Monday, January 24, 2005

1 NEW YORK STATE SENATE 2 3 4 THE STENOGRAPHIC RECORD 5 6 7 8 9 ALBANY, NEW YORK 10 January 24, 2005 11 3:30 p.m. 12 13 14 REGULAR SESSION 15 16 17 18 SENATOR RAYMOND A. MEIER, Acting President 19 STEVEN M. BOGGESS, Secretary 20 21 22 23 24 25

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(518) 371-8910 1 P R O C E E D I N G S 2 ACTING PRESIDENT MEIER: Senator 3 Bruno. 4 SENATOR BRUNO: Mr. President, we 5 are waiting for the Minority members to end 6 their conference. And it's a little lengthier 7 than they had expected, but we are told that 8 they will be in the chamber momentarily. And 9 hopefully that's the case. 10 Unlike being in school, you don't 11 get marked late or absent when they're not 12 here at 3:00 o'clock. So for the students 13 that are here, I apologize. We usually start 14 pretty promptly at 3:00, but today we are 15 doing some rule changes that take a lot of 16 discussion, a lot of debate, and people are 17 preparing for that. 18 So thank you, Mr. President. We're 19 going to start hopefully soon. 20 (Pause.) 21 ACTING PRESIDENT MEIER: The 22 Senate will come to order. May I ask everyone 23 present to please rise and join me in the 24 Pledge of Allegiance to the Flag. 25 (Whereupon, the assemblage recited

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(518) 371-8910 1 the Pledge of Allegiance to the Flag.) 2 ACTING PRESIDENT MEIER: In the 3 absence of clergy, may we bow our heads in a 4 moment of silence. 5 (Whereupon, the assemblage 6 respected a moment of silence.) 7 ACTING PRESIDENT MEIER: Reading 8 of the Journal. 9 THE SECRETARY: In Senate, 10 Friday, January 21, the Senate met pursuant to 11 adjournment. The Journal of Thursday, 12 January 20, was read and approved. On motion, 13 Senate adjourned. 14 ACTING PRESIDENT MEIER: Without 15 objection, the Journal stands approved as 16 read. 17 Presentation of petitions. 18 Messages from the Assembly. 19 Messages from the Governor. 20 Reports of standing committees. 21 Reports of select committees. 22 Communications and reports from 23 state officers. 24 Motions and resolutions. 25 Senator Bruno.

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(518) 371-8910 1 SENATOR BRUNO: Mr. President, I 2 believe I have a privileged resolution at the 3 desk numbered 172. I would ask that it be 4 read in its entirety and move for its 5 immediate adoption. 6 ACTING PRESIDENT MEIER: The 7 Secretary will read. 8 THE SECRETARY: By Senator Bruno, 9 Legislative Resolution Number 172, 10 congratulating the Tamarac High School Girls 11 Soccer Team and Coach Craig Gilbert upon the 12 occasion of capturing the 2004 New York State 13 Class C Championship, and on their outstanding 14 season and overall team record. 15 "WHEREAS, Excellence and success in 16 competitive sports can be achieved only 17 through strenuous practice, team play and team 18 spirit, nurtured by dedicated coaching and 19 strategic planning; and 20 "WHEREAS, Athletic competition 21 enhances the moral and physical development of 22 the young people of this state, preparing them 23 for the future by instilling in them the value 24 of teamwork, encouraging a standard of healthy 25 living, imparting a desire for success and

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(518) 371-8910 1 developing a sense of fair play and 2 competition; and 3 "WHEREAS, It is the sense of this 4 Legislative Body to acknowledge the prominent 5 athletes and teams of this great Empire State 6 who distinguish themselves through outstanding 7 performances and exemplary athletic 8 achievements; and 9 "WHEREAS, Attendant to such 10 concern, and in full accord with its 11 long-standing traditions, this Legislative 12 Body is justly proud to congratulate the 13 Tamarac High School Girls Soccer Team and 14 Coach Craig Gilbert upon the occasion of 15 capturing the 2004 New York State Class C 16 Championship, and on their outstanding season 17 and overall team record; and 18 "WHEREAS, The Tamarac High School 19 Bengals Girls Soccer Team defeated Mattituck 20 High School 1 to 0 to capture the first New 21 York State championship in the history of this 22 remarkable program, and finished the season 23 with an amazing record of 24 and 1; and 24 "WHEREAS, In the New York State 25 Class C Championship game, Tournament MVP

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(518) 371-8910 1 Janel Van Alstyne scored the game-winning goal 2 with 48 seconds remaining in regulation, and 3 Marisa Abbott, selected as the Outstanding 4 Goalkeeper of the Tournament, recorded her 5 17th shutout of the season and 39th of her 6 career, to lead the Bengals to victory; and 7 "WHEREAS, The Tamarac High School 8 Girls Soccer Team has won 10 Section II 9 Championships since 1991 and advanced to the 10 New York State Semifinals six times with Coach 11 Craig Gilbert, who tallied his 397th career 12 victory at the helm; and 13 "WHEREAS, The athletic talent 14 displayed by this team is due in great part to 15 the efforts of Coach Craig Gilbert and his 16 outstanding assistant coaches, skilled and 17 inspirational tutors, respected for their 18 ability to develop potential into excellence; 19 and 20 "WHEREAS, The team's overall record 21 is outstanding, and the team members were 22 loyally and enthusiastically supported by 23 family, fans, friends and the community at 24 large; and 25 "WHEREAS, The hallmarks of the

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(518) 371-8910 1 Tamarac High School Girls Soccer Team, from 2 the opening game of the season to 3 participation in the New York State Class C 4 Championship game at Union-Endicott's Ty Cobb 5 Stadium, were a sisterhood of athletic 6 ability, of good sportsmanship, of honor and 7 of scholarship, demonstrating that these team 8 players are second to none; and 9 "WHEREAS, Athletically and 10 academically, the team members have proven 11 themselves to be an unbeatable combination of 12 talents, reflecting favorably on Tamarac High 13 School; and. 14 "WHEREAS, Coach Craig Gilbert and 15 his staff have done a superb job in guiding, 16 molding and inspiring team members toward 17 their goals; and 18 "WHEREAS, Sports competition 19 instills the values of teamwork, pride and 20 accomplishment, and Coach Craig Gilbert and 21 his outstanding athletes have clearly made a 22 contribution to the spirit of excellence which 23 is a tradition of Tamarac High School; now, 24 therefore, be it 25 "RESOLVED, That this Legislative

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(518) 371-8910 1 Body pause in its deliberations to 2 congratulate the Tamarac High School Girls 3 Soccer Team, its members -- Marisa Abbott, 4 Jill Benedetto, Jessie Bouchard, Meredith 5 Campbell, Vincenza Casale, Sarah Collins, 6 Catherine Comiskey, Kate Finan, Laura Finan, 7 Leah Glass, Kathryne Kulzer, Alex LaCoss, 8 Caitlin Latham, Sarah Lonergan, Kelsey 9 Matusak, Vicki Neudecker, Cassie Petit, 10 Lindsay Plunkett, Hanna Sloboda, Natalie 11 Sloboda, Kellie Sullivan, Janel Van Alstyne, 12 Chandree VanVranken, Alesha Wright -- Manager 13 Joy Glogowski, JV Coach Bill Wood, Modified 14 Coach Julia Thompson, and Varsity Coach Craig 15 Gilbert on their outstanding season and 16 overall team record; and be it further 17 "RESOLVED, That copies of this 18 resolution, suitably engrossed, be transmitted 19 to the Tamarac High School Girls Soccer Team 20 and to Coach Craig Gilbert." 21 ACTING PRESIDENT MEIER: Senator 22 Bruno. 23 SENATOR BRUNO: Thank you, Mr. 24 President and colleagues. 25 I'm as proud as I can be to welcome

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(518) 371-8910 1 the Tamarac Soccer Team here in our chamber. 2 I live about a mile and a half from the 3 school; children and grandchildren have gone 4 to the school. And this really is a proud 5 moment for me to welcome the championship 6 team, their coach, Craig Gilbert, families and 7 your friends. 8 We heard a resolution numbered 172 9 read. And for those of you that aren't aware, 10 when that resolution passes, it becomes a 11 permanent record of the history here in this 12 chamber and in this state. So fifty years 13 from now, twenty years from now, when you're 14 out in the world, your families -- their 15 children, your grandchildren -- can look up 16 this date, Resolution 172, and you will hear 17 and they will read what you have just heard 18 and has been read. It's something to be proud 19 of. 20 What is really something to be 21 proud of is that you have won sectional 22 championships, now the state champion, and you 23 persevered, stayed with it, stayed committed, 24 stayed dedicated. 25 As some of this was being read,

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(518) 371-8910 1 some of my colleagues were lamenting that you 2 had beat their team. Very painful. And in 3 the finals, here's Senator LaValle thinking 4 that his team might win, and you beat him, 5 with Janel Van Alstyne's goal in the last 48 6 seconds of the game, and they win the state 7 championship. There's Senator LaValle. We 8 express our sympathy to him. 9 (Laughter.) 10 SENATOR BRUNO: You've either got 11 it, Kenny -- they've got it. 12 So you've got it. And what's 13 happening in your lives as you team with each 14 other, some of you excel individually, but 15 that's what happens in teams. But if you 16 weren't a team, you wouldn't be champions. 17 And you are champions. And you know how to 18 work together. You know how to relate. 19 And Marisa Abbott was the 20 outstanding goalie of the tournament. And 21 congratulations to Marisa. 22 So you have done it absolutely 23 great, something truly outstanding. It's 24 great to be academically proficient -- and you 25 are, or you wouldn't be on the team. But when

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(518) 371-8910 1 you can excel in this way, you are a role 2 model for more people than you can imagine -- 3 other students, your own peers, people who are 4 younger, people who are older. You're role 5 models. And that's something to be very proud 6 of. 7 Your parents, your friends, we are 8 all extremely proud and proud to have you here 9 in this chamber, proud that we will accept 10 this resolution. 11 And again, today is kind of a 12 special day in that we're handing up Rules 13 changes. And the members here are still 14 deliberating over how they will deliberate on 15 the floor. But we're happy that Senator 16 Schneiderman joined us here as the floor 17 leader to be representative. So thank you. 18 SENATOR SCHNEIDERMAN: Soccer 19 fan. 20 SENATOR BRUNO: And he is a 21 soccer fan. And he wishes that you were in 22 his district, but you're not. You're in mine. 23 And I'm glad that you're there. 24 (Laughter.) 25 SENATOR BRUNO: So

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(518) 371-8910 1 congratulations to you. And I would move the 2 passage of the resolution. 3 ACTING PRESIDENT MEIER: The 4 question is on the resolution. All those in 5 favor signify by saying aye. 6 (Response of "Aye.") 7 ACTING PRESIDENT MEIER: Those 8 opposed, nay. 9 (No response.) 10 ACTING PRESIDENT MEIER: The 11 resolution is unanimously adopted. 12 (Applause.) 13 ACTING PRESIDENT MEIER: Senator 14 Bruno. 15 SENATOR BRUNO: Mr. President, 16 can we ask for an immediate conference of the 17 Majority members in the Majority Conference 18 Room. We estimate we'll be 10, 15 minutes. 19 And by then we hope that the Minority will be 20 on the floor. 21 Thank you, Mr. President. 22 ACTING PRESIDENT MEIER: 23 Immediate conference of the Majority in the 24 Majority Conference Room. 25 (Whereupon, the Senate stood at

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(518) 371-8910 1 ease at 3:50 p.m.) 2 (Whereupon, the Senate reconvened 3 at 4:26 p.m.) 4 ACTING PRESIDENT MEIER: Senator 5 Bruno. 6 SENATOR BRUNO: Mr. President, 7 can we at this time call up Resolution Number 8 196 and ask that it be read in its entirety 9 and move for its immediate adoption. 10 ACTING PRESIDENT MEIER: Motions 11 and resolutions. 12 The Secretary will read. 13 THE SECRETARY: By Senators 14 Bruno, Skelos, Padavan, Morahan, and Stavisky, 15 Legislative Resolution Number 196, mourning 16 the untimely death of three of New York City's 17 bravest: Fire Lieutenant Curtis W. Meyran, 18 Firefighter John G. Bellew, and Firefighter 19 Richard T. Sciafani. 20 "WHEREAS, Citizens across our State 21 and Nation are inspired by and indebted to our 22 valiant firefighters who exhibit courage and 23 bravery every day in the course of their 24 duties; and 25 "WHEREAS, Firefighters exemplify

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(518) 371-8910 1 the power of human compassion and the strength 2 of the American spirit through actions of the 3 most heroic magnitude. Their sacrifices and 4 their selfless dedication merit tribute and 5 recognition by all citizens of this great 6 country; and 7 "WHEREAS, This Legislative Body is 8 deeply moved to inscribe upon its records this 9 remembrance for Fire Lieutenant Curtis W. 10 Meyran, Firefighter John G. Bellew, and 11 Firefighter Richard T. Sciafani, three 12 incredibly brave and admirable men whose 13 memory will remain in the hearts of all those 14 who had the honor of knowing them; and 15 "WHEREAS, On Sunday, January 23, 16 2005, Fire Lieutenant Curtis W. Meyran and 17 Firefighter John G. Bellew died battling a 18 three-alarm fire in a four-story apartment 19 building in the Bronx. Firefighter Richard T. 20 Sciafani died searching for children in a 21 Brooklyn fire; and 22 "WHEREAS, Fire Lieutenant Curtis W. 23 Meyran, 46 years old, was appointed to the 24 FDNY on November 12, 1989, and was currently 25 assigned to Battalion 26 in the Bronx; and

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(518) 371-8910 1 "WHEREAS, During his 16-year career 2 with the FDNY, Fire Lieutenant Curtis W. 3 Meyran was twice cited for bravery, in 1991, 4 while working at Ladder 161, and in 1997, 5 while assigned to Ladder 123, both in 6 Brooklyn, New York; and 7 "WHEREAS, A resident of Malverne, 8 New York, Fire Lieutenant Curtis W. Meyran is 9 survived by his wife, Jeanette, and their 10 three children, Dennis, Dineen, and Angela; 11 and 12 "WHEREAS, Firefighter John G. 13 Bellew, 37 years old, was appointed to the 14 FDNY on July 17, 1994, and was currently 15 assigned to Ladder Company 27 in the Bronx; 16 and 17 "WHEREAS, During his 10-year 18 career, Firefighter John G. Bellew worked at 19 Ladder 10 and Engine Company 23; and 20 "WHEREAS, A resident of Pearl 21 River, New York, Firefighter John G. Bellew is 22 survived by his wife, Eileen, and their four 23 children, Brielle, Katreana, Jack, and Kieran; 24 and 25 "WHEREAS, A 10-year veteran,

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(518) 371-8910 1 Firefighter Richard T. Sciafani, 37 years old, 2 was assigned to Ladder 103. He was one of the 3 first firefighters to arrive at the scene; and 4 "WHEREAS, A resident of Bayside, 5 New York, Firefighter Richard T. Sciafani, is 6 survived by his mother, Joan, his sister, 7 Joanne, and many extended family members; and 8 "WHEREAS, New York's bravest 9 continually make sacrifices for New Yorkers 10 and have always and will always be there when 11 this great City needs them most; and 12 "WHEREAS, It is the sense of this 13 Legislative Body to convey its grateful 14 appreciation and heartfelt regret in 15 recognition of the loss of these three 16 firefighters who made the ultimate sacrifice 17 so the residents of New York City can live 18 safely; now, therefore, be it 19 "RESOLVED, That this Legislative 20 Body pause in its deliberations to mourn the 21 untimely death of three of New York City's 22 bravest: Fire Lieutenant Curtis W. Meyran, 23 Firefighter John G. Bellew, and Firefighter 24 Richard T. Sciafani; and be it further 25 "RESOLVED, That copies of this

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(518) 371-8910 1 resolution, suitably engrossed, be transmitted 2 to the families of Fire Lieutenant Curtis W. 3 Meyran, Firefighter John G. Bellew, and 4 Firefighter Richard T. Sciafani." 5 ACTING PRESIDENT MEIER: Senator 6 Bruno. 7 SENATOR BRUNO: Thank you, Mr. 8 President. 9 We are, colleagues, pausing in our 10 deliberations here today as we heard the 11 chronicle of three brave firefighters who gave 12 their lives yesterday. And we can't help but 13 be reminded of the courage, the bravery of 14 those three men specifically, every 15 firefighter throughout this state, throughout 16 this country that responds. 17 The weather yesterday was about as 18 unpleasant as it could be, and yet people are 19 on call, on duty, and respond. These three 20 men didn't call in sick, they didn't show up 21 late, they were just there. They were there 22 doing what firefighters do every day, being 23 ready being, being on call. To do what? To 24 help save lives, just as these people were 25 doing. And they gave their own lives.

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(518) 371-8910 1 So we do pause. And we must 2 remember and always remember that we do a lot 3 of things in this chamber, a lot of good 4 things on behalf of the people of this state. 5 But it's so important for us to just remember 6 the sacrifices that people like these three 7 firefighters -- like others who are in uniform 8 throughout the world, like the police in 9 uniform -- they stand ready to do what we 10 can't do for ourselves and to actually give 11 their lives to help others. 12 So we're indebted to their families 13 for having shared their lives with us all. 14 And we will remember, all of us, not just 15 these three that are departed from the Bronx 16 and from Brooklyn, but all of the people who 17 are in uniform, who are out there literally 18 putting their lives on the line for us here 19 and people like us throughout this state and 20 the rest of the world. 21 Thank you, Mr. President. 22 ACTING PRESIDENT MEIER: Senator 23 Skelos. 24 SENATOR SKELOS: Thank you, Mr. 25 President. Thank you, Senator Bruno, for

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(518) 371-8910 1 sponsorship of this resolution. 2 One of my constituents 3 unfortunately lost his life, Lieutenant Curtis 4 Meyran, who lived in Malverne, a wonderful 5 small community, with his wife, Jeanette, and 6 three children, Dennis, Angela, and Dineen. 7 I did not know the lieutenant, but 8 I can guarantee you, like with so many of our 9 firefighters and fire officers, not only did 10 they serve the citizens of New York City, but 11 I guarantee you, within their home 12 communities, whether it was in New York City 13 or in Malverne, on Long Island, they were 14 involved with probably coaching a Little 15 League team, they were involved perhaps on the 16 island, as so many firefighters, as a 17 volunteer firefighter -- again, risking their 18 life in the city as a paid firefighter, on the 19 island and other communities upstate as 20 volunteer firefighters -- involved with their 21 church or synagogue, and just doing what they 22 can to make their communities a little bit 23 better. 24 Senator Bruno alluded to it; this 25 really puts things in perspective. I mean, so

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(518) 371-8910 1 many things that we do in this chamber are 2 very important, obviously, helping the 3 citizens of the State of New York. But 4 sometimes we get hung up on things that 5 perhaps aren't as important in terms of 6 quality of life and what's real. And what 7 these gentlemen -- and I call them 8 gentlemen -- did, these heroes, was real. 9 They gave up their lives to protect children, 10 by running into a house in the Bronx to see if 11 there were any tenants in the building, 12 running into another building in Queens to see 13 if there were any children there. That's 14 real. And that's what we should reflect upon, 15 and all of us in this state, this area, should 16 reflect upon when we think about our 17 firefighters, our fire officers, and our 18 policemen. 19 So we all thank you, Senator Bruno, 20 for this resolution. And to these families, 21 all we can say is our prayers, our sympathy, 22 our hearts, and certainly whatever we can do 23 for them as a body, I know that we will. 24 ACTING PRESIDENT MEIER: Senator 25 Morahan.

