Senate Democrats relent, decide to attend governor's talk
ALBANY -- Bring out the chairs for the State Senate Democrats.
It turns out that after all, Senate Democratic leaders do want to hear what their governor has to say about the state budget's dire predicament in a rare joint session of the Assembly and Senate on Monday.
A day after Senate officials brushed off Gov. David A. Paterson's upcoming speech as a "photo op" and waste of taxpayer money, Democratic leaders had a change of heart today.
"We will be attending and hope to make a productive use of the time by continuing negotiations on a responsible deficit reduction plan," said Austin Shafran, a spokesman for the Senate Democratic leadership.
Morgan Hook, a Paterson spokesman, said, "The governor is pleased that the entire Legislature is ready and willing to work with him to close the budget gap and make important reforms for New Yorkers."
The move was a partially hollow threat, anyway, since a number of rank-and-file Senate Democrats were planning to brush off their leadership's decision and attend the speech anyway.
A number of them are facing potentially tight re-election contests next year, and the image in opposition television ads in the fall of 2010 of their empty seats during what Paterson is billing as a major policy address might not go over well with voters.
The Senate Democratic leadership, which includes senators John Sampson, Malcolm Smith and Pedro Espada, stuck their necks out with their original decision. Assembly Democrats, Assembly Republicans and Senate Republicans all signaled their intention to appear for the governor's noon address in the Assembly chamber on Monday.
The speech comes on the final day of an annual political gathering in Puerto Rico, which is being attended by many lawmakers, including Sampson and Espada. Shafran on Thursday had said that conference had nothing to do with the original decision to boycott the Paterson address.
Privately, one Democratic Party insider said the initial decision to boycott the Monday session showed a remarkable lack of political skill on the part of the Senate Democrats, who risked being portrayed as uninterested in the budget deficit.
The governor said he wants to use the joint session -- normally used for State of the State addresses each January -- to pound the point home to reluctant lawmakers about the need to cut spending in order to reduce the state's $3.2 billion deficit. He has proposed about $1 billion in education and health care cuts that many lawmakers are opposing.
The governor also has stepped up his campaign for the 2010 election -- despite overtures from the White House that he not run and knife-sharpening by forces promoting Attorney General Andrew Cuomo as an alternative to Paterson at the top of the Democratic ticket next year. His campaign today began airing two television ads around the state.
One ad takes the unusual course of acknowledging his political problems, beginning with the line: "Some say I shouldn't be running for governor." He continues that some of those people include lawmakers, unions and big corporations that, Paterson maintains, he forced to either make difficult budget decisions, in the case of lawmakers, or to endure cuts or tax hikes to help balance the budget, in the case of the unions and companies.
The other ad is a classic, meet-the-candidate type of message that appears to be trying to introduce -- or maybe reintroduce -- Paterson to the electorate. Paterson became governor last year following the sudden resignation of Eliot Spitzer, who was caught up in a prostitution ring, so 2010 would, if he stays in the race, be his first direct appeal to voters as governor.
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