Monday, May 3, 2010

1 NEW YORK STATE SENATE 2 3 4 THE STENOGRAPHIC RECORD 5 6 7 8 9 ALBANY, NEW YORK 10 May 3, 2010 11 4:12 p.m. 12 13 14 REGULAR SESSION 15 16 17 18 SENATOR NEIL D. BRESLIN, Acting President 19 ANGELO J. APONTE, Secretary 20 21 22 23 24 25

Candyco Transcription Service, Inc. 1 P R O C E E D I N G S 2 ACTING PRESIDENT BRESLIN: The 3 Senate will please come to order. 4 I ask everyone to rise and recite 5 with me the Pledge of Allegiance. 6 (Whereupon, the assemblage recited 7 the Pledge of Allegiance to the Flag.) 8 ACTING PRESIDENT BRESLIN: The 9 Reverend Peter G. Young will give the 10 invocation, from Mother Teresa Community 11 Church. 12 REVEREND YOUNG: Thank you. 13 May I remember with prayer the 14 death anniversary of Senator John Marchi 15 today, who had served in this house for over 16 50 years, and all of those who have served in 17 this house, the Senators who have been so 18 dedicated, so that they will be remembered by 19 way of their leadership in New York State. 20 Because You, Almighty and Eternal 21 God, have revealed Your glory to all nations, 22 God of power and might and wisdom and justice, 23 come to our Senators through Your authority 24 with the prayer that Your laws are enacted and 25 the judgments are decreed, with our citizens

Candyco Transcription Service, Inc. 1 benefiting from their dedication and of our 2 session today. 3 Amen. 4 ACTING PRESIDENT BRESLIN: Thank 5 you, Father Young. 6 The reading of the Journal. 7 The Secretary will read. 8 THE SECRETARY: In Senate, 9 Sunday, May 2nd, the Senate met pursuant to 10 adjournment. The Journal of Saturday, 11 May 1st, was read and approved. On motion, 12 Senate adjourned. 13 ACTING PRESIDENT BRESLIN: 14 Without objection, the Journal stands approved 15 as read. 16 Presentation of petitions. 17 Messages from the Assembly. 18 Messages from the Governor. 19 Reports of standing committees. 20 Reports of select committees. 21 Communications and reports from 22 state officers. 23 Motions and resolutions. 24 Senator Klein. 25 SENATOR KLEIN: Thank you,

Candyco Transcription Service, Inc. 1 Mr. President. 2 On behalf of Senator Aubertine, on 3 page number 23 I offer the following 4 amendments to Calendar Number 371, Senate 5 Print Number 7181, and ask that said bill 6 retain its place on Third Reading Calendar. 7 ACTING PRESIDENT BRESLIN: So 8 ordered. 9 SENATOR KLEIN: On behalf of 10 Senator Foley, I move that the following bill 11 be discharged from its respective committee 12 and be recommitted with instructions to strike 13 the enacting clause: Senate Number 4985. 14 ACTING PRESIDENT BRESLIN: So 15 ordered. 16 SENATOR KLEIN: On behalf of 17 Senator Foley again, on page number 24 I offer 18 the following amendments to Calendar Number 19 389, Senate Print Number 5995, and ask that 20 said bill retain its place on Third Reading 21 Calendar. 22 ACTING PRESIDENT BRESLIN: So 23 ordered. 24 SENATOR KLEIN: Mr. President, I 25 move to amend Senate Bill Number 1901A by

Candyco Transcription Service, Inc. 1 striking out the amendments made on April 1, 2 2009, and restoring it to its original print 3 number, 1901. 4 ACTING PRESIDENT BRESLIN: So 5 ordered. 6 SENATOR KLEIN: Mr. President, I 7 wish to call up my bill, Print Number 5896C, 8 recalled from the Assembly, which is now at 9 the desk. 10 ACTING PRESIDENT BRESLIN: The 11 Secretary will read. 12 THE SECRETARY: Calendar Number 13 378, by Senator Klein, Senate Print 5896C, an 14 act to amend the Real Property Law. 15 SENATOR KLEIN: Mr. President, I 16 now move to reconsider the vote by which this 17 bill was passed. 18 ACTING PRESIDENT BRESLIN: The 19 Secretary will call the roll on 20 reconsideration. 21 (The Secretary called the roll.) 22 THE SECRETARY: Ayes, 59. 23 SENATOR KLEIN: Mr. President, I 24 now offer the following amendments. 25 ACTING PRESIDENT BRESLIN: The

Candyco Transcription Service, Inc. 1 amendments are received, Senator Klein. 2 SENATOR KLEIN: Mr. President, at 3 this time can you please call on Senator 4 Parker. 5 ACTING PRESIDENT BRESLIN: 6 Senator Parker. 7 SENATOR PARKER: Mr. President, 8 point of personal privilege. 9 ACTING PRESIDENT BRESLIN: You 10 may proceed, Senator Parker. 11 SENATOR PARKER: Thank you, 12 Mr. President. 13 I'd like to take a few moments of 14 personal privilege to address my words and 15 actions of last week. 16 I ran for this office to bring 17 change. The communities I represent of the 18 21st District, which include Flatbush and East 19 Flatbush, Midwood, Ditmas Park, Kensington and 20 Boro Park, have long been shortchanged. On 21 every single issue that matters to my 22 constituents -- affordable housing, 23 immigration access, access to healthcare, 24 quality education, mass transit and public 25 safety -- this state, this Senate, has let

Candyco Transcription Service, Inc. 1 them down. 2 The seat I occupy was created in 3 2002 during redistricting. I ran and ran hard 4 on all those issues, to make change. When I 5 got here, I was somewhat surprised to learn 6 that as a freshman Senator in the minority, I 7 was expected to be unseen, unheard and 8 uninvolved. It was implicit but clear my 9 constituents were expected to be 10 disenfranchised. My vote and their votes were 11 effectively irrelevant, and I was urged by 12 some in this chamber to go along and get 13 along. I think everybody knows that didn't 14 happen. 15 I was sent here to be a voice for 16 the voiceless. One month within my first 17 term, the New York Times ran an editorial when 18 I had the nerve, the gall, to actually ask 19 questions in a committee meeting. I asked 20 questions about the nominee's qualifications 21 to run one of the most important agencies in 22 the state. He had failed the bar several 23 times, for example, but I never asked him 24 questions about his race, his ethnicity, and 25 his religion.

Candyco Transcription Service, Inc. 1 And as a matter of fact, post that 2 questioning, him and I actually developed, I 3 think, a very good relationship, and I 4 consider him a friend even to this day. 5 The next day Senator Duane tried to 6 ask the same questions of a nominee in the 7 Senate Finance Committee. As Senator Duane 8 went further, asking questions the nominee's 9 involvement in allegedly helping fix a case 10 where a worker was killed on a job site, the 11 committee chair simply ruled his questions as 12 not relevant. The chair decided the questions 13 had gone on long enough and called for the 14 vote. 15 We've come a long way since 2003. 16 In terms of process, we became more active as 17 a minority conference. We worked with 18 communities across the state and won elections 19 to transform this chamber. And when we took 20 the majority, we didn't stifle debate, strip 21 minority resources, or bottle things up in 22 committee. 23 Instead, under Malcolm Smith and 24 John Sampson, we opened this house up in ways 25 never seen before, offering members of the

Candyco Transcription Service, Inc. 1 minority conference the ability to exercise 2 their rights, privileges of being a Senator, 3 and the ability to represent their 4 constituents, a courtesy we had never 5 previously received. 6 Mr. President, I would much prefer 7 today's spotlight be on the environmental or 8 labor bills and the budget extenders. And to 9 the extent that my words last week brought 10 commotion and emotion to this house in ways 11 that may distract or divide us or divert us 12 from the important work of the people of 13 New York State -- this work that's so 14 important for all of us, the work that 15 New Yorkers sent us here to accomplish -- if I 16 have offended people in this chamber in any 17 way, I offer my sincerest apologies for my 18 zealous advocacy. 19 But to the extent that my words 20 bring debate and discussion to this house on 21 the issue of race, exclusion and, conversely, 22 new opportunity, I offer my sincerest 23 commitment to continue that debate and that 24 discussion and ask you to be partners in that 25 debate.

Candyco Transcription Service, Inc. 1 It is also exceedingly important 2 for me to explain to this house, through you, 3 Mr. President, that my criticisms are not, in 4 fact, at bottom personal. I can't see into 5 anyone's soul. And I should not have 6 personalized my comments, because the issues I 7 spoke about are larger than any one individual 8 or group. The problems of race, lack of 9 access to opportunity, and the economic 10 disparities in New York existed long before 11 any of us were elected to this chamber. And 12 to the extent they persist, in many ways we 13 are all complicit. 14 All that is necessary for evil to 15 triumph is for good people to do nothing. The 16 failures of this chamber to right historic and 17 current wrongs were and are not personal. 18 Rather, they are institutional, and we are all 19 of us not doing enough. 20 We need to do more to ensure 21 diversity on the bench and the commissions, 22 authorities, and boards. We need to do more 23 to ensure fair and less political contracting 24 and investment opportunities through OGS and 25 the agencies and departments and office of the

Candyco Transcription Service, Inc. 1 State Comptroller. 2 We need to look more closely at 3 hiring an opportunity agenda for the Senate 4 itself. It would be easy to look at either 5 side of this chamber, compare the compositions 6 of our conferences and call it a day. It 7 would be easy to look at their respective 8 hiring records and draw conclusions. But that 9 would only further divide us, fuel the 10 dysfunction, and weaken our state even more in 11 these difficult times. 12 I regret seeking to ascribe blame 13 in such personal terms rather than focusing on 14 the broader nature of the work that we must 15 do. We don't need to fix blame, we need to 16 fix the problem. And we can really only do 17 that if we work together. 18 I think everyone knows that I am a 19 loud and passionate advocate for my community 20 and for the people of the State of New York. 21 I will never shrink away from my 22 responsibility to speak up for those who sent 23 me here and, by extension, for those I love. 24 Even before former Governor Spitzer 25 said it, I have long believed that you don't

Candyco Transcription Service, Inc. 1 change the world by a whisper. I believe, in 2 my responsibility to speak the truth as I know 3 it, that we still have far to go on issues of 4 race, gender, class and sexuality, and to 5 confront those hard truths in all their 6 complexity whenever I can. 7 Much has been said about what 8 people describe as my anger. I still believe 9 there is much to be confronted and much to be 10 fought over. And in recent days I have been 11 reminded of President Obama's speech on race, 12 and I have read it again in the context of 13 this moment. It was an amazing speech at an 14 amazing time in our collective histories. And 15 in it our President spoke of anger on both 16 sides of the racial divide. 17 One particular passage about black 18 anger struck me, and it stays with me. He 19 said, and I quote, "That anger is not always 20 productive. Indeed, more often it distracts 21 attention from solving real problems. It 22 keeps us from squarely facing our own 23 complexity and our condition and prevents the 24 African-American community from forging the 25 alliances it needs to bring about real change.

Candyco Transcription Service, Inc. 1 But the anger is real; it is powerful; and it 2 simply can't be wished away. To condemn it 3 without understanding its roots only serves to 4 widen the chasm of misunderstanding that 5 exists between the races." 6 The President went on to say that a 7 similar anger exists in the white community 8 and how anger on both sides distracts from the 9 real challenges, he says. Again, in quotes, 10 "Just as black anger often proved 11 counterproductive, so have these white 12 resentments distracted attention from the real 13 culprits of the middle-class squeeze -- a 14 corporate cultural rift with inside dealings; 15 questionable accounting practices and 16 short-term greed; a Washington dominated by 17 lobbyists and special interests; economic 18 policies that favor the few over the many. 19 And yet to wish away the resentment of white 20 Americans, to label them as misguided or even 21 racist without recognizing they are grounded 22 in legitimate concerns, this too widens the 23 racial divide and blocks our path to 24 understanding." 25 Here we are, two years after the

Candyco Transcription Service, Inc. 1 speech, facing the same problems of the 2 economy, class, and special influence -- and 3 here we are with no real cooperation to fix 4 the problems, to form a more perfect union, or 5 to build a safer, stronger or more prosperous 6 New York. 7 I also agree with the President 8 that we cannot view racial relations as 9 static, as if no progress has been made and we 10 are bound to a tragic past. America has 11 changed, but that change has not come easily 12 or quietly. Nor has that change come without 13 hard work, sacrifice, and the willingness to 14 work together. And for most times it has been 15 New York leading that change -- in the labor 16 movement, the abolitionist movement, the 17 suffrage movement, the Stonewall uprisings and 18 others. 19 I believe it is time for us to lead 20 again. It is my hope today that hard as my 21 words were last week, we can use these coming 22 weeks of our session to have a conversation 23 and to do that hard work that we need to do 24 around these difficult issues. 25 It is my hope that today can be a

Candyco Transcription Service, Inc. 1 starting point for real conversation based on 2 a commitment on my part to work on both sides 3 of the aisle to find ways to give real people 4 access to real jobs, capital and the 5 opportunities of this state. 6 It is my hope today that we can 7 lead a meaningful effort to bring our people 8 together instead of continuing the divisions 9 that have manifested themselves in conflictive 10 governmental dysfunction. 11 Mr. President, I wish to make one 12 more point. Over the past few days, I've had 13 a relatively unique set of experiences. I 14 have received more requests for media 15 interviews than at any other time in my 16 career. Not for legislation I passed or 17 demonstrating for more education funding or 18 for the free breast cancer or dental 19 screenings I offer in my district, or for the 20 prom dresses I will give away to many young 21 women of low-income households this Saturday, 22 but solely for this issue. 23 I have also, for the first time in 24 my life, received death threats. My office 25 has received multiple threats, one of which

Candyco Transcription Service, Inc. 1 also threatened the President. The 2 authorities are investigating, and I hope not 3 much more will come of it. But the threats 4 tell me that that conversation we need -- we 5 really need to have this conversation. 6 The threats are also a clear 7 reminder to me that we are not alone and that 8 I am not alone. That those around me -- my 9 staff, my family, you, my colleagues -- may 10 all be impacted by my actions. And I say to 11 all of you that I will work to make better 12 choices. 13 I'm not afraid. I know that there 14 are consequences for those choices that I 15 make. But I believe that conversation is too 16 important to back away from, and I'll tell you 17 why. Last Wednesday reporters descended upon 18 my district office seeking comments from me 19 and my constituency. Tragically, right across 20 the street, a young man in his early thirties 21 was shot and killed. The media was there to 22 cover me but ended up covered the shooting. I 23 can tell you they don't usually cover 24 shootings in Brooklyn, particularly in 25 Flatbush. If it weren't so tragic, that irony

Candyco Transcription Service, Inc. 1 could make one laugh or cry. 2 Where were the schools and the 3 after-school programs, the prenatal care, the 4 social workers, the cops on the beat when that 5 young man was shot? That's why I'm here. For 6 all the young men and women who are murdered 7 over economic scrapes, or who live in poverty 8 and fear, and those kids we have failed. The 9 reality is I cannot fix these problems by 10 working alone. I need your help, and I want 11 your help to fix them. 12 That's the real test for us. We 13 can -- the real test for us is whether we can 14 work together across regions, across racial 15 and political lines, and invest in each other 16 to save our state. Can we reject the old 17 arrangements, the old disagreements to build a 18 stronger and fairer economy for everyone? Can 19 we come together to build a safe, strong and 20 more just New York? Can we suffer together in 21 the deepest, most savage economic upset since 22 the Great Depression? 23 I believe we can. I know we can. 24 I am willing to step back from the rhetoric 25 alone if we were all willing to step up and do

Candyco Transcription Service, Inc. 1 the work. I am willing to work with anyone in 2 this chamber to make that a reality, and I ask 3 you for all your help in this effort. 4 Thank you, Mr. President. 5 ACTING PRESIDENT BRESLIN: Thank 6 you, Senator Parker. 7 Senator Klein. 8 SENATOR KLEIN: Mr. President, 9 can you recognize Senator Libous. I believe 10 he has a motion. 11 ACTING PRESIDENT BRESLIN: 12 Senator Libous. 13 SENATOR LIBOUS: Mr. President, 14 on page 19 I offer the following amendments to 15 Calendar Number 311, Senate Print 5863A, on 16 behalf of Senator Fuschillo, and ask that said 17 bill retain its place on Third Reading 18 Calendar. 19 ACTING PRESIDENT BRESLIN: So 20 ordered. 21 Senator Klein. 22 SENATOR KLEIN: Mr. President, I 23 believe there's a resolution at the desk by 24 Senator Sampson. I ask that the resolution be 25 read in its entirety and move for its