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(518) 371-8910 1 SENATOR MORAHAN: Thank you, Mr. 2 President. 3 I too rise in sorrow to memorialize 4 one of my constituents, John Bellew, from 5 Pearl River. Pearl River is a small hamlet 6 that is peopled by people who work in 7 volunteer services, work in the city services 8 of police and fire. I don't know what the 9 percentages are, but it's a great, great 10 percentage of people who do serve the 11 community in various ways. 12 John was only 37 years of age. His 13 wife, Eileen, he met in Brielle, New Jersey. 14 And in honor of that meeting and that coming 15 together, they named their first daughter 16 Brielle. Three other children; another 17 daughter, two boys, one of whom will never 18 know his father -- he's only five months old. 19 And the others will have a very short memory 20 of him. 21 I know in my family my wife lost 22 her dad as a New York City police officer 23 killed in the line of duty at age 29. And she 24 was only 18 months, so she grew up never 25 knowing her dad in the home.

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(518) 371-8910 1 These children will have to deal 2 with that loss and that struggle and that 3 mystery, if you will, of what their dad was 4 all about. 5 He was a young man, he was born in 6 Queens, came to Rockland County, he graduated 7 from Malloy High School, went on to graduate 8 college, went into the corporate world, if you 9 will, the business world, stayed there for a 10 while, didn't like it. It was something he 11 didn't feel rewarding. And he wanted to join 12 all his cousins and all his other relatives 13 who were firefighter and police officers. And 14 for that, that fateful decision, he gave his 15 life for his community. And that is the 16 greatest sacrifice anyone can make for their 17 fellow human beings. 18 John will be missed by his family 19 and wife, Eileen, his many neighbors in Pearl 20 River. And it's a community that has already 21 suffered so much with the loss of firefighters 22 and police officers in 9/11. And now we will 23 relive that tragedy. 24 And as Senator Skelos said, it puts 25 things in perspective for us. When we think

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(518) 371-8910 1 we're doing a great thing up here, we think 2 what we're doing up here is so very, very 3 important, this is what others are doing -- 4 without fanfare, without any bragging. 5 The other two fine people, one was 6 noted for being the first one through the door 7 at any fire, couldn't wait till they got in to 8 rescue people. They are a tribute to the 9 bravest, New York City's bravest, and they are 10 a tribute to the whole department. And 11 they're a tribute to the people of New York 12 City and New York State. 13 Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Thank 14 you, Senator Bruno, for making that wonderful 15 resolution in memory of these three people, 16 these three heroes. Thank you. 17 ACTING PRESIDENT MEIER: Senator 18 Stavisky. 19 SENATOR STAVISKY: Thank you, Mr. 20 President. 21 Richard Sciafani lived in my Senate 22 district, in the Bay Terrace section of 23 Bayside. He was 37 years old. He had been 24 assigned to one of the elite units in 25 Greenwich Village, and yet he sought a

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(518) 371-8910 1 transfer to the firehouse in East New York 2 because it provided more activity, because he 3 wanted to go out and help people. Why else do 4 people become firefighters except to help 5 others, to rush into buildings where everybody 6 is trying to flee. 7 Today's I think it was the Daily 8 News had a very poignant photograph on page 3 9 of the firefighter Sciafani being carried out 10 of the burning building. And what was he 11 doing there? This was a birthday party that 12 children were having in this apartment house 13 in East New York, in Brooklyn. And he went 14 back to see if there were any other children 15 who were still there at the birthday party. A 16 birthday party, a time of celebration, a time 17 of joy and happiness. But apparently he got 18 entangled with some equipment or something 19 that was on the floor, and he lost his life in 20 that -- at that children's birthday party. 21 His mother, Joan, his sister, 22 Joanne -- mothers aren't supposed to bury 23 children. They're supposed to celebrate a 24 full life. And this mother is without her son 25 now. And it reminds us of what a dangerous

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(518) 371-8910 1 business it is being a firefighter -- and 2 being a police officer as well, but 3 particularly New York's bravest. And it seems 4 to me that all of us mourn the passing of a 5 New York City employee killed in the line of 6 duty, because the city has lost one of its 7 very, very best. 8 I know that everybody here will 9 want to convey their condolences to the family 10 and hope that this was the last tragedy to 11 occur. 12 Thank you, Mr. President. And 13 thank you, Senator Bruno, for introducing this 14 resolution. 15 ACTING PRESIDENT MEIER: Senator 16 Gonzalez. 17 SENATOR GONZALEZ: Thank you, Mr. 18 President. 19 I too want to thank Senator Bruno 20 for this resolution. In the Bronx, in my 21 district, firefighters have fallen -- 22 particularly in my district, but also in 23 Queens. And like Senator Skelos said, it puts 24 it in perspective as to what it's all about. 25 And particularly in the Bronx, we always felt

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(518) 371-8910 1 that the bravest and the firefighters were the 2 first to respond to anything that happened in 3 the Bronx. Or if they would put calls, the 4 firefighters were there in seconds, even if 5 there was a crime. And as we were fighting 6 crime, they too, along with the police 7 officers, were part of that scene in terms of 8 crime. 9 And so my heart goes to the family 10 and to these heroes. But it does put it in 11 perspective that we have the greatest 12 firefighters, and not only firefighters, but 13 the police officers. And, you know, God bless 14 their souls. Thank you. 15 ACTING PRESIDENT MEIER: The 16 question is on the resolution. All those in 17 favor -- I'm sorry. 18 Senator Diaz. 19 SENATOR DIAZ: Thank you, sir. 20 Mr. President, I'll also take this 21 opportunity to express my appreciation to 22 Senator Bruno for this resolution, even though 23 it is not my district where this incident 24 happened. But it is the Bronx. And the area, 25 Morris Heights, in the Bronx, is mainly

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(518) 371-8910 1 Hispanic and minority residents. We in the 2 City of New York, we have a failing that we 3 criticize, and sometime say and sometime -- 4 most of the time we're saying that the fire 5 department doesn't hire minorities and that 6 the minorities are left out when they hire in 7 the fire department. And that is true. 8 But today, today we are -- I'm 9 reading in the New York Post, I'm reading, I'm 10 looking at the tragic incident that takes our 11 attention now. And I see that when fires and 12 police departments in the City of New York, 13 all over the country, all over the state, when 14 they have to respond to their duties, they put 15 their life in danger, then they put their 16 life -- and when an accident like this 17 happens, it takes everybody. It doesn't take 18 blacks only, it doesn't take Hispanics, it 19 doesn't take whites, it takes -- there's no 20 color. There is no gender. Everybody goes. 21 And Firefighter John Bellew, 22 leaving seven children. On behalf of the 23 Bronx community that I represent, and on 24 behalf of Senator González's community and all 25 of us that is in Minority, I extend my sorrow

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(518) 371-8910 1 to the families of those two heroes, 2 Lieutenant Curtis Meyran and Firefighter John 3 Bellew. And to those -- to the mother and 4 those seven children that are left without a 5 father. 6 And, Senator Bruno, thank you very 7 much. When this happens in the Bronx, 8 anywhere in the city, it hurts. But it hurts 9 more when it happens in a community, the 10 minority community that I represent. 11 Thank you. And I appreciate this 12 for you doing this. Thank you very much. 13 ACTING PRESIDENT MEIER: Any 14 other Senator wish to be heard on the 15 resolution? 16 The question is on the resolution. 17 All those in favor signify by saying aye. 18 (Response of "Aye.") 19 ACTING PRESIDENT MEIER: Those 20 opposed, nay. 21 (No response.) 22 ACTING PRESIDENT MEIER: The 23 resolution is unanimously adopted. 24 Senator Bruno. 25 SENATOR BRUNO: Mr. President,

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(518) 371-8910 1 can we open the resolution to all the members 2 here in the chamber and put their names on the 3 resolution unless anyone would approach the 4 desk and ask not to be included. 5 And can we ask, with this vote, 6 that we all just stand in respect for the 7 memory of these firefighters and for all of 8 those that are in uniform putting their lives 9 on the line every day. 10 (Whereupon, the assemblage 11 respected a moment of silence.) 12 ACTING PRESIDENT MEIER: The 13 resolution will be opened for sponsorship by 14 the members. Anyone not wishing to be so 15 listed notify the desk. 16 Senator Bruno. 17 SENATOR BRUNO: Mr. President, I 18 have Resolution 195 at the desk. I would ask 19 that it be read, title only, and move for its 20 immediate adoption. 21 ACTING PRESIDENT MEIER: The 22 Secretary will read. 23 THE SECRETARY: By Senator Bruno, 24 Senate Resolution Number 195, to adopt the 25 Rules of the Senate for the years 2005-2006.

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(518) 371-8910 1 SENATOR PATERSON: Explanation. 2 ACTING PRESIDENT MEIER: Senator 3 Bruno, Senator Paterson has requested an 4 explanation. 5 SENATOR BRUNO: Thank you, 6 Senator Paterson and colleagues. 7 As you all will recall, we've 8 established a task force to review the rules 9 of the Senate. And the resolution that we 10 have on the floor before us changes the 11 procedures by the way we vote in this chamber. 12 And the bottom line is to make what we do here 13 more open, more responsive, more public. 14 And one of the more important parts 15 of what we are doing is that each member, in 16 the controversial calendar, and any vote that 17 is debated, members will have to be in their 18 seats. So it eliminates empty-seat voting. 19 We're also establishing a task 20 force to study the technology that's out 21 there, with a bipartisan approach, chaired by 22 Senator Wright, to really review what is out 23 there in terms of opening this process, making 24 it more responsive. 25 And there is something in the

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(518) 371-8910 1 neighborhood of 38 or 40 pages of rules that 2 pertain to how we function here in this 3 chamber. And the intent of these rules is to 4 make the process more efficient, more open, 5 more responsive. 6 Now, we will have differences here 7 in this chamber. We'll have differences on 8 the effect of the rules that we've handed up. 9 I simply submit to all of you that we'll 10 debate our differences of opinion, and we 11 respect the differences of opinion. 12 And we're also very aware, all of 13 us, that the votes that we take in this 14 chamber, when we are out there every two years 15 meeting with the constituency, how we vote in 16 this chamber, we're all held accountable. And 17 we're very aware that the competition gets 18 very severe as to who will be in the majority 19 when the votes are counted every two years in 20 this chamber. 21 Republicans, people on this side of 22 the aisle, have been elected to be a majority 23 here in this chamber. And we respect every 24 single individual in this chamber, but we must 25 function as a majority. And that's what the

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(518) 371-8910 1 procedures that we're handing up will allow. 2 And I want to remind everyone in 3 this chamber that while the Assembly has 4 moved, a couple of weeks ago, they're adopting 5 things that we have done in this chamber the 6 last ten years. And they still don't have the 7 open procedures that we have after all of the 8 rules and the rule changes that we have here 9 in this chamber. 10 Now, is that totally satisfactory 11 to the Minority? I would be surprised if it's 12 totally satisfactory. I would guess that 13 these rules changes won't be, and that will be 14 part of what we will discuss here over this 15 next length of time. 16 But I just submit that the 17 objective is to govern, and the Majority is 18 elected to govern, and that's what these rules 19 are all about, is together respecting every 20 individual in this chamber, recognizing that 21 every individual should participate in the 22 process. And we intend that that be the case. 23 And we've gotten along, I think, in 24 terms of governing, very well, Senator 25 Paterson and all of our colleagues in this

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(518) 371-8910 1 chamber. And I just remind everyone, there's 2 a time to campaign and there's a time to 3 govern. This is the time for us to govern. 4 Thank you, Mr. President. 5 ACTING PRESIDENT MEIER: The 6 question is on the resolution. 7 Senator Paterson, why do you rise? 8 SENATOR PATERSON: Mr. President, 9 to speak on the resolution. 10 ACTING PRESIDENT MEIER: Senator 11 Paterson, on the resolution. 12 SENATOR PATERSON: First, I'd 13 like to thank Senator Bruno for, in the last 14 two weeks, meeting with me personally two or 15 three times, for the Majority's cooperation in 16 trying to put this rules package together, for 17 the negotiation that we had not held up until 18 that point, and for the personal cooperation 19 of the staff and my colleagues, the members of 20 the Majority. 21 And we did reach an agreement on 22 empty-seat voting. The Assembly, who I think 23 did very well, reached an agreement on this 24 three weeks ago. And we have done the same 25 thing. And in the spirit of governance, not

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(518) 371-8910 1 campaign, I even met with the leader and some 2 of the members of the Majority task force 3 today, and we publicly announced our agreement 4 on empty-seat voting. 5 Now, that could not have been 6 advantageous from a political perspective, but 7 I do believe it's important to demonstrate 8 cooperation and negotiations in governing. 9 And it is for that reason that we are going to 10 present eight amendments to this proposal that 11 we think would make it a better proposal. 12 Because I can't vote for this proposal as it 13 stands. I can't. And I'm going to explain 14 why. 15 Under the proposal that has been 16 presented, the rules would now go to the Rules 17 Committee. The Rules Committee has no 18 regularly scheduled session. In our reform 19 package, which we made available to everybody, 20 we want to have an open administrative Rules 21 Committee like the one they have that governs 22 the House and the Senate in Washington. That 23 way, the proposal would be more acceptable. 24 But in any branch of government, 25 the most elemental parliamentary procedure is

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(518) 371-8910 1 that you have the right to change the rules 2 from the floor. Now, that has existed 3 everywhere. And for some reason, this isn't 4 something that I wanted to reform before this 5 year, because this is in the rules-change 6 proposal for this year. 7 So I cannot understand why, after 8 all of the political talk that I heard about 9 reform back in October -- and I think now that 10 I can speak for myself, I think that people 11 will understand why I didn't want to be part 12 of a rules task force during a campaign. I 13 wanted to be part of it during the actual 14 governing phase. 15 But this is the problem. You can 16 campaign and you can say you're for reform, 17 and then the first thing you do, the first new 18 change that you make is that you take the 19 Rules Committee approval and take it away from 20 the chamber and put it in the Rules Committee. 21 So I could stop right there. That is really a 22 core issue and an issue that I think explains 23 what is happening. 24 Then we come to an issue that was 25 changed in the rules of 2001, that on motions,

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(518) 371-8910 1 petitions and amendments there would be 2 something called a canvass of agreement. I 3 honestly have got to tell you I never heard of 4 a canvass of agreement before. And it is a 5 procedure by which we don't really record the 6 votes. So now we have a house of government 7 that actually is taking a canvass, is not 8 actually recording the votes of the members in 9 the house. 10 Now, is it true that sometimes on 11 amendments the vote that some of us take that 12 we may find out later on in an election that 13 that vote is exploited by the adversarial 14 party or an adversarial candidate? 15 Absolutely. That's what we all signed up for. 16 That's why we're in public service, to defend 17 what we think is right. Not to keep it in 18 secret, not to keep it stowed away from public 19 knowledge, not to obfuscate the ability of the 20 public to know how you actually stand on a 21 particular issue. 22 Now, that is why this whole idea of 23 canvass of agreements is wrong. And it is 24 another core issue. You just can't have any 25 rules or even use the word "reform" while

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(518) 371-8910 1 you're passing this kind of legislation. 2 The issue of messages of necessity. 3 Now, we reached an all-time low in this 4 chamber when the Governor sent us a message of 5 necessity on a bill that he vetoed. So it was 6 an emergency that we get it through the house 7 so he could veto it? 8 What we want to make sure is that 9 the message of necessity really truncates 10 legislation coming through the session in 11 emergencies, that it doesn't just become a 12 regular procedure whereby there isn't the 13 opportunity to go through the regularly 14 scheduled reading periods and public 15 disclosure before we pass legislation. 16 On the issue of committees, there 17 are ways that we can run the committee system 18 that do not allow for committee meetings to be 19 held at the same time that we're on the floor, 20 especially now that we've agreed that we won't 21 have empty-seat voting. 22 So how does a person attend a 23 committee meeting and actually wind up on the 24 floor at the same time? This is further part 25 of our amendment package that we're going to

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(518) 371-8910 1 introduce. 2 But I will just say this. I am 3 actually surprised at my colleagues on the 4 other side of the aisle, because they have 5 caused myself and my colleagues a number of 6 headaches and a number of -- and much anxiety 7 over the years. And the year in particular 8 that I have to take my hat off to the members 9 of the Majority was the year 2000. It was a 10 presidential year. We thought that we had 11 some excellent candidates to run that year. 12 And we came in here and we had some 13 issues that we thought -- we believed in and 14 we thought that the overriding number of 15 citizens in New York State believed in it too, 16 issues like hate crimes legislation, women's 17 health and wellness issues, campaign finance, 18 lobby reform, and gun control. And every time 19 we got some steam up, the Majority would have 20 a press conference or pass the bill and it 21 would kill us. 22 And, you know, even when you lose, 23 sometimes you've got to tip your hat to your 24 adversary. I don't know how many of my 25 colleagues really believed in hate crimes.

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(518) 371-8910 1 And I think a lot of them did; 57 members of 2 the Senate told the New York Post once that 3 they did, but for some reason we couldn't pass 4 this bill since it was introduced in 1987. 5 Lobby reform was something we talked about for 6 years. All of a sudden in that year, 2000, 7 they passed. And we didn't win a seat. 8 And -- but you've got to tip your 9 hat to your adversary, because it was very 10 timely, it was very seasonable, and it was 11 very well done. And I crawled out of here 12 that year wishing that one day the Majority 13 would make a mistake. 14 And it's today. It's today. 15 Because the issue of legislative reform, how 16 the rules are set in the legislative bodies, 17 is sweeping this state. It was cited as a 18 number-one issue that voters thought was the 19 most important in this last election. So to 20 come in here with this rules proposal, which 21 actually reverses, really, the spirit of the 22 way a house of government should be run, flies 23 in the face of it. 24 And I'm trying to figure out how it 25 happened. I'm trying to figure out what all

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(518) 371-8910 1 of you did wrong in 2005 that you knew five 2 years ago. And I know that some of you 3 sitting here right now, and you know in your 4 heart -- wasn't that a Republican, "in your 5 heart you know I'm right," Barry Goldwater? -- 6 you know I'm right. 7 And this is a mistake. You've made 8 a big mistake. Yes, you did. And you are 9 going to hear about it for the next two years. 10 And I don't think you should have done it this 11 way. If I were a Republican consultant, I 12 would have told you not to do it this way. 13 But the people of this state are 14 speaking out on this issue. This was an issue 15 that never polled well. Our conference used 16 to poll it, and up until about 2001 it never 17 polled well. All of a sudden, people have 18 recognized that ideology is not just the only 19 reason to vote for people. It's integrity. 20 It's the way government is run. 21 And now. My colleagues, you remind 22 me of the character in Crime and Punishment, 23 Raskolnikov. When the investigator said to 24 him, "You're going forward when you should 25 stay back, you're staying back when you should

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(518) 371-8910 1 be going forward. And like a fly, you will 2 fly right into the light and I will swallow 3 you whole." [Gulping.] And I'm going to do 4 it. And the funny thing is, you make it easy 5 for me. 6 So now I hear we're not even -- 7 that the Majority doesn't even want to record 8 the votes on changing the rules. We don't 9 even have any rules in this house right now. 10 We're starting the beginning of the session, 11 and we have no rules here. So why would we 12 not record the votes on the amendments? 13 That's a standard parliamentary procedure, 14 isn't it? 15 But you know something? You can do 16 it any way you want, because at present there 17 are more votes on that side of the aisle than 18 there are here. But just remember, you can 19 win the battle and lose the war. And what I'm 20 saying is if you really want to pass this 21 package and call it reform, make my day. 22 Because you know it's not reform, I know it's 23 not reform, and the people of this state know 24 it's not reform. And that will be proven over 25 time.

