Talking to upstate New York
Town meetings will replace speech, but real commitment still is needed
It’s mildly disappointing but hardly surprising that Gov. David A. Paterson has scrapped the idea of a separate “State of Upstate” address. He can’t want to be bound by the approaches of his disgraced predecessor, who last year gave what he promised would be only the first of such annual speeches.
As it turns out, New York’s first State of Upstate speech, delivered in Buffalo by then-Gov. Eliot Spitzer, also looks to be the last. That is, perhaps, unfortunate, but it won’t matter a lot as long as Paterson finds other ways to keep upstate’s needs prominent in his administration’s planning, and to ensure that upstaters know they aren’t being forgotten.
That appears to be Paterson’s plan. The governor says he will hold a series of town hall meetings across upstate, allowing him to hear concerns from residents across the region. The first meeting will be held Sunday in Watertown. A meeting in Buffalo is tentatively scheduled for Feb. 18.
If there is a disadvantage to Paterson’s approach, it is in its piecemeal nature. Spitzer’s speech was an event, heard by upstaters and downstaters alike. He invited New Yorkers to judge his progress from year to year.
It will be harder to hold Paterson accountable for specific progress, but he could also come away from these town hall meetings with a fuller understanding of upstate’s problems, and perhaps with the seeds of new ideas for addressing them. In the end, upstaters have to trust that Paterson is interested in their issues. That he is going to hold these meetings suggests that trust would not be misplaced. It will pay to watch.
It’s also fair to note that this is a radically different time in New York from a year ago, when Spitzer unveiled a $1 billion upstate revitalization program. The bottom has come out of the state’s bucket since then, as problems with the national economy hit New York especially hard. Big-ticket projects are harder to pursue when even routine obligations become challenges. What is more, to a greater extent than last year, upstate and downstate share similar problems.
Still, the State of Upstate speech provided welcome attention to a huge, underserved part of New York. If it was mainly symbolic, as Andrew Rudnick of the Buffalo Niagara Partnership believes, it nonetheless made upstate harder to ignore and gave residents a way to hold the governor accountable. Sometimes, symbolism matters. And it was important that downstaters heard the message, too. It will be up to Paterson and all upstaters to ensure that the symbolism of the governor’s tour of cities serves similar purposes.
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