Candyco Transcription Service, Inc. 1 immediate adoption. 2 ACTING PRESIDENT BRESLIN: 3 Senator Klein, has this resolution been deemed 4 privileged and submitted to the offices of the 5 Temporary President? 6 SENATOR KLEIN: Yes, it has, 7 Mr. President. 8 ACTING PRESIDENT BRESLIN: The 9 Secretary will read. 10 THE SECRETARY: By Senator 11 Sampson, legislative resolution recognizing 12 Saturday, May 1, 2010, as Law Day USA in the 13 State of New York. 14 "WHEREAS, For over two centuries 15 our state and nation have adhered to the rule 16 of law as the foundation for a safe, free and 17 justice society. Seeking to formally 18 recognize this tradition, President Eisenhower 19 established Law Day in 1958 as a day of 20 national dedication to the principles of 21 government under the law; and 22 "WHEREAS, This Legislative Body 23 celebrates the importance of Law Day USA in 24 the State of New York. In doing so, we as 25 citizens of this great state and nation

Candyco Transcription Service, Inc. 1 recommit ourselves to the rule of law and to 2 upholding the fundamental principles enshrined 3 in our founding documents; and 4 "WHEREAS, The theme of this year's 5 Law Day, 'Law in the 21st Century: Enduring 6 Traditions and Emerging Challenges,' reminds 7 us to draw upon and adapt to our time-honored 8 legal traditions to meet the demands of a 9 global world; and 10 "WHEREAS, As we begin the second 11 decade of the 21st century, new communications 12 technologies are rapidly emerging, connecting 13 the world. Legal issues of human rights, 14 migration, environmental regulation, and 15 outsourcing are now internationally commingled 16 due to the ease of communicating and traveling 17 across borders. Accordingly, the law is also 18 dramatically changing; and. 19 WHEREAS, This Legislative Body is 20 committed to ensuring that the citizens of 21 New York State understand and remain dedicated 22 to and are protected by the principles of 23 government under the law; now, therefore, be 24 it resolved 25 "RESOLVED, That this Legislative

Candyco Transcription Service, Inc. 1 Body pause in its deliberations to recognize 2 Saturday, May 1, 2010, as Law Day USA in the 3 State of New York; and be it further 4 "RESOLVED, That copies of this 5 resolution, suitably engrossed, be transmitted 6 to Carolyn B. Lamm, President, American Bar 7 Association, and to Michael E. Getnick, 8 President, New York State Bar Association." 9 ACTING PRESIDENT BRESLIN: The 10 question is on the resolution. All those in 11 favor please signify by saying aye. 12 (Response of "Aye.") 13 ACTING PRESIDENT BRESLIN: 14 Opposed, nay. 15 (No response.) 16 ACTING PRESIDENT BRESLIN: The 17 resolution is adopted. 18 Senator Sampson has indicated that 19 he would like to open the resolution to joint 20 cosponsorship by the entire house. Any 21 Senator wishing not to be on the resolution 22 please notify the desk. 23 Senator Klein. 24 SENATOR KLEIN: Mr. President, 25 there will be an immediate meeting of the

Candyco Transcription Service, Inc. 1 Finance Committee, followed by an immediate 2 meeting of the Rules Committee in the Majority 3 Conference Room, Room 332. 4 Pending the return of the Rules 5 Committee, may we please stand at ease. 6 ACTING PRESIDENT BRESLIN: There 7 will be an Immediate meeting of the Finance 8 Committee in Room 332, followed by a meeting 9 of the Rules Committee. 10 Pending the return of those 11 committees, the Senate stands at ease. 12 (Whereupon, the Senate stood at 13 ease at 4:32 p.m.) 14 (Whereupon, the Senate reconvened 15 at 5:15 p.m.) 16 ACTING PRESIDENT BRESLIN: 17 Senator Klein. 18 SENATOR KLEIN: Mr. President, I 19 believe there's a report of the Rules 20 Committee at the desk. I move that we adopt 21 the report at this time. 22 ACTING PRESIDENT BRESLIN: There 23 is a report of the Rules Committee at the 24 desk. 25 The Secretary will read.

Candyco Transcription Service, Inc. 1 THE SECRETARY: Senator Smith, 2 from the Committee on Rules, reports the 3 following bills: 4 Senate Print 7678, by the Senate 5 Committee on Rules, an act to amend the 6 Education Law; 7 7686, by Senator Dilan, an act to 8 amend the State Finance Law; and 9 Senate Print 7689, by the Senate 10 Committee on Rules, an act making 11 appropriations for the support of government. 12 All bills ordered direct to third 13 reading. 14 ACTING PRESIDENT BRESLIN: All 15 those in favor of adopting the Rules Committee 16 report please signify by saying aye. 17 (Response of "Aye.") 18 ACTING PRESIDENT BRESLIN: 19 Opposed, nay. 20 (No response.) 21 ACTING PRESIDENT BRESLIN: The 22 Rules Committee report is adopted. 23 Senator Klein. 24 SENATOR KLEIN: Mr. President, 25 can we please go to a reading of the calendar

Candyco Transcription Service, Inc. 1 at this time. 2 ACTING PRESIDENT BRESLIN: The 3 Secretary will read. 4 THE SECRETARY: Calendar Number 5 123, by Member of the Assembly Lancman, 6 Assembly Print Number 2374A, an act to amend 7 the Judiciary Law. 8 ACTING PRESIDENT BRESLIN: Read 9 the last section. 10 SENATOR LIBOUS: Lay it aside. 11 ACTING PRESIDENT BRESLIN: The 12 bill is laid aside. 13 THE SECRETARY: Calendar Number 14 315, by Senator Stewart-Cousins, Senate Print 15 7129B, an act to amend Chapter 118 of the Laws 16 of 1969. 17 SENATOR LIBOUS: Lay it aside. 18 ACTING PRESIDENT BRESLIN: The 19 bill is laid aside. 20 THE SECRETARY: Calendar Number 21 346, by Senator Onorato, Senate Print 7053, an 22 act to amend the Labor Law. 23 ACTING PRESIDENT BRESLIN: Read 24 the last section. 25 THE SECRETARY: Section 3. This

Candyco Transcription Service, Inc. 1 act shall take effect immediately. 2 ACTING PRESIDENT BRESLIN: Call 3 the roll. 4 (The Secretary called the roll.) 5 ACTING PRESIDENT BRESLIN: 6 Announce the results. 7 THE SECRETARY: Ayes, 60. 8 ACTING PRESIDENT BRESLIN: The 9 bill is passed. 10 THE SECRETARY: Calendar Number 11 402, by Member of the Assembly Destito, 12 Assembly Print Number 8313A, an act to amend 13 the Executive Law. 14 ACTING PRESIDENT BRESLIN: Read 15 the last section. 16 THE SECRETARY: Section 2. This 17 act shall take effect immediately. 18 ACTING PRESIDENT BRESLIN: Call 19 the roll. 20 (The Secretary called the roll.) 21 ACTING PRESIDENT BRESLIN: 22 Announce the results. 23 THE SECRETARY: Ayes, 60. 24 ACTING PRESIDENT BRESLIN: The 25 bill is passed.

Candyco Transcription Service, Inc. 1 THE SECRETARY: Calendar Number 2 403, by Member of the Assembly DelMonte -- 3 SENATOR KLEIN: Lay the bill 4 aside for the day, please. 5 ACTING PRESIDENT BRESLIN: The 6 bill is laid aside for the day. 7 THE SECRETARY: Calendar Number 8 405, by Member of the Assembly Latimer -- 9 SENATOR KLEIN: Lay the bill 10 aside for the day, please. 11 ACTING PRESIDENT BRESLIN: The 12 bill is laid aside for the day. 13 THE SECRETARY: Calendar Number 14 408, by Member of the Assembly Abbate, 15 Assembly Print Number 7173, an act to amend 16 the Executive Law. 17 ACTING PRESIDENT BRESLIN: Read 18 the last section. 19 THE SECRETARY: Section 2. This 20 act shall take effect immediately. 21 ACTING PRESIDENT BRESLIN: Call 22 the roll. 23 (The Secretary called the roll.) 24 ACTING PRESIDENT BRESLIN: 25 Announce the results.

Candyco Transcription Service, Inc. 1 THE SECRETARY: Ayes, 60. 2 ACTING PRESIDENT BRESLIN: The 3 bill is passed. 4 THE SECRETARY: Calendar Number 5 409, by Member of the Assembly Rosenthal, 6 Assembly Print Number 5655, an act to amend 7 the Energy Law. 8 ACTING PRESIDENT BRESLIN: Read 9 the last section. 10 THE SECRETARY: Section 2. This 11 act shall take effect immediately. 12 ACTING PRESIDENT BRESLIN: Call 13 the roll. 14 (The Secretary called the roll.) 15 ACTING PRESIDENT BRESLIN: 16 Announce the results. 17 THE SECRETARY: Ayes, 60. 18 ACTING PRESIDENT BRESLIN: The 19 bill is passed. 20 Senator Klein, that completes the 21 reading of the noncontroversial calendar. 22 SENATOR KLEIN: Mr. President, 23 can we please go to a reading of the 24 controversial calendar. 25 ACTING PRESIDENT BRESLIN: The

Candyco Transcription Service, Inc. 1 Secretary will ring the bell. 2 The Secretary will read. 3 THE SECRETARY: Calendar Number 4 123, by Member of the Assembly Lancman, 5 Assembly Print Number 2374A, an act to amend 6 the Judiciary Law. 7 SENATOR BONACIC: Will the 8 sponsor explain the bill, please? 9 Explanation. 10 ACTING PRESIDENT BRESLIN: 11 Senator Klein, Senator Bonacic has requested 12 an explanation. 13 SENATOR KLEIN: Yes, 14 Mr. President. 15 This legislation requires each 16 commissioner of jurors, one for each county, 17 to collect demographic information on the 18 jurors who present for jury service. Some of 19 the information could include but is not 20 limited to a juror's age, ethnicity, age and 21 sex. 22 ACTING PRESIDENT BRESLIN: 23 Senator Bonacic. 24 SENATOR BONACIC: Will the 25 sponsor yield for a couple of questions?

Candyco Transcription Service, Inc. 1 ACTING PRESIDENT BRESLIN: 2 Senator Klein, do you yield to Senator 3 Bonacic? 4 SENATOR KLEIN: Yes, 5 Mr. President. 6 ACTING PRESIDENT BRESLIN: 7 Senator Bonacic. 8 SENATOR BONACIC: Senator Klein, 9 I'm under the impression that the Office of 10 Court Administration is doing this now. Is 11 this something different than what they're 12 doing in the jury pool when they come in? 13 ACTING PRESIDENT BRESLIN: 14 Senator Klein. 15 SENATOR KLEIN: Through you, 16 Mr. President. To my knowledge, in my 17 office's conversation with the Office of Court 18 Administration, they're not doing this. And 19 they support this specific legislation. 20 I think what you're getting at are 21 the broader terms that were used in the 22 original bill before the bill was amended, 23 they were opposed to. But they support this 24 legislation. 25 ACTING PRESIDENT BRESLIN:

Candyco Transcription Service, Inc. 1 Senator Bonacic. 2 SENATOR BONACIC: Can I ask 3 Senator Klein one more question? 4 ACTING PRESIDENT BRESLIN: Will 5 you yield to an additional question, Senator 6 Klein? 7 SENATOR KLEIN: Yes, 8 Mr. President. 9 ACTING PRESIDENT BRESLIN: 10 Senator Bonacic. 11 SENATOR BONACIC: Senator Klein, 12 when all of this information is finally 13 collected, what is the end game? What's the 14 next step? 15 SENATOR KLEIN: Well, a study put 16 out several years ago which showed that this 17 was a problem, that most juries and some 18 juries around the state, specifically 19 downstate, don't reflect adequately the people 20 who live there. 21 So this is a way to finally have 22 this information, which was never collected 23 before, done in a very easy way by just adding 24 another checkoff box on the existing 25 questionnaires that they distribute, and then

Candyco Transcription Service, Inc. 1 we can determine how we can potentially open 2 up the jury pool that much further. 3 Right now we're limited to voter 4 registration and other means as far as the 5 ways we get information or the way we can 6 actually pick jurors from specific lists. So 7 I guess in the long run we can see if the 8 claims that have been talked about are 9 actually warranted. 10 ACTING PRESIDENT BRESLIN: 11 Senator Bonacic. 12 SENATOR BONACIC: Another 13 question, Senator Klein? 14 ACTING PRESIDENT BRESLIN: 15 Senator Klein, will you yield to an additional 16 question? 17 SENATOR KLEIN: Yes, 18 Mr. President. 19 ACTING PRESIDENT BRESLIN: 20 Senator Bonacic. 21 SENATOR BONACIC: Okay, I want to 22 make sure I understand this. If I live in a 23 county where I have 25 percent of my 24 population is Asian, 25 percent is 25 Afro-American, 25 percent is Hispanic, and the

Candyco Transcription Service, Inc. 1 other 25 percent is Caucasian, is it the 2 ultimate goal, when we have a jury of 12, that 3 we have three members from each of those 4 races? Would that be the ideal goal of 5 eventually where we want to go with this 6 information? 7 SENATOR KLEIN: I don't think 8 that's what the goal is, Senator. But I do 9 believe that once we have this information -- 10 and by the way, this legislation is only going 11 to require that we gather this information to 12 see if a lot of the claims that are out there 13 and the studies that we've seen in the past 14 are warranted. 15 ACTING PRESIDENT BRESLIN: 16 Senator Bonacic. 17 SENATOR BONACIC: Okay, on the 18 bill. 19 ACTING PRESIDENT BRESLIN: 20 Senator Bonacic, on the bill. 21 SENATOR BONACIC: I'm not going 22 to support this legislation for a variety of 23 reasons. 24 Number one, the courts have held 25 just recently, on March 30th of this year, in

Candyco Transcription Service, Inc. 1 Berghuis v. Smith, that unless you can show 2 there's systematic exclusion in your minority 3 pool, then it makes no difference what your 4 jury composition is. And there have been 5 attacks on verdicts because of racial 6 composition, and therefore the verdict should 7 be set aside. 8 And I don't generally support that 9 policy. I think regardless of the racial 10 composition, we're basically Americans. We 11 can come together on a jury deliberation, in a 12 common goal, and do justice. So I don't like 13 the basis of why you're collecting the 14 information. 15 And the second thing is the courts 16 have held if there's no attempt at systematic 17 exclusion, regardless of what the racial 18 composition of the jury is, you can't set the 19 verdict aside. 20 For example, it's hard to get 21 people to come to jury pools. They're busy. 22 And for some reason the commissioner of jurors 23 sends out these subpoenas to a generally 24 Afro-American community, and 95 percent of the 25 minority pool is Afro-American. And that jury

Candyco Transcription Service, Inc. 1 is all Afro-American, and there is an Asian or 2 a Caucasian or a Hispanic being tried. And 3 the verdict is -- they come together and they 4 make the verdict based on the facts to render 5 justice. 6 The court decision here, the 7 Supreme Court in the case that I cited, just 8 five weeks ago said unless can you prove 9 there's a systematic exclusion on how you've 10 put the people in the jury pool, it's never 11 going to support a motion to set aside a 12 verdict on racial composition. 13 So I think this is an exercise in 14 futility. The courts just recently are 15 closing the door on it. And to suggest that 16 the racial composition has got to reflect the 17 population of the county, it undercuts who 18 Americans are and how they can come together 19 and render justice. For that reason, I'm 20 voting no. 21 Thank you, Mr. President. 22 ACTING PRESIDENT BRESLIN: Thank 23 you, Senator Bonacic. 24 Are there any other Senators 25 wishing to be heard?