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(518) 371-8910 1 So I'm going to give everybody a 2 chance to think it over as we present these 3 amendments. And we will be collegial, we will 4 be cooperative, we will work under whatever is 5 imposed as a result of this discussion, 6 because that is our duty to the public. And 7 we again thank all of you for the cooperation 8 of at least negotiating with us. 9 We think that you're dead wrong on 10 this proposal, but we'll go forward and work 11 with you as civilly and as cooperatively as we 12 can. However, it is impossible for us to 13 accept the rules changes that are proposed in 14 even the fashion in which it's going to be 15 implemented. 16 ACTING PRESIDENT MEIER: Senator 17 DeFrancisco. 18 SENATOR DeFRANCISCO: Senator 19 Paterson, I have great respect for you. But I 20 think that the comments you just made really 21 show that what we're really dealing with today 22 is a continuation of the election process. 23 If you are basically saying to us 24 we have made your day because we have given 25 you an issue that you can take over the

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(518) 371-8910 1 majority on during the next election, then I 2 think it's pretty clear what the true 3 motivations are on some of these bills, some 4 of the these amendments. 5 Obviously there's a difference of 6 opinion on some. But on the other hand, I 7 would hope that whatever we come down with as 8 final rules changes today, we would also 9 recognize that in the past we have already 10 changed the rules to a great extent where, as 11 Senator Bruno mentioned, the Assembly is just 12 catching up at this point in time. 13 So I think, I hope that the debate 14 today will really be focused on whether the 15 rules make sense, whether they are rules that 16 we should pass, we should change, and whether 17 or not they stand on their merits, as opposed 18 to whether or not it's going to put us in a 19 better position two years from now, since we 20 have two years between now and then to govern. 21 Thank you. 22 ACTING PRESIDENT MEIER: Senator 23 Diaz. 24 SENATOR DIAZ: Thank you, Mr. 25 President.

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(518) 371-8910 1 I represent an area of the Bronx, 2 the 32nd Senatorial District. A very poor 3 district, black and Hispanic and few others. 4 My office receives, every single day, from 25 5 to 40 clients every single day. My district 6 office is open from 9:00 to 5:00. 7 And the people that come to my 8 office, they have a complaint -- housing 9 eviction, dispossession, immigration, Social 10 Security, welfare, fair hearings, homeless, 11 families of inmates, et cetera, et cetera. My 12 staff have to become social workers. 13 We in my community, the problem is 14 we're different to other communities. And 15 when we run -- some of you, when you run -- 16 some of you are lawyers and you have your own 17 law firms, and to come here is part-time for 18 you. For some of us, this is it. There is no 19 part-time. It's to serve the community 24 20 hours, seven days a week. 21 But I have to do all these things, 22 ladies and gentlemen, with four staff and one 23 seasonal staff a year during session. So 4½ 24 staff, my office has to do all this. And we 25 are here talking about reform, or making my

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(518) 371-8910 1 days or not making my days. 2 But I wish you could make my day 3 today, ladies and gentlemen. Make my day when 4 you do a real reform and distribute the 5 resources with equal share. I have read the 6 New York Post, and I read that the 7 distinguished gentleman from Yonkers has 30, 8 30 staff members. Thirty staff members. And 9 this distinguished member from the South Bronx 10 only has four. 11 So if we really want to talk about 12 reform, make my day. Share. Give me a piece 13 of the pie. Let me serve my community with 14 dignity. Give me the necessary resources for 15 me to take care of my community, my 16 constituents, five days a week from 9:00 to 17 5:00 and sometimes even Saturdays. 18 I need you to consider that. And 19 tell me if it was not an aberration for 20 somebody to have 30 staff members and for me 21 to get only four. Aren't we all Senators? 22 Aren't we all here to serve our communities? 23 So make my days, ladies and 24 gentlemen. Give me equality. Make me part of 25 this. Help me serve my community. I need

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(518) 371-8910 1 more staff members, and we will do it. But to 2 have one with 30 staff members and another 3 with four staff members, this is something 4 that we have to take into consideration. I 5 mean, if we are going to talk about reform, 6 let's talk about reform. 7 Thank you, ladies and gentlemen. 8 ACTING PRESIDENT MEIER: Senator 9 Oppenheimer. 10 SENATOR OPPENHEIMER: I was going 11 to ask a question of my good friend John 12 DeFrancisco, if he would yield. 13 ACTING PRESIDENT MEIER: Senator 14 DeFrancisco, do you yield for a question? 15 SENATOR DeFRANCISCO: Sure. 16 SENATOR OPPENHEIMER: Senator 17 DeFrancisco, you were saying that this was a 18 continuation of the political process. But as 19 you know, most all of the reforms that we are 20 putting out from this side of the aisle were 21 reforms that were mentioned in the Brennan 22 Center for Justice package. 23 Now, would you say that the Brennan 24 Center for Justice is acting politically, or 25 in the manner of other good-government groups

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(518) 371-8910 1 like the League of Women Voters? 2 SENATOR DeFRANCISCO: Yes, I am 3 saying that. 4 And I would like to yield the floor 5 to Senator Saland, who has actually studied 6 this in great detail and can give you a very 7 detailed answer to prove the point that I just 8 mentioned. 9 SENATOR OPPENHEIMER: Well -- 10 okay. Let's -- 11 SENATOR CONNOR: Point of order, 12 Mr. President. This is a procedure I've never 13 seen before in this house. I know we have no 14 rules, but I haven't seen this procedure 15 before. 16 ACTING PRESIDENT MEIER: What's 17 your point of order? 18 SENATOR CONNOR: The person who 19 is being questioned is yielding the floor when 20 in fact Senator Oppenheimer had the floor. 21 ACTING PRESIDENT MEIER: Well, 22 Senator Oppenheimer had the floor. Senator 23 DeFrancisco indicated he would like Senator 24 Saland to handle the matter. Senator 25 Oppenheimer said okay.

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(518) 371-8910 1 The chair recognizes Senator 2 Saland. 3 SENATOR SALAND: Thank you, 4 Senator. And I'll be more than happy, if it 5 will make Senator Connor -- please him, I'll 6 sit down and wait for an appropriate time to 7 stand up. 8 I just have a few things that I'd 9 like to say, and it was your mention of the 10 Brennan Center report that really brings them 11 to mind. 12 And everybody knows what the 13 Brennan Center report is. We've all heard 14 about it. And I'd be willing to venture that 15 not a single one of the editorial writers who 16 have commented on it have read it. I'm 17 willing to venture that few if any of the 18 reporters who have embraced it have read it. 19 I'm willing to venture that within the ranks 20 of all of those sitting in this chamber and 21 the other chamber, some 212, that, if I was 22 generous, maybe eight to 10 of our members may 23 have read it. 24 And I'd like to comment by saying I 25 saw reported in November 29th issue of the

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(518) 371-8910 1 Albany Times Union a point about the Brennan 2 Center. And their spokesperson was a 3 gentleman named Scott Schell. And he 4 dismissed criticism of the Brennan Report as 5 distractions. He said, and I quote, "The 6 Center stands by every finding and every 7 proposed reform." 8 And certainly Brennan has set the 9 table for what has been the reforms that 10 you're proposing and the reforms that have 11 been of the greatest of interest to so many. 12 I would suggest to you they 13 acknowledge in that article that they're a 14 lobbying group. I've looked at their lobbying 15 sheets that they have filed, including the 16 ones I guess that they filed late. And the 17 long and the short of it is they're a lobbying 18 group. 19 And yet they're a lobbying group 20 that has been embraced in a fashion that I've 21 never seen embraced by groups, including the 22 media, who have become their apostles. And I 23 would submit to you that Brennan proposes to 24 stand before us much like a white-robed figure 25 holding stone tablets. And I fear they've

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(518) 371-8910 1 given us a golden calf. 2 And let me start off by asking you 3 if you would recall there is a bill that we 4 did that provided for a -- bear with me one 5 minute, if you would, Senator. It authorized 6 the City of Elmira, in the County of Chemung, 7 to enter an agreement with respect to 8 confinement of detainees in such county jail. 9 Do you recall debating that bill? 10 SENATOR OPPENHEIMER: Point of 11 order. 12 I think at this point it's probably 13 safest for me just to say that I'd like to get 14 on with the meat of this. And I can thank you 15 very much for providing me -- we are going to 16 disagree. And you're going to hear why we 17 disagree and why we think the process should 18 be more open and why we think that it should 19 not be -- 20 SENATOR SALAND: Let me suggest, 21 then, that you don't have to answer the 22 question. 23 And the answer to the question is 24 no, you didn't debate the bill, nor did 25 anybody else. But Brennan cites that as major

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(518) 371-8910 1 legislation. 2 And I can give you a list of dozens 3 of bills -- because their study and their 4 methodology, quite candidly, if the virtues 5 they extolled among their researchers were in 6 fact true, and if you read their 7 acknowledgement, I would be as for it as I was 8 when I read the acknowledgement. But let me 9 suggest to you that their methodology is 10 flawed. 11 The whole basis for their findings 12 are 308 major legislative bills based upon a 13 review of McKinney's. Now, of those -- and 14 they take great pains to say that we don't 15 debate those bills nor are there hearings on 16 them in committee. The reason I pointed the 17 bill out to you that I pointed is because 18 there are dozens of bills like that. This is 19 the major legislation for which this house and 20 the other house have been criticized for not 21 debating, bills for which there were 22 extenders, they were local bills. 23 I mean, should we be debating a 24 bill providing, what, distinctive license 25 plates to members of the Arts Council? I

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(518) 371-8910 1 don't know if that was a bill that warranted 2 being debated. But we were criticized for not 3 debating it. 4 Let me suggest to you that the 5 definition of debate -- and I have been to 6 many legislative chambers throughout this 7 country, and I have witnessed the same kind of 8 debates in those chambers as I have seen in 9 this chamber. And yet, under their 10 definition, I didn't witness debate. 11 SENATOR OPPENHEIMER: Let me 12 thank Senator Saland. 13 SENATOR SALAND: Well, I think I 14 still have the floor. 15 (Multiple speakers.) 16 ACTING PRESIDENT MEIER: Wait a 17 minute. Senator Oppenheimer has the floor. 18 Are you claiming the floor, 19 Senator? 20 SENATOR OPPENHEIMER: Yes, thank 21 you. 22 ACTING PRESIDENT MEIER: Senator 23 Oppenheimer. 24 SENATOR OPPENHEIMER: But I do 25 thank Senator Saland.

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(518) 371-8910 1 And I think maybe we're focusing 2 too much on the Brennan report when we should 3 be focusing on -- no, no, no. Let me explain 4 what I'm saying. I want you to know that 5 20 years ago, when I came into this body, I 6 wrote a lot of reform legislation because I 7 had come from the presidency of the League of 8 Women Voters and I saw a lot of things that 9 were wrong here. And it's in our structure 10 and it's in our process. 11 And so I was just using the Brennan 12 Center because that seems to be a genesis of 13 what a lot is happening now, because it has 14 finally come into the awareness of the general 15 public. When I first wrote this legislation 16 20 years ago, nobody was interested. Not the 17 least bit interested. I ran on these issues 18 and, even in talking in debates, nobody was 19 interested in what I was saying. So I stopped 20 talking about it. 21 But now I appreciate what the 22 Brennan Center has done, I really do. Because 23 it has the citizenry at least talking about 24 it. And they've focused on us, and I think 25 that's very beneficial. And I think there are

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(518) 371-8910 1 many issues here that have to be discussed. 2 Resources is one of them. More say for all of 3 us in this process. More openness so that 4 people will know what's happening in our 5 committees. Just a general more transparency 6 and more involvement of the citizens and for 7 all of us, as well as certainly equal 8 resources or at least more rational, 9 reasonable resources for everyone. 10 And I think there's a lot of work 11 that we can do here. And I'm sorry that we 12 haven't done it in the legislation, the 13 resolution that is before us. 14 Thank you. 15 ACTING PRESIDENT MEIER: Senator 16 Connor. 17 SENATOR CONNOR: Thank you, Mr. 18 President. 19 Mr. President, in a legislative 20 body the rules, the fundamental principle is 21 the rules are whatever the majority says the 22 rules are at any given time. And you can 23 write all the rules you want, and all the 24 institutional changes can be put in the rules, 25 but the fact is the rules at any given time do

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(518) 371-8910 1 not bind the majority. They bind the 2 minority, but they don't bind the majority. 3 That's why we can do business by 4 unanimous consent. There's no way you can 5 eliminate any procedure that we customarily 6 use on unanimous consent as long as there is 7 unanimous consent. You can't pass a rule that 8 says there shall no more be unanimous consent 9 granted to do something. That's an inherent 10 contradiction. The legislative body can move 11 forward together, if no one objects, and do 12 anything it wishes. Anything lawful, 13 obviously, or within its constitutional 14 powers. 15 You know, I've heard rules debates 16 over the years, over many, many years. I see 17 our former colleague Senator Leichter was here 18 today. What a coincidence. I remarked -- and 19 he's here on a visit in connection with an 20 event tonight that his daughter is a key 21 participant in. But the fact is I said to 22 someone a couple of weeks ago, They're going 23 to eliminate the provision from the written 24 rules that allowed the Majority Leader to star 25 any bill that's on the calendar. Most of my

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(518) 371-8910 1 colleagues here looked at me like, What's a 2 star? 3 Well, believe me, we were convinced 4 25 and 20 and 15 years ago that this entire 5 house would function with absolutely 6 unadulterated democracy if we could only 7 eliminate the provision in the rules that gave 8 the Majority Leader the power to star a bill. 9 And what that meant, for those who 10 are looking at me saying what's a star, it 11 meant -- to place a star on the bill meant the 12 bill was killed. Even though it had gotten 13 through the committees, even though it had 14 gotten to the floor, even though it might have 15 been cosponsored by 40 members and commanded 16 50 votes here. If the Majority Leader or his 17 designee said "Star the bill," it meant it was 18 dead and it could not be voted on by this 19 entire house. 20 And Senator Leichter would stand 21 here on the rules day and point out that not 22 even the presiding officer of the Supreme 23 Soviet had the power to star a bill, but our 24 Majority Leader did. Now, we all know where 25 the Supreme Soviet ended up. I hope everybody

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(518) 371-8910 1 here at least remembers that there was a 2 Supreme Soviet once. 3 But today we're eliminating it from 4 the rules. And how come nobody seems to care 5 or address that? There were editorials, 6 20 years ago there were editorials in all the 7 newspapers demanding that the rules be changed 8 to eliminate the Majority Leader's power to 9 star a bill. There were. 10 And what happened to that issue? 11 Well, the Majority Leader -- and I frankly 12 can't remember, I think it may have been 13 Senator Marino, actually, and Senator Bruno 14 has certainly honored it since -- just made a 15 statement saying: We're not going to change 16 the rule, but I'm not going to do that. And 17 so there has been no bill on the calendar 18 starred by a Majority Leader for the last 12 19 or 14 years. And today the Majority proposes 20 to take the language out of the rules. 21 Well, what's the point of that? 22 The point of that is it doesn't matter. It 23 doesn't matter what the rules say. It matters 24 how the Majority and its leadership behave. 25 And if you look at all the

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(518) 371-8910 1 dissatisfaction and the editorials out 2 there -- and, yes, the Brennan Center. I'll 3 talk about them in a minute, because I've had 4 my own experiences with them, Mr. President. 5 But the fact is it's how the Majority behaves. 6 It's how they decide the tenor and the tone of 7 the house is going to be set. It's not what 8 it says in the rules. 9 And by the way, since in the last 10 14 years the Majority Leader has not used his 11 power to star a bill on the calendar, is there 12 a soul in Albany, is there a soul in the State 13 of New York that thinks that resulted in 14 legislation passing this house that the 15 Majority Leader didn't want? I don't think 16 so. I don't think the power of the Majority 17 Leader to control legislation disappeared 18 because he stopped using the star. 19 So it doesn't -- and when you sum 20 it up, the specific language of various 21 rules -- and I know reformers, if you go back 22 and you read about Teddy Roosevelt in the 23 other house in the 1870s pushing for reforms 24 there, reform is not a new game. It comes 25 periodically to Albany. And there's this

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(518) 371-8910 1 fascination that if we only changed this rule 2 or this procedure, we'd get perfect democracy. 3 Mr. President, we get the democracy we want to 4 have. The majority in any legislative body 5 sets the tone. 6 You know, there's a proposal to 7 have rules to basically to try and allow the 8 minority to have a bigger role in legislation. 9 Well, my question, Mr. President, is when did 10 the rule pass that said minority members' 11 substantive bills can't pass the house? There 12 is no such rule. And don't look at me, 13 members, colleagues. No one should look at me 14 like, Are you crazy, that can't happen. 15 I came to this chamber in 1978, in 16 my first full session here, in the Minority, 17 sitting in that chair where Senator Savino 18 sits. I passed 19 bills into chapter. They 19 were not local bills. They were not local 20 bills. Changed the statute of limitations for 21 statutory rape. That's not a local bill. 22 Passed the New York City school bus safety 23 law. What did that mean? You had to stop 24 when a school bus was loading or unloading. 25 That never used to be the law in the city, it

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(518) 371-8910 1 was just the rest of the state. And I could 2 go on and on. Passed kosher protection laws, 3 since declared unconstitutional. But, hey, 4 they were on the books for 25 years first. 5 Passed a first number of bills like 6 that. Not because the rules said I could, but 7 because the Majority in the house at the time 8 and the Majority Leader -- and I know what his 9 instructions to his counsels were: You may do 10 any legislation for the Minority on the 11 merits. 12 Now, did that mean I passed my 13 legislative agenda? No. I was pretty far to 14 the left then, and I had lots of and lots of 15 bills that I loved, and they weren't going to 16 pass this house with a Republican majority in 17 it. But there were other bills, and I knew 18 how to spot them, that I thought, I can pass 19 this. This just makes common sense. There's 20 no D or R. There's no philosophy in this 21 other than what's right for the public. 22 And the system was, and I'd tell my 23 colleagues, you would go to the committee 24 chair -- and some of you are still here -- go 25 to the committee chair and say, I have this

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(518) 371-8910 1 bill or whatever, invariably would be told to 2 meet with my counsel. Meeting with the 3 counsel, invariably would be told by the 4 Republican committee chair's counsel how you 5 should amend the bill because it wasn't 6 drafted properly or covered more than it 7 should or less than it ought to. You would 8 amend it, and lo and behold, the bill would 9 come out. 10 Mr. President, there was a 11 tradition in this house in those days that I 12 have not seen since. And that was when a new 13 member spoke, be he or she Democrat or 14 Republican, when they first spoke on the floor 15 and sat down, all of our colleagues would 16 applaud. Remember that tradition? Haven't 17 seen that done in years. 18 Another tradition. When I first 19 passed my first bill, and I didn't even know 20 it was a tradition, all my colleagues stood 21 and applauded. People knew it was your first 22 bill. People kept track of that. I haven't 23 seen that done in years. 24 I suggest, Mr. President, this 25 rules fight is fine. But it's the way you run

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(518) 371-8910 1 the house, it's the respect you give 2 colleagues. 3 And by the way, when it did start 4 to change? I'd say it really started to 5 change after 1984 when the Democrats elected 6 three senators to this house, we won three 7 seats, won three seats that we hadn't held 8 before. Senator Oppenheimer was one, Senator 9 Quattrociocchi was one, and Senator Hoffmann 10 was the other. And all of a sudden -- nobody 11 changed any rules, the word just passed among 12 the Majority, don't pass any Minority bills. 13 Now, what has that done, by the 14 way? Reflect upon that, Mr. President. It 15 leaves a lot of very talented members in this 16 Minority up here in Albany with very little 17 legislative role to play. A lot of time on 18 their hands. Time to plot, time to scheme. 19 Now, my second or third year up 20 here I wasn't here sitting here figuring how 21 to knock off the leader. I was interesting in 22 taking the 19 votes and trying to pass 22 23 chapters. And I did. Because I was a 24 legislator. And people came to me, very 25 important unions in this state. Other

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(518) 371-8910 1 interest groups would come and say, You really 2 know labor law. Would you carry this bill for 3 me, for our union? And I would. It didn't 4 mean the kiss of death to it. 5 The interesting thing is after the 6 rule -- after there was no rule but a whisper 7 not to do Minority bills, and there was a big 8 fight here. And finally it was slightly 9 modified. Not in writing. And it was we can 10 do those little wonderful pieces of 11 legislation like, you know, letting Mrs. Jones 12 get her house back because it was wrongfully 13 seized for nonpayment of property taxes, or 14 you could give up almost any park in your 15 district, the Majority let you give that away, 16 and alienate it. 17 But the fact of the matter is 18 nothing changed in the rules. And I think if 19 you really look at the dissatisfaction out 20 there -- and by the way, Mr. President, the 21 Brennan Center. I recently testified not two 22 months ago for the defendants in a lawsuit in 23 federal court that's brought by the Brennan 24 Center. My colleagues may not know about 25 this, but if they win that lawsuit, there will

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(518) 371-8910 1 be no more judicial conventions, there will be 2 direct primary elections for Supreme Court. 3 And not to debate that now, but there's a lot 4 of problems with that. To my mind, it's not 5 the way to go. 6 So a lot of the lawsuits that they 7 brought in election law, which I'm very 8 familiar with, I've disagreed with. And 9 they've won, they've often won because the 10 state or city boards of elections settled 11 because they really didn't have a dog in the 12 hunt. And they settled and pay legal fees to 13 the Brennan Center. Yeah, they're not for 14 profit, but they have collected hundreds of 15 thousands in legal fees as a result of these 16 lawsuits they've brought. 17 So I have any disagreements with 18 them. And I agree with some of what they do 19 as well, and some of their positions. And I 20 did read that report. And I do find it 21 flawed. But I think the dissatisfaction out 22 there -- unfortunately, the Brennan Center 23 report became shorthand that the press could 24 use to describe this Legislature as 25 dysfunctional.

