few seats back to Republicans they are also on the verge of picking up others and will wind up with a majority close but not quite as large as what they had coming into the election: 40 seats in the 63-seat chamber. Republicans believe they are narrowing the margin to 36-27, perhaps slimmer.
To get to that 40-seat majority, the 2018 elections saw several progressive Democrats eject more moderate members of the party in primaries while relatively moderate Democrats flipped Republican seats in the general. Cuomo was a significant presence in the latter, rallying with Democratic nominees in parts of the state where he remains popular but Republicans have had success and that he would need in his own reelection bid, which he went on to win by a wide margin.
The 2018 State Senate results set the stage, along with Cuomo’s win and continued Democratic dominance in the Assembly, for the passage of a long list of progressive priorities in 2019.
This year, despite Democrats’ hope that they could pick up as many as ten Senate seats, defend seven, and be competitive in a few others, it was bound to be a tough election. With President Donald Trump on the ballot, Republican turnout was undoubtedly going to be far higher than in 2018 even if Democrats voted in higher numbers too. And despite a fundraising and expenditure advantage for the Democratic Senate Campaign Committee, there were millions being spent against them in targeted independent expenditures by outside entities, including billionaire Ron Lauder and law enforcement unions, who opposed criminal justice reforms enacted by the Democrat-led Legislature and governor. Lauder, a prominent donor to Cuomo, alone spent nearly $5 million while police unions spent more than $1 million in trying to inaccurately paint Democrats as anti-police and pro-crime.
To some observers, the governor made minimal effort to help Democrats on the receiving end of that spending and even less so in challenging Republican messaging statewide about a Democrat-controlled Legislature run amok. Many have even speculated that Lauder’s independent expenditures had the governor’s tacit approval. “That’s bullshit,” said Rich Azzopardi, a Cuomo spokesperson, in an email, when presented with those arguments.
Azzopardi insisted that the governor did his best to help Democrats’ chances. The governor endorsed a slate of candidates including Senators John Brooks, Todd Kaminsky, Monica Martinez, Anna Kaplan, Jim Gaughran, Kevin Thomas, and Pete Harckham, and nominees Sean Ryan and Laura Ahern. He recorded robocalls and made appearances at virtual fundraisers for Kaplan, Martinez, Gaughran, Thomas, and Harckham, and made additional virtual fundraising appearances for Senator Kaminsky and nominees Karen Smythe, Samra Brouk, and Jacqualine Berger, and signed a fundraising letter for nominee Jeremy Cooney.
“In what world, during a pandemic when you can't barnstorm and do rallies – if you look at that list of endorsements, robocalls and fundraisers – can they say he didn't do enough,” Azzopardi said in a subsequent phone interview. “It’s ridiculous.”
“The governor worked really hard to bring this majority in under his ticket in 2018,” Azzopardi added. “And we worked really hard to maintain it. Let all the votes be counted and let's see where it goes...We did a lot together. We did a lot of good for the state of New York. And we look forward to working with the Senate Democratic majority next year.”
While no one expected Cuomo to travel the state holding large rallies amid the coronavirus pandemic, the governor did no in-person campaign events. At the same time, Lieutenant Governor Kathy Hochul, Cuomo's running-mate and “partner in government,” did barnstorm the state, holding campaign appearances with several Democratic candidates in tough races -- including Brooklyn’s Andrew Gounardes, whom Cuomo campaigned with in 2018 as he flipped a Senate seat but is noticeably absent from the governor’s 2020 list. Cuomo made at least three appearances with Gounardes in October and November 2018, but none, whether virtual or in-person, in 2020. Hochul campaigned with Gounardes in Brooklyn the day before Election Day this year.
Overall, Cuomo opted against joining Democratic candidates in person to bring local and media attention to their campaigns and boost their messages.
A source in the State Democratic Party said the governor was “somewhat helpful” with his fundraisers and endorsements. “But it's a little bit like it's almost just for show,” the source said, noting that the State Democratic Party, which is controlled by Cuomo, could have done more.
“The state party could have done mailers, done TV...there could have been more money spent, more sort-of consolidated or coordinated messaging,” the source said, pointing out that while the state party gave massive contributions to specific candidates, they paled in comparison to the Lauder spending. “The money thing is the big thing. You have states around the country where the state party literally will drop millions of dollars into these local races,” said the source, who insisted on anonymity in order to speak freely.
While Cuomo had transferred campaign funds to some Democrats in 2018, he did not do so this cycle even though, as of July, he had more than $13 million in campaign cash. The State Democratic Party did transfer funds to candidates in the closing weeks of the election – $50,000 each to Thomas and Gaughran and $25,000 to Monica Martinez. None of those numbers account for the money Cuomo helped some candidates raise via his appearances at the virtual fundraisers.
Tom Staudter, a spokesperson for Harckham’s campaign, said the governor’s assistance was definitely helpful. “Governor Cuomo was a big help to Senator Harckham’s campaign,” he said. “In our district, there were only positives. His leadership during the pandemic was recognized as safeguarding and benefiting our residents and I know Senator Harckham is looking forward to partnering with the governor in the future.” Though Harckham trails by about 7,000 votes after in-person vote tallies, there are still 40,000 absentee ballots to count in the district, and Staudter expects that a major portion of those will be from Democrats.