Candyco Transcription Service, Inc. 1 Hearing none, the Secretary will 2 ring the bell. Members are asked to come to 3 the chamber for the vote. 4 Read the last section. 5 THE SECRETARY: Section 3. This 6 act shall take effect on the 90th day. 7 ACTING PRESIDENT BRESLIN: Call 8 the roll. 9 (The Secretary called the roll.) 10 ACTING PRESIDENT BRESLIN: 11 Senator Klein, to explain his vote. 12 SENATOR KLEIN: Thank you, 13 Mr. President. 14 I just want to make sure my 15 colleagues are clear that, you know, this 16 legislation is not mandating any expansion of 17 any jury pool. It's just requiring more 18 information be gathered to see more ways we 19 can get more and more people eligible to be 20 jurors. 21 I think that certainly should be 22 the intent, based on a 2006 Citizen Action 23 study which showed that many people aren't 24 participating in the jury process. 25 So I think the combination of

Candyco Transcription Service, Inc. 1 having more information at the disposal of the 2 OCA can only help in getting more and more 3 people involved in the jury process. So of 4 course I vote yes, Mr. President. 5 ACTING PRESIDENT BRESLIN: Thank 6 you, Senator Klein. 7 Senator Klein will be recorded in 8 the affirmative. 9 Senator Farley, to explain his 10 vote. 11 SENATOR FARLEY: Before I explain 12 my vote, I'd just like to complain how long it 13 takes to get somebody to be able to vote on 14 this. I wish the members would be in their 15 seats so that they could vote. We wait and 16 wait and wait for them to come to the chamber. 17 I'm going to vote up on this bill. 18 But I do have some concerns that perhaps this 19 could be just another example of where the 20 court could change its mind in saying the jury 21 pool was not reflective of the community or 22 something and therefore we need a new trial. 23 But I will vote aye. But again, 24 Mr. President, I wish you could get them in 25 the room faster on a vote.

Candyco Transcription Service, Inc. 1 ACTING PRESIDENT BRESLIN: I'll 2 do my best, Senator Farley. 3 Senator Farley to be recorded in 4 the affirmative. 5 Announce the results. 6 THE SECRETARY: Those recorded in 7 the negative on Calendar Number 123 are 8 Senators Bonacic, Flanagan, Golden, Griffo, 9 O. Johnson, Lanza, Larkin, LaValle, Leibell, 10 Little, Nozzolio, Padavan, Saland, Skelos, 11 Volker and Young. 12 Ayes, 44. Nays, 16. 13 ACTING PRESIDENT BRESLIN: The 14 bill is passed. 15 THE SECRETARY: Calendar Number 16 315, by Senator Stewart-Cousins, Senate Print 17 7129B, an act to amend Chapter 118 of the Laws 18 of 1969, relating to a separate union free 19 school district. 20 SENATOR LIBOUS: Explanation. 21 ACTING PRESIDENT BRESLIN: 22 Senator Stewart-Cousins, an explanation has 23 been requested. 24 SENATOR STEWART-COUSINS: Thank 25 you, Mr. President.

Candyco Transcription Service, Inc. 1 This is a bill that would allow the 2 Greenburgh North Castle Union Free School 3 District to establish -- which is, by the way 4 a Special Acts District -- to establish a 5 school for special needs children in Orange 6 County. It is hoped that about 155 residents 7 will be served by this school. 8 It is cosponsored by Senator 9 Larkin, who represents Orange County. And I 10 think he would certainly attest to the need 11 for -- 12 SENATOR LIBOUS: Explanation 13 satisfactory. 14 SENATOR STEWART-COUSINS: Was 15 that enough? 16 ACTING PRESIDENT BRESLIN: Thank 17 you very much, Senator Stewart-Cousins. 18 Are there any other Senators 19 wishing to be heard? 20 Hearing none, the Secretary will 21 ring the bell. 22 Read the last section. 23 THE SECRETARY: Section 4. This 24 act shall take effect immediately. 25 ACTING PRESIDENT BRESLIN: Call

Candyco Transcription Service, Inc. 1 the roll. 2 (The Secretary called the roll.) 3 ACTING PRESIDENT BRESLIN: 4 Announce the results. 5 THE SECRETARY: Ayes, 60. 6 ACTING PRESIDENT BRESLIN: The 7 bill is passed. 8 Senator Klein, that completes the 9 reading of the controversial calendar. 10 SENATOR KLEIN: Mr. President, at 11 this time can we please go to a reading of the 12 supplemental calendar. 13 ACTING PRESIDENT BRESLIN: The 14 Secretary will read the supplemental calendar. 15 THE SECRETARY: Calendar Number 16 475, by the Senate Committee on Rules, Senate 17 Print 7678, an act to amend the Education Law. 18 ACTING PRESIDENT BRESLIN: Read 19 the last section. 20 THE SECRETARY: Section 18. This 21 act shall -- 22 SENATOR MONTGOMERY: Lay it 23 aside. 24 ACTING PRESIDENT BRESLIN: The 25 bill is laid aside.

Candyco Transcription Service, Inc. 1 THE SECRETARY: Calendar Number 2 477, by the Senate Committee on Rules, Senate 3 Print 7689, an act making appropriations for 4 the support of government. 5 ACTING PRESIDENT BRESLIN: Read 6 the last section. 7 SENATOR LIBOUS: Lay it aside. 8 ACTING PRESIDENT BRESLIN: The 9 bill is laid aside. 10 Senator Klein, that completes the 11 reading of the noncontroversial supplemental 12 calendar. 13 SENATOR KLEIN: Mr. President, 14 can we please go to a reading of the 15 controversial supplemental calendar. 16 ACTING PRESIDENT BRESLIN: The 17 Secretary will read. 18 THE SECRETARY: Calendar Number 19 475, by the Senate Committee on Rules, Senate 20 Print 7678, an act to amend the Education Law. 21 SENATOR MONTGOMERY: Explanation. 22 ACTING PRESIDENT BRESLIN: An 23 explanation has been requested, Senator Smith. 24 SENATOR SMITH: Thank you very 25 much, Mr. President.

Candyco Transcription Service, Inc. 1 This bill is an act that amends the 2 Education Law in relation to the powers and 3 the duties of Boards of Cooperative 4 Educational Services, to the operation and 5 management of and enrollment at charter 6 schools, and to increasing the cap on the 7 number of charter schools. 8 This bill, Mr. President, increases 9 the cap that strengthens our ability for Race 10 to the Top, it makes services for high-needs 11 students a critical part of the process, gives 12 priorities to students with special needs, 13 requires open board meetings for transparency 14 and accountability, prevents conflicts of 15 interest, requires public reports to be 16 reported, and also has a common application 17 process that develops a standard. 18 ACTING PRESIDENT BRESLIN: Thank 19 you, Senator Smith. 20 Senator Liz Krueger, on the bill. 21 SENATOR LIZ KRUEGER: Thank you, 22 Mr. President. 23 Will the sponsor yield to a 24 question? 25 ACTING PRESIDENT BRESLIN:

Candyco Transcription Service, Inc. 1 Senator Smith, will you yield to a question 2 from Senator Krueger? 3 SENATOR SMITH: Yes, I will, 4 Mr. President. 5 And, Mr. President, I also ask that 6 Senator Craig Johnson, who is also a 7 cooperating person on the bill with me, will 8 be available for questions as well. 9 ACTING PRESIDENT BRESLIN: Thank 10 you, Senator Smith. 11 SENATOR LIZ KRUEGER: Thank you. 12 Senator Smith, I understood your explanation, 13 but there's a lot of details in this bill. 14 And because it didn't go through the Education 15 Committee, the Senate didn't really have a 16 chance to review fully all of the changes to 17 state law that would be applied if this became 18 law. 19 Can you just clarify for me what 20 the role of for-profit corporations and 21 management companies would be in both 22 operating charter schools and also overseeing 23 the evaluation of charter schools? 24 SENATOR SMITH: Right. In this 25 particular bill, Mr. President, this bill does

Candyco Transcription Service, Inc. 1 not address the change in management of 2 private corporations. However, Mr. President, 3 the bill does allow for for-profit 4 corporations to manage charter schools with 5 regard to curriculum, with regards to the 6 management of their employees such as teachers 7 and maintenance. 8 ACTING PRESIDENT BRESLIN: 9 Senator Krueger. 10 SENATOR LIZ KRUEGER: Thank you. 11 Through you, Mr. President, if the sponsor 12 would continue to yield. 13 ACTING PRESIDENT BRESLIN: 14 Senator Smith, will you continue to yield? 15 SENATOR SMITH: Yes, Mr. 16 President. 17 ACTING PRESIDENT BRESLIN: You 18 may proceed, Senator Krueger. 19 SENATOR KRUEGER: Thank you very 20 much. So as I understand it, for-profit 21 companies could manage charter schools, or run 22 them, and they could in fact be responsible 23 for the evaluations of them. 24 Under this bill, either explicitly 25 or not dealt with in the bill, could I be a

Candyco Transcription Service, Inc. 1 staff and/or board member of a for-profit 2 charter school but also be the separate 3 for-profit company evaluating the outcomes in 4 the charter school? Would that be allowed? 5 SENATOR SMITH: Well, Mr. 6 President, through you, Mr. President, there 7 is the conflict of interest portion of this 8 bill which is very critical with regard to 9 those type of challenges. And I believe that 10 portion addresses her concern with regard to 11 conflict of interest. 12 ACTING PRESIDENT BRESLIN: 13 Senator Krueger. 14 SENATOR LIZ KRUEGER: Thank you, 15 Mr. President. If the sponsor would still 16 continue to yield. 17 ACTING PRESIDENT BRESLIN: Do you 18 continue to yield, Senator Smith? 19 SENATOR SMITH: Absolutely, 20 Mr. President. 21 ACTING PRESIDENT BRESLIN: You 22 may proceed, Senator Krueger. 23 SENATOR LIZ KRUEGER: Thank you 24 very much. 25 There was a previous bill that was

Candyco Transcription Service, Inc. 1 actually what we recall of S6468, which 2 sometimes is called the Sampson/Silver Charter 3 School Bill. And this bill has many of the 4 same sections but a number of changes or 5 exclusions from the previous bill. 6 Can you explain to me how this bill 7 deals with the question of co-location of 8 charters and public schools and 9 decision-making over where the schools will be 10 located, what happens if the existing public 11 school believes that it is not able to 12 accommodate an additional school or multiple 13 schools run by people in the same building? 14 How does this bill address those problems? 15 SENATOR SMITH: Through you, 16 Mr. President, this particular bill does not 17 address the issue of co-location. It leaves 18 it as it was in the former charter school 19 bills. 20 ACTING PRESIDENT BRESLIN: 21 Senator Krueger. 22 SENATOR LIZ KRUEGER: Thank you, 23 Mr. President. If the sponsor would please 24 continue to yield. 25 ACTING PRESIDENT BRESLIN: Would

Candyco Transcription Service, Inc. 1 you continue to yield, Senator Smith? 2 SENATOR SMITH: Absolutely, 3 Mr. President. 4 ACTING PRESIDENT BRESLIN: You 5 may proceed. 6 SENATOR LIZ KRUEGER: Mr. 7 President, through you. This bill says that 8 it would permit authorizing entities to grant 9 approval for the board of a single charter 10 school to offer a single grade at multiple 11 sites, with each additional site counted 12 against the cap. 13 I don't quite understand this. Are 14 we talking about physically a school being all 15 fifth grade, a school being all fourth grade, 16 a school -- how does that -- I don't 17 understand that. Could you explain that, 18 please? 19 ACTING PRESIDENT BRESLIN: 20 Senator Smith. 21 SENATOR SMITH: Yes, through you, 22 Mr. President. That reference that she is 23 talking about with regard to lock sites is a 24 charter school actually operating a particular 25 grade at one site and at another site. And

Candyco Transcription Service, Inc. 1 that would also account for -- toward the cap, 2 if you will. 3 The challenge that charter schools 4 have now which we are trying to address in 5 this bill has to do with multiple locations as 6 well as trying to deal with charters in 7 particular where they are sited. 8 ACTING PRESIDENT BRESLIN: 9 Senator Krueger. 10 SENATOR LIZ KRUEGER: Thank you, 11 Mr. President. Through you, if the sponsor 12 would continue to yield. 13 ACTING PRESIDENT BRESLIN: Will 14 you continue to yield, Senator Smith? 15 SENATOR SMITH: Yes, 16 Mr. President. 17 SENATOR LIZ KRUEGER: So it's 18 also my understanding that through this bill 19 there could somehow be some connection between 20 multiple charter schools for different not 21 necessarily grades but the categories of 22 school. So we usually define K through 5, 23 then 5 through 8 are middle school, then a 24 high school. 25 At least in the City of New York

Candyco Transcription Service, Inc. 1 right now, you would apply through a lottery 2 for the elementary charter school, and then 3 the assumption is you would apply separately 4 for a lottery into a middle school and/or a 5 high school. How would this work under this 6 bill for providing that people can take the 7 opportunity to apply to charters at different 8 grade levels? 9 ACTING PRESIDENT BRESLIN: 10 Senator Smith. 11 SENATOR SMITH: Thank you very 12 much, Mr. President. 13 With regard to the question by my 14 colleague as it relates to multiple locations, 15 the challenge with the charter schools that we 16 addressed earlier has to do with multiple 17 locations. And if she's referencing -- and I 18 have a question of her if she's referencing 19 zone versus district. 20 Is that what you're referring to? 21 SENATOR LIZ KRUEGER: Well, I 22 understand the difference between zone and 23 district, at least as it applies to New York 24 City. We have zone elementary schools and we 25 have zone middle schools, but we don't have

Candyco Transcription Service, Inc. 1 zone high schools. 2 But I think in the example I was 3 asking you if there was a charter school -- 4 oh, I don't know, the Liz Krueger For-Profit 5 Charter School Corporation that had 10 6 different schools. They would each apply one 7 for the cap, so you'd have 10 schools counted 8 toward the cap. But in this corporation I 9 might want children to start with my system 10 and then keep moving through my system. 11 Is that possible, or is there a 12 model where other children might attempt to 13 apply to the school, some in kindergarten, 14 some in the first grade, some at the 15 middle-school level, some at the high-school? 16 How would this work? 17 SENATOR SMITH: Through you, 18 Mr. President, many parents are concerned with 19 their children when they go into these charter 20 schools if in fact they can continue on and 21 not have to go into the public school system. 22 In addition, when you have an 23 operator of a school that operates the school 24 well, as opposed to having to apply for 25 another charter application, which is a very

Candyco Transcription Service, Inc. 1 cumbersome process, this bill allows for that 2 particular operator to open additional schools 3 under the performance of their current 4 charter, which we assume is doing well, which 5 is why it's been extended. 6 ACTING PRESIDENT BRESLIN: 7 Senator Krueger. 8 SENATOR LIZ KRUEGER: Thank you, 9 Mr. President. If the sponsor would continue 10 to yield. 11 ACTING PRESIDENT BRESLIN: Do you 12 continue to yield, Senator Smith? 13 SENATOR SMITH: Yes, sir, 14 Mr. President. 15 ACTING PRESIDENT BRESLIN: 16 Senator Krueger. 17 SENATOR LIZ KRUEGER: As I 18 understand your explanation, Senator, under 19 this bill, if this became law, a private 20 corporation, the Liz Krueger Charter School 21 Corporation, could have as many schools as a 22 public school system in any specific area. 23 Granted, in the City of New York, with 1100 24 public schools, obviously that couldn't be the 25 case, because there's even in your bill a

Candyco Transcription Service, Inc. 1 maximum I believe of 460 charter schools or 2 somewhere close to that. 3 But in a relatively smaller 4 geographic area -- say, Albany -- is it 5 conceivable that over time you could have one 6 company running a school system equal in size 7 to the public school system? 8 SENATOR SMITH: Through you, 9 Mr. President, I believe the bill has parts of 10 it that will not allow that to happen. 11 However, we also know the 12 authorizer would have to grant that. And we 13 suspect the authorizer would have a good eye 14 and overview of that process to make sure it 15 didn't occur. 16 ACTING PRESIDENT BRESLIN: 17 Senator Krueger. 18 SENATOR LIZ KRUEGER: Thank you, 19 Mr. President. If the sponsor would continue 20 to yield. 21 ACTING PRESIDENT BRESLIN: Do you 22 continue to yield, Senator Smith. 23 SENATOR SMITH: Yes, 24 Mr. President. 25 SENATOR LIZ KRUEGER: Thank you.