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(518) 371-8910 1 Now, with that, with that 2 conclusion, albeit the evidence doesn't 3 support the conclusion, it's hard to quibble 4 with the conclusion that we are a 5 dysfunctional legislature if your criteria is 6 are members involved, does legislation pass on 7 its merits, is everyone accorded a respectful 8 role in it. We are dysfunctional when it 9 comes to that. And we didn't used to be. 10 And if you talk about the campaigns 11 spilling into the Senate chamber, Mr. 12 President, as Senator DeFrancisco did, it 13 started when the Majority decided their 14 reaction to losing seats in 1984 ought to be 15 shut down the Minority, don't let them pass 16 any bills, don't let them have anything. That 17 wasn't always the way it was done. 18 Yes, the Majority rules. I have 19 talked, I talked 15 or 20 years ago to a very 20 old gentleman in Brooklyn, a gentleman in his 21 90s who once served here and then went on to a 22 distinguished judicial career. I don't 23 know -- he was a judge, anyway, for a lot of 24 years, I don't know how distinguished. But he 25 had served here.

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(518) 371-8910 1 And he said, "You still have the 2 same deal up there." And I said, "What's the 3 deal?" And of course in the crass lexicon 4 and political lexicon of his day, he said, 5 "Sixty-forty. Everybody's got to eat." 6 I said, "What do you mean?" And he 7 said, "Well, the deal we always had was in 8 each house the majority gets 60 percent, the 9 minority gets 40 percent. No matter what." I 10 said, "Well, it is based on the percentage the 11 minority had in the house?" "No, no, no. The 12 minority 40 percent, majority 60 percent. 13 Everybody's got to eat." 14 Why was that the rule? Because 15 before the Voting Rights Act, before Baker v. 16 Carr, and before really sophisticated computer 17 programs, that's as much as you gerrymandered 18 it. And experts like the late Don Zimmerman, 19 up on the fifth floor here in their stocking 20 feet, walking over maps with pins and threads, 21 did a good job of gerrymandering, but it 22 wasn't perfect. And each majority always 23 recognized that in the next landslide they may 24 go into the minority and they would like to be 25 treated with respect as legislators.

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(518) 371-8910 1 So we can have this rules fight. 2 But what I tell my colleagues is until there 3 is a will and a way to change the way this 4 house operates -- and you can take this over 5 to the other house too -- you can change all 6 the rules you want, it's not going to be a 7 functional small "D" democracy in this house 8 or in this Legislature until people make up 9 their minds to truly end the campaign after 10 the election and to govern together as 11 colleagues. 12 ACTING PRESIDENT MEIER: Senator 13 Skelos. 14 SENATOR SKELOS: Thank you, Mr. 15 President. 16 Perhaps, Senator Connor, I can put 17 1984 a little bit more in perspective other 18 than the way that you did it. In 1984, 19 Senator Mega defeated an incumbent Democrat, 20 Senator Skelos defeated incumbent Democrat 21 Carol Berman. 22 And following that election, 23 shortly thereafter, I do recall -- and I think 24 you were the campaign chairman, so I thank you 25 for the good job.

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(518) 371-8910 1 SENATOR CONNOR: I wasn't. 2 SENATOR SKELOS: You weren't. 3 But I would just also point out 4 that in the aftermath of the '84 election and 5 in particular the '86 election, there were 6 numerous reforms enacted within the 7 legislature based upon the indictment of the 8 minority leader, a number of other individuals 9 within your conference for abuse of public 10 property, essentially, hiring of detectives to 11 follow individuals such as myself on the 12 public payroll. And I could go on and on and 13 on, but that's past history. 14 I know that you went back to '84 15 and that time, so I just thought it would be 16 important to put it in perspective that 17 members win, members lose. But in 1984, 18 Senator Skelos and Senator Mega defeated 19 incumbent Democrats. 20 SENATOR CONNOR: Mr. President, 21 since I've been addressed, may I respond? 22 ACTING PRESIDENT MEIER: Senator 23 Connor. 24 SENATOR CONNOR: Thank you, Mr. 25 President.

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(518) 371-8910 1 I would also point out that another 2 seat changed hands. Senator Winikow's seat 3 went to the Republicans. So overall, it was a 4 wash. It was a wash that year. Pick up 5 three, lose three. 6 And I would also point out that 7 those gentlemen who were indicted, no one was 8 ever convicted and they were all dismissed. 9 In fairness to their reputations, no one was 10 found guilty of committing any crime as a 11 result of the 1986 election. 12 Thank you. 13 ACTING PRESIDENT MEIER: Senator 14 Liz Krueger. 15 SENATOR KRUEGER: Thank you, Mr. 16 President. On the bill. 17 My colleagues have talked about 18 whether or not we're fighting over 19 parliamentary procedure or civility or 20 politics. And the answer is, of course, all 21 of the above. 22 But as the chair of the Democrats' 23 Legislative Task Force on Rules and Budgetary 24 Reform, I've had an opportunity to listen to 25 the testimony of people from throughout the

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(518) 371-8910 1 State of New York, with their views not only 2 about what is a reality, our dysfunction, but 3 also what we can do about it. 4 And I've also been happily forced 5 to start to study parliamentary procedure, 6 because in fact the purpose of parliamentary 7 procedure is to assure that we have both 8 civility and fairness in moving forward on a 9 day-to-day basis legislatively. 10 And Senator Connor was right when 11 he points out that -- and Senator Bruno was 12 right earlier today when he pointed out that 13 the Majority rules. But the history and the 14 purpose of parliamentary procedure throughout 15 history in both England and the United States, 16 of which our government is modeled after, was 17 to assure that there were standard codes that 18 assured that it is the right in a democracy, 19 small "D," that in a legislature there is the 20 right of free and fair debate, the right of 21 the majority to decide and the right of the 22 minority to protest and be protected. And 23 that without dissenting voices, there is no 24 public debate. And without vigorous public 25 debate in all parts of the legislative

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(518) 371-8910 1 process, covered by the media to inform 2 citizens, there is no democracy. 3 And that is why we are here today 4 fighting for changes in our rules, to ensure 5 that we no longer continue to be the 6 dysfunctional legislature that in our hearts 7 all of us know we sit in, and that it is the 8 people's business we are sent here to do, and 9 that we will not accomplish our goals and we 10 will watch year after year more decisions 11 being taken away from us and moved into, 12 frankly, either the Governor's chambers or the 13 judiciary if we fail the assignment of in fact 14 small "D" democratizing ourselves through 15 following fundamental parliamentary procedure. 16 And the New York State Open Meeting 17 Law says it is essential to the maintenance of 18 a democratic society that the public business 19 be performed in an open and public manner and 20 that citizens of the state be fully aware of 21 and able to observe the performance of public 22 officials and attend and listen to the 23 deliberations and decisions that go into the 24 making of public policy. And that the people 25 must be able to remain informed if they are to

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(518) 371-8910 1 retain control over those who are their public 2 servants. It is the only climate under which 3 the commonwealth will prosper and enable 4 governmental process to operate for the 5 benefit of those who created it. 6 And parliamentary procedure is 7 relatively simple and clear once you get 8 through all of the detail. And it talks about 9 some fundamental principles. The purpose is 10 to facilitate the transaction of business and 11 to promote cooperation and harmony; to assure 12 equality of rights, that all members have 13 equal rights, privileges, and obligations; 14 that the majority does vote to decide, but 15 that these votes should be recorded; and that 16 the minority's rights should also be protected 17 and that there should be the right of 18 discussion, full and free, on every 19 proposition presented for decision and the 20 right of information and fairness and good 21 faith. 22 And my frustration here tonight is 23 that the package that has been offered by the 24 Majority to be the rules of the Senate for the 25 next two years don't meet any of those

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(518) 371-8910 1 standards. And they're not my standards, 2 they're the standards from the "Standard Code 3 of Parliamentary Procedure," which I am 4 advised is the definitive work on 5 parliamentary procedure guiding and governing 6 legislatures and other organizations 7 throughout the United States. 8 So the task is to meet simple 9 parliamentary procedure and hopefully have 10 greater civility between us, as Senator Connor 11 was addressing. And yet this package tonight 12 does not reduce the near-total control of the 13 Majority Leader over the legislative process; 14 does not end the practice of closed-door 15 governing on major issues; does not open the 16 legislative process to greater public scrutiny 17 and input; does almost nothing to improve the 18 critical committee process, merely codifies 19 current Senate practices; does not put into 20 place a workable conference committee process 21 between the two houses; does not require a 22 recorded vote on every Senate floor action, 23 including discharge motions and nonsponsored, 24 also known as hostile, amendments; does not 25 permit the Minority to put forth alternatives

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(518) 371-8910 1 to what the Majority has proposed; does not 2 give Minority members a more equitable share 3 of resources; and, perhaps worst of all, 4 effectively prohibits any future efforts to 5 reform the Senate Rules on the floor. 6 What the people see here is clear. 7 What we ought to expect of ourselves is clear. 8 We know we can do better. I would argue and 9 will argue later that the Minority has 10 proposed a definitive package of rules for 11 this legislature that does do better, that 12 does meet the standards of parliamentary 13 procedure. 14 And so I am disappointed with the 15 outcome today and hope that my colleagues on 16 both sides will still look carefully at the 17 package that the Democratic Minority put out 18 over two weeks ago to the public and consider 19 an alternative package to the one that has 20 been presented to us today. 21 Thank you, Mr. President. 22 ACTING PRESIDENT MEIER: Senator 23 Volker. 24 SENATOR VOLKER: Mr. President, 25 you know, I guess having listened to Senator

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(518) 371-8910 1 Connor is one of the reasons that I wanted to 2 speak. And I'll speak fairly quickly. 3 Actually, what happened is -- and 4 clearly Senator Skelos, who was in both 5 houses, has a good idea of this whole 6 situation. But I will say this. I was in 7 both houses also, but of course I was there 8 much earlier. It was really the Assembly that 9 changed, not us as much. When the Assembly 10 became really so dictatorial many years ago, 11 it had an impact on us. 12 And I only mention that because -- 13 and let me just say that this house has always 14 treated the Senate Minority with much greater 15 respect and much greater -- and tried to deal, 16 in many issues, with a much lighter hand than 17 the Assembly. 18 I can tell you that I remember very 19 well, and I will -- and I haven't told this 20 story about that period when the Senator was 21 talking about. The leader at the time was 22 getting prepared, if I remember right, to 23 leave. And let's just say that he sort of 24 delegated some of the responsibilities to a 25 few members, including myself. And we got

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(518) 371-8910 1 into the worst fight I've ever seen in my 2 time, and it went on for about two months 3 until finally one day we had a discussion and 4 we said, you know, it's time to stop this. 5 And we did. 6 And the reason I say that, this is 7 democracy. You know, one of the things that 8 really bothers me about this -- and, you know, 9 you should be asking for more resources, and 10 you want more power. The constitutional 11 framers -- but on the other hand, a socialist 12 republic does that. They give you all the 13 stuff, and somebody else runs things. And 14 everybody is equal, meaning they have less 15 power. But they're equal. That's not the way 16 it works, and they don't work that way in 17 Congress, by the way. 18 I understand what you're saying, 19 but I have to tell you -- and Senator Padavan 20 and I have looked at this -- these rules, and 21 I've got to tell you, these are -- and I must 22 say to you that there was a couple of 23 things -- contrary to maybe what Senator 24 Saland said, there was a couple of things that 25 were pointed out to us that needed change, in

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(518) 371-8910 1 my opinion, very much so, and some reforms 2 that frankly -- and the Majority Leader star, 3 yeah, it's true. 4 By the way, I think you were wrong, 5 Marty, because I think that the former 6 Majority Leader, I think, did use it a couple 7 of times. But Joe has never done it. Just a 8 couple of times; I don't think very much. 9 Because, for one thing, he had a guy who 10 pretty well watched legislation pretty 11 heavily, and as you know, so he didn't really 12 have to bother with the star. I admit that. 13 But I think our process here has 14 been much more free than in previous years. 15 But I think the reforms that we've set up here 16 are reforms that keep this body moving. You 17 talk about message of necessity. You know, 18 most of the legislation that we deal with a 19 message of necessity are old bills, reformed, 20 changed, and then finally came out. And 21 they're used because we are in a situation 22 where either we must do it quickly -- most of 23 the messages of necessity are right at the end 24 of the session. They rarely come any other 25 time. And we've tightened up the rules on

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(518) 371-8910 1 that. 2 But you and I know very well, if we 3 don't like a piece of legislation and we give 4 the ability of the minority to veto it, you'll 5 do it, just because you don't like it. And 6 that's not the way a democratic majority -- 7 and I mean democracy majority -- works. 8 Let me say that the rule changes 9 that we've created here do allow the 10 legislative process to be more representative, 11 more deliberative, more accessible. And let 12 me point something out about dysfunctional. 13 Of course, I'm in a county right now, Erie 14 County, that's really dysfunctional. And, I 15 mean, we can't even get a percent sales tax 16 things done because the county executive and 17 the county legislature are fighting. 18 Nothing in your package, nothing in 19 our package would prevent 63 people from one 20 house from stopping the budget. Because there 21 was a judge's decision, by the way, by one 22 region of the state that said that one region 23 of the state was to get some resources and the 24 other regions were to be shut out. This house 25 could do the same thing. But the Assembly did

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(518) 371-8910 1 it. And they waited until August, and we were 2 able to pass a budget. 3 Nothing in any of these so-called 4 rules changes would change that. But what 5 these rules changes do is to allow this house, 6 much more so than the Assembly, to be more 7 open, responsive, and to allow, I think, a 8 greater debate. 9 And I've got to tell you this, as 10 somebody who is on the Codes Committee, as I 11 think many of you know -- by the way, just 12 sending out a congratulatory to all the 13 members of the Codes Committee from last year, 14 because we had one of the best years we have 15 ever had in criminal -- in my opinion, the 16 best year, in criminal justice. And that 17 thank you not only goes to Republican members, 18 but to Democratic members, to Tom Duane and 19 Malcolm and all the people that were on the 20 committee. Because I think we did a pretty 21 darn good job. Not too many people paid 22 attention. The criminals have, by the way, 23 and the bad people. But I'm sending that out 24 because I think it was not noticed. 25 The reason I'm saying this is we're

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(518) 371-8910 1 part of the rules -- we didn't need a change 2 in the rules to do that. We did it anyways. 3 Now, these rules changes that 4 Senator Padavan was so involved in -- and 5 debated with the Brennan people, by the way, 6 very strongly -- I think will make our house a 7 more effective house. Our ability will be 8 even greater to do more things in this house. 9 But I would point out to you, we've 10 still got to deal with the other house. We 11 still have to deal with the other house, and 12 we still have to negotiate with the Assembly 13 and with the Governor. We can do all we want 14 here, but we still have to deal with other 15 people. 16 ACTING PRESIDENT MEIER: Senator 17 Schneiderman. 18 SENATOR SCHNEIDERMAN: Thank you, 19 Mr. President. 20 We are, as Senator Paterson, noted, 21 going make some amendments to this rule. But 22 I just want to try and bring us back down to 23 earth here a little bit. When Senator 24 Paterson spoke earlier, he wasn't saying this 25 is a political issue. What he was saying is

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(518) 371-8910 1 this is a matter of integrity. And if you are 2 not hearing what the voters are saying, they 3 may have to say it again. But that doesn't 4 mean it's political. 5 The people in this state are losing 6 confidence in the government. And you can 7 talk about the Brennan Center report. But two 8 weeks ago when Senator Bruno broke and agreed 9 to negotiate with Senator Paterson, a list of 10 dozens of groups sent a letter to the two 11 leaders endorsing basic proposals that are in 12 our amendments and some of which are in the 13 Brennan Center report -- radical groups like 14 the Business and Professional Women of New 15 York State, the Citizens' Budget Commission, 16 Edmund J. McMahon, the senior fellow at the 17 Manhattan Institute, the National Federation 18 of Independent Business, the Greater 19 Binghamton Chamber of Commerce. 20 So this is not a matter of a few 21 radicals or a few airheads down in Lower 22 Manhattan coming up with proposals. Are you 23 not listening to the voters all over this 24 state? This is a house -- we can stand and 25 say, oh, we're better than the Assembly, this

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(518) 371-8910 1 and that. The Brennan Center studied five 2 years. Five years. They didn't talk about 3 major bills in this portion of their report. 4 7,109 bills came to the floor of this house; 5 7,109 bills passed. 6 The people of this state do not 7 view this as a real, deliberative legislative 8 body, because what goes on on the floor here 9 is viewed as preordained. It is not viewed as 10 a serious legislature where nothing is ever in 11 dispute, where no bills are ever amended on 12 the floor. It is not viewed as a serious 13 legislature where Mr. O'Clair, sitting here, 14 he had a bill, Timothy's Law, that had over 50 15 sponsors and we couldn't bring it to the floor 16 of the Senate. 17 So I'd like to bring this down to 18 reality. We do have some amendments to make 19 which I would like to get through. And maybe 20 then we can start to consider the reality of 21 the rules we're addressing. 22 It's one thing to say these rules 23 make things more efficient and more effective. 24 I know we heard the same thing in January 2001 25 when this house voted -- and anyone who's on

