Assembly

The Assembly approved today a minimum wage hike on a largely party-line vote that is designed to send a message in what has so far been a comparatively uncontentious budget season.

The measure was approved 101 to 44. It would increase the $7.25 minmum wage to $9, and ties future increases to the rate of inflation, and was altered last month in order to mirror President Obama’s proposal on the federal level, made in his State of the Union address.

The bill that passed in the Democratic-dominated chamber this evening is unlikely to be made law, though that does not rule a form of the wage increase from taking place this year.

What the vote today did was set down a marker — publicly — of where rank-and-file legislative Democrats in Albany want to be on the minimum wage as the budget negotiations continue this month.

The intended audience for the statement is varied.

First, there’s the state Senate, where a coalition of Republicans and five independent Democrats control the chamber in a unique power-sharing agreement that is not yet three months old. The 27 so-called “mainline” Democrats have pointed out repeatedly they have the votes to pass a minimum wage hike in the Senate now, a talking point that’s designed to apply pressure to the Independent Democratic Conference.

A spokesman for Sen. Jeff Klein, the IDC leader and co-president of the Senate, said in a statement today he was confident the wage hike would be accomplished in the budget.

“Senator Klein strongly supports a minimum wage increase and expects to see an increase passed as part of this year’s budget package,” said the spokesman, Eric Soufer.

Senate Republicans, meanwhile, say the wage hike is for too much in a struggling economy. They are advancing their argument by backing a package of tax cuts of more than $2 billion.

Today, Sen. Tom Libous said it would be better to pair the wage hike with tax cuts, and possibly do it outside of the budget in order to achieve an on-time spending plan under a condensed schedule (the Easter and Passover holidays have moved up the budget-making process and a plan could be passed by March 21).

Still, Republicans are outnumbered in the chamber and likely see the same high poll numbers for the wage hike.

“Today, the Assembly once again advanced legislation to increase the minimum wage in New York State, this time proposing a hike to a full $9,” Senate GOP Leader and co-president Dean Skelos said. “I continue to have concerns that this measure may be counterproductive to our efforts to help businesses create new jobs and rebuild the state’s economy. We estimate that increasing the minimum wage to $9 would negatively impact New York businesses to the tune of $480 million, causing them to shed jobs to protect their bottom line.”

Another audience for the wage hike are labor groups and the labor-backed Working Families Party, key political constiutencies for the Assembly Democrats’ large majority. The last several years in Albany have seen spending cuts as well as a new, less generous pension tier.

While Silver backed and approved a minimum wage increase last year in the midst of an election season, labor still would like to see a tangible victory this legislative session.

Lastly, it is Cuomo who Assembly Democrats are also showing a unified front in the final weeks of the budget negotiations. Silver marshaled more than 100 votes to raise the minimum wage to his specifications. How it’s utlimately accomplished, Silver said, doesn’t matter.

“Whether it’s done this month or next month or the month after really doesn’t make a difference. The important thing is that it gets done,” Silver said.

The Democratic-led Assembly is expected to vote on a measure that would raise the state’s minimum wage to $9 a hour and tie future increases to the rate of inflation, a move designed to send a message to the state Senate on what’s expected to be a very busy lobby day in the final weeks of the budget negotiations.

The vote is not wholly surprising and the measure, backed by Assembly Speaker Sheldon Silver and Assemblyman Keith Wright, and the measure is expected to pass overwhelmingly.

But the vote comes as state legislative leaders and Gov. Andrew Cuomo continue to negotiate the $142.6 billion spending proposal that includes a wage hike of $8.75, but no index to inflation.

It also comes as the mainline Senate Democrats pointed out last week that support was sufficient in their chamber to pass the wage hike.

If anything, the move is designed to make a statement on the wage hike with a proposal that mirrors the one made by President Obama in his State of the Union address.

“The good thing is that number one it’s being talked about,” Wright said in an interview. “I remember for years and years it wasn’t talked about.”

Whether it is in the budget or done legislative donesn’t matter, Wright said, just as long as the hike is accomplished, though he did say which version of the minimum wage hike is actually done “remains to be seen.”

“If we can do it by way of a piece of legislation, that’s fine,” he said. “If we can do it by way of the budget, that’s fine.”

Senate Republicans have said they would prefer a mix of tax cuts and credits to a minimum wage hike, and today proposed a $500 million tax cut proposal that’s part of an overall $2 billion effort to cut taxes.

Senate GOP Leader and co-president Dean Skelos has said the state should wait to see what the federal government does before lawmakers act in Albany.

But Wright said that’s not the point.

“I think it’s silly,” he said. “I think we have to be proactive as a state. They love to wait. Everybody loves to wait. But the time is now. People need relief.”

The current minimum wage is $7.25, the same as the federal minimum.

The Democratic-led Assembly is projecting an extra $484 million more in revenue than Gov. Andrew Cuomo’s $142.6 billion budget proposal lays out in its revenue forecast report released today.

Assembly Speaker Sheldon Silver said as much in a scrum with reporters earlier today that the revenue projections would be higher than forecast by Cuomo’s Division of Budget.

What’s this mean in the context of the budget fight in the coming weeks?

Look for Assembly lawmakers to push for the restoration in all manner of cuts, possibly member items, proposed by Cuomo’s spending plan.

Silver ruled out member items as one allocation for the funds, but did suggest that cuts in programs for the developmentally disabled should be considered.

Here’s the report:

2013rev Report by Nick Reisman

The Daily Show last night led off with the controversy over Assemblyman Dov Hikind’s blackface costume, dubbing the Brooklyn Democrat “Crazy Stupid Dov.”

In the bit, Stewart began by noting Hikind, an Orthodox Jew, has taken offense over anti-semitism in popular media, but didn’t seem to find anything wrong with his Purim costume as a “basketball player.”

“Not that it really matters, but that is some poorly done blackface,” Stewart said.

After issuing a sort-of apology, Hikind went further yesterday and apologized on his blog.

Typically that is not a headline anyone in public life wants.

But Assemblyman Dov Hikind is defending on his blog the choice of going as a “basketball player” complete with black face paint at a Purim party at his Brooklyn home.

This morning Hikind, one of the more conservative Democrats in the large majority conference in the Assembly, says the costume is a non-issue and that he does “not have a prejudice bone in his body.”

“Everywhere that Purim was being celebrated, people wore costumes. It was Purim. People dress up,” he wrote.

The picture was first reported by The Observer’s Politicker NY blog.

He also complained the reaction to the photo, posted on Facebook, has been overblow.

“I am intrigued that anyone who understands Purim — or for that matter understands me — would have a problem with this,” he wrote. “This is political correctness to the absurd.”