Candyco Transcription Service, Inc. 1 There was also some confusion, perhaps, about 2 the treatment of both special-needs 3 populations in this bill compared to existing 4 charter law and rules for English-as-a-second- 5 language students, this bill, to previous 6 charter law. So I'll try to take it apart. 7 Under existing charter law, what 8 are the requirements for serving children with 9 special needs or educational -- so sorry. The 10 term is -- it's three letters. It involves 11 children who have special -- IEPs. Thank you 12 very much, Chair Oppenheimer. 13 So there's one rule under current 14 law about treatment for children with IEP, and 15 I believe that changes in this law. Can you 16 explain how it changes? 17 SENATOR SMITH: Through you, 18 Mr. President. Under existing law, we are 19 required, charter schools are required to 20 service that population. 21 ACTING PRESIDENT BRESLIN: 22 Senator Krueger. 23 SENATOR LIZ KRUEGER: Thank you, 24 Mr. President. If, through you, the sponsor 25 would continue to yield.

Candyco Transcription Service, Inc. 1 ACTING PRESIDENT BRESLIN: Do you 2 continue to yield, Senator Smith? 3 SENATOR SMITH: Yes, 4 Mr. President. 5 ACTING PRESIDENT BRESLIN: You 6 may proceed, Senator Krueger. 7 SENATOR LIZ KRUEGER: As I read 8 the new bill, they would be required to serve 9 at least 50 percent of children with 10 disabilities and English-language learners as 11 a ratio of the percentage of those children in 12 the school district or zone. So as I'm 13 reading the law under your bill, charter 14 schools would have to serve at least 15 50 percent of the children, not 50 percent of 16 the children in their school. 17 But if -- I'll make this up. I'm 18 already the for-profit company, so I can't be 19 the school district. So in the Malcolm Smith 20 School District, if 20 percent of the children 21 are defined as special needs and 20 percent of 22 the children are defined as ELL, English 23 language learners, that means that under your 24 law any charter school would have to be 25 serving at least 10 percent special needs and

Candyco Transcription Service, Inc. 1 10 percent ELL? Is that a correct analysis? 2 ACTING PRESIDENT BRESLIN: 3 Senator Smith. 4 SENATOR SMITH: Thank you, 5 Mr. President. Through you, Mr. President, 6 this particular bill allows charter schools to 7 give admission preference to students with 8 disabilities and students who are 9 English-language learners and mandates 10 enrollment preference for charter schools 11 serving under half of the percentage of 12 students in the school district or the 13 community district in which that charter 14 school is located. 15 SENATOR LIZ KRUEGER: Through 16 you, Mr. President, if the sponsor would 17 continue to yield. 18 ACTING PRESIDENT BRESLIN: Will 19 you continue to yield, Senator Smith, to 20 Senator Krueger? 21 SENATOR SMITH: Absolutely, 22 Mr. President. 23 SENATOR LIZ KRUEGER: I believe 24 you were agreeing with me. So I just want to 25 double-check that the charter schools would

Candyco Transcription Service, Inc. 1 have to serve at least 50 percent of the 2 students with these definitions in any given 3 district. 4 ACTING PRESIDENT BRESLIN: 5 Senator Smith. 6 SENATOR SMITH: Through you, 7 Mr. President, not necessarily agreeing, but 8 they would have to give a preference, as I 9 formerly stated. 10 SENATOR LIZ KRUEGER: I'm sorry, 11 I didn't hear you. 12 SENATOR SMITH: That's a 13 designated preference, as I formerly stated. 14 SENATOR LIZ KRUEGER: As a 15 designated preference. So -- 16 ACTING PRESIDENT BRESLIN: 17 Senator Krueger. 18 SENATOR LIZ KRUEGER: Thank you. 19 Excuse me, Mr. President. Through you, if the 20 sponsor would continue to yield. 21 ACTING PRESIDENT BRESLIN: Do you 22 continue to yield, Senator Smith? 23 SENATOR SMITH: Yes, 24 Mr. President. 25 SENATOR LIZ KRUEGER: Thank you.

Candyco Transcription Service, Inc. 1 So again, let's go back to my 2 hypothesis that in any given geographic area 3 there might be a large enough number of 4 charter schools to not necessarily equal but 5 come close to equalling the number of public 6 schools. But under this law, the charter 7 schools would only have an obligation to 8 provide preference for admission for half the 9 number of children in these categories, 10 children who have special needs and/or 11 children with ELL needs. 12 So does that mean in the public 13 schools, by definition, they would end up with 14 double the percentage of children with special 15 needs and with ELL needs? 16 SENATOR SMITH: Through you, 17 Mr. President. Her assumptions are correct. 18 But remember, Mr. President, there is a 19 lottery. And these students also could be 20 accepted through the lottery as well. 21 ACTING PRESIDENT BRESLIN: 22 Senator Krueger. 23 SENATOR LIZ KRUEGER: Thank you. 24 Thank you very much. If the sponsor would 25 continue to yield.

Candyco Transcription Service, Inc. 1 ACTING PRESIDENT BRESLIN: Do you 2 continue to yield, Senator Smith? 3 SENATOR SMITH: Yes, 4 Mr. President. 5 SENATOR LIZ KRUEGER: So again, 6 my understanding -- you're right, it's a 7 lottery, it could be a hundred percent of the 8 children with special needs and/or a hundred 9 percent of the children who are ELL that could 10 be accepted through the lottery. But the 11 mandate is only up to 50 percent. 12 And so I believe that my math is 13 right that it could leave the public school 14 system with dramatically greater percentages 15 of children with special needs and 16 dramatically greater percentages of children 17 who have English as a second language issues 18 that need to be resolved. Is that your 19 understanding also? 20 SENATOR SMITH: Through you, 21 Mr. President. Yes, Mr. President, for my 22 colleagues as well as many of the advocates 23 and those who even oppose the bill, whether 24 it's the UFT or NYSUT, that was a big concern 25 of many of them. There were no basic

Candyco Transcription Service, Inc. 1 requirements before. And in trying to address 2 their particular needs, we move that up to a 3 percentage, yes. 4 ACTING PRESIDENT BRESLIN: 5 Senator Krueger. 6 SENATOR LIZ KRUEGER: Thank you. 7 If, through you, Mr. President, the sponsor 8 would continue to yield. 9 ACTING PRESIDENT BRESLIN: 10 Senator Smith, do you continue to yield? 11 SENATOR SMITH: Yes, 12 Mr. President. 13 SENATOR LIZ KRUEGER: Thank you. 14 My understanding also from this 15 bill is that it would allow charter schools to 16 provide alternative sites for children with 17 special needs, either for services for 18 children with special needs or an entirely 19 separate school for children with special 20 needs. 21 Could you clarify that for me? 22 SENATOR SMITH: Yes, 23 Mr. President. Yes, it would do so. But this 24 is in the spirit of the concern about 25 saturation. And by giving the charter school

Candyco Transcription Service, Inc. 1 the ability to have other locations, other 2 sites, it will obviously ameliorate some of 3 that concern about pressing the students that 4 are in that current location against the wall 5 in terms of space and location, being 6 sensitive to that need. 7 ACTING PRESIDENT BRESLIN: 8 Senator Krueger. 9 SENATOR LIZ KRUEGER: Thank you. 10 And certainly there are justifiable 11 reasons to have special services for children 12 with special needs off-site or subcontracted. 13 And obviously in the public school system we 14 even sometimes separate out children with 15 special needs into separate buildings and 16 separate schools, and I certainly recognize 17 that from the City of New York. 18 But under this law, could the 19 following scenario happen? A consortium of 20 separate charters that are each approved 21 individually under the cap, and approved by 22 either -- by one of the, I guess, two options 23 we're keeping in place with this bill, a 24 Regents approval or a SUNY approval process -- 25 could a group of charters who are not

Candyco Transcription Service, Inc. 1 otherwise related from a corporate perspective 2 pool all of their special needs children into 3 some other location somewhere outside all of 4 their buildings? 5 SENATOR SMITH: Through you, 6 Mr. President. No, I don't believe so. But 7 that was also assumed that there would be that 8 kind of interest to do such, and I doubt 9 charter operators would do so. 10 ACTING PRESIDENT BRESLIN: 11 Senator Krueger. 12 SENATOR LIZ KRUEGER: If through 13 you, Mr. President, the sponsor would continue 14 to yield. 15 ACTING PRESIDENT BRESLIN: Do you 16 continue to yield, Senator Smith? 17 SENATOR SMITH: Yes, 18 Mr. President. 19 ACTING PRESIDENT BRESLIN: You 20 may proceed. 21 SENATOR LIZ KRUEGER: Mr. 22 President, I read the bill and it seemed to me 23 fairly vague about whether or not charter 24 schools could do that, which is why I'm very 25 concerned.

Candyco Transcription Service, Inc. 1 And so I'll ask the sponsor again, 2 what in the bill would prevent that situation 3 from happening? Let's say in the City of 4 New York the charter schools from throughout a 5 fairly large geographic area, five boroughs, 6 8.5 million people, making the determination 7 that they were going to find one, two, three 8 locations and define them as the places where 9 these special needs children go to so that 10 they've met their state obligation but don't 11 actually have, then, what we define I think 12 more as a normal community-based public school 13 where children with diverse needs and at 14 different levels of learning all get served 15 together. Your bill doesn't stop that. 16 SENATOR SMITH: Through you, 17 Mr. President. Yes, obviously the schools 18 have to still follow IP rules. But more 19 importantly, what would make sure that 20 wouldn't happen is we still are required to 21 follow federal law. 22 ACTING PRESIDENT BRESLIN: 23 Senator Krueger. 24 SENATOR LIZ KRUEGER: Thank you. 25 Through you, Mr. President.

Candyco Transcription Service, Inc. 1 ACTING PRESIDENT BRESLIN: Will 2 you continue to yield, Senator Smith? 3 SENATOR SMITH: Yes. Absolutely, 4 Mr. President. 5 SENATOR LIZ KRUEGER: Thank you. 6 Under your bill, who's reviewing 7 the charter schools to make sure that they are 8 meeting the requirements of the law both on 9 acceptance, on services provided, on outcomes, 10 on the money, the public money being spent and 11 accounted for? What's the process for that? 12 SENATOR SMITH: There is -- one, 13 Mr. President, they're required under this 14 bill to provide public reports on that. Two, 15 obviously you have the Regents as well as 16 SUNY, and then you have the localities over a 17 million. 18 And more importantly, 19 Mr. President, these charters, as they have 20 done, their boards, in addition. But what's 21 critical for this, Mr. President, is the 22 accountability and transparency that's in here 23 that's required, similar to the public school 24 system. 25 ACTING PRESIDENT BRESLIN:

Candyco Transcription Service, Inc. 1 Senator Krueger. 2 SENATOR LIZ KRUEGER: Thank you, 3 Mr. President. If the sponsor would continue 4 to yield. 5 ACTING PRESIDENT BRESLIN: Will 6 you continue to yield, Senator Smith? 7 SENATOR SMITH: Yes. 8 SENATOR LIZ KRUEGER: Thank you. 9 Could publicly traded companies run 10 charter schools under this law? 11 ACTING PRESIDENT BRESLIN: 12 Senator Smith. 13 SENATOR SMITH: Through you, 14 Mr. President, no. 15 SENATOR LIZ KRUEGER: I'm sorry I 16 didn't hear. Excuse me. 17 SENATOR SMITH: No, not that I'm 18 aware of. 19 SENATOR LIZ KRUEGER: No, they 20 couldn't? 21 SENATOR SMITH: Not that I'm 22 aware of. 23 ACTING PRESIDENT BRESLIN: 24 Senator Krueger. 25 SENATOR LIZ KRUEGER: Through

Candyco Transcription Service, Inc. 1 you, Mr. President, if the sponsor would 2 continue to yield. 3 ACTING PRESIDENT BRESLIN: Do you 4 continue to yield, Senator Smith? 5 SENATOR SMITH: Yes, 6 Mr. President. 7 SENATOR LIZ KRUEGER: Since the 8 bill doesn't explicitly lay out the 9 definitions of a for-profit corporation or 10 management company, how do we know a publicly 11 traded company couldn't run charter schools? 12 ACTING PRESIDENT BRESLIN: 13 Senator Smith. 14 SENATOR SMITH: Mr. President, 15 that is why we have our overseers, such as 16 SUNY, Board of Regents, in addition to the 17 charter's board as well. 18 ACTING PRESIDENT BRESLIN: 19 Senator Krueger. 20 SENATOR LIZ KRUEGER: Through 21 you, Mr. President, if the sponsor would 22 continue to yield. 23 ACTING PRESIDENT BRESLIN: 24 Senator Smith? 25 SENATOR SMITH: Yes,

Candyco Transcription Service, Inc. 1 Mr. President. 2 SENATOR LIZ KRUEGER: Thank you. 3 So you listed out a number of 4 entities who might or could or would evaluate 5 how the money is spent, how the students are 6 doing, how the students are accepted, whether 7 there's retention, whether they're moved 8 off-campus to some other sites. Is there no 9 role for the State Comptroller or, in the City 10 of New York, the City Comptroller in actually 11 looking at how these monies are spent and 12 these children are educated? 13 ACTING PRESIDENT BRESLIN: 14 Senator Smith. 15 SENATOR SMITH: Through you, 16 Mr. President, we know the Appellate Court, 17 Mr. President, has made a ruling on that, and 18 obviously we understand what that position 19 was. 20 But it is clear that the 21 Comptroller has the right and has the 22 authority to audit charter schools if he so 23 chooses to. 24 ACTING PRESIDENT BRESLIN: 25 Senator Krueger.

Candyco Transcription Service, Inc. 1 SENATOR LIZ KRUEGER: Thank you, 2 Mr. President. If the sponsor will continue 3 to yield. 4 ACTING PRESIDENT BRESLIN: Do you 5 continue to yield, Senator Smith? 6 SENATOR SMITH: Yes, absolutely. 7 ACTING PRESIDENT BRESLIN: 8 Senator Krueger. 9 SENATOR LIZ KRUEGER: Thank you. 10 Can you just clarify again this 11 50 percent versus 75 percent lottery 12 application process and how that works? 13 ACTING PRESIDENT BRESLIN: 14 Senator Smith. 15 SENATOR SMITH: Through you, 16 Mr. President, I was just conferring with 17 counsel. 18 And what my colleague is referring 19 to is once the schools hit a 50 percent 20 enrollment piece of special ed students in 21 surrounding areas, at that point they are 22 allowed to -- until they get to 75 percent, I 23 should say -- at that point, right, then 24 they're allowed to? 25 ACTING PRESIDENT BRESLIN:

Candyco Transcription Service, Inc. 1 Senator Krueger. 2 SENATOR LIZ KRUEGER: I'm sorry, 3 I have to ask the Senator to repeat himself. 4 Either I didn't hear or I didn't quite 5 understand. 6 ACTING PRESIDENT BRESLIN: Would 7 you repeat your answer, Senator Smith? 8 SENATOR SMITH: The question was 9 the 50 percent/75 percent enrollment; correct? 10 Fifty percent enrollment of special ed 11 students around them. Once we hit that mark, 12 then that's when we'll -- and when we get to 13 75 percent, we're allowed to go back to the 14 50 percent. That's as simple as it is. 15 ACTING PRESIDENT BRESLIN: 16 Senator Krueger. 17 SENATOR LIZ KRUEGER: Thank you. 18 Maybe there's another interpretation, so I 19 will -- I also believe there's some attempt in 20 this bill -- excuse me. Through you, 21 Mr. President, if the sponsor would continue 22 to yield. 23 SENATOR SMITH: Absolutely. 24 SENATOR LIZ KRUEGER: Thank you 25 very much. There was also something about if

Candyco Transcription Service, Inc. 1 the schools had failed to meet their 2 obligation to hit the 50 percent mark for 3 serving the special-needs children and 4 children with English-language needs, that 5 their target would be raised to 75 percent. 6 Am I misunderstanding that portion of the 7 bill? 8 ACTING PRESIDENT BRESLIN: 9 Senator Smith. 10 SENATOR SMITH: Yes, through you, 11 Mr. President, if I can just read that section 12 of the bill my colleague is referring to. 13 It simply requires that charter 14 schools which are found to be serving less 15 than 50 percent of the population of students 16 with disabilities and English-language 17 learners represented in the school district of 18 the location to automatically admit students 19 in these subgroups outside of the lottery 20 until all applicants are admitted or the 21 population reaches 75 percent, to give you a 22 little more language. 23 ACTING PRESIDENT BRESLIN: 24 Senator Krueger. 25 SENATOR LIZ KRUEGER: Thank you,