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(518) 371-8910 1 the other side of the aisle who was here in 2 January 2001 voted for this -- to stop the 3 practice of recording votes of Senators on 4 amendments, to stop the practice of recording 5 votes of Senators on motions. How that makes 6 the public more able to tell where their 7 Senators stand, I do not know. 8 The rules proposal you've presented 9 us today continues this trend. Instead of us 10 having open debates, as we are today, on the 11 rules of the Senate, this would require those 12 to be referred to the Rules Committee, which 13 is not a regular committee with published 14 meetings and agendas that are distributed. 15 Here's the Senate committee meeting list. You 16 will never see the Rules Committee listed on 17 such a list, because it operates on the fly 18 and essentially as a sort of a shadow 19 committee. It has its own set of rules in the 20 section on committee rules. 21 So this process is going to 22 continue the trend. So I'd like to bring this 23 back to reality. Anyone in this house who 24 doesn't think we have a serious credibility 25 problem in this state I think is woefully out

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(518) 371-8910 1 of touch. And that's what Senator Paterson's 2 point is. We have to do better than tinkering 3 around the edges. We have to do better than 4 passing more aggressive measures that continue 5 the process of this not being a real, 6 functional legislature. 7 I'm sorry. According to the rules 8 of this house, it doesn't matter how many 9 sponsors you have on a bill, it doesn't matter 10 how many years a bill passes out of committee. 11 Under Rule -- what's been called by some 12 commentators "the Heart of Darkness," 13 Rule VIII, Section 6, the Majority Leader has 14 absolute power to determine what is on the 15 active list, what comes to the floor for a 16 vote and what doesn't. 17 And as long as every bill that 18 comes to the floor passes, as long as that 19 absolutely authoritarian power continues, 20 we're not going to be taken seriously. So our 21 proposal, embodied in our package, is to make 22 the rules real, make the committees real. If 23 a bill is based out of committee, it should 24 come to the floor. If someone wants to 25 sponsor a bill, they should be allowed to

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(518) 371-8910 1 sponsor a bill. 2 And I have heard no valid criticism 3 of our report released three weeks ago based 4 on efficiency, transparency, based on 5 responsiveness. So I would appreciate it if 6 we could now move forward with our amendments, 7 and then I know we have time for further 8 debate thereafter. But I believe that we have 9 eight amendments, and we're going to try to do 10 them as quickly as possible. I know there are 11 other Senators who want to speak. 12 Thank you, Mr. President. 13 ACTING PRESIDENT MEIER: The 14 chair is going to finish the list of people 15 who have asked to speak and take members in 16 regular order and recognize them. 17 I know, Senator Valesky, that you 18 have an amendment. 19 Senator Bonacic. 20 SENATOR BONACIC: Thank you, Mr. 21 President. 22 You know, I've been listening to 23 debate now for almost an hour and a half about 24 the rules. And if I had come and visited this 25 chamber for the first time, not involved in

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(518) 371-8910 1 politics or being an elected official, and I 2 was seated up there in that audience, I would 3 have to ask, What is everybody talking about? 4 How does any of these rules that we 5 may or may not do bring a timely budget? How 6 does it reduce property taxes? How does it 7 bring affordable health care? How does it 8 lower our car insurance? How does it reduce 9 crime or create jobs? That's what the people 10 want from us, productivity as a legislature. 11 Now, I served nine years in the 12 Assembly. And I have to tell you, in the 13 minority, as far as the policies of 14 leadership, we were treated with disrespect 15 and it was a tyranny. 16 Never disrespectful with the 17 members on both sides of the aisle, never. 18 And some of my best friends are over there on 19 the Democratic side in the Assembly. Because 20 that's the dignity and the civility we give to 21 each other because of people putting us here. 22 So -- and I had to take pride for 23 nine years that I would improve a product that 24 improved the quality of life of the people we 25 served. If I had a good bill, sponsored it,

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(518) 371-8910 1 it never saw the light of day. It was taken 2 by a majority member, and it was passed. I 3 didn't like it. But you know what? I got a 4 satisfaction that the people would be better 5 served. And that's what I took back to 6 justify why I'm here. Never got sponsorships. 7 Never got the same resources. But that's what 8 we give. 9 Now, it disturbs me greatly to hear 10 members say we are dysfunctional. We are all 11 stained by that. I grant you that the budget 12 process is dysfunctional, because there's no 13 constitutional, statutory trigger to make an 14 on-time budget. But let me just talk about 15 some of the things that I think we've 16 accomplished together. And never, never as a 17 member get up here and say this Legislature is 18 dysfunctional, because I dispute that greatly. 19 For example, in 1994, New York 20 State was ranked the 6th most violent state in 21 the nation. Today, it's the safest large 22 state in America. There were 86,000 fewer 23 violent crimes in 2003 than in 1994. 24 In the economy, with Empire Zones, 25 Centers for Excellence and all our personal

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(518) 371-8910 1 business tax reductions, we are now ranked 2 second in the nation in business climate and 3 new corporate facilities by Site Selection 4 magazine. We're ranked second in the nation 5 in insourcing. That's attracting jobs from 6 foreign-based companies. High-tech projects 7 alone, this year, $2.7 billion. And we've 8 reduced 19 different taxes, giving back the 9 people $122 billion. 10 In health care, we stepped up in 11 Family Health Plus and Child Health Plus and 12 now a million more people in this state have 13 insurance that they didn't have before, adults 14 and children. 15 We are among the tops in education 16 per pupil that we invest in our children, 17 trying to bring excellence in education. And 18 it's now estimated that 340,000 senior 19 citizens are enrolled in EPIC, saving 20 20 percent on prescription drugs. Our SUNY 21 system is the best in terms of attendance at 22 SUNY and CUNY. 23 In 2003, we were ranked one in the 24 best parks in the United States. 800,000 25 acres of open space we've created. And we

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(518) 371-8910 1 have the toughest acid rain standards, and 2 we've enacted brownfields revitalization 3 program. And today fewer families are on 4 welfare in the last decade than ever before. 5 We dropped nearly 600,000 people off the 6 welfare rolls. Child poverty has declined to 7 a 21-year low of 13 percent. And today we 8 have the best homeland security state in the 9 country, and we're ranked number one, the 10 largest safe state in the country. We have 11 done this together. 12 Now, if you want to stain yourself 13 when an elected official gets up and says we 14 are dysfunction as a Legislature because of 15 election pandering or embracing a lobbying 16 report, that is their privilege to say it. 17 But they are wrong, they are wrong, they are 18 wrong. 19 Can we do better? Should we do 20 better? Absolutely. But I have only cited 21 some things that we have done together that 22 the vote is no, that we are not dysfunctional. 23 And we will be judged on our policy 24 enhancements and how we better improve the 25 quality of life and not this

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(518) 371-8910 1 tempest-in-a-teapot rules debate. 2 Thank you, Mr. President. 3 ACTING PRESIDENT MEIER: Senator 4 Saland. 5 SENATOR SALAND: Thank you, Mr. 6 President. 7 I would like for a moment just to 8 pursue, if I might, something that was just 9 discussed by Senator Bonacic. I would 10 respectfully submit that if in fact you 11 devised the perfect procedural system and if 12 Brennan, however unrealistic, is perfection, 13 then I would pose some of the very same 14 questions that Senator Bonacic either posed or 15 certainly implied. 16 Would we have an on-time budget? 17 Would we have budget reform? Would we correct 18 the imbalance in the processing of our budget 19 between the Executive and the Legislature? 20 Would we have Medicaid reform? Would we have 21 the ability to do any number of things that 22 we've been criticized for not being able to 23 complete? Would we end logjam? Would the 24 system just come marvelously through, 25 finishing in a cohesive, organized fashion on

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(518) 371-8910 1 the last day of the session, whenever that 2 might occur? 3 In the Brennan report, Brennan 4 recommends or makes mention of our inability 5 to obtain Wicks reform. Would we have Wicks 6 reform? 7 I think the answer to each of those 8 questions would be no. And I think those nos 9 are the measure of our dysfunction. 10 I think we all should embrace 11 procedural reform. And I think what we are 12 doing here today certainly is a reflection of 13 trying to agree on what constitutes that 14 procedural reform. And I certainly concur 15 wholeheartedly that there's room for that 16 reform. 17 I do not, however, believe that 18 procedural reform or procedure is the measure 19 of either function or dysfunction. It's not. 20 What has caused us to be viewed as 21 dysfunctional, notwithstanding the comments of 22 Brennan, is our inability to get a budget on 23 time for some 20 years. It is our inability 24 to deal with the issues of Medicaid reform and 25 the others that I mentioned.

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(518) 371-8910 1 Now, in his comments a bit earlier 2 Senator Schneiderman made passing reference to 3 Brennan and said something about major 4 legislation really being of no import in the 5 scheme of what we're discussing. Well, I'm 6 going to submit to you that basically the tone 7 and tenor of everything that has occurred has 8 occurred based upon the Brennan report. 9 And for those of you who have read 10 the Brennan report, as Senator Connor 11 mentioned that he has, I think you'll see that 12 certainly the research leaves a lot to be 13 desired. I think you will see that zealotry 14 has replaced research. 15 And quite candidly, you know, I'm 16 just a small-town lawyer who used to have a 17 general practice. I don't practice actively 18 any longer. And perhaps when I saw Cravath 19 Swaine, I just should have stopped right in my 20 tracks and said the imprimatur of Cravath 21 Swaine is on this, how could it not possibly 22 be gold. 23 So I plodded forward in my own 24 bumbling way and just decided that there are 25 some things here that intrigued me. So let me

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(518) 371-8910 1 share with you, I started to talk before, when 2 they measure performance by committees or when 3 they measure performance by this chamber, they 4 measure it based upon major legislation and 5 major bills. 6 And they cite McKinney's. And 7 McKinney's, as you know, puts out pamphlets, 8 Russ McKinney's [ph]. They put out about ten 9 every session that [unintelligible]. And 10 basically they draw, Russ McKinney's draws off 11 of those pamphlets. And they describe things 12 called major legislation. 13 And I read to you what some of 14 those items of major legislation are. And 15 I'll just give you just a taste. I mentioned 16 earlier, authorize the City of Elmira, in the 17 County of Chemung, to enter agreement with 18 respect to confinement of detainees in such 19 county jail. Prohibits taxicabs from imposing 20 an additional charge for wheelchairs. Extends 21 for an additional two years the establishment 22 of certain water charges for hospitals and 23 charities in New York City. Extends the 24 statute of limitations for phenoxy herbicide 25 actions for armed forces personnel who served

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(518) 371-8910 1 in Indochina, for an additional two years. 2 Adds additional time to appeal a civil 3 judgment or a judgment on order of modus of 4 entry as delivered by mail or by delivery 5 service. Relates to providing tax relief to 6 individuals serving in a combat zone in the 7 Federal Republic of Yugoslavia. Authorizes 8 members of not-for-profit corporations to 9 issue acts of proxy by means of an agent in 10 facsimile signature or by means of electronic 11 transmission. Makes technical corrections to 12 Chapter 271 of the Laws of 1994 relating to 13 creating a women's veterans coordinator in the 14 Division of Veterans Affairs. Establishes the 15 Suffolk County Judicial Facilities Agency. 16 Trust me, I could go on and on. 17 This is the major legislation that we failed 18 to debate. This is the major legislation that 19 we were criticized for not debating. Brennan 20 says -- and they start off right in Footnote 2 21 of the Executive Summary, and I'll, if you'll 22 indulge me, quote it: "For purposes of this 23 study, we have analyzed the major legislation 24 passed from 1997 to 2001." 25 Now, does that constitute analysis?

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(518) 371-8910 1 How anybody could have considered that to be 2 major legislation, and let me go over some of 3 it, to debate it -- now, who here in this 4 chamber would have found cause to debate that 5 bill? If you want, I'll give you another 20, 6 30, or 40 of them. 7 Now, the methodology, they go on to 8 talk about frequency of debate. I had to read 9 through 82 pages. If you read the text and 10 didn't read the appendices, you have no idea 11 how they defined debate. So look at the 12 second appendix. That's the one that contains 13 the definition of debate. 14 And this is how they define it. 15 "Frequency of debate," and I'm quoting, "This 16 refers to a significant debate" -- I'm not 17 quite sure what that means -- "over a bill 18 with at least a few speeches or exchanges over 19 the merits of the bill rather than simply an 20 explanation of its terms by the sponsor." So 21 mere debate isn't good enough. It has to be 22 significant to receive the Brennan seal of 23 approval. 24 Now, from this they extrapolate 25 that 82 percent of major legislation passed

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(518) 371-8910 1 without any discussion, much less debate, in 2 the Assembly, and 71 percent in the Senate. 3 Why would those bills have been 4 debated? Why? I mean, there was no reason to 5 debate them anyway. And as I said, I could 6 bore you with a list far greater than that. 7 So according to Brennan, if I am 8 asked to explain a bill and two or three of my 9 colleagues ask me questions, that's not 10 significant debate. If I rise to explain a 11 bill, I answer two or three questions, two or 12 three people get up to explain their votes, 13 that is not debate. 14 Now, some of you may be aware I 15 formerly was an officer in the National 16 Conference of State Legislatures and in that 17 capacity had the opportunity to visit a number 18 of legislative chambers in other states. What 19 we think of as debate, at least what I've 20 thought of as debate, and Brennan certainly 21 says is not debate, is routinely the kinds of 22 debate that I've observed in the eight or so 23 chambers that I have visited, one house or 24 another, in both -- in both houses or one 25 house of the states that I've attended.

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(518) 371-8910 1 And they go on to say basically the 2 same thing about committees. There are few 3 committee hearings on major bills. Well, why 4 would you hold a committee hearing to figure 5 out the needs of the Chemung County Jail, why 6 would you hold a committee hearing to go 7 extend payments for -- or exclusions for 8 payments of charities for buildings in 9 New York City or for a veterans' affairs 10 person, a woman, in the Office of Veterans 11 Affairs? I mean, would that require a public 12 hearing? But yet we're criticized for not 13 doing it; it's a measure of our dysfunction. 14 Let me suggest to you a little 15 further that in some instances they've 16 compared apples and oranges. If you've 17 bothered to read the report, you'll see they 18 talk about professional legislatures. We are 19 one of I believe nine professional 20 legislatures that they list. We're joined by 21 California, we're joined by Michigan, we're 22 joined by Ohio, we're joined by New Jersey, 23 we're joined by Massachusetts and two or three 24 others. 25 And they go on to assert that we

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(518) 371-8910 1 have too many committees. They say that with 2 the exception of the State of Mississippi, 3 which has 35, New York State has more standing 4 committees than anybody else. Well, when I 5 say compared apples and oranges, when you 6 look, for instance, at California, which has a 7 much smaller senate than we do, when you look 8 at Wisconsin, Illinois -- Illinois, 35 9 senators, 17 committees. Wisconsin, 33 10 senators, 16 committees. Michigan, 38 11 senators, 28 committees. California, 47 and 12 26 committees. 13 If you apportioned those committees 14 based on the size of a 62-member house, a 15 number of those states would have more 16 committees than we do. We would all be 17 generally in the same ballpark. 18 And then they go on to talk about 19 logjam. Very, very disingenuously, I thought. 20 They state, and I'm quoting here, "Evidence is 21 not available for this report to determine 22 whether the New York State Legislature has 23 faced a greater logjam than other chambers in 24 recent years." 25 Now, how does one measure the

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(518) 371-8910 1 degree of logjam in 99 legislative chambers? 2 How do you do that? And what determines the 3 degree of logjam? 4 It goes on to say, "Plainly, the 5 end-of-session logjam is one of the many 6 practices and procedures that preclude 7 legislators' serious consideration of final 8 legislation prior to a floor vote." 9 Well, let me just suggest to you 10 that going to the very sources that Brennan 11 went to, particularly to NCSL, looking at some 12 of the tables that they looked at -- and some, 13 if they looked at, they chose not to use -- 14 they would have known that when it comes to 15 logjam, given the most recent data for 1998, 16 43 states representing 82 chambers reported 17 frequent logjams. No state reported never 18 having a logjam, and about a dozen reported 19 having occasional logjam. Their disclaimer 20 was, quite honestly, a bit disingenuous if not 21 dishonest. 22 You heard earlier mention of some 23 of the criticism about the Majority Leader 24 hiring and firing committee staff. I've been 25 in this house now for 14 years; this is my

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(518) 371-8910 1 15th. I have hired every person on my 2 committee. If I had to remove somebody, that 3 was my responsibility. And I think that's 4 true of everybody here. This Majority Leader 5 has never required us to hire or fire anybody. 6 It's a chairman's decision. It may be the 7 case in the Assembly, but not the case in this 8 house. 9 Assembly Rules may have never met. 10 Senate Rules does. And I think I speak for 11 every chairman here, I negotiate my bills. 12 The Majority Leader doesn't do it for me. I 13 and my staff negotiate my bills with the 14 Assembly and with the Governor's office. 15 Brennan looked at the operation of 16 one Assembly committee. There are 70 standing 17 committees in this house. One Assembly 18 committee. And they based all of their astute 19 findings with regard to how committees operate 20 on this one Assembly committee. 21 They talk about, with criticism, 22 the fact that the chairperson controls bills 23 in committee. Does that come as a surprise to 24 anybody? Does that not happen routinely 25 throughout the country? Well, if you're not

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(518) 371-8910 1 aware, let me tell you -- and NCSL could have 2 provided the information to them; they may 3 have had it, chose not to use it -- it's a 4 common practice. The majority of states defer 5 to the chairman with regard to activities 6 within the committee. A clear majority, 7 probably somewhere about 60 percent of them. 8 They talk about legislators not 9 actually consenting individually to bills that 10 are passed. Who does not consent individually 11 to a bill that's passed, regardless if it's a 12 fast roll call or a slow roll call? 13 You know, and they talked about 14 empty-seat voting. We're going to a system 15 now where the controversial calendar, you'll 16 vote from your seat. I assume Brennan knew 17 this, or if not, they chose to ignore it; 18 there are some 28 states in which they have 19 consent calendars. Members cast one vote for 20 the entire calendar. They vote for the first 21 bill, and that becomes their vote for the 22 entire calendar, or they just vote for the 23 entire calendar en masse, one vote. 24 Additional states, such as the state of North 25 Carolina, they'll just have a consent

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(518) 371-8910 1 calendar, one vote for local bills. 2 And for some reason or other, they 3 failed to note that there are 18 states that 4 do voice votes. You have no idea what a 5 member has done, none whatsoever. Not a word 6 is it mentioned in the Brennan report. 7 It's safe to say that Brennan was 8 probably aware that 25 chambers vote from 9 their office. Now, why do I say they vote 10 from their office? Well, the long and the 11 short of it is I'm being a little tongue in 12 cheek. Their office is in the chamber. They 13 sit at their desk. There's no district 14 office, there's no Capitol office. So they 15 don't have to go too far. 16 And then I don't know if there's 17 anybody here who subscribes to this, but they 18 claim that at no time does the Legislature 19 have to consider a vote in order to pass 20 legislation. 21 So I guess nobody bothers to read 22 bills, nobody has to concern themselves with 23 how they voted on a bill. Because according 24 to Brennan, you never have to consider how 25 you're going to vote on a bill.

