Sampson's Whimper

In a response to Senate Majority Leader Dean Skelos', R-Rockville Centre, victory lap on Thursday, Senate Minority Leader John Sampson has reiterated his cry baby posture.
Characterizing the potential rules changes as a brazen power grab, Sampson scoffed at the idea that Skelos was promoting an era of bipartisanship. Skelos had argued that because he had elevated three minority members to committee chair posts, which is more than ever in the past, he was essentially extending a meaningful olive branch.
"True bipartisanship is not about responding to the pleas of politicians for committee chairs," said Sampson.
His more weighty allegation was that the Republicans were introducing a constitutional crises by removing power from the Lt. Governor's position, just because it is currently held by a Democrat.
He said, "It is political pandering at its worst, and something Republicans never would have attempted were the Lt. Governor a member of their party.  Threatening the integrity of our State Constitution, which has protected New Yorkers for over 200 years, is politics at its lowest form.  There must be a better way."
The rules reform are likely to pass the Rules Committee on Monday, when all the Republicans members will be present. They will then probably pass the Senate with all of the Republicans voting in favor and possibly some of the Independent Dems who were awarded committee chairs.

Majority RULES in the NYS Senate

Senate Majority Leader Dean Skelos, R-Rockville Centre, released a letter today for Minority Leader John Sampson, which basically tells his Democratic colleague, "Tough."
The disagreement stems from an attempt on Tuesday by the Senate Republicans to pass a series of rules changes, which would have the impact of lessening the authority of the lieutenant governor and would ease some term limit restrictions. The changes stalled (temporarily) in the rules committee on Tuesday, when one Republican on the committee was missing from the 85 minute meeting. Because Republicans couldn't muster 13 votes, the proposal ended up being pulled by the chair.
Now, though, Skelos has said that the rules changes will happen in the upcoming week, as they advance out of committee and to the floor. "I expect that these rules will also pass the Senate with bipartisan support," he said.
In addition to accusing Democrats of delaying the senate from acting on critical issues, like the looming budget deficit, Skelos argued that he was actually being more conciliatory than his immediate predecessor. Specifically, he cited the assignment of committee chairs as evidence of his bipartisan approach.
"I have selected three Democrats to serve as committee chairs, which is more members of the minority party than any Majority Leader has ever chosen to head up Senate Standing committees," said Skelos.
The rules meeting has not been scheduled yet, which is in keeping with the impromptu nature of these meetings.

NYS Senate Heroes Promise Action! (updated)

NYS Senate Democrats called on their Republican counterparts today to join with them and pass the tenets of Former NYC Mayor Ed Koch's "New York Uprising Heroes of Reform pledge," as the senate's first order of business in the new year.
“Keep your promise. Pass the pledge,” said Senate Democratic Conference Leader John Sampson, referring to Republicans who signed Koch's pledge during the election season and joined the team of super friends that were supposedly championing reform.


The reforms in the New York Uprising pledge will allegedly:

• Create an independent redistricting commission so legislators can no longer draw their own districts.
• Strengthen ethics and disclosure laws and create an independent oversight commission to improve the standards of conduct and accountability for all elected officials.
• Take the politics out of budgeting to stop the practice of fiscal manipulation that encourages the state to spend more than it has.

Of the current senate's 62 members, 53 of them have committed to the reforms.
The bill for redistricting was proposed this year by Senator David Valesky(SB 660) and was referred to the committee on Senate Investigations & Government Operations. It was previously introduced by Valesky in 2009, when it failed to gain any traction, and again in 2010 when it died in the Senate Finance Committee.

Update: NYS Senate did nothing today.