Candyco Transcription Service, Inc. 1 Mr. President. If the sponsor would please 2 continue to yield. 3 ACTING PRESIDENT BRESLIN: Do you 4 continue to yield, Senator Smith? 5 SENATOR SMITH: Of course, 6 Mr. President. 7 SENATOR LIZ KRUEGER: Thank you. 8 SENATOR SMITH: Mr. President, 9 just to ask my colleague that I'm probably 10 going to refer to Craig Johnson. There is 11 something I have to take care of off the 12 floor. So I will take a few more questions 13 and then Senator Johnson. 14 SENATOR LIZ KRUEGER: Thank you. 15 I think I only have a few more questions, 16 Senator. 17 ACTING PRESIDENT BRESLIN: 18 Senator Krueger. 19 SENATOR LIZ KRUEGER: So on this 20 issue I understand how you evaluate the 21 population for a school when we're talking 22 about elementary schools, at least in the City 23 of New York, where we have what's called zone 24 schools. But in my understanding, in the bill 25 the zone for high schools -- so for charter

Candyco Transcription Service, Inc. 1 high schools, under this law, the zone would 2 be the City of New York. So how would this 3 50 percent be applied to lotteries for high 4 schools in the City of New York? 5 ACTING PRESIDENT BRESLIN: 6 Senator Smith. 7 SENATOR SMITH: Thank you, 8 Mr. President. One moment. 9 Thank you, Mr. President. Through 10 you, Mr. President, they would have to reach 11 the citywide total. They would have to reach 12 the citywide total. 13 ACTING PRESIDENT BRESLIN: 14 Senator Krueger. 15 SENATOR LIZ KRUEGER: Thank you. 16 Sorry, just thinking. I know other 17 people have additional questions so I don't 18 want to take up everyone's time. 19 I guess on the bill, Mr. President. 20 ACTING PRESIDENT BRESLIN: Thank 21 you, Senator Smith. 22 Senator Krueger on the bill. 23 SENATOR LIZ KRUEGER: Thank you 24 very much. Thank you for your responses, 25 Senator. And I feel that I will have more

Candyco Transcription Service, Inc. 1 questions, but I won't take up the time on the 2 floor. 3 Here's my dilemma today. I'm not 4 an opponent of charter schools by definition, 5 and I think that they can be excellent 6 alternatives for public schools. But I also 7 worry about going too far too fast. 8 I'm not concerned about raising the 9 cap. And my understanding is that for Race to 10 the Top issues, which we also must confront in 11 this Legislature within the next few weeks, 12 the only portion of this bill that applies to 13 the debate around the Race to the Top federal 14 funds is the cap. Everything else in this 15 bill is a separate discussion and not relevant 16 for being approved or not being approved for 17 federal money. 18 I'm frustrated that we're not 19 sitting either around a table somewhere or on 20 the floor of the Legislature today discussing 21 what we need to do to change our laws to 22 assure that we can compete for Round 2 Race to 23 the Top money, because it's up to 24 $700 million. And most of us are pretty 25 simple about these things: If there's federal

Candyco Transcription Service, Inc. 1 money to be gotten, we would like to get it 2 here in New York State. And we certainly need 3 it for our public school system. 4 But I just want to go on record, I 5 do not see this bill as a bill that resolves 6 our Race to the Top legislative assignment. 7 And so I worry that this pulls us off the 8 discussion that is very time-sensitive and 9 pulls us off the questions about changing a 10 cap to a whole new scenario of accountability 11 or a lack thereof when talking about spending 12 what may be greater and greater amounts of 13 public education money in a system -- with all 14 due respect to the Senator, the sponsor of 15 bill -- that we don't have enough answers for. 16 The language is too vague. The 17 question of whether for-profit companies who 18 are publicly traded can in fact run our school 19 system; the question of whether the people who 20 are good at doing audits, the comptrollers of 21 the state and of counties and of the City of 22 New York, have a role to play in evaluating 23 what is going on with public monies; the 24 concern -- and it's a big concern for me -- 25 that the same entities or the same people who

Candyco Transcription Service, Inc. 1 might run these charter school companies might 2 also run the companies who are assigned to do 3 the evaluation of the charter schools. 4 It has been brought to my attention 5 in my raising concerns over the last few 6 days -- because we've only had a couple of 7 days to look at the bill -- that the same 8 complaints can be made of the public school 9 system and that we need to reform the public 10 school system. So, for the record, no 11 disagreement. We need to do better with our 12 public school system also. 13 But I am very concerned that not 14 dealing with that question and not dealing 15 with the Race to the Top question, we're here 16 on the floor of the Senate being asked to vote 17 for or against a bill that doesn't have enough 18 answers to the real concerns I have about 19 accountability: Accountability for the money, 20 accountability for who will be running the 21 schools, accountability for who will close 22 down the bad charters -- because all the 23 research shows and recent newspaper stories 24 show there are good charters and there are bad 25 charters. And I don't see anything in this

Candyco Transcription Service, Inc. 1 bill that makes more explicit than current law 2 what can be done and who has the authority to 3 take a school that isn't working and close it 4 down. 5 And I was hoping that the next time 6 this house dealt with the question of 7 expanding charters or defining reform of 8 charter schools, that that would be up front 9 and central for us: Who had the authority to 10 say, No, it's not working, we don't care if 11 it's a five-year authorization or a five-year 12 plus whatever time it took to get started 13 authorization, that government -- because 14 government is responsible for the public 15 education of our children, and government is 16 who's funding both the public school system 17 and the charter school system -- that we would 18 do better at getting clarification for how 19 government would evaluate what was happening 20 what worked, what didn't work, both in charter 21 schools and public schools, and would be held 22 accountable to immediately fix the problems 23 that they saw. And I don't see that in these 24 bills. 25 I do see much broader options

Candyco Transcription Service, Inc. 1 available to charters. And I've been told, in 2 fairness, that the reason charters work so 3 well in many parts of the State of New York 4 and the country is because they're allowed 5 more independence and freedom to innovate, to 6 adjust for the needs of children, to be 7 creative. I think that's the right answer. 8 My frustration is we live at the 9 same time where government, for its public 10 school system, seems to be dictating just the 11 opposite. We don't allow them to innovate. 12 We don't allow them to be creative. We don't 13 allow them to go off-script. 14 And so I find an irony in how we, 15 the government, are approaching what's 16 different and better about charities versus 17 public, that we want to allow all these 18 options for charter schools and yet we don't 19 want to allow any of these options for the 20 public school system. And I don't actually 21 understand that. 22 So I feel that this requires more 23 research, greater debate, more analysis of 24 this bill, how it's written, what it will and 25 will not allow. And that in fact what we

Candyco Transcription Service, Inc. 1 should be spending our time on this week is 2 understanding what the State of New York needs 3 to do in order to be more successful in 4 competing for Race to the Top monies or if we 5 even agree that that's what we should be 6 doing. 7 I just want to repeat, on the 8 record, this bill doesn't address the 9 questions for Race to the Top. Because I 10 think there is confusion out there. And I 11 don't want anyone to choose to vote yes or no 12 on this bill because they think they are 13 voting for or against changes in the state law 14 that will get us federal dollars from the Race 15 to the Top. 16 I don't believe I have enough 17 satisfactory answers to the questions in my 18 mind about this bill, so I will be voting no. 19 Thank you, Mr. President. 20 ACTING PRESIDENT BRESLIN: Thank 21 you, Senator Krueger. 22 Senator Oppenheimer, on the bill. 23 SENATOR OPPENHEIMER: Yes. Yes, 24 on the bill. 25 Well, I'll be joining my colleague

Candyco Transcription Service, Inc. 1 and voting no. And certainly several 2 interesting discussions just took place, and 3 there's philosophical issues which were very 4 interesting. And it would have been very 5 welcome to be able to discuss them at greater 6 length. 7 I will say of this bill that there 8 are many parts that I do support. In fact, I 9 was seeing at least seven which were my 10 stand-alone bills, and of course I support 11 them -- having BOCES provide services to 12 charter schools and doing the duration of a 13 charter for five instructional years. Because 14 as it is now, they usually count the first and 15 second years of the charter when the school is 16 first being formed, they're not doing any 17 instruction. So we changed the bill to say 18 that it would have to be -- the charter's 19 duration had to be for five instructional 20 years. 21 We dealt with conflicts of 22 interest. We talked about retaining students 23 who are at risk of educational failure. We 24 talked about just bringing in more students 25 who were ELL students or learning disabled

Candyco Transcription Service, Inc. 1 students or more seriously disabled students. 2 And a lot of that is in this bill, and I'm 3 very pleased with that. 4 But there are some things that have 5 been left out and need to be negotiated. And 6 those are things like the current exemption 7 from auditing by our Comptroller. In this 8 bill, it still stays with the Board of 9 Regents. And it is felt that since all our 10 school districts in New York State are audited 11 by the Comptroller, that it seems logical and 12 necessary to also audit charter schools in the 13 same way. 14 Issues of co-location are not 15 mentioned in this bill, even though 16 co-location, when a chart school takes over a 17 floor or two of a public school, it is 18 co-locating with this regular public school. 19 And there are many issues that have to be 20 dealt with in co-location. 21 And suggestions have been made that 22 perhaps if we had a list of maybe 20 or 30 or 23 40 schools specifically, let's say, in 24 New York City, where there was additional 25 space within the schools, and then we would be

Candyco Transcription Service, Inc. 1 able to co-locate in that additional space in 2 the schools and perhaps offer something to the 3 existing schools. Perhaps we will fix your 4 roof or we will fix your bathrooms or we will 5 do something to make the process of the two 6 schools locating in one school work more 7 cooperatively with one another and make them 8 more welcomed into the school. 9 The issue of oversaturation is not 10 mentioned in this bill, and I think that's a 11 serious one. It's particularly serious for 12 right where we are now, in Albany, and 13 particularly serious for Buffalo, where a huge 14 percentage of the students of that area are 15 choosing to go to charter schools and 16 therefore greatly reducing the number of 17 children in the regular schools and causing 18 enormous dislocation. 19 So those are a few of the things 20 that are concerning me. But I guess what 21 concerns me the most is that I felt 22 negotiations were going on fairly well between 23 all the entities and we had seen several 24 concessions being made by the teachers unions 25 and by the school administrators and by the --

Candyco Transcription Service, Inc. 1 we hope by the charter people, the supporters 2 of charters. 3 And the idea was to try and bring 4 as many entities together so that our 5 application to Race to the Top would be a 6 strong one and, as has been mentioned earlier, 7 is not just -- it is certainly not just adding 8 numbers to charter schools, it is adding 9 accountability. And even Arne Duncan, who is 10 our Secretary of Education in the United 11 States, he has said that also, that the 12 accountability issue is much more important 13 than just growing numbers. 14 And we were working in a direction, 15 I felt, that we were going to be able to 16 present something that was very substantial 17 and had a good deal of agreement among all the 18 parties involved. I feel that this will be a 19 distraction, to say the least. I think it 20 will drive us further apart instead of 21 bringing us all together. 22 And my request was that we could 23 hold off for another week or maybe two weeks 24 and see what could be achieved by everybody 25 working together, which has been happening.

Candyco Transcription Service, Inc. 1 So I'll be voting no, because I think this 2 is -- it's much too early. If we had waited 3 those two weeks, I probably would have been 4 able to vote yes. But under the 5 circumstances, I think it's more divisive than 6 it is helpful. 7 ACTING PRESIDENT BRESLIN: Thank 8 you, Senator Oppenheimer. 9 Senator Diaz, on the bill. 10 SENATOR DIAZ: Will the sponsor 11 yield for a question or two, please? 12 ACTING PRESIDENT BRESLIN: 13 Senator Johnson, will you yield to a question 14 from Senator Diaz? 15 SENATOR CRAIG JOHNSON: I will. 16 ACTING PRESIDENT BRESLIN: You 17 may proceed, Senator Diaz. 18 SENATOR DIAZ: Thank you. 19 Senator Johnson. 20 SENATOR CRAIG JOHNSON: Senator 21 Diaz. 22 SENATOR DIAZ: Will you please 23 tell me, enlighten me about where are the 24 charter schools located in majority districts? 25 SENATOR CRAIG JOHNSON: Sure.

Candyco Transcription Service, Inc. 1 Thank you. Through you, Mr. President, 2 charter schools obviously -- and public 3 charter schools, may I add -- are located 4 throughout the state: Buffalo, Albany, about 5 five on Long Island. But the predominant 6 amount happen to be in New York City, areas 7 like Harlem, South Bronx, Brooklyn. So the 8 concentration right now we see are 9 predominantly in New York City. 10 SENATOR DIAZ: Mr. President, 11 would the sponsor continue to yield. 12 ACTING PRESIDENT BRESLIN: 13 Senator Johnson, will you yield to another 14 question from Senator Diaz? 15 SENATOR CRAIG JOHNSON: Of course 16 I do. 17 ACTING PRESIDENT BRESLIN: You 18 may proceed, Senator Diaz. 19 SENATOR DIAZ: So you are telling 20 me that the majority of charter schools are 21 located in black and Hispanic neighborhoods 22 and that black and Hispanic children are the 23 ones taking advantage of it? 24 SENATOR CRAIG JOHNSON: Through 25 you, Mr. President, let me just -- if my words

Candyco Transcription Service, Inc. 1 don't necessarily do it, let me offer some 2 statistics provided to me by the New York City 3 Department of Education as well as the Charter 4 Schools Institute from SUNY, State University 5 of New York. 6 According to the New York City 7 Department of Education, 90 percent of 8 students in public charity schools are either 9 black or Hispanic. Those are the New York 10 City-authorized schools. 11 In terms of SUNY, who authorizes as 12 well, as you know, 91 percent of those 13 students in SUNY-authorized public charter 14 schools are identified as students of color. 15 Let me also add, Senator Diaz, that 16 of the SUNY schools, 76 percent of the 17 students in SUNY charter schools qualify for 18 free or reduced lunch. In New York City, 19 according to the New York City Department of 20 Education, in the charter public schools 21 71 percent of charter students are eligible 22 for free or reduced-price lunch. And that's 23 as compared to 61 percent of students 24 citywide, those in the district schools. 25 ACTING PRESIDENT BRESLIN:

Candyco Transcription Service, Inc. 1 Senator Diaz. 2 SENATOR DIAZ: Mr. President, 3 will the sponsor continue to yield, please? 4 ACTING PRESIDENT BRESLIN: Do you 5 continue to yield, Senator Johnson? 6 SENATOR CRAIG JOHNSON: Of 7 course, Senator Breslin. 8 ACTING PRESIDENT BRESLIN: You 9 may proceed. 10 SENATOR DIAZ: So, Senator 11 Johnson, this bill requires the charter 12 schools to be doubled to 460. That means that 13 if we could, from 200, go from 200 to 460, 14 you're telling me that children in my 15 district, parents in my district, the 32nd 16 Senatorial District that I represent, black 17 and Hispanic in the majority, that the parents 18 in my district will get more opportunities to 19 get their children to a charter school to get 20 a good education and to have what other people 21 have that we don't have? 22 SENATOR CRAIG JOHNSON: Through 23 you, Mr. President, the answer is yes. 24 SENATOR DIAZ: Will the sponsor 25 yield.