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(518) 371-8910 1 Now, I was particularly intrigued 2 with regard to their comments on hearings, or 3 lack thereof, in committees. And I was 4 certainly surprised to see the name of -- my 5 name and a member of my staff, which 6 incidentally was spelled incorrectly, in the 7 portion of the text that dealt with -- this 8 may have been a footnote -- that dealt with 9 the actions of hearings on major legislation. 10 And the person who conducted the 11 research, the telephone interview, slash, 12 research -- I have no idea if it was a man or 13 a woman -- but basically this person said that 14 I never held hearings on a bill, a bill which 15 dealt with providing security for students in 16 a school setting, requiring fingerprinting and 17 criminal background checks on school 18 employees. And the proposition that was cited 19 was that the Senate dealt with these major 20 bill and never held hearings. 21 Well, this very capable, competent, 22 astute researcher really knew his stuff or her 23 stuff. Had they bothered to research, what 24 they would have known was that I held four 25 hearings on the predecessor of that bill.

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(518) 371-8910 1 They were held during 1998. 1999 marked a new 2 session. In 1999 that bill took a new number, 3 and changes were incorporated based on the 4 four hearings that I had held in the preceding 5 year. 6 The depth of the research was 7 awesome, and this person certainly did a 8 stunning job. And they also cited several 9 bills for which there were public hearings as 10 not having had public hearings. I mean, the 11 quality of research is astounding. 12 They offer, without support or 13 conclusion, that voters cannot hold their 14 representatives accountable. Now, the last 15 time I checked, all our votes are public 16 records. We routinely receive questionnaires 17 by each and every advocacy group that God only 18 knows have been created. 19 And they cite, several times, Al 20 Rosenthal. Al Rosenthal has been cited by 21 some as the dean of legislative studies. And 22 they cite "The Decline of Representative 23 Democracy" in numerous footnotes. It's a 1998 24 publication. 25 In 2004, in a work called "Heavy

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(518) 371-8910 1 Lifting: The Job of the American 2 Legislature," the same Al Rosenthal states: 3 "It is easy to second-guess the Legislature 4 and the process. There may always be better 5 ways to pass a bill or to defeat one. More 6 study, more deliberation, more input and 7 greater efficiency are frequently advocated. 8 Editorial writers seldom hesitate to tell the 9 public how the Legislature could better do its 10 job. And the Legislature probably could 11 always do better in some way. But the process 12 is not really manageable, depending as it does 13 on contingencies of all kinds. As long as 14 there is disagreement among members, interest 15 groups to deal with a member has to worry 16 about, or a governor who wants a piece of the 17 action, the process can take just about any 18 course, and it does. Everyone and everything 19 is connected, interdependent, and no one is in 20 full control. Legislating is truly a 21 collective endeavor, but is one in which many 22 people pull in different ways. 23 "Legislatures do not look good 24 because of the very nature of the function 25 they perform. They channel, express and try

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(518) 371-8910 1 to settle differences and conflicts. They do 2 so in a complicated, unprogrammed, and human 3 fashion. The most unattractive business to 4 the average eye, legislatures and the process 5 come off as even less attractive as a result 6 of their treatment in the press, in political 7 campaigns by advocates for one side or 8 another, and because of the misbehavior of 9 some of their own members." 10 Rosenthal then goes on to make this 11 statement: "Legislatures are not pretty, but 12 neither is democracy." Which is not unlike 13 the words of Winston Churchill, who said: 14 "It's been said that democracy is the worst 15 form of government except all those other 16 forms that have been tried from time to time." 17 The reality is, ladies and 18 gentlemen, that Brennan is a lobbying group. 19 The stories, by the way, you know, for today 20 have been written. And certainly to some 21 extent this represents an exercise in 22 futility, because I'm sure the same members in 23 the media who didn't read the Brennan report, 24 the same editorial writers who didn't read the 25 Brennan report have already written their

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(518) 371-8910 1 stories and they're just inserting the quotes 2 and the names as, you know, they're wont to 3 do. 4 But the long and the short of it is 5 if you took everything that Brennan wanted -- 6 and some of it is just not to be found in any 7 legislature anywhere in these 50 states of 8 ours, in 99 chambers, so it is so beyond the 9 pale of anything that you would find anywhere 10 as almost borderline fairy tale. But were you 11 to do it, it would not be the measure of 12 dysfunction. It would not make this chamber 13 any more functional than it was last session. 14 It wouldn't resolve the budget gridlock. It 15 wouldn't resolve the host of other issues that 16 really have been the measure of dysfunction. 17 ACTING PRESIDENT MEIER: Senator 18 Valesky. 19 SENATOR VALESKY: Thank you, Mr. 20 President. On the resolution. 21 I think that in listening to 22 members on both sides of the aisle talk this 23 afternoon and this evening, I think we're 24 missing one important point. The reason to do 25 real reform of the rules of this house has

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(518) 371-8910 1 nothing to do with Democrats and Republicans. 2 It has nothing to do with which party controls 3 the majority of this house. It has to do with 4 good government. 5 And I can tell you that perhaps 6 more than any other member in this chamber, I 7 was looking forward to being able to support 8 new rules of the Senate that were in the best 9 interests and in the spirit of good 10 government. And in fact, two weeks ago today, 11 when the Majority Leader announced his intent 12 to work in a bipartisan fashion to create real 13 reform of the rules of the Senate, that was a 14 very encouraging sign. 15 Unfortunately, today we don't have 16 real reform of the rules of the Senate. The 17 people of New York State, certainly the people 18 in the 49th District in Central New York that 19 I now represent, people don't care about 20 Democrats versus Republicans. They don't care 21 which party controls the majority. All they 22 care about is a government that is responsive, 23 a government that is responsible, and a 24 government that acts on their behalf and in 25 their best interests. That's why we ought to

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(518) 371-8910 1 be enacting real reform of the State Senate 2 here today. 3 And if I might, we have a series, I 4 believe, of eight amendments to offer up at 5 this time. 6 Mr. President, I believe you have 7 an amendment at the desk. I ask that be 8 reading of the amendment be waived and ask to 9 be heard at this time on the amendment. 10 ACTING PRESIDENT MEIER: The 11 amendment is at the desk, the reading is 12 waived, and you're recognized to explain the 13 amendment. 14 SENATOR VALESKY: Thank you, Mr. 15 President. 16 As Senator Paterson indicated in 17 his remarks earlier, one of the components of 18 the new rules package that we'll be asked to 19 vote on shortly includes a proposal that would 20 require all future proposals to change the 21 Senate Rules to be approved by the Rules 22 Committee before coming to the Senate floor 23 for a vote. 24 So my understanding of that rule, 25 should it be approved today, would mean that

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(518) 371-8910 1 there would be a fairly high likelihood that 2 we would never have a debate on the floor of 3 this Senate again in regard to rules of the 4 Senate. 5 So my amendment would alter those 6 proposed rules changes by deleting the 7 proposal to refer all future proposals to 8 change Senate Rules to the Rules Committee, by 9 eliminating the Rules Committee itself in 10 order to return authority over legislation to 11 the substantive committees, and creating in 12 place of the Rules Committee a Rules and 13 Administration Committee which would provide a 14 forum for discussion, consideration and 15 implementation of various Senate policies, 16 which I think a rules committee ought to be 17 used for, as opposed to making decisions and 18 moving legislation to the floor, an aspect 19 that ought to be left to the substantive 20 committees. 21 So I urge support from all of my 22 colleagues today on this amendment. Thank 23 you. 24 ACTING PRESIDENT MEIER: Those 25 Senators in agreement with the amendment

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(518) 371-8910 1 please signify by raising your hands. 2 SENATOR SCHNEIDERMAN: Point of 3 order. 4 ACTING PRESIDENT MEIER: Senator 5 Schneiderman, state your point of order. 6 SENATOR SCHNEIDERMAN: Mr. 7 President, is there going to be a roll call 8 recorded on this amendment? 9 ACTING PRESIDENT MEIER: Senator, 10 this is governed by Rule 9-3(e) of the Senate, 11 which provides for a canvass of agreement. 12 SENATOR SCHNEIDERMAN: Well, for 13 the record, we would request a recorded vote 14 on this, since we are in the period of 15 two-week extension of the rules. 16 And let the record reflect that on 17 our side of the aisle, we respectfully request 18 that every Senator should be proud of the way 19 they vote and not seek to avoid a recorded 20 vote. 21 Thank you, Mr. President. 22 ACTING PRESIDENT MEIER: The 23 negatives raise your hands, please. 24 I'm sorry, the votes in agreement 25 please raise your hands.

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(518) 371-8910 1 THE SECRETARY: Those recorded in 2 agreement are Senators Andrew, Breslin, Brown, 3 Connor, Diaz, Dilan, Duane, Gonzalez, 4 Hassell-Thompson, Klein, L. Krueger, 5 C. Kruger, Onorato, Oppenheimer, Parker, 6 Paterson, Sabini, Savino, Schneiderman, 7 Serrano, A. Smith, M. Smith, Stachowski, 8 Stavisky and Valesky. 9 ACTING PRESIDENT MEIER: The 10 amendment is not agreed to. 11 Senator Brown. 12 SENATOR BROWN: Thank you, Mr. 13 President. 14 I believe there's an amendment at 15 the desk. I ask that the reading of the 16 amendment be waived, and I would like to be 17 heard on the amendment. 18 ACTING PRESIDENT MEIER: The 19 amendment is at the desk, the reading is 20 waived, and you're recognized to explain the 21 amendment. 22 SENATOR BROWN: Thank you. 23 The purpose of this amendment is to 24 demonstrate that we take the budget deadline 25 seriously. And hopefully, if this amendment

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(518) 371-8910 1 is passed, it would help lead to on-time 2 budgets in our state. As we all know, 3 New York has failed to adopt its budget in a 4 timely manner every year since 1984. 5 Now, neither the current Senate 6 Rules nor the proposed 2005-06 Senate Rules 7 include any provisions to change the way the 8 Legislature considers the budget. This 9 amendment represents a different way of 10 addressing budget reform. It simply requires 11 the Legislature to remain in session after 12 April 1st when the budget has not been acted 13 on. 14 We have the power to change the 15 process of late budgets in this state. What 16 we're doing certainly, clearly, is not working 17 for our community. Let's end the process of 18 late budgets by passing this amendment. 19 Now, clearly the goal of this 20 amendment is to keep us working until we get 21 our job done, and that's to pass the budget. 22 I believe, and my constituents have said -- 23 and I think all of our constituents are saying 24 all across the state -- that they want to see 25 the budget passed on time. When the budget is

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(518) 371-8910 1 not passed, it has a negative impact on school 2 districts, local governments and 3 community-based organizations. 4 This year, our goal should be to 5 pass a budget on time, and this amendment will 6 help us to accomplish that. I ask my 7 colleagues to join with me in supporting this 8 measure. 9 ACTING PRESIDENT MEIER: Senator 10 Padavan. 11 SENATOR PADAVAN: Will the 12 Senator yield to a question. 13 ACTING PRESIDENT MEIER: Senator 14 Brown, do you yield for a question? 15 SENATOR BROWN: Yes, I do. 16 SENATOR PADAVAN: You said "the 17 Legislature." I assume you mean both houses 18 when you say "the Legislature." 19 SENATOR BROWN: Yes, I do. 20 SENATOR PADAVAN: These are 21 amendments to our rules in this house. They 22 are not binding on the Assembly. Do you 23 agree? 24 SENATOR BROWN: Yes, I do. 25 SENATOR PADAVAN: Okay. So

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(518) 371-8910 1 therefore, we could stay here until the cows 2 come home, Senator. 3 If the Speaker of the Assembly 4 crosses his hands and says, "I'm not going to 5 deal with the budget until the end of July," 6 or whatever date he picks, would that in any 7 way, shape or form serve any purpose for us to 8 be here every day between April 1st and the 9 time he decides that he's going to negotiate 10 in good faith? 11 SENATOR BROWN: I believe that we 12 can break with business as usual and we can 13 lead by example. 14 I think if this house takes the 15 step of demonstrating our leadership by 16 staying here every day, working and 17 demonstrating our willingness to negotiate a 18 budget agreement, that we can have an impact 19 on the other house of the Legislature as well 20 as on the Governor. 21 SENATOR PADAVAN: On the 22 proposed -- 23 ACTING PRESIDENT MEIER: Senator 24 Padavan, on the proposed amendment. 25 SENATOR PADAVAN: There is no

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(518) 371-8910 1 doubt that we agree, Senator, that we want an 2 on-time budget, that we want budget reform. 3 And indeed, this house, last year and again 4 this year, passed specific legislation that 5 would achieve that objective. And I think you 6 voted for it, if my memory serves me 7 correctly. 8 SENATOR BROWN: Yes, I did. 9 SENATOR PADAVAN: Yet the 10 Assembly refuses to join with us, to partner 11 with us in these initiatives that would be 12 true budget reform, not simply sitting here 13 but putting in place those procedures and 14 mechanism that would win the day for the 15 people of this state. And as you properly 16 stated, school districts and others would know 17 what is forthcoming in our budget. 18 But the fact remains, we cannot do 19 this unilaterally, that it requires the other 20 house to act in good faith. And if there was 21 any indication, we saw last year when the 22 Speaker said, Until July 31st comes about, I'm 23 not even going to talk about this. And so we 24 came here week after week, into August, when 25 we finally adopted a budget, if not every week

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(518) 371-8910 1 certainly on and off. 2 I think we demonstrated clearly our 3 commitment, as you propose in this amendment. 4 But I suggest to you that the amendment is 5 faulty because it has no effect over the other 6 house, and that a better approach would be to 7 try and convince them, your colleagues in the 8 majority there, to follow our lead on true 9 budget reform. 10 ACTING PRESIDENT MEIER: Senator 11 Skelos. 12 SENATOR SKELOS: Senator Brown, 13 just a -- I haven't really seen the amendment 14 at this point, but you would require all of us 15 to be here after April 1st -- 16 SENATOR BROWN: Yes. 17 SENATOR SKELOS: -- if there's no 18 budget? 19 In your amendment, do you eliminate 20 per diems for legislators that there then 21 after April 1st? 22 SENATOR BROWN: No, the amendment 23 does not eliminate per diems, Senator. 24 SENATOR SKELOS: Thank you. 25 ACTING PRESIDENT MEIER: Senator

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(518) 371-8910 1 Connor. 2 SENATOR CONNOR: Mr. President, I 3 don't support this. Because I remember when 4 Senator Marino was the Majority Leader and I 5 spent good Fridays here, Palm Sundays. It 6 didn't pass a budget any bit sooner. At the 7 end of session when we had important 8 legislation, we were here on July 4th. What 9 did I do on July 4th? I went to the movies 10 and I collected a per diem, as did most of the 11 members here. 12 So I don't think this is going to 13 accomplish anything. And I'm just reading it, 14 and it says that we can't adjourn. Well, we 15 don't adjourn. We don't adjourn. We just 16 don't sit in session. It's faulty. The 17 constitution says we can't adjourn without 18 permission from the other house. So we don't 19 adjourn. 20 So, you know, it's whether we're in 21 active session. When Senator Bruno says "I 22 move the Senate stand adjourned until next 23 Monday, intervening days to be legislative 24 days," it means, I don't know, Senator Farley 25 or somebody comes up here every day and pounds

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(518) 371-8910 1 us into session, and we're in session every 2 day. So we are in session every day or every 3 other day. Because if we don't do that, we 4 violate the constitution. 5 I'm not voting for this. 6 ACTING PRESIDENT MEIER: Senator 7 Brown. 8 SENATOR BROWN: On the amendment, 9 Mr. President. 10 You know, the reality of it is we 11 are not here every day. We pass extenders, we 12 go home, members go to their businesses, they 13 go to their law practices. Some, in fact, go 14 to their summer homes. I've seen members come 15 back here during these extender periods with 16 great tans. 17 I mean, the reality is we are not 18 working, we are not doing the job that we were 19 elected to do. That is the reality of it. 20 And it's ridiculous. 21 And I heard the voters in my 22 district loud and clear in 2004. They want 23 that budget passed on time. They don't want 24 us going on vacation. They don't want us 25 going home. And that's what this amendment is

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(518) 371-8910 1 designed to do. 2 ACTING PRESIDENT MEIER: Those in 3 agreement with the amendment please signify by 4 raising your hand. 5 SENATOR SCHNEIDERMAN: Mr. 6 President. 7 ACTING PRESIDENT MEIER: Senator 8 Schneiderman, why do you rise? 9 SENATOR SCHNEIDERMAN: Point of 10 order. 11 I don't want to have to keep 12 repeating this, but we would like a ruling 13 from the chair as to why we are not able to 14 record the votes on these amendments. 15 ACTING PRESIDENT MEIER: Senator 16 Schneiderman, the chair did in fact rule. I 17 told you that it was Rule 9-3(e) of the Senate 18 which provides for a canvass of agreement on 19 petitions, motions and amendments. And that 20 in fact was the way Senator Paterson 21 articulated it when he spoke some moments 22 earlier. That is the ruling of the chair. 23 Those Senators in agreement with 24 the amendment please signify by raising your 25 hands.

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(518) 371-8910 1 THE SECRETARY: Those recorded in 2 agreement are Senators Andrews, Breslin, 3 Brown, Diaz, Dilan, Duane, Gonzalez, 4 Hassell-Thompson, Klein, L. Krueger, 5 C. Kruger, Onorato, Oppenheimer, Parker, 6 Paterson, Sabini, Savino, Schneiderman, 7 Serrano, A. Smith, M. Smith, Stachowski, 8 Stavisky, and Valesky. 9 ACTING PRESIDENT MEIER: The 10 amendment is not agreed to. 11 Senator Krueger. 12 SENATOR KRUEGER: Thank you, Mr. 13 President. 14 I believe that there is an 15 amendment at the desk. And I'd ask that the 16 reading of the amendment be waived and would 17 like to be heard on my amendment. 18 ACTING PRESIDENT MEIER: Your 19 amendment is at the desk. The reading is 20 waived. You're recognized for the purpose of 21 explaining your amendment, Senator. 22 SENATOR KRUEGER: Thank you. 23 I rise to propose Amendment Number 24 3, to empower communities, open bill 25 sponsorship, and improve the legislative

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(518) 371-8910 1 record and make more information available to 2 the public. 3 This amendment would alter the 4 Majority's proposed rules for 2005-2006 in a 5 variety of ways. One, it would allow the 6 ranking Minority member or any three committee 7 members of either party to place a bill on a 8 committee agenda to be debated in the 9 committee. 10 Two, it would allow the ranking 11 Minority member or any three committee members 12 of any party to hold a public hearing. 13 Three, it would authorize any 14 Senator to join on any bill as a cosponsor. 15 Four, it would require detailed 16 committee reports on each bill that is 17 reported to the floor. 18 Five, it would require more 19 information to be made available to the public 20 through the Internet. The active list, 21 including committee transcripts and votes, 22 fiscal notes, and Senate expenditure reports 23 all should be available to the public far more 24 easily. 25 Democracy is good. My party right

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(518) 371-8910 1 here is prepared to have our votes counted 2 when we do hostile amendments. We're even 3 proposed to publicly disagree with each other 4 and not always vote together on every bill. 5 That is open government. That's what we're 6 striving for. 7 Allowing committees to function as 8 they do in most state legislatures, as many 9 reports have documented -- as Congress 10 operates -- ensures that there is public 11 discourse, that there is public information 12 about the bills being put forward, that 13 there's an opportunity for the committee to 14 actually listen to various bills and debate 15 them and vote on them and decide whether they 16 should move to the floor or not for a vote. 17 That is a radical change from how 18 we do business today in the Senate and how we 19 would continue to do business under the rules 20 proposed by the Majority tonight. The simple 21 concept of allowing ranking members or a group 22 of members of a committee to decide whether a 23 bill can even be put on a committee agenda for 24 a discussion and debate, or to have a public 25 hearing on a bill -- not every bill, but on

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(518) 371-8910 1 bills that are felt to be important enough by 2 a certain number of committee members or the 3 ranker for the committee -- is standard 4 operating procedure in many legislatures 5 throughout this country. 6 Open bill sponsorship is a 7 fundamental way for the voters to see where 8 their leaders, their legislators are on 9 particular legislation. 10 Senator Schneiderman used an 11 example earlier; I just want to clarify it. 12 Because, in this house, Minority members are 13 universally or, with some exception, not 14 allowed to submit a buck slip and have it 15 accepted to be cosponsors of bills, to say to 16 you, our colleagues and to the world, We 17 support this legislation, we'd like to move 18 it, because of that last year in this chamber 19 a bill called Timothy's Law, with 33 20 Republican sponsors, enough sponsors to pass 21 the bill without one Democrat, a bill that 22 didn't get to this floor despite the fact that 23 23 Democrats signed buck slips asking to 24 cosponsor that bill -- that was 56 Senators 25 out of 62 who were on record as saying they

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(518) 371-8910 1 wanted this bill to at least come to the floor 2 for a debate. 3 Open bill sponsorship is a very 4 simple and very clear-cut way to document 5 democracy and the democratic process. Our 6 amendment would allow for it. 7 Finally, our amendment would allow 8 for improving the legislative record and 9 making more information available to the 10 public. Constituents should be able to obtain 11 information about their Senator's views and 12 their actions and their votes here on the 13 floor, on motions to discharge, on hostile 14 amendments, and on bills. The legislative 15 process itself should be as clear and 16 transparent as we, as legislators, and modern 17 technology can possibly make it. 18 And frankly, thanks to the Internet 19 and television, there is so much more we could 20 do to ensure that the public knows what goes 21 on up in our chamber and what doesn't. And 22 they will become greater participants in the 23 process of government and democracy for it. 24 So I hope that my colleagues will 25 join me in supporting this amendment tonight.