In an interview on the Max & Murphy podcast prior to the election, State Democratic Party Chair Jay Jacobs made a similar argument to Azzopardi. “He's doing a lot. The governor’s been on fundraising zooms. He’s given me the request to raise money through the state party and he said use his name to raise money. I've done just that,” Jacobs said. “So he's been very helpful and he's been giving guidance and strategic advice. What he can't do is hold big rallies, like Trump does around the country, which I know he'd like to do and he's done in the past. This environment just won't permit it.”
Almost exclusively standing by while Democrats got relentlessly attacked by Republicans and their outside allies would seem counterintuitive for a Democratic governor. But Cuomo has never been one to easily share power or attention with members of his own party and has, in the past, appeared content to preside over a split Legislature where he can mostly call the shots without getting pulled too far to the left. He has oftentimes rebuffed progressive policies proposed by Democrats, slowly embracing them once they become too popular to oppose or appear especially advantageous politically. Prior to Democrats flipping the Senate, he triangulated with an erstwhile rogue offshoot of moderate Democrats who called themselves the Independent Democratic Conference (IDC), which helped Republicans control the legislative chamber and was seen by many as a Cuomo-backed effort.
A supermajority in the Senate, combined with that already in the Assembly, would allow Democrats stronger negotiating position on legislative and budget matters, and to override the governor’s veto if they pursue legislation that Cuomo rejected.
“Cuomo has always preferred working with Republicans than working with Democrats,” said Benjamin Rosenblatt, president of Tidal Wave Strategies, a political consulting firm. “We saw that when he helped gerrymander the State Senate map for Republicans. We saw that when he helped them with the IDC, with majorities over and over again. And we saw that this time when his billionaire friends bankrolled efforts to stop Democrats from getting a State Senate supermajority.”
Rosenblatt said Cuomo could have used his popularity, particularly in parts of the state such as Long Island, to help boost incumbent Democrats who are now uncertain about their victories. “That could have helped push Democrats over the line when they are facing these attacks against them, trying to connect them to [New York City Mayor] Bill de blasio, saying that they're anti-police,” he said.
Cuomo himself conceded on Thursday that the statewide Republican campaign had a strong impact, though he appeared to be speaking as a casual observer that had no role to play. “It shouldn't have been this close,” he said on WAMC radio with host Alan Chartock. “I believe the Republicans beat the Democrats on the messaging. I think they branded Democrats as anti-law and order. And that hurt Democrats. It was untrue.”
As Cuomo seemingly watched that messaging unfold across the state, including in districts where he had campaigned with Democrats in 2018, he was not moved to be more assertive in helping his party-mates beat back the focused, sustained barrage from Republicans.
Cuomo also pointed to how Republicans tied Democratic candidates to de Blasio, who has been widely unpopular in the state for years and who undertook a failed effort to flip the State Senate from Republican control in 2014 that led to an investigation by the Manhattan District Attorney over questionable fundraising tactics. No charges were filed. “They ran de Blasio’s picture all over the state. ‘They'll turn New York State into New York City, looting and crime and homelessness...That was their message and it resonated more than it should have,” said Cuomo, who has himself repeatedly painted New York City in such negative light during his press briefings over the past several months.
Asked about Cuomo’s comments at his daily news briefing on Thursday, de Blasio dismissed them. “I think whatever the Republicans did was pretty modest honestly,” he said, joking that in the future he would endorse Republicans to cause confusion.
Some political observers pointed out that many Republicans used images of Cuomo on their negative campaign literature.
Unlike Cuomo, Hochul kept a busy campaign schedule as election day neared. She appeared at events for State Senate incumbents Gounardes, Harckham, and Thomas, and candidates Berger, Brouk, Ryan, and John Mannion. Without the absentee ballot counts, only Brouk and Ryan are ahead in their races.
In 2018, on the other hand, Cuomo launched a concerted effort to help Democrats flip both the State Senate and the House of Representatives. With much fanfare, he appeared with State Senate seats on Long Island and together signed a nine-point pledge of policies they would pursue. He publicly endorsed Gounardes in similar fashion in Southern Brooklyn, with a slightly modified pledge more focused on New York City. Gounardes went on to replace Martin Golden, then the only Republican State Senator in the five boroughs outside of Staten Island, after winning by just 1,271 votes.
Gounardes is now at risk of losing his seat, running behind Republican challenger Vito Bruno by about 6,000 votes after the in-person tally, a deficit he has a shot at making up through absentee ballots that number more than 18,500.
In Southern Brooklyn, where Republicans did well against Democrats at the state and federal levels, though outcomes are still being determined through the absentee ballot count, Cuomo’s government actions ahead of the election may have hurt Democrats politically.
“In 2018, he came out here and campaigned with everybody and was actively trying to gain more seats in the Senate,” said a Democratic source in Southern Brooklyn who requested anonymity to speak freely. “And this time around, it was the opposite. There was no presence out here at all.” What made it worse, on top of the Lauder-funded ads, the source said, was Cuomo’s botched rollout of new lockdown restrictions in response to localized coronavirus infection spikes that angered constituents in those districts. “It was a lot of incoming,” the source said of Republican attacks. “We took on a lot of water and there was very little air support.”
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by Samar Khurshid, senior reporter, Gotham Gazette
@samarkhurshid @GothamGazette