Where do Democrats they find these people no less elect them?
Senate completes no business, as usual
Democrats squabble with each other, GOP
By Tom Precious
NEWS ALBANY BUREAU
Updated: July 16, 2009, 7:03 AM / Story tools:
ALBANY — Despite last week’s conclusion of the brief, GOP-led coup, Senate Democrats spent their first full session back in power Wednesday wrangling with each other, bickering with Republicans over pork barrel funding and haggling over how the gridlocked-chamber should be run.
In the end, as midnight passed, the sides reported being close to a deal to change internal rules for the operation of the Senate to, lawmakers claim, make it more partisan-equitable and rank-and-file friendly.
But hundreds of bills already approved in the Assembly—from standardizing how wrongfully convicted individuals can obtain DNA evidence to toughening teen driving laws and banning texting while driving to providing tax credits to help places like Buffalo encourage rehabilitation of historic structures — were left languishing in the Senate.
Instead, plans were to try in the wee hours to pass a brief, bare-bones list of mostly minor bills — like renaming highways — and return today for another try on remaining matters.
Remarkably, the Democrats called the session knowing they would be down one member — Sen. Daniel Squadron of Brooklyn, who is off on his honeymoon — preventing their razor-thin majority from even getting a quorum to pass bills without the help of Republicans.
That help was not offered freely, as GOP senators then began seeking concessions that stalled action all day and night.
By nightfall, at least two more frustrated Democrats fled the Capitol and headed home to New York City as the sides continued to negotiate new rules on how the chamber will be run on everything from size of Senate staffs to how a bill makes it to the floor.
Republicans used their newfound— although temporary— power as leverage to negotiate changes to internal rules and to make pork barrel demands. Talks dragged on all day, but as midnight approached lawmakers said a deal was near on on rule changes to, for instance, allow controversial bills to more easily be considered by allowing bills to bypass the committee-stopping process if 38 senators agree to a floor vote.
The Senate did, with some difficulty, confirm more than a dozen judges —kept waiting all day at the Capitol as the senators battled behind closed doors —to various state judicial posts. Among the 15 judges confirmed was John Michalski, a former Amherst town prosecutor who was reappointed, at $136,700 annually, to the state’s Court of Claims with an assignment to Supreme Court duty.
Like the coup days, happy talk reigned even though inaction filled the day and left not just the judges, but lobbyists, staffers and rank-and-file senators clamoring for information.
“There’s no problem,” Sen. John Sampson of Brooklyn, the Democratic conference leader, said of the talks over the rules changes.
“Real good. You should come back in a little while. We’ll have real reform,” said a smiling Sen. Pedro Espada, the Bronx Democrat and one of the masterminds of the June 8 coup who last week was made majority leader for flipping back to the Democrats.
The Democrats, who wrestled back control of the 62- member chamber last Thursday, came back to town to potentially pass hundreds of bills already approved by the Assembly but kept waiting during the past month of gridlock. Chief on their agenda was a bill to continue mayoral control of the New York City school system.
Though the coup officially ended last Thursday, the fog continued, exacerbated by the narrow, 32-30 Democratic margin in the chamber — a slim lead that had Democrats again learning the lesson that every vote counts.
At one point in the internecine battling, three Democrats bolted from the building. Among those leaving was Sen. Hiram Monserrate, a Queens Democrat who has made headlines for various reasons in recent months.
After being elected last November, Monserrate was arrested for allegedly slashing his girlfriend’s face with a broken glass. After joining Espada in the coup, he then retreated to the Democrats.
A couple weeks after he flipped back, a decision was quietly made by Senate leaders to give back to Monserrate his Consumer Affairs Committee chairmanship. That post was stripped from him earlier this year while his criminal legal problems are resolved. The restoration of the committee job also pays Monserrate a $12,500 stipend on top of his $79,500 base salary.
“That’s not nice,” a fleeing Monserrate said to a television reporter who asked how he was able to get the post back while he is still facing criminal charges in the assault case.
By Wednesday night, Monserrate was back in his chair, voting to confirm the judges.
Watching over the festivities all day was Florida businessman and Buffalo Sabres owner
B. Thomas Golisano, who helped back the June 8 coup by the Republicans and two renegade Democrats.
Golisano, trying to pick up the pieces from the monthlong stalemate and eventual political status quo that returned last Thursday, was holed up in Espada’s office for much of the day, delaying a return flight on his private jet to South Florida as the talks dragged on into the night.
Golisano declined to comment until the issues were resolved, but Steven Pigeon, his political adviser, who last week was given a job as counsel to Espada, sought to give advance credit to Golisano for playing a key role in the discussions to change the Senate rules.
The partisan relations were not cozy. Sen. William Stachowski, D-Lake View, said Republicans were blocking a deal to get their hands on more state money for capital projects back in their districts. He said there was about $400 million on the table under discussion. What did the GOP want to spend it on? “For whatever they want,” he said.
Asked why the Democrats would return since they were one vote short of being able to get a quorum and therefore would give a strong negotiating position to the GOP, Stachowski said, “Because we thought there was going to be a spirit of cooperation because we were going to make the rule changes that they so desperately based everything on.”
He added, admittedly with a healthy dose of sarcasm, “It wasn’t a fight about money. It was all about reform.”
But Sen. Thomas Libous, a Binghamton Republican, said the changes in the internal rules will make it fairer to the minority party Republicans and their constituents while still keeping Democrats “in their always good place” in the majority.
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