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(518) 371-8910 1 Thank you, Mr. President. 2 ACTING PRESIDENT MEIER: Those in 3 agreement with the amendment please signify by 4 raising your hand. 5 THE SECRETARY: Those recorded in 6 agreement are Senators Andrews, Breslin, 7 Brown, Connor, Diaz, Dilan, Duane, Gonzalez, 8 Hassell-Thompson, Klein, L. Krueger, 9 C. Kruger, Onorato, Oppenheimer, Parker, 10 Paterson, Sabini, Savino, Schneiderman, 11 Serrano, A. Smith, M. Smith, Stachowski, 12 Stavisky and Valesky. 13 ACTING PRESIDENT MEIER: The 14 amendment is not agreed to. 15 Senator Duane. 16 SENATOR DUANE: Thank you, Mr. 17 President. I believe there's an amendment at 18 the desk. 19 ACTING PRESIDENT MEIER: Your 20 amendment is at the desk. Do you wish to 21 waive the reading and be recognized to explain 22 it? 23 SENATOR DUANE: I do, Mr. 24 President. Thank you. 25 ACTING PRESIDENT MEIER: Proceed,

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(518) 371-8910 1 Senator. 2 SENATOR DUANE: This amendment 3 would alter the proposed rules by eliminating 4 the canvass of agreement so that the vote of 5 every nonsponsor or hostile amendment and 6 discharge motion would be recorded. It would 7 also eliminate the limits on discharge 8 motions. 9 As those of us who were here may 10 recall, in 2001 the Senate Rules were amended 11 to drastically limit the opportunity for 12 Senators to move to discharge a bill out of 13 committee and to provide that a roll call 14 would take only on the final passage of a 15 bill. Instead, a canvass of agreement is 16 recorded. 17 The effect of this was to end the 18 practice of recorded votes on hostile 19 amendments and motions to petition a bill or 20 resolution out of committee. Under the 21 pre-2001 rules, a roll call vote was recorded 22 on all hostile amendments and all discharge 23 motions. 24 A canvass of agreement is a list of 25 Senators supporting the amendment or motion.

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(518) 371-8910 1 It ensures that no Senator is recorded as 2 voting against a proposal. 3 I believe the public deserves 4 better. They should be able to find out when 5 an alternative is offered to a legislative 6 proposal, and they should be able to know 7 where their Senator stands on that proposal. 8 That is what advocates for legislative rules 9 reform mean when they talk about openness and 10 accountability. 11 Quite simply, when you take a 12 position you should be prepared to defend that 13 position. If you prefer one Senate bill to an 14 alternative proposal, you should be prepared 15 to articulate why you supported one over the 16 other. If you feel that a bill should not be 17 discharged from committee, then you should be 18 prepared to answer for that position. 19 And it's for those reasons, Mr. 20 President, that I urge any colleagues to vote 21 in the affirmative on this amendment. 22 ACTING PRESIDENT MEIER: Those 23 Senators in agreement with the amendment 24 please signify by raising your hand. 25 THE SECRETARY: Those recorded in

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(518) 371-8910 1 agreement are Senators Andrews, Breslin, 2 Brown, Connor, Diaz, Dilan, Duane, Gonzalez, 3 Hassell-Thompson, Klein, L. Krueger, 4 C. Kruger, Onorato, Oppenheimer, Parker, 5 Paterson, Sabini, Savino, Schneiderman, 6 Serrano, A. Smith, M. Smith, Stachowski, 7 Stavisky and Valesky. 8 ACTING PRESIDENT MEIER: The 9 amendment is not agreed to. 10 Senator Malcolm Smith. 11 SENATOR MALCOLM SMITH: Thank 12 you, Mr. President. 13 Mr. President, I believe there is 14 an amendment at the desk. I ask that the 15 reading of it be waived and I be heard on the 16 amendment. 17 ACTING PRESIDENT MEIER: Your 18 amendment is at the desk, Senator. The 19 reading is waived, and you're recognized to 20 explain your amendment. 21 SENATOR MALCOLM SMITH: Thank 22 you, Mr. President. 23 I am going to be so bold as to make 24 three assumptions about all of our behaviors 25 and all of our beliefs. And should I be

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(518) 371-8910 1 wrong, anyone can challenge me and obviously 2 correct me. 3 One, I believe as legislators we 4 firmly believe in doing the right thing. And 5 that is we got elected to office because we 6 wanted to serve, we wanted to do the right 7 thing by the people that we represent. 8 The second thing is we wanted to do 9 the best that we could. And again, I say that 10 when we got elected to office, we believed and 11 we want to make sure that we not only do the 12 right thing but we do the best that we can to 13 represent the people of this state. 14 The third thing is something that I 15 think we all share, and that is we try and we 16 want to treat others the way we would like 17 them to treat us. And I would daresay if I 18 was to ask that question of each member in 19 this chamber, in particular those in the 20 Majority, if you think it is fair the way we 21 are being treated or in fact if you would like 22 to be treated the way we are being treated, I 23 would daresay you would side with my opinion. 24 I would only ask that for a moment 25 you think about that question. Do you really

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(518) 371-8910 1 believe that we are being treated fairly? Do 2 you really believe or do you feel that you 3 would like to be treated the way that we are 4 being treated right now in this chamber? 5 The amendment that I have, Mr. 6 President, is Amendment Number 5. It speaks 7 to the messages of necessity. And I took a 8 moment to just look up a basic definition of 9 the word "reform." And the Oxford Dictionary 10 says "Reform: To make or become better by the 11 removal of faults and errors." 12 The message of necessity as it is 13 now, the Governor can certify it, requested by 14 the Speaker or the Majority Leader. The bill 15 is voted on immediately. The rule -- or the 16 reform that has been put forward today simply 17 adds that a member will be required to explain 18 or give additional information on the need for 19 such message. 20 When you go to the actual rule, 21 Rule VI, Section 1, it actually says that if 22 the member deems appropriate, they would be 23 required to make additional statements. 24 That is not any reform, Mr. 25 President. It does nothing for or to change a

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(518) 371-8910 1 fault or an error that exists in this 2 particular rule right now. 3 The amendment that I am putting 4 forward, which is one that I think would 5 provide some fairness to the process, simply 6 requires a two-thirds vote to a message of 7 necessity, allowing this full chamber to be a 8 full partner in participating in whether or 9 not messages of necessity can be handed down. 10 I think my leader, Senator 11 Paterson, offered up a comment earlier about 12 it which explained the, if you would, scenario 13 that last year we experienced when the 14 Governor sent a message of necessity down for 15 the minimum wage, only to, after we passed the 16 bill in this chamber, to come right behind us 17 and veto the bill. 18 Therefore, it is with great 19 pleasure that I offer this amendment. I think 20 Senator Bonacic talked about fair treatment. 21 I think the amendments that you heard prior to 22 this one, as well as those that you will hear 23 after, speak to the need for fairness. 24 We are not offering these up to be 25 hostile; we are offering them up because these

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(518) 371-8910 1 are the right things to do. We were elected 2 to do the right thing. We were elected 3 because we wanted to do the best that we can. 4 And we are here in office now asking for you 5 just to be fair in what we are trying to do as 6 legislators in this particular body. 7 You're in the majority. That's a 8 fact of life. That's the way it is now. The 9 day will come when that situation may change. 10 And I would daresay you would want to be 11 treated fairly, just like we are asking to be 12 treated fairly today. 13 So this particular rule, this 14 amendment that we're asking to change is just 15 one that simply says we would like a 16 two-thirds vote on a message of necessity. 17 We're not asking for a lot. We're only asking 18 that you give us the right to be treated by 19 like decent humans and which you would like to 20 be treated yourself. 21 So therefore, Mr. President, I 22 offer this amendment. I hope that our members 23 in this entire chamber will support this and, 24 as you ask them to raise their hand, that in 25 true bipartisanship they will see fit to raise

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(518) 371-8910 1 their hand to this amendment. 2 Thank you very much, Mr. President. 3 ACTING PRESIDENT MEIER: Senator 4 Larkin. 5 SENATOR LARKIN: Will Senator 6 Smith yield for a question. 7 ACTING PRESIDENT MEIER: Senator 8 Smith, do you yield for a question from 9 Senator Larkin? 10 SENATOR MALCOLM SMITH: Senator 11 Larkin, as a true military man, it will be my 12 pleasure to yield. 13 SENATOR LARKIN: Thank you very 14 much. 15 Senator Smith, you know that the 16 Assembly can ask for a message of necessity 17 and this house can ask for a message of 18 necessity or the Governor can give us a 19 message. Right? 20 SENATOR MALCOLM SMITH: Yes. 21 SENATOR LARKIN: Could you give 22 me an idea of how many messages of necessity 23 in the year 2004 you voted for and how many 24 you voted against? 25 SENATOR MALCOLM SMITH: Well, I

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(518) 371-8910 1 will tell you, the significance of a message 2 of necessity, Mr. Larkin, which I'm clear you 3 understand and I understand, is one in which 4 there is an emergency, one in which something 5 critical happens, like we did with 9/11, like 6 we did if something critical comes down like 7 what the Governor did last year on the bill 8 for the minimum wage. 9 But unfortunately, it has been 10 abused. It is simply abused. So when you ask 11 how many have I voted for, I voted for those 12 which I thought were messages of necessity 13 based on the rules which you employed during 14 that time. 15 Today we are asking that you change 16 such rules. And you brought up the Assembly. 17 What the Assembly does is their business. The 18 Senate, we are a distinguished body of 19 individuals, as Mr. Bruno will tell you, 20 separate and different from all the rest, 21 because we are the best. 22 So therefore, if in fact we want to 23 continue to lead, to lead -- and I daresay 24 your speaker, the Majority Leader, Senator 25 Bruno, does that in tremendous fashion, just

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(518) 371-8910 1 as my colleague and friend Senator Paterson 2 does. I daresay we have probably two of the 3 best leaders in this particular body. 4 However, what needs to happen is 5 you need to vote for this amendment, which 6 will allow you to then put on your record that 7 you have voted for this particular rules 8 change regarding the message of necessity. 9 SENATOR LARKIN: I appreciate the 10 dialogue about the vote. But my question 11 is -- answer me, please -- how many did you 12 vote for and how many did you vote against? 13 You don't need a counsel to tell you that. 14 You're a bright man. 15 SENATOR MALCOLM SMITH: I voted 16 for as many as I needed to agree to. 17 SENATOR LARKIN: Thank you. 18 SENATOR MALCOLM SMITH: Thank 19 you. 20 ACTING PRESIDENT MEIER: Those 21 Senators in agreement with the amendment 22 please signify by raising your hand. 23 THE SECRETARY: Those recorded in 24 agreement are Senators Andrews, Breslin, 25 Brown, Diaz, Dilán, Duane, Gonzalez,

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(518) 371-8910 1 Hassell-Thompson, Klein, L. Krueger, 2 C. Kruger, Onorato, Oppenheimer, Parker, 3 Paterson, Sabini, Savino, Schneiderman, 4 Serrano, A. Smith, M. Smith, Stachowski, 5 Stavisky and Valesky. 6 ACTING PRESIDENT MEIER: The 7 amendment is not agreed to. 8 Senator Hassell-Thompson. 9 SENATOR HASSELL-THOMPSON: Thank 10 you, Mr. President. I believe there's an 11 amendment at the desk. And I ask the reading 12 of the amendment to be waived, and I would 13 like to be heard on that amendment. 14 ACTING PRESIDENT MEIER: Your 15 amendment is at the desk, the reading is 16 waived, and you're recognized to explain the 17 amendment. 18 SENATOR HASSELL-THOMPSON: Thank 19 you, Mr. President. 20 Many of my colleagues have already 21 alluded to the essence of this amendment, and 22 that is to ensure that there is equal 23 allocation of resources to both sides of the 24 aisle in this house. 25 Without elaborating further,

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(518) 371-8910 1 because I think they've already spoken well on 2 the issue, I will just go to the amendment and 3 suggest that this amendment would amend Senate 4 Resolution 195 as follows. At page 19, 5 designate the undesignated paragraph under 6 Section 2 as Subsection A, and insert the 7 following at page 20 as Subsection B, which 8 reads: "Each Senator shall be entitled to an 9 equal allocation of staff, newsletters and 10 other printed materials, postage, travel and 11 prerequisites, provided that the allocation 12 for staff may be greater for Senators holding 13 leadership positions or for any Senator 14 serving as the chair or ranking member of a 15 standing committee, so long as the allocation 16 is commensurate with the additional duties 17 assigned to such Senator." 18 This amendment provides for equal 19 resources for all Senators regardless of party 20 affiliation. Resources include, as I've said, 21 et cetera. The equal resources for all 22 Senators would ensure that all constituent 23 voices are heard and that their interests are 24 served by the entire Legislature. 25 Senators who chair a committee or

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(518) 371-8910 1 serve as ranking Minority member will be 2 entitled to additional resources required to 3 fulfill their responsibilities. 4 New York can be very partisan at 5 times, but every member of the public deserves 6 and is entitled to equal representation. 7 Senators must have the resources they need to 8 do their job, which is to advocate on behalf 9 of their constituents. 10 Thank you, Mr. President. 11 ACTING PRESIDENT MEIER: Those 12 Senators in agreement with the amendment raise 13 your hands. 14 THE SECRETARY: Those recorded in 15 agreement are Senators Andrews, Breslin, 16 Brown, Connor, Diaz, Dilan, Duane, Gonzalez, 17 Hassell-Thompson, Klein, L. Krueger, 18 C. Kruger, Onorato, Oppenheimer, Parker, 19 Paterson, Sabini, Savino, Schneiderman, 20 Serrano, A. Smith, M. Smith, Stachowski, 21 Stavisky and Valesky. 22 ACTING PRESIDENT MEIER: The 23 amendment is not agreed to. 24 Senator Sabini. 25 SENATOR SABINI: Mr. President, I

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(518) 371-8910 1 believe there's an amendment at the desk. I 2 ask that the reading of the amendment be 3 waived, and I'd like to be heard on the 4 amendment. 5 ACTING PRESIDENT MEIER: Senator, 6 your amendment is at the desk, the reading is 7 waived, and you're recognized to explain your 8 amendment. 9 SENATOR SABINI: Thank you, Mr. 10 President. 11 I offer an amendment that will help 12 and empower every member of this body in many 13 ways. First of all, it would end the practice 14 of absentee voting in committee, end the 15 practice of holding committee meetings off the 16 floor, which we do far too much, and require 17 the Senate to stand at ease when a committee 18 meeting is held off the floor. 19 The proposal would prohibit the 20 recording of committee votes unless the 21 Senator is physically present -- unless 22 they're simultaneous committee meetings, and 23 hopefully we'd have fewer of those. It would 24 limit the holding of committee meetings off 25 the floor by requiring the consent of ranking

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(518) 371-8910 1 Minority members or two-thirds of all the 2 members of the committee and require the 3 Senate to stand at ease when such meetings are 4 held. 5 Now, right now it's mistakenly 6 thought by some that we have proxy voting. We 7 really don't, at least not according to our 8 rules. But we do have absentee voting. The 9 amendment would prohibit absentee voting and 10 require a Senator to be present to cast their 11 vote. 12 Now, this is not revolutionary. 13 Years ago in the New York City Council, for 14 example, you could actually have the guy who 15 swept the floor cast your vote for you. They 16 changed it; the committees functioned. It 17 wasn't the end of civilization. Water still 18 ran, bills kept getting passed, toilets still 19 flushed. It worked. 20 The public deserves accurate 21 information about a Senator's role in the 22 law-making process and committee process, 23 including their attendance and votes. Without 24 legislators' participation in the legislative 25 process and publicly available information

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(518) 371-8910 1 about what we do and how we do it, voters 2 can't really judge what we're doing. That 3 goes in general elections or primaries. The 4 voters really should be able to measure what 5 it is that we do or don't do. 6 The amendment would end the current 7 practice of permitting Senators to vote on 8 matters coming before a committee without 9 having been there. And, you know, one of the 10 things that strikes me, our legislative task 11 force in the Minority on reform had a very 12 enlightening hearing and a witness, Eric Lane, 13 who said that many who criticize the process 14 in Albany, particularly in the Senate, miss 15 the point, that the most glaring malfunction 16 of what we do is that our committee process 17 really doesn't work properly. 18 That even though we have a 19 committee structure and some of the committee 20 chairmen work very hard, we really run most of 21 our legislation at the end of session through 22 the Rules Committee, most of the important 23 stuff. So you don't develop the expertise 24 that you should on the issue, because you 25 don't hear the discourse. Committee meetings

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(518) 371-8910 1 are five minutes long, we don't take them very 2 seriously, and in effect you can mail in your 3 vote. 4 I'll give an example of something 5 that was done just within the last two years. 6 We passed a smoking ban in public places in 7 this state. Senator Fuschillo worked very 8 hard to keep that issue alive and succeeded in 9 doing so. But let's doing look at the example 10 of what happened at the city level and what 11 happened at the state level. 12 At the city level, there was nine 13 months of hearings on the bill to ban smoking 14 in restaurants and bars. There were over 700 15 witnesses -- doctors, attorneys, bar owners, 16 restaurateurs, health experts and just plain 17 citizens. And they came forward, and the bill 18 was amended and reworked to address some 19 concerns of people. But there was a process. 20 It was open to the public. Everyone knew what 21 was coming. You knew when the vote was going 22 to be, and it happened. 23 What did we do? Two days later, I 24 believe it was, we did it in one day. Both 25 houses, bam. Both houses as guilty as the

