Governor Kathy Hochul delivered her State of the State address focused on what she calls the “Affordability Agenda.”
There are over 200 proposals in the State of the State book including programs ranging from a Baby Benefit paying women $100 a month during pregnancy and $1,200 upon birth, child care funding, and free community college for students ages 25-55 in certain needed fields.
The Governor also announced "every subway train will have a uniformed officer onboard between 9:00 p.m. and 5:00 a.m."
She also defended the Congestion Pricing tax and New York’s expansion of its New Green Deal initiatives. The spending and policy proposals filled 150 pages.
The South Shore Press spoke to New York State Conservative Party Chairman Gerry Kassar about his take on the Speech. He described the Governor’s effort saying, “Governor Hochul Laid an Egg at The Egg.” The Egg is a large, Brutalist style performance center in Albany’s Empire State Plaza that looks exactly like an egg.
“In my view, the State of the State was a flop and others agree with me. She'd have to go and ophthalmologist to get some vision. Frankly, she has no concept of how disappointed New Yorkers are with their state government,” said Kassar. “She wants to talk about affordability, but she talks about affordability without saying anything that would indicate the government understands the reasons why people can't afford living in this state - it's taxes and it's the fees.”
Kassar went on to say that Governor Kathy Hochul is “going to tax, spend, and toll financially teetering New Yorkers into ‘affordability’ whether they like it or not.”
Hochul also did not adequately address the issues of crime, pro-criminal laws, and the illegal migrant crises. “She didn't say anything that was all that meaningful about crime. She's got some ideas to slowly continue to turn back the problems that were created by the Democrat criminal justice reforms. Some seem to recognize they made a mistake, but they do not want to straighten it out,” Kassar said.
Kassar believes that Hochul and the Democrats are just trying to figure out how happy they can keep left leaning political progressives while at the same time making the people who were hurt by pro-crime proposals feel like something's being done when in reality nothing of substance is being considered.
Kassar said, “It should be pretty obvious that I would be critical of these policies, but I’ll say this. I have not consistently been critical of what every other Democrat governor has said over the years. There's been many things that I’ve agreed with, but she just gives us these documents where it is very difficult to find good things.”
Kassar emphasized that “people are disappointed” and that the country is changing and “there are no more wine and roses” and that Hochul and her team just don’t seem to understand that. “There was no thematic approach to this speech, something you could walk away from and say, Hey, you know, she understands now. I described the address as she ‘laid an egg at the egg.’ Well, in all honesty, that does summarize it. This state is famously unaffordable, and Governor Hochul’s tired, big-government vision will only make things worse.”