Candyco Transcription Service, Inc. 1 ACTING PRESIDENT BRESLIN: Will 2 you continue to yield for another question? 3 SENATOR CRAIG JOHNSON: Of 4 course, Mr. President. 5 ACTING PRESIDENT BRESLIN: You 6 may proceed, Senator Diaz. 7 SENATOR DIAZ: So you are telling 8 me again, Senator Johnson -- I have to see if 9 I can get you right -- you are telling me that 10 by doing this and voting in favor of this bill 11 to expand charter schools, the black and 12 Hispanic community, the black and Hispanic 13 parents, the black and Hispanic children would 14 benefit? 15 SENATOR CRAIG JOHNSON: Through 16 you, Mr. President, the answer is yes. 17 But let me expand, because I think 18 what's being lost so far in this debate is how 19 all of New York State's children and all of 20 New York State's parents will benefit. 21 Remember where we are, ladies and 22 gentlemen, right now in terms of education 23 here in New York State. Right now we are in 24 the midst of a nationwide competition known as 25 Race to the Top. And if we may, let's go back

Candyco Transcription Service, Inc. 1 a little ways to January of this past year, 2 because I think it's important that we get out 3 on the floor of the Senate what happened in 4 January when a bill was thrown into committees 5 in the Senate and in the Assembly on the claim 6 to get Race to the Top dollars. And that bill 7 would have done no such thing. 8 We are competing right now against 9 a number of states when it comes to education 10 reform in order to qualify for $700 million. 11 And guess what? Out of that $700 million, 12 more than 99 percent of that money will go to 13 traditional public schools. So the schools in 14 Senator Diaz's district, Senator Krueger's 15 district, Senator Oppenheimer's district, my 16 district, the traditional public schools will 17 have access to that money, $700 million. 18 But we need to compete for that. 19 And if you look how well we did last time, we 20 came 15th out of 16 states for that money. 21 Well, we need to improve our score. 22 And there are multiple ways to do it. There 23 are some ways that it seems that it will never 24 happen, some ways that are off the table when 25 it comes to improving our scores. But there

Candyco Transcription Service, Inc. 1 are other ways we can do it. And this is one 2 way. This is one way to do it. 3 And so yes, Senator Diaz, we have 4 the opportunity to put additional public 5 charter schools into your district, should 6 they qualify -- because they need to go 7 through an application process, a rigorous 8 application process that at Senator Perkins' 9 hearing in detail went through how that 10 process goes about. 11 But what's important to recognize 12 and what the studies show, from Hoxby and from 13 the recent CREDO study that was released in 14 January 2010, is that your students will 15 benefit from these schools. 16 Thank you. 17 SENATOR DIAZ: Mr. President, on 18 the bill. 19 ACTING PRESIDENT BRESLIN: 20 Senator Diaz, on the bill. 21 SENATOR DIAZ: Mr. President and 22 ladies and gentlemen, there is a saying "Put 23 your money where your mouth is." And there 24 are some people saying that they always care 25 for the black and Hispanic and the minority

Candyco Transcription Service, Inc. 1 children and that they're all looking out for 2 the best. 3 Here is an opportunity that we 4 could show, as Democrats, as Republicans, that 5 we could really show that we care for 6 children. Not for people personally, for 7 power for people, but for children. And to 8 give some parents in the City of New York, in 9 my district, the opportunity to send their 10 children to a good school and to get a good 11 education and to compete, not to be left 12 behind. 13 And today, I am proud and have to 14 congratulate Leader Sampson, John Sampson, for 15 the courage, the initiative, the caring for 16 children in the State of New York and to 17 present this bill, to allow this bill to come 18 to the floor. 19 And I am proud and honored -- to 20 me, it's an honor, Mr. President, it's an 21 honor to me that this body and Chairman 22 Sampson have given me to go back to my 23 district, to look at the parents of the 24 children in my district and tell them I voted 25 for more charter schools and I want to give

Candyco Transcription Service, Inc. 1 you the opportunity that you deserve. I'm 2 proud and honored. This is the biggest honor 3 they're giving me, the biggest honor they're 4 giving me, telling me to go back to my 5 district to tell all the little Juanas -- like 6 Congressman Serrano used to say, little Juana 7 and Luisa and Pepe in my district, telling 8 them: We did it for you. We're opening doors 9 for you children. Go enjoy it. 10 And in fact, if I cannot do 11 anything else, I'll be more than happy to do 12 this. And I ask all of you to think of 13 children first, children first, and to vote 14 for this bill and to allow this bill to go 15 through and to give the parents in my district 16 the opportunity that they deserve. That's all 17 we're asking for. We're not asking for more. 18 We're not asking for more than for whatever we 19 get. 20 So we are going to stop and don't 21 give the opportunity to people to decide to be 22 able to do this? This is a great opportunity. 23 This is the opportunity of our life. And I am 24 going to be part of history. And I am 25 honored, again, happy to be part of this

Candyco Transcription Service, Inc. 1 history today with voting for more charter 2 schools. We voted to give the parents in my 3 district opportunity, we voted for the 4 children in my district. I'm honored. I will 5 face them and tell them, with my head high: 6 "I voted for you. I did it for you. We did 7 it." 8 Thank you, Mr. President. 9 ACTING PRESIDENT BRESLIN: Thank 10 you, Senator Diaz. 11 Senator Montgomery, on the bill. 12 SENATOR MONTGOMERY: Yes, thank 13 you, Mr. President. 14 I would just start by reminding all 15 of us that we all, every single one of us in 16 this room, have been through an educational 17 system. That's what separates America from 18 most of the other parts of the world, 19 especially those parts of the world where 20 there is no such thing as access for all 21 citizens. So I'm proud to be an American 22 today. 23 We are talking about the 24 underpinning of America, democracy. And that 25 is education, free education. That is what

Candyco Transcription Service, Inc. 1 America represents. And through that, there's 2 access to other things in America that America 3 has to offer all of its citizens. But 4 education is the access to those things. 5 So we're not talking about a 6 program that is for my district or Senator 7 Diaz's district or Senator Savino's district. 8 We're talking about the underpinning of the 9 American society. And it is what Martin 10 Luther King and other people that were part of 11 the so-called civil rights movement, it was 12 part of the women's rights movement, it was 13 part of the human rights movement, as of 14 today -- access to education. 15 So I think we need to be very, 16 very, very careful about what we do to make 17 changes that are fundamental to changing that 18 system. And certainly there are parts of the 19 system that I would like to see changed. I do 20 not like what public education represents 21 totally, but I'm willing to work on positive 22 and constructive involvement. But I certainly 23 would want to make sure that we preserve it. 24 I want to say that I too supported 25 the Sampson/Silver bill that was introduced

Candyco Transcription Service, Inc. 1 in -- I believe in March. It was S6468. I am 2 not in favor of the bill that is before us 3 today. Why? Because I believe that there are 4 important and significant aspects to the issue 5 of the charter school system that we need to 6 be responsibly addressing. And the bill that 7 we have before us does not address those. 8 The accountability I think is 9 extremely important. How that system is 10 funded, how it is accountable. We're talking 11 about public dollars, public tax dollars going 12 into another system. We need to understand 13 and have accountability for what that system 14 does, both with the funding as well as with 15 the children that are in there. 16 It is my understanding that the 17 charter school movement has gone to court to 18 oppose the Comptroller having access to audit 19 them. I think that is clearly a problem for 20 us. 21 I think that we have not, in this 22 bill -- there is no restriction for for-profit 23 organizations actually sponsoring and managing 24 charter schools. I think we need to be 25 extremely cautious about the fact that if we

Candyco Transcription Service, Inc. 1 allow for-profit involvement in the charter 2 school in public education, we're moving 3 toward privatization. For-profit 4 organizations are for profit. And so I think 5 we need to be very careful. I'm very 6 concerned about that. 7 I think that we need to also 8 understand who's managing our schools. Are 9 these charter schools being managed by outfits 10 that are from outside of our state, outside of 11 the community, and do not have the same 12 interests, they do not have the same interest 13 as the communities of the schools that are 14 located? This is really, I think, an issue 15 that we need to be talking about. 16 We have these charter schools -- 17 ostensibly, the charter school movement was 18 started to be an experimental movement giving 19 us a picture of what kinds of things make a 20 difference -- improve education, give us a 21 road map, a blueprint for improving our public 22 school system. 23 We have not yet seen that the State 24 Ed Department has been able to take the best 25 practices from the charter school system and

Candyco Transcription Service, Inc. 1 begin to translate those and transfer those to 2 the larger system so we can benefit from the 3 so-called improvements of the charter school. 4 We need to make sure that what we're doing is 5 actually funding a system that is indeed 6 actually better for our children. 7 And let me just say this, 8 Mr. President. I have here a report of two 9 schools in my district, P.S. 15 and P.S. 256, 10 Benjamin Banneker. P.S. 15 is in Red Hook. 11 They have had to give up a good part of their 12 school, including six full rooms and six 13 half-rooms, to accommodate a charter school. 14 These rooms include academic classrooms, a 15 computer room, a science lab, and an 16 occupational therapy room, a speech and 17 language room, a professional development 18 room, the special education office, and a room 19 used by Good Shepherd Services for individual 20 and family counseling. That's one school 21 giving up all of that space for a charter 22 school. It has created havoc in that 23 community. It is absolutely awful. 24 And on top of that, this fall the 25 Department of Education in New York City

Candyco Transcription Service, Inc. 1 announced that the charter school would stay 2 in the building until 2015 and expand its 3 grades, occupying more space each year and 4 forcing P.S. 15 to shrink its size. 5 That's what's happening in New York 6 City all over the city. I have other schools 7 in my district that have had the same fate. 8 And that's what the mayor of New York City has 9 decided is his process of siting charter 10 schools. We think that needs to be addressed. 11 It was addressed in 6468, Senator Sampson's 12 bill. This Rules bill has no such reference. 13 The Sampson/Silver bill authorized 14 only not-for-profit EMOs. They prohibited 15 EMOs -- that's the management organizations -- 16 that are charter operators from working with 17 school districts. 18 There are a number of safety 19 measures in the bill that Senator Sampson 20 introduced earlier. This Rules bill has none 21 of those. 22 And, Mr. President, this is very, 23 very serious. This is a step that we must not 24 take, expanding this charter system without 25 funding, without oversight, without

Candyco Transcription Service, Inc. 1 transparency, and without even isolating the 2 things that we know are good about charter 3 schools and using those, transferring those 4 and figuring out a way to benefit all of the 5 schools in the state that are failing. 6 So I'm going to be voting no on 7 this bill because I think this is the wrong 8 thing to do, the wrong decision. And if we do 9 the wrong thing, if we don't address the 10 issues that are being raised here tonight now, 11 we stand a chance of this system getting so 12 far out of hand, so far out that we will not 13 be able to address it logically as a 14 legislature. 15 For us in New York City, it will be 16 the same thing as we have with giving the 17 education system control to the mayor. This 18 is another one of those giant steps, and I 19 think we need to be very, very, very much more 20 careful and thoughtful and we should not be 21 doing this in this way. 22 So, Mr. President, I'm going to 23 have to vote no. Thank you. 24 ACTING PRESIDENT BRESLIN: Thank 25 you, Senator Montgomery.

Candyco Transcription Service, Inc. 1 Are there any other Senators 2 wishing to be heard? 3 Senator Golden, on the bill. 4 SENATOR GOLDEN: Thank you, 5 Mr. President. 6 I rise to explain and to say thank 7 you for a bipartisan bill here today that is 8 going to be passed here in the Senate. And 9 hopefully it will be passed in the Assembly 10 and the Governor will sign it into law. 11 It raises the cap of the number of 12 charter schools from 200 to 460. And it's to 13 be shared by SUNY, who gets 230 schools, and 14 the Board of Regents and the local school 15 districts get the additional 230 schools. 16 In this bill, 115 charter slots to 17 be available for the City of New York. This 18 bill responds to President Obama's call for 19 high-quality charter public schools as a 20 critical component of that Race to the Top. 21 It expands again that number from 200 to 460, 22 or about 10 percent of the total public 23 schools here across the State of New York, 24 about 4600 schools. 25 By lifting that cap, that 10

Candyco Transcription Service, Inc. 1 percent of all public schools in this state, 2 the legislation will enable New York to 3 qualify for a maximum number of points related 4 to charter schools, and therefore giving us 5 the opportunity for Round 2 funding of 6 $700 million, of which 50 percent of that 7 grant will be received and will go to the 8 New York State Department of Education to 9 implement programs that are in that grant. 10 And the other 50 percent will be allocated to 11 local school districts, based upon their Title 12 I student enrollment to help support efforts 13 to improve that student performance. 14 Independent research has repeatedly 15 found that New York City's charter schools 16 dramatically outperform noncharter schools 17 serving the same mix of students. A recent 18 study by a research group in Stanford 19 University, which has previously called out 20 the weakness in the charter schools 21 nationwide, identified New York's group of 22 charter schools as a beacon. 23 On January 10, 2010, in a New York 24 Times editorial it discussed "why charter 25 schools in New York City are outperforming

Candyco Transcription Service, Inc. 1 charters elsewhere as well as their local 2 'traditional' school counterparts." 3 This legislation would also enact 4 significant reforms through increased 5 accountability and transparency of New York's 6 charter schools and enhance the ability of 7 these charter schools to serve special ed kids 8 and to serve the ELL and give these students 9 admission priorities to schools that serve low 10 numbers of these students with special needs. 11 It requires the charter board 12 members to meet the same conflicts of interest 13 and ethics requirements as traditional school 14 board members. And it establishes uniformity 15 and oversight in the lottery and application 16 process. 17 As many of you will remember, back 18 in the '80s and '90s and the early 2000s there 19 were two brothers, they set up this 20 foundation, and they would give out these 21 grants, these $2500 grants. And there were a 22 relatively low number of grants that they 23 would give out each and every year. Do you 24 know how many parents would line up for those 25 applications? Hundreds of thousands would

Candyco Transcription Service, Inc. 1 fill out those applications. 2 And, ladies and gentlemen, nothing 3 has changed. Not in the '80s, not in the 4 '90s, not in the 2000s. Our education 5 standards have gotten better. Our children 6 are getting a better education. But I have to 7 tell you, ladies and gentlemen, our greatest 8 treasures are our assets and our greatest 9 assets are our children. 10 And those parents of today will do 11 anything to make sure that their child gets a 12 good education. And it's up to each of us 13 here today to allow for that opportunity, to 14 allow for those parents to have that 15 competition, for our educational system to 16 have that competition to be able to check, to 17 be able to have those checks and balances and 18 be able to see what's good, what's bad, what 19 works and what doesn't work. 20 Ladies and gentlemen, this is a 21 good day for all of us. This is a good day 22 for each child across this state. There are 23 3 million kids that attend school systems 24 across this great state. Out of that 25 3 million, a small number will go to charter

Candyco Transcription Service, Inc. 1 schools. But there are lines, ladies and 2 gentlemen, to get into those charter schools 3 and waiting lists to get into those charter 4 schools. The question is why. 5 I've heard some of my colleagues 6 say that the Department of Education hasn't 7 been able to take those good practices and to 8 be able to insert them into our educational 9 system today. Well, they should do that. 10 They should take the good practices and give 11 every child across the state its 12 opportunities. We owe it to those treasures. 13 We owe it to the greatest assets of this great 14 country. We owe it to those children. 15 I vote aye, Mr. President. 16 ACTING PRESIDENT BRESLIN: 17 Senator Espada, on the bill. 18 SENATOR ESPADA: Thank you, 19 Mr. President. 20 I rise because I'm very familiar 21 with the subject matter, in that my first 22 profession coming out of Fordham University 23 was as a licensed bilingual teacher in the 24 public school system, both in the early grades 25 and in high school.