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(518) 371-8910 1 other in doing it in a fast manner, in a 2 manner that really didn't have a public 3 process, in a manner that didn't take into 4 account a lot of things that affected other 5 parts of the state. 6 And I would submit to you that's 7 because we really have a structure that 8 doesn't allow the committee process to be that 9 important. It works sometimes, as I said. 10 And I'm sure there are committee chairmen who 11 are going to be upset who say, My committee 12 works. The structure doesn't engender that. 13 If it works, it's in spite of the structure. 14 My amendment would also take into 15 account a more important law that we can't 16 ignore, and that's the law of physics. My 17 understanding is, although we only got this 18 proposal seconds before we got in the chamber, 19 that we are going to require people to be in 20 their seats to vote now. Well, if you're in 21 your seat on the floor to vote, you can't be 22 in a committee meeting off the floor. So the 23 law of physics sort of trumps anything we do 24 here. 25 So why don't we just sort of

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(518) 371-8910 1 reratify the law of physics and say, you can't 2 have a meeting off the floor while we're 3 voting on things here on the floor, especially 4 if we're going to require people to be in 5 their own seat. 6 If a Senator wants to actually 7 participate in a committee meeting off the 8 floor, he has to hear about it -- and if 9 you're not in the chamber, you won't hear 10 about it -- and he has to leave his 11 responsibilities on the floor. And that even 12 minimizes the debate that we carry on on the 13 floor. 14 This rules change will permit 15 committee meetings be held off the floor under 16 appropriate circumstances. And there will be 17 appropriate circumstances, but it would be 18 designed to ensure that those committee 19 meetings are the exception and not the rule. 20 Finally, when it's necessary for 21 the Senate to hold a committee meeting off the 22 floor, the rule would provide that we stand at 23 ease. Now, we do that sometimes now, but not 24 enough. 25 And I think it's only fair to all

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(518) 371-8910 1 the members, no matter what party affiliation 2 they have, to make their jobs a little bit 3 easier and make the debate more meaningful by 4 ending the practice of rampant meetings off 5 the floor. And that's what my amendment 6 proposes to do. 7 Thank you, Mr. President. 8 ACTING PRESIDENT MEIER: Those 9 Senators in agreement with the amendment 10 please signify by raising your hand. 11 THE SECRETARY: Those recorded in 12 agreement are Senators Andrews, Breslin, 13 Brown, Connor, Diaz, Dilan, Duane, Gonzalez, 14 Hassell-Thompson, Klein, L. Krueger, 15 C. Kruger, Onorato, Oppenheimer, Parker, 16 Paterson, Sabini, Savino, Schneiderman, 17 Serrano, A. Smith, M. Smith, Stachowski, 18 Stavisky and Valesky. 19 ACTING PRESIDENT MEIER: The 20 amendment is not agreed to. 21 Senator Schneiderman. 22 SENATOR SCHNEIDERMAN: Thank you, 23 Mr. President. 24 This is the final amendment. I 25 believe it is at the desk. I would request

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(518) 371-8910 1 that its reading be waived and ask to be heard 2 on the amendment. 3 ACTING PRESIDENT MEIER: The 4 amendment is at the desk. The reading is 5 waived. You're recognized to explain the 6 amendment. 7 SENATOR SCHNEIDERMAN: Thank you, 8 Mr. President. 9 This amendment is our full package 10 of proposed rules reforms. On January 5th, 11 our conference, after work by Senator 12 Krueger's task force, issued a series of 13 proposals of comprehensive reforms to the 14 Senate Rules. 15 This amendment would strike the 16 proposed rules that have been introduced by 17 the Majority and would replace them with our 18 proposal. I would respectfully submit that 19 our proposal is superior in every respect. 20 Let me give you a couple of brief examples. 21 But it's superior because the 22 essence of our proposal is to further 23 democratize and open up the legislative 24 process in this house. And the essence of the 25 Senate Rules as they are now is to perpetuate

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(518) 371-8910 1 what is essentially an authoritarian 2 structure. 3 Why do I say that? Let's look at a 4 couple of examples. The current rule, Senate 5 Rule VI, Section 1(b), the Temporary 6 President, when a bill is introduced, has 7 absolute unfettered discretion to say it's 8 going to this committee and not that 9 committee. It then is lodged in a committee 10 under the current Senate Rules. 11 Our rule would provide for a 12 Committee on Rules and Administration that 13 would decentralize this process. It would 14 have rules. It would have regulations. The 15 process of a bill proceeding forward after 16 it's introduced would not be subject to the 17 unfettered discretion of one man or woman. 18 Second of all, once a bill goes to 19 a committee, under the current Rule VII, 20 Section 3, the committee chair has absolute 21 unfettered discretion on what to put on the 22 committee agenda and may add or delete right 23 up until the committee meeting. It is 24 suggested that perhaps 24 hours notice to 25 committee members is appropriate where

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(518) 371-8910 1 possible. 2 So even if a bill goes to a 3 committee with a responsible chair, that chair 4 has absolute discretion over whether it 5 actually gets voted on. 6 And finally, even if a bill passes 7 a committee -- and this, for me, was the most 8 astonishing thing about this Legislature when 9 I got here -- under Rule VIII, Section 6, and 10 I'm going to quote, "The Temporary President 11 may file with the Journal Clerk a list of 12 bills in the Third Reading Calendar which may 13 be acted upon on that date and may lay aside 14 any other bills." The Temporary President. 15 The Majority Leader has absolute, 16 unfettered discretion to say even though a 17 bill has 55, 62 sponsors, it doesn't matter; 18 if it passes out of a committee twenty years 19 in a row, it doesn't have to come to the floor 20 for a vote. That is in the current rules. 21 Our rules would change that. Our 22 rules would provide that bills can be brought 23 from the committee to the floor. Three 24 members of the committee or the ranker could 25 put it on the agenda for a vote in the

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(518) 371-8910 1 committee. And once it leaves the committee, 2 there is no provision that the Majority Leader 3 controls the active list. It would proceed to 4 the floor for a vote unless the sponsor pulls 5 it back. 6 Our rules would open this house up, 7 would democratize this house. We would 8 restore, as Senator Duane just pointed out, 9 the rule that you record votes on amendments 10 and on motions. And we would not, as the 11 proposed rules by the Majority would do, shunt 12 the debate on Senate Rules that we're having 13 here today into the black hole of the Rules 14 Committee. 15 I'm sorry to say that I guess if 16 this rule passes today, this is going to be 17 the last debate on Senate Rules we're going to 18 have on the floor of the Senate until there's 19 a substantial change in the structure of this 20 house. That is the wrong thing to do. It is 21 wrong to reduce the recording of votes. It is 22 wrong to end the public's ability to know. 23 And it is certainly wrong to take the rules 24 debate, now that the public has caught on to 25 the fact that our rules have problems, and try

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(518) 371-8910 1 and shunt it off to a committee. 2 Our rules would open the house, 3 would democratize the house, would change the 4 house. The proposal advanced by the Majority, 5 I'm sorry to say, would actually make things 6 worse. It purports to do things -- we only 7 received this, again, a few hours ago -- that 8 I believe it doesn't do. 9 And I would respectfully call my 10 colleagues' attention to the fact that in fact 11 this does not -- the proposal by the Majority 12 does not end absentee voting. It seems to 13 institutionalize it. As drafted, and it was 14 just handed to us, it states that a member's 15 vote on any matter before the committee shall 16 be entered by the member on a signed official 17 voting sheet delivered to the committee chair. 18 So I guess just being present and listening to 19 the debate and voting doesn't work anymore. 20 You have to -- this institutionalizes absentee 21 voting. 22 So the proposal before us today by 23 the Majority does not democratize, does not 24 open up, does not make this house more 25 transparent. Our proposal would, and that's

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(518) 371-8910 1 what's offered in this amendment. 2 And my final point to my colleagues 3 here -- and this is meant with all sincerity. 4 I know there are people here, particularly 5 some of our committee chairs, who work very 6 hard. But when I hear the argument that 7 process doesn't matter, that it doesn't really 8 matter, we can't do any better -- process does 9 matter. We can change our rules. We can have 10 a more democratic process. And it borders on 11 un-American to say process doesn't matter. 12 When the Founders gathered in 13 Philadelphia 220 years ago, they weren't 14 writing rules of property or mortgages or 15 marriage, they were setting up a process. 16 So process does matter. Let's not 17 say, Oh, it doesn't make any difference, 18 people are bad, people are -- if you don't 19 have goodwill, you can't do anything. We can 20 change our rules. We can get more bills to 21 the floor. And maybe the results will be 22 beneficial for our government. I think they 23 will be. 24 I believe in the American system of 25 democracy. I believe in a representative

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(518) 371-8910 1 government where legislators are empowered to 2 represent their constituents in every aspect 3 of the business of their house. And I 4 respectfully submit that this amendment would 5 carry out those goals, Mr. President. 6 ACTING PRESIDENT MEIER: Those in 7 agreement with the amendment please signify by 8 raising your hands. 9 THE SECRETARY: Those recorded in 10 agreement are Senators Andrews, Breslin, 11 Brown, Connor, Diaz, Dilan, Duane, Gonzalez, 12 Hassell-Thompson, Klein, L. Krueger, 13 C. Kruger, Onorato, Oppenheimer, Parker, 14 Paterson, Sabini, Savino, Schneiderman, 15 Serrano, A. Smith, M. Smith, Stachowski, 16 Stavisky and Valesky. 17 ACTING PRESIDENT MEIER: The 18 amendment is not agreed to. 19 The question now is on the 20 resolution. The Secretary will call the roll. 21 Senator Sabini. 22 SENATOR SABINI: On the 23 resolution, Mr. President. 24 ACTING PRESIDENT MEIER: Senator 25 Sabini, on the resolution.

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(518) 371-8910 1 SENATOR SABINI: You know, we 2 heard -- since we're not going to listen to 3 any of our suggestions, let's start talking 4 about some of the rules that are on the floor 5 now. 6 You know, we listened to a very 7 lengthy discourse about great things that have 8 happened in the state based on what the 9 Legislature has done. That's our job. Good 10 God, if we hadn't done some of those things, 11 what the hell do they pay us for? But we can 12 do better. That's the whole point. We can do 13 better. 14 I heard a lengthy book review today 15 on the Brennan Center report. I assume the 16 reviewer didn't like the report. That has 17 nothing to do with these rules. Has nothing 18 to do with the rules. I didn't hear anyone 19 explain why it is that members can't cosponsor 20 bills. I didn't hear anyone explain why it's 21 a good idea why votes aren't recorded. I 22 didn't hear any of that during debate. Didn't 23 hear it once. 24 Why is it a good idea that votes 25 aren't recorded on a canvass of agreement?

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(518) 371-8910 1 Why is it a good idea that members can't 2 cosponsor bills? I don't know. Does that 3 make government better? Is it making this 4 better here? I don't think so. We can do 5 better. 6 And if everyone in this building -- 7 and it goes for the two houses -- really 8 thinks that every editorial writer in the 9 state, half the citizens in the state who pay 10 attention, and the experts and the 11 good-government groups who watch us and the 12 reporters who watch us are all wrong -- boy, 13 oh, boy. There was a fable about that. It's 14 called "The Emperor Has No Clothes." 15 I mean, I guess if we stand here 16 long enough and wish it, we can think we're 17 really right about this, that we're the ones 18 doing the right thing and everyone else is 19 crazy. It usually doesn't work that way, 20 though. 21 And, you know, I heard that the 22 stories were written about this already and 23 the quotes will be inserted. And you're 24 right. Just like everything else that happens 25 here. What happens here, it's no different

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(518) 371-8910 1 than the World Wrestling Federation, it's no 2 different than the Harlem Globetrotters. We 3 know the outcome when the bills come up. It's 4 based on the rules, on the structure. 5 We send hundreds of thousands of 6 people around the world -- I heard the 7 President talk the other day about restoring 8 democracy around the world and exporting it, 9 those values. We're going to have an election 10 in Iraq. And I'll bet you that the Iraq 11 National Assembly will have better rules than 12 we have, based on American influence. 13 But not here. Not in this house. 14 We can't have that. Because instead, we get a 15 copy of the proposal just before we walk in 16 the door. If this proposal is so good, why 17 didn't it see the light of day before? I 18 don't know. Our proposal has been out there, 19 talked about, public forums ad nauseam. And 20 yet we get our copy of our rules here just as 21 we walk in the door. 22 It's wrong. The process is wrong, 23 and people know it. And, you know, if you 24 want to choose to believe that it's not 25 important, so be it. We'll all be judged

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(518) 371-8910 1 later on. But I think it's important. I 2 think the public has figured out it's 3 important. And until we start to realize and 4 be a more responsive government, we're going 5 to have to listen to these people scream at 6 us, both in our districts and in our 7 newspapers. 8 ACTING PRESIDENT MEIER: Senator 9 Hassell-Thompson. 10 SENATOR HASSELL-THOMPSON: To 11 explain my vote, Mr. President. 12 ACTING PRESIDENT MEIER: Well, 13 we're not on the vote yet. You want to be 14 recognized on the resolution? 15 SENATOR HASSELL-THOMPSON: I want 16 to be recognized on the resolution. 17 ACTING PRESIDENT MEIER: Senator 18 Hassell-Thompson. 19 SENATOR HASSELL-THOMPSON: One of 20 the tactics that is used worldwide whenever we 21 are in disagreement with something or someone, 22 we vilify the messenger. Therefore, we can 23 afford to ignore the message. You can vilify 24 the Brennan Center. You can vilify the League 25 of Women Voters. You can vilify any of the

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(518) 371-8910 1 good-government groups that you choose. But 2 you will not stop the message. 3 The message is that this government 4 is broken. And those of you of good 5 conscience know it. But you will vote the way 6 you will vote, but you will know in your heart 7 that this is broken. So vote as you will. 8 But the message is still a good message no 9 matter whom the messenger may be. 10 ACTING PRESIDENT MEIER: On the 11 resolution. The Secretary will call the roll. 12 (The Secretary called the roll.) 13 ACTING PRESIDENT MEIER: Senator 14 Paterson, to explain his vote. 15 SENATOR PATERSON: Mr. President, 16 we put forth rules that this conference has 17 advocated for basically for twenty years. We 18 advocated for it when no one would listen to 19 us. We now find that over a period of time 20 that a lot of people are listening to us. 21 So we think that this is good 22 government. Obviously it's more enticing when 23 it gets a lot of public approval, which it is 24 now. So I don't mind if anybody questions my 25 motivations.

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(518) 371-8910 1 As a matter of fact, actually my 2 motivation was I wanted to be the head of the 3 Republican Senate Campaign Committee. I 4 thought this was a good way to actually 5 present the conference's positions better. 6 But the reality is in the end that 7 when you do question anybody's motivations, 8 one of the primary requisites of receiving 9 equity in the law is that you come to court 10 with clean hands. And when I look at this 11 package, I'm trying to figure out what is the 12 motivation of having canvass of agreements, of 13 having resources so widely disparate in this 14 place, and of taking the Rules Committee -- 15 the rules proposals and actually disposing of 16 them in a Rules Committee which calls for a 17 resolution. 18 And under my reading of the rules, 19 I don't even understand how a resolution goes 20 before the Rules Committee, that there's no 21 real way to do that. 22 So I think that at the end of this 23 vote, since it's the tone around here really 24 more than the rules, we will try as hard as we 25 can to cooperate, and we will go forward. But

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(518) 371-8910 1 since this may be the last time I ever speak 2 about the rules on the Senate floor, I just 3 didn't want to miss the opportunity to say 4 that I always thought it was a good system and 5 we should have kept it. 6 I vote no. 7 ACTING PRESIDENT MEIER: Senator 8 Paterson will be recorded in the negative. 9 Senator Breslin, to explain his 10 vote. 11 SENATOR BRESLIN: Thank you, Mr. 12 President. 13 On January 10th I thought that -- I 14 was one of the ones who thought that real 15 reform would take place during these past two 16 weeks. What we see in the 62 pages that have 17 been presented to us -- and again, presented 18 to us right before session -- are at best 19 disingenuous. They're an attempt to do as 20 little as possible and to not effectuate real 21 reform, but to try to do that very small 22 amount that hopefully will please people who 23 aren't as interested in reading whether reform 24 takes place. 25 I think the Majority has failed. I

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(518) 371-8910 1 think the people of the State of New York will 2 realize the Majority has failed. Because this 3 place still remains the most dysfunctional 4 body in the United States. And for that 5 reason, I vote in the negative. 6 ACTING PRESIDENT MEIER: Senator 7 Breslin will be recorded in the negative. 8 Senator Bruno, to explain his vote. 9 SENATOR BRUNO: To explain my 10 vote. 11 We're voting for this resolution 12 that is before the floor. And I listened with 13 great interest to the debate. And I have the 14 greatest deal of respect for my colleague 15 Senator Paterson and all of my colleagues 16 here. 17 But reform is in the eyes of the 18 beholder. And when it's all said and done, 19 we're talking being a process here on the 20 floor and a process that works and has worked. 21 It doesn't necessarily suit every individual, 22 but governing is governing. 23 And we can talk about what's going 24 to happen two years from today when we're all 25 together. But that's two years from today.

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(518) 371-8910 1 And we're here now, and we have to govern over 2 these next two years. 3 So what we have before this 4 conference is reform. And as you are not 5 supportive, you're not supporting the reforms 6 that you talk about. We took budget reform 7 out, and you're selective as to how you 8 support budget reform for this year. 9 And that's really the parents of 10 all reform. If we don't get a budget in place 11 on behalf of your constituency this year, 12 shame on us. But we're going to do everything 13 that we can in this chamber to get a budget 14 done by April 1st. And that is a reform that 15 we should stay focused on. 16 The process that we're going 17 through is governing. And I appreciate the 18 observations, the comments. And we are where 19 we are. So I would urge my colleagues here to 20 support reforming this process, making it more 21 open, more responsive to the public. 22 Thank you, Mr. President. 23 ACTING PRESIDENT MEIER: Senator 24 Bruno will be recorded in the affirmative. 25 Announce the results.

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(518) 371-8910 1 THE SECRETARY: Those recorded in 2 the negative on Senate Resolution Number 195 3 are Senators Andrews, Breslin, Brown, Connor, 4 Diaz, Dilan, Duane, Gonzalez, 5 Hassell-Thompson, Klein, L. Krueger, 6 C. Kruger, Onorato, Oppenheimer, Parker, 7 Paterson, Sabini, Savino, Schneiderman, 8 Serrano, A. Smith, M. Smith, Stachowski, 9 Stavisky and Valesky. 10 Excuse me, Senator Brown is in the 11 affirmative. 12 Ayes, 33. Nays, 24. 13 ACTING PRESIDENT MEIER: The 14 resolution is adopted. 15 Senator Bruno. 16 SENATOR BRUNO: Mr. President, is 17 there any further business to come before the 18 Senate this evening? 19 ACTING PRESIDENT MEIER: There's 20 no further business at the desk, Mr. 21 President. 22 SENATOR BRUNO: Can I announce 23 that there will be a Finance Committee meeting 24 at 9:15 in the Majority Conference Room -- 25 tomorrow morning, not this evening. A.m.

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(518) 371-8910 1 And, Mr. President, we're handing 2 up the following committee assignments and ask 3 that they be recorded. 4 ACTING PRESIDENT MEIER: The 5 assignments are received and will be entered 6 in the Journal. 7 SENATOR BRUNO: Mr. President, 8 there being no further business to come before 9 the Senate, I would move that we stand 10 adjourned until 11:00 a.m. tomorrow. 11 ACTING PRESIDENT MEIER: On 12 motion, the Senate stands adjourned until 13 Tuesday, January 25th, at 11:00 a.m. 14 (Whereupon, at 7:26 p.m., the 15 Senate adjourned.) 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25

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