Candyco Transcription Service, Inc. 1 And growing up in the public school 2 system, we often referred to 110 Livingston 3 Street, the very centralized education system 4 in the City of New York. Then we move towards 5 the '60s and '70s, where the battle was fought 6 on the ground for decentralization, what role 7 would communities have, parents have in 8 designing an educational system for their 9 children. 10 Now, while we can start in the '60s 11 and the '70s, you can go further back in the 12 great American immigration stories at Ellis 13 Island and how new immigrants came to this 14 country, through New York City, the city I'm 15 most familiar with, and sought to design a 16 system of education that linguistically and 17 culturally and otherwise would achieve 18 mainstreaming them into the greater American 19 society. 20 We're here today because there is a 21 schism and the least of those priorities, 22 quite frankly, has often been our children. 23 We can wax eloquent about children; we're all 24 professional orators and elected officials, we 25 know how to do that. But the truth of the

Candyco Transcription Service, Inc. 1 matter is that there are some folks in the 2 shadows, there are some serious power 3 struggles that we have to bring out of those 4 shadows. Because the truth is that children 5 are not being heard here today, for the most 6 part. Teachers are not necessarily being 7 heard here, for the most part, nor those 8 principals or parents or those children 9 waiting on line. 10 We do have to have a bill before 11 this house that deals with the role of 12 for-profits, that deals with the role of 13 management firms, that deals with the role of 14 evaluating educational outcome, that deals 15 with conflicts of interest, that deals with 16 co-location, that deals with educational 17 policy about high-needs children, special 18 needs children. 19 And let me pause. As I became a 20 father and I had a job as a teacher, my kids 21 could not and should not and did not go to 22 that public school system that was available 23 to them. Because the fact of the matter was 24 that given their learning disabilities, I 25 would have been involved in malpractice as a

Candyco Transcription Service, Inc. 1 parent to put them in an educational system 2 that was ill-equipped to deal with their 3 special needs. 4 And so when we talk about an 5 interest in defining special needs, in 6 defining English-as-a-second-language students 7 and their educational struggles, let's not 8 just focus in on this charter school failure 9 to deal with admissions policies. I've been 10 around too long. We have to deal with 11 1 million children who have 60 percent of the 12 English language students, failing out of the 13 public school system. 14 And so it is an educational failure 15 that we all have to deal with. Whether we 16 talk about a public school charter experience 17 or a public education experience, those that 18 come to this country in search of the great 19 American dream, we're failing them. And both 20 systems have not lived up to their 21 obligations. And both powers, whether they be 22 the affluent, philanthropic, well-intentioned 23 charter school folks or whether it be the 24 principals or teachers union, have failed. 25 Because if we just focus in on how

Candyco Transcription Service, Inc. 1 to turn public education money into an 2 economic or for-profit opportunity, or if we 3 talk about protecting teachers at all costs 4 and jobs at all costs and having tenure be 5 redefined so that the worst teachers can 6 continue to teach children, and so that when 7 we attach merit to whether or not folks keep 8 their job, that conversation can be had. 9 In other words, the politics and 10 the polarization is the reason why we have to 11 pass one-house bills. And so this debate has 12 to get stimulated by more than just passing 13 one-house bills. We have to have a real 14 conversation about having children first, as 15 Senator Diaz indicated. 16 And in doing that, we look forward 17 to a bill that our leader, Senator Sampson, 18 and that Assembly Leader Silver could put 19 before both houses that will deal with 20 accountability, transparency, audits, student 21 accomplishments. 22 And yes, there is this notion that 23 somehow we have to get stimulated, motivated, 24 energized because we're in some Race to the 25 Top. Again, both sides of this huge equation

Candyco Transcription Service, Inc. 1 are losing, and in the middle is the 2 educational abyss where our children lie, 3 where their educational failures could be 4 countered by private institutes but mostly the 5 parents that sit anxiously awaiting the day 6 when they truly could have options. 7 So that, yeah, there's a public 8 monopoly on education, there's a challenge, a 9 challenge to that system which is incomplete 10 in that you haven't dealt well with high-needs 11 students, we have created a battle for space 12 in our public school systems. This angst, 13 this incredible anger that builds up in these 14 public hearings that I've been to is only a 15 by-product of the fact, again, that we haven't 16 done our job. 17 Whatever we do, we have to have a 18 bill that deals with the issues of access, 19 issues of what defines educational 20 achievement, issues of co-location, issues of 21 getting capital into use for charter schools. 22 Yes. Yes. The reason why you have these 23 co-location battles is because we don't have 24 the facilities available for this true 25 competition or this true option to fully

Candyco Transcription Service, Inc. 1 blossom. 2 And so they're both public schools. 3 One goes by the name of charter schools. One 4 has a tremendous support in the private 5 sector, and the philanthropic dollar has found 6 it. 7 And the big public challenge to 8 this house and to the Assembly, the 9 Legislature and the Governor, is to deal with 10 all of the elements that would make for a 11 resolution in time for Race to the Top, yes, 12 but in time so that next September, when the 13 new class of students seeks admission into 14 these schools, that they can truly have a 15 choice. 16 I will be supporting this bill, 17 Mr. President, because I think it starts the 18 conversation. It doesn't finish it for sure. 19 ACTING PRESIDENT BRESLIN: Thank 20 you, Senator Espada. 21 The debate is closed. 22 The Secretary will ring the bell. 23 Read the last section. 24 THE SECRETARY: Section 18. This 25 act shall take effect immediately.

Candyco Transcription Service, Inc. 1 ACTING PRESIDENT BRESLIN: Call 2 the roll. 3 (The Secretary called the roll.) 4 ACTING PRESIDENT BRESLIN: 5 Senator DeFrancisco, to explain his vote. 6 SENATOR DeFRANCISCO: Thank you, 7 Mr. President. 8 I know there's some controversy 9 about this bill and the unions are not in 10 favor of it. However, we're in a financial 11 disaster right now in the State of New York, 12 where we're going to run out of money by June. 13 It's just a shame we didn't pass a bill to put 14 our application for Race to the Top money at 15 the top of the pile a few months ago, and then 16 we might have had some more money to count on 17 for this year's budget. 18 So I'm voting yes on this to 19 enhance our application for federal money, up 20 to $700 million, to replace the cuts that 21 otherwise would be necessary for education. 22 And I'm doing this in favor of the teachers, 23 those teachers which will otherwise be laid 24 off and not be able to teach our students if 25 we don't get the funding that we need to

Candyco Transcription Service, Inc. 1 provide to our districts. 2 So I vote aye. Thank you. 3 ACTING PRESIDENT BRESLIN: 4 Senator DeFrancisco will be recorded in the 5 affirmative. 6 Senator Thompson, to explain his 7 vote. 8 SENATOR THOMPSON: Thank you, 9 Mr. President, for recognizing me today. 10 I just wanted to speak about this 11 issue for a moment because charter schools and 12 traditional public schools are very important 13 institutions. While we know that this is a 14 one-house bill today and probably will not 15 pass the State Assembly, I think it does begin 16 a needed debate. 17 And although I'm not voting for the 18 bill -- because largely I believe it has today 19 distracted us from the efforts to finalize the 20 state budget -- this bill, however, does take 21 some steps forward in terms of making reforms 22 and providing more accountability. But the 23 challenge for this bill is that still falls 24 short. 25 It falls short in certain key

Candyco Transcription Service, Inc. 1 areas -- to make sure that the State 2 Comptroller will have the ability to do audits 3 of charter schools. It also falls short as 4 well in making sure that we address the 5 saturation language of oversaturation in 6 certain communities. Hopefully, as we move 7 forward, as well that it will address reforms 8 that are needed on the public school side. 9 There was a report that was issued 10 today by the teachers and some of their 11 supporters that talk about what the charter 12 schools do wrong or don't do effectively. And 13 I believe that there are things that the 14 public schools need to address and that they 15 can learn and pick up from some of the charter 16 schools. 17 For example, one of the things that 18 many people have heard me talk about is 19 parental involvement. I ran for the Senate on 20 the issue of parental involvement. Whatever 21 happens as a result of this or doesn't happen 22 as a result of this must address the issue of 23 the high rate of students dropping out in the 24 state, the low literacy rates, bad test scores 25 and low rates of parental involvement. Those

Candyco Transcription Service, Inc. 1 are the four cornerstone issues that I hold 2 dear to my heart. 3 And so I support both school 4 systems. However, this is not the best way to 5 do it. And particularly as we move forward, 6 we need to have a more transparent process. 7 Thank you, and I vote no. 8 ACTING PRESIDENT BRESLIN: 9 Senator Thompson to be recorded in the 10 negative. 11 Senator Stavisky, to explain her 12 vote. 13 SENATOR STAVISKY: Thank you, 14 Mr. President. 15 I'm not going to repeat what was 16 said here, except a misconception was said. 17 The Stanford Center for Research on 18 Educational Outcomes, which studied the 19 charter school movement nationally -- and is, 20 incidentally, one of the most comprehensive 21 studies on charter schools -- they found that 22 fewer than one-fifth of the charter schools 23 nationally offered a better education 24 comparable to the local schools, about half 25 offered an equivalent education, and more than

Candyco Transcription Service, Inc. 1 a third, 37 percent -- and this is the 2 respected institute at Stanford University -- 3 37 percent of the charter schools were 4 significantly worse. 5 And it seems to me that that's what 6 it's about. To do kids do better in a charter 7 school? In my opinion, they do not. 8 And I support the public schools, 9 and I vote no. 10 ACTING PRESIDENT BRESLIN: 11 Senator Stavisky will be recorded in the 12 negative. 13 Senator Saland, to explain his 14 vote. 15 SENATOR SALAND: Thank you, 16 Mr. President. 17 Mr. President, I certainly believe 18 in competition. Competition in all avenues of 19 the life I think is ultimately healthy and 20 produces a better product. 21 Some of you may recall at the time 22 that we increased the charter cap, we passed 23 the portion of the budget containing the 24 education funding and the education language 25 with one dissenting vote. And I was

Candyco Transcription Service, Inc. 1 intimately involved in those negotiations 2 because at the time I was the Education chair. 3 And I was that lone dissenting vote. 4 And the reason for my dissenting at 5 that time had nothing to do with the concept 6 of charter schools, but it had everything to 7 do with the fact that there was no effort to 8 provide local control, something that in some 9 40-plus percent of the states that have 10 charters is permitted by operation of law. 11 And I continue to believe that 12 that's critically important. I welcome the 13 city's embrace of charter schools. If it 14 works for them, that's fine; they're funding 15 it. They're a dependent school district, and 16 they're funding it in substantial part. 17 I do think, however, that local 18 school districts -- or, as the feds call them, 19 LEAs -- should have some say in whether or not 20 a charter school is in fact permitted to be 21 part of their school program because they in 22 fact are bearing a substantial portion of the 23 cost. 24 So for that reason, Mr. President, 25 I will be voting in negative on this bill.

Candyco Transcription Service, Inc. 1 Thank you. 2 ACTING PRESIDENT BRESLIN: 3 Senator Saland to be recorded in the negative. 4 Senator Montgomery, to explain her 5 vote. 6 SENATOR MONTGOMERY: Yes, thank 7 you, Mr. President. 8 In addition to the questions that 9 I've already raised, I sure would like to know 10 what is the rush. 11 And another question that I have is 12 that most of the people, most of the Senators 13 in here don't have any charter schools in 14 their areas. And Senator Golden doesn't have 15 any in his district. And so most of you don't 16 even -- this is not even the issue that they 17 have to concern themselves about as it relates 18 to education in their districts. 19 But certainly I do. And I also 20 know that schools don't fail by themselves. 21 Their communities have an environment that 22 doesn't support success. 23 So now I see -- another question I 24 have is that we have people on Wall Street who 25 have put together a fund, a pool, which they

Candyco Transcription Service, Inc. 1 intend to use against people who they view as 2 being against charter schools. Now, why would 3 people on Wall Street, the hedge fund people, 4 be so interested in these children when they 5 are the reason why we had so many foreclosures 6 in the communities where those children with 7 failing schools live? 8 So there's something very strange 9 about this whole issue. And it doesn't seem 10 like it's so much for the children. I don't 11 see the same people who are so interested in 12 children now, I have not seen them ever in my 13 life standing up for what's good for those 14 children, especially those children that they 15 claim need these charter schools so much. 16 I'm not against charter schools. 17 But I must say, on behalf of my son to all of 18 his teachers -- there are some that I could 19 name here, they were wonderful. He was a 20 public school student. He did very well, and 21 he is still doing well. I thank the public 22 school system in this state and in my city. 23 So I'm voting no because I don't 24 see the rush to take money out of a system 25 that we should be improving and send it away

Candyco Transcription Service, Inc. 1 to a system for which there is no 2 accountability or transparency. I vote no. 3 ACTING PRESIDENT BRESLIN: 4 Senator Montgomery will be recorded in the 5 negative. 6 Senator Perkins, to explain his 7 vote. 8 SENATOR PERKINS: Thank you very 9 much, Mr. Chairman. 10 You know, no one here is against 11 money coming to schools for education, if 12 that's what it's really for. We are tying 13 this legislation to something called Race to 14 the Top, $2 billion of public money that will 15 be spent without any auditing, without any 16 oversight by the Comptroller. 17 For me, it's not simply about Race 18 to the Top. I think that, for me, this is 19 more like race to the trough. It's more like 20 folks seeing an opportunity to get some public 21 dollars without the kind of scrutiny, without 22 the kind of transparency, without the kind of 23 accountability that we would not allow in any 24 other sector of public government but for this 25 charter sector, and we are opening up the

Candyco Transcription Service, Inc. 1 floodgates in that regard. 2 Now, I know that a lot of us are 3 concerned about the failure of our traditional 4 public schools and are appreciative of those 5 instances when the charter schools have proven 6 themselves to be successful. But if you read 7 the New York Times this Sunday, you'll find 8 that the story is not that clear. It's a very 9 murky record, to say the least. If you read 10 the New York Times from last week you'll find 11 that it's about the money, for many. 12 And many of you I hope have 13 received what it is I sent out to you that 14 spells it out from the perspective of the 15 Times. And also you might want to make note 16 of the Times Union this weekend, where they 17 have a featured article "For the Kids," 18 underscoring again that it's about the money 19 and not about the kids. 20 So I can't vote for this. I think 21 that there's something cynical about this type 22 of legislation that does not speak to some of 23 the reforms that have been written about in 24 the public papers and that my hearings brought 25 out, particularly when we talk about

Candyco Transcription Service, Inc. 1 co-location, where in some communities there 2 are serious confrontations about this type of 3 situation. 4 ACTING PRESIDENT BRESLIN: 5 Senator Perkins -- 6 SENATOR PERKINS: I also want -- 7 ACTING PRESIDENT BRESLIN: 8 Senator Perkins, how do you vote? 9 SENATOR PERKINS: -- in 10 conclusion, to also talk about the saturation 11 issues and the fact that the cherry-picking 12 with respect to special ed children that's 13 taking place. 14 So I'm going to be voting against 15 this. I look forward to another episode where 16 we can move forward in a more responsible, 17 more creative way to make sure that if we're 18 going to have charters or any kind of public 19 schools that they are responsive, with the 20 type of transparency and accountability that 21 we would expect in any other part of public 22 service. 23 Thank you. 24 ACTING PRESIDENT BRESLIN: 25 Senator Perkins will be recorded in the

Candyco Transcription Service, Inc. 1 negative. 2 I remind people that there is two 3 minutes to explain your vote. 4 Senator Craig Johnson, to explain 5 his vote. 6 SENATOR CRAIG JOHNSON: Thank you 7 very much, Mr. President. 8 First, let me say this to clarify 9 for the record. Senator Stavisky, the study 10 that you cited was the national CREDO study 11 that did not even look at the New York City 12 charter schools. CREDO then did the study of 13 the New York City charter schools which 14 Senator Golden commented about, and they 15 praised the New York City charter schools. So 16 you're looking at a national study. 17 Very similarly, in the New York 18 Times piece this past week, what people 19 pointed out is that nationally, when you don't 20 have the accountability or the transparency, 21 you have problems. The same piece, though, 22 said that experts praised New York State's 23 accountability and transparency and said we do 24 a better job here in New York State. 25 So when you grab those studies,

Candyco Transcription Service, Inc. 1 make sure you're looking at the ones that talk 2 about New York State versus the national 3 studies. 4 But we're getting off the point. 5 We talk about studies and we talk about 6 for-profits, and we can all cite particular 7 things. It's about the kids. It's about the 8 parents. It's about the fact that we have 9 Race to the Top, we have the ability to secure 10 $700 million, and to do so we have to do 11 particular things. 12 The $700 million, 99 percent of it 13 will go to traditional public schools. Those 14 will help Velmanette Montgomery's school 15 districts. Those will help Liz Krueger's 16 school districts. Those will help Marty 17 Golden's school districts. It will help all 18 of our school districts. We lose sight of 19 that fact. 20 The fact is is that access to 21 quality education should not be predetermined 22 by somebody's zip code. And charter schools, 23 public charter schools help children, 24 predominantly African-American and 25 Hispanic-American communities, get a better

Candyco Transcription Service, Inc. 1 education. If you don't believe me, go to the 2 Harlem Success Academy, like I did, and see 3 how these kids are succeeding. Who now have a 4 25 percent population of special ed kids, who 5 scored 100 percent on their math scores and 6 97 percent on their English scores. One of 7 the best schools in the state, public schools. 8 But let me say this, finally. If 9 you have qualms, if you have questions, I urge 10 you to go see the movie called "The Lottery." 11 It's a very simple film. It involves -- 12 ACTING PRESIDENT BRESLIN: 13 Senator Johnson -- 14 SENATOR CRAIG JOHNSON: It 15 involves -- 16 ACTING PRESIDENT BRESLIN: 17 Senator Johnson, how do you vote? 18 SENATOR CRAIG JOHNSON: -- four 19 families and talks about their struggles and 20 their desire to get into these schools and 21 have access to education these kids can't get 22 today. 23 I vote yes. 24 ACTING PRESIDENT BRESLIN: Thank 25 you, Senator Johnson. You will be recorded in

Candyco Transcription Service, Inc. 1 the affirmative. 2 Senator Onorato, to explain his 3 vote. 4 SENATOR ONORATO: Thank you, 5 Mr. President. 6 I rise to support this bill. I 7 think it's a wake-up call, finally, for the 8 public education system to get their act 9 together. 10 I have probably the first charter 11 school in Queens County, located in Woodside, 12 and I have the most diversified district 13 perhaps in the State of New York, where we 14 have 130 different languages spoken in my 15 area. And I have more and more requests than 16 I can possibly handle with recommendations 17 that they allow me to write a letter of 18 recommendation to get them into the charter 19 school that I have located in my district. 20 So I'm voting with my constituents 21 who want a chance to give their children the 22 same opportunity as the children that are 23 already attending the charter school in 24 Woodside. I vote yes. 25 ACTING PRESIDENT BRESLIN:

Candyco Transcription Service, Inc. 1 Senator Onorato will be recorded in the 2 affirmative. 3 Senator Diaz, to explain his vote. 4 SENATOR DIAZ: Thank you, 5 Mr. President. 6 I remember, Mr. President, many 7 years, many years ago when there was no 8 charter schools and three reverends, three 9 ministers, Reverend Floyd Flake from Brooklyn, 10 Reverend Wyatt Tee Walker from Manhattan, and 11 myself, we conducted a press conference at 12 City Hall asking Albany to approve charter 13 schools. Way back. And now we -- I'm proud 14 of what I did, I'm proud of what I'm doing. 15 But, Senator Golden, I heard that 16 you don't have a charter school in your 17 district and you are voting for it. Senator 18 Golden, Senator Padavan, you guys that don't 19 have my color skin, you guys that don't have 20 charter schools, you are voting to help my 21 children in my district. 22 I would like to extend an 23 invitation to you, Golden, and to you, 24 Padavan, to come to the South Bronx, to my 25 charter school, and pay a visit with me. You

Candyco Transcription Service, Inc. 1 will see the parents. You will see the 2 happiness. You will see the victory that we 3 have achieved. 4 So anytime, you will be welcome to 5 come with me. I am inviting you right now to 6 come to my district and meet the parents of my 7 district. 8 Thank you for your vote today. I'm 9 voting yes. 10 ACTING PRESIDENT BRESLIN: 11 Senator Diaz will be recorded in the 12 affirmative. 13 Senator Stewart-Cousins, to explain 14 her vote. 15 SENATOR STEWART-COUSINS: Thank 16 you, Mr. President. 17 I rise because I think we can do 18 better. I know that we are talking about our 19 children, and I think it should be clear that 20 I don't think anyone in this chamber is 21 against charter schools. But I again repeat 22 what has been repeated over and over again. 23 It is the investment in our future. If New 24 York City is doing it right, it can be 25 codified, it can be put in our legislation.

Candyco Transcription Service, Inc. 1 Because there are many schools that are doing 2 it wrong. 3 And if we have an opportunity to 4 begin a conversation, we should begin it, but 5 we shouldn't end it at a place that we know 6 won't accomplish the goals. We want our 7 children to be educated. Every single child 8 does not want to stand in line in a lottery 9 hoping against hope that education is in their 10 future, a quality education that can allow 11 them to sit in these chambers. 12 And if we can do better and if we 13 have an opportunity to race to the top and 14 actually get to the top by creating language 15 and creating transparency and accountability 16 as well as opportunity, we ought to do that. 17 So I at this point will vote no. I 18 look forward for a real discussion, a 19 continued conversation and a race to the top 20 that actually includes all children in 21 New York State. 22 ACTING PRESIDENT BRESLIN: 23 Senator Stewart-Cousins will be recorded in 24 the negative. 25 Senator L. Krueger, to explain her

Candyco Transcription Service, Inc. 1 vote. 2 SENATOR LIZ KRUEGER: Thank you. 3 Just for the record, sometimes the 4 rhetoric gets hot when we're passionate about 5 issues, and I respect that. But to clarify, 6 just once and for all on the record, this bill 7 doesn't get us the Race to the Top money. The 8 Race to the Top has a series of evaluations 9 that we need to do better on. 10 Based on the findings from our 11 rejection, we only could have received an 12 additional 12.6 points in our application for 13 Race to the Top based on raising the charter 14 cap. I think it's fine to raise the charter 15 cap; 12.6 points isn't getting us the money. 16 We still have the assignment. So the argument 17 this bill, yes, means $700 million is a false 18 statement. 19 Second, this money can't be used 20 to -- the Race to the Top money, if we get it, 21 can't be used to avoid teacher layoffs. 22 That's not what it's there for. 23 So just two points. You can 24 support charter schools or not support charter 25 schools, you can debate what we need to do for

Candyco Transcription Service, Inc. 1 Race to the Top money, and we need to continue 2 that. But this bill doesn't get us 3 $700 million, although I would love to get us 4 $700 million, and you can't use that 5 $700 million to avoid layoffs. We still have 6 an obligation to deal with the tough decisions 7 in the state budget quickly. 8 I'll be voting no, as I said 9 before. Thank you, Mr. President. 10 ACTING PRESIDENT BRESLIN: 11 Senator L. Krueger will be recorded in the 12 negative. 13 Senator Schneiderman, to explain 14 his vote. 15 SENATOR SCHNEIDERMAN: Thank you, 16 Mr. President. 17 I look forward to being able to 18 vote for a bill to lift the cap on charter 19 schools. I think the needs for further 20 reforms have been discussed today. 21 But I have to say, listening to the 22 debate, the thing that disturbs me the most 23 about this is that while I think that there 24 may be, as some have suggested, some people 25 interested in education for bad reasons,

Candyco Transcription Service, Inc. 1 frankly, I think the overwhelming majority of 2 people on both sides of this issue are 3 concerned about kids and are concerned about 4 schools and do want what's best for our 5 children. 6 This is an issue that has become 7 very polarized. And I think that in fact most 8 of us here would look forward to a bill that 9 would enable us to lift the cap. I hope that 10 we can get back to the negotiations, as 11 Senator Oppenheimer spoke about. My 12 understanding is that there was a lot of 13 progress being made on the issue of having a 14 unified approach to the Race to the Top 15 application. 16 But I would urge all my colleagues, 17 there's a difference between an opponent and 18 enemy. And demonizing anybody in this debate 19 probably doesn't serve us well. So I'm going 20 to vote no on this bill. I look forward to 21 being able to vote yes on a bill down the road 22 that has some further reforms. 23 Thank you, Mr. President. 24 ACTING PRESIDENT BRESLIN: 25 Senator Schneiderman will be recorded in the

Candyco Transcription Service, Inc. 1 negative. 2 Announce the results. 3 THE SECRETARY: Those recorded in 4 the negative on Calendar Number 475 are 5 Senators Breslin, Duane, L. Krueger, LaValle, 6 Montgomery, Oppenheimer, Padavan, Perkins, 7 Saland, Schneiderman, Serrano, Stachowski, 8 Stavisky, Stewart-Cousins and Thompson. 9 Ayes, 45. Nays, 15. 10 ACTING PRESIDENT BRESLIN: The 11 bill is passed. 12 The Secretary will read. 13 THE SECRETARY: In relation to 14 Calendar Number 477, Senator C. Kruger moves 15 to discharge, from the Committee on Finance, 16 Assembly Bill Number 10924 and substitute it 17 for the identical Senate Bill Number 7689, 18 Third Reading Calendar 477. 19 ACTING PRESIDENT BRESLIN: 20 Substitution ordered. 21 THE SECRETARY: Calendar Number 22 477, by the Assembly Committee on Rules, 23 Assembly Print Number 10924, an act making 24 appropriations for the support of government. 25 ACTING PRESIDENT BRESLIN:

Candyco Transcription Service, Inc. 1 Senator Klein. 2 SENATOR KLEIN: Mr. President, is 3 there a message of necessity and appropriation 4 at the desk? 5 ACTING PRESIDENT BRESLIN: 6 Senator Klein, there is a message of necessity 7 and appropriation at the desk. 8 SENATOR KLEIN: Mr. President, I 9 move to accept the message at this time. 10 ACTING PRESIDENT BRESLIN: The 11 question is on the acceptance of the message 12 of necessity and appropriation. All those in 13 favor please signify by saying aye. 14 (Response of "Aye.") 15 ACTING PRESIDENT BRESLIN: 16 Opposed, nay. 17 (No response.) 18 ACTING PRESIDENT BRESLIN: The 19 message is accepted. 20 Please read the last section. 21 SENATOR LIBOUS: Excuse me, 22 Mr. President. 23 ACTING PRESIDENT BRESLIN: 24 Senator Libous, why do you rise? 25 SENATOR LIBOUS: Thank you. I

Candyco Transcription Service, Inc. 1 believe there's an amendment by Senator 2 LaValle at the desk. I would ask that you 3 waive its reading and call on Senator LaValle, 4 please. 5 ACTING PRESIDENT BRESLIN: 6 Senator LaValle's amendment is here at the 7 desk. Without objection, the reading is 8 waived and you may speak on the amendment. 9 SENATOR LaVALLE: Thank you, 10 Mr. President. 11 There is an inequity in the bill. 12 This amendment tries to or does make it fair 13 and equitable between the State University and 14 the City University. 15 Under this budget, City University 16 construction projects can move forward. 17 Effective May 1, SUNY construction projects 18 have come to a halt. Needless to say that 19 workers, contractors throughout this state are 20 in a neutral position, are not working, are 21 not moving on projects that need to come to 22 completion. 23 Our laws make an attempt to be 24 equitable and fair. And clearly the budget 25 bill before us treats one system fairly and

Candyco Transcription Service, Inc. 1 the other system, State University, unfairly. 2 This is analogous to the situation 3 where contractors throughout the state had to 4 cease to work on their road projects and other 5 projects in the state. 6 So this amendment corrects that 7 inequity that I can only assume was done 8 through some oversight. Thank you. 9 ACTING PRESIDENT BRESLIN: Thank 10 you, Senator LaValle. 11 Senator Klein. 12 SENATOR KLEIN: Mr. President, 13 point of order. 14 ACTING PRESIDENT BRESLIN: 15 Senator Klein, you may proceed. 16 SENATOR KLEIN: According to 17 Article 7, Section 4 of the Constitution, the 18 Legislature may only add single line-item 19 appropriations stated separately and 20 distinctly. Because the items in this 21 amendment are not single, distinct line items, 22 the amendment is unconstitutional and 23 therefore out of order. 24 ACTING PRESIDENT BRESLIN: Senat 25 or Klein, your point of order is confirmed and

Candyco Transcription Service, Inc. 1 the nonsponsor amendment is out of order. 2 SENATOR LIBOUS: Mr. President -- 3 Mr. President -- Mr. President -- 4 ACTING PRESIDENT BRESLIN: 5 Senator Libous. 6 SENATOR LIBOUS: Thank you for 7 recognizing me. I'd like to challenge the 8 ruling of the chair, Mr. President. Because 9 as I mentioned last week and the previous week 10 and the previous week before that, we believe 11 that the amendment is not out of order. We 12 believe that -- 13 ACTING PRESIDENT BRESLIN: 14 Senator Libous, would you like to make a 15 motion to overrule the ruling of the chair? 16 SENATOR LIBOUS: Yes, 17 Mr. President, I would. 18 ACTING PRESIDENT BRESLIN: All 19 those in favor of overruling the ruling of the 20 chair please signify by raising your hands. 21 Announce the results. 22 THE SECRETARY: Ayes, 27. Nays, 23 31. 24 ACTING PRESIDENT BRESLIN: The 25 motion fails.

Candyco Transcription Service, Inc. 1 SENATOR DeFRANCISCO: Point of 2 order. 3 ACTING PRESIDENT BRESLIN: 4 Senator DeFrancisco. 5 SENATOR DeFRANCISCO: I thought 6 there was a reform that said that there's no 7 empty-chair voting in the State Senate any 8 longer. 9 ACTING PRESIDENT BRESLIN: You're 10 right. Senator Robach -- you're referring to 11 Senator Robach? 12 SENATOR DeFRANCISCO: Well, 13 that -- we can concede Senator Robach. But 14 there's not too many chairs that are -- there 15 are a lot of chairs empty on that side. You 16 must have not looked to the left. 17 ACTING PRESIDENT BRESLIN: When 18 voting on a motion with a show of hands, it is 19 those people who are showing their hands. 20 SENATOR DeFRANCISCO: So under 21 those circumstances you don't have to be in 22 your chair, is that the ruling? If that's the 23 case -- 24 ACTING PRESIDENT BRESLIN: 25 Senator Klein.

Candyco Transcription Service, Inc. 1 SENATOR KLEIN: Mr. President, 2 just to clarify Senator DeFrancisco's point, 3 that's only on controversial bills where a 4 member has to be in their seat. 5 ACTING PRESIDENT BRESLIN: 6 Announce the results. 7 THE SECRETARY: Ayes, 29. Nays, 8 31. 9 ACTING PRESIDENT BRESLIN: The 10 motion fails. 11 The main bill is before the house. 12 SENATOR DeFRANCISCO: 13 Explanation. 14 ACTING PRESIDENT BRESLIN: An 15 explanation has been requested. 16 Senator C. Kruger. 17 SENATOR CARL KRUGER: How did I 18 guess? 19 This bill is once again another 20 extender covering the period from May 4th to 21 May 11th. And it is a bill with $2.3 billion 22 in an All Funds appropriation and $622 million 23 in the General Fund appropriation. 24 ACTING PRESIDENT BRESLIN: 25 Senator DeFrancisco.

Candyco Transcription Service, Inc. 1 SENATOR DeFRANCISCO: Yes, before 2 I ask Senator Kruger to yield, I'm speaking to 3 all the people who left the chambers. This is 4 going to be a very brief discussion, in view 5 of the lateness of the hour. And if people 6 would stay close so we don't have to wait a 7 half an hour for those chairs to be filled. 8 ACTING PRESIDENT BRESLIN: It is 9 hoped that everyone will stay close so that 10 when the vote comes it will be expeditious. 11 SENATOR DeFRANCISCO: Would 12 Senator Kruger yield to a question? 13 ACTING PRESIDENT BRESLIN: 14 Senator Kruger, will you yield to a question 15 from Senator DeFrancisco? 16 SENATOR CARL KRUGER: Yes. 17 Through you, Mr. President. 18 SENATOR DeFRANCISCO: If I asked 19 you the same questions that I've asked you in 20 previous weeks concerning the progress of the 21 negotiations that are being held privately 22 between the three New York City leaders, 23 whether or not -- would your answers be that 24 the negotiations are ongoing, that you can't 25 give us any specifics, the reasons you can't

Candyco Transcription Service, Inc. 1 give us specifics is because the negotiations 2 are sensitive and the negotiations change from 3 time to time and you don't want to upset the 4 rhythm of the negotiations and as soon as we 5 meets a critical mass we will hear from the 6 leadership and have a budget bill to be 7 discussed after it's already negotiated? 8 Would that be the -- 9 SENATOR CARL KRUGER: Give that 10 man a cigar. 11 (Laughter.) 12 SENATOR DeFRANCISCO: Would that 13 be your answer? 14 SENATOR CARL KRUGER: In all 15 forms, yes. 16 SENATOR DeFRANCISCO: Okay. 17 Would he yield to one last question? 18 ACTING PRESIDENT BRESLIN: Would 19 you yield to one last question? 20 SENATOR CARL KRUGER: Yes, I 21 will, Mr. President. 22 SENATOR DeFRANCISCO: Senator 23 Kruger, do you have anything to add to 24 enlighten us as to what's happened from last 25 week to this week?

Candyco Transcription Service, Inc. 1 SENATOR CARL KRUGER: No. 2 SENATOR DeFRANCISCO: Thank you. 3 On the bill. 4 ACTING PRESIDENT BRESLIN: 5 Senator DeFrancisco, on the bill. 6 SENATOR DeFRANCISCO: Now, I did 7 that simply, quite frankly, to move the 8 process along, because I think it was pretty 9 obvious what the answer was going to be from 10 prior weeks. 11 But I just wanted to add a couple 12 new things that have developed over the last 13 week as far as things that may be relevant in 14 getting an open public process going. 15 Point number one is that the 16 Associated General Contractors on April 30th 17 brought a lawsuit against the state for 18 withholding payments as well as bid awards on 19 highways. And these payments relate to 20 districts all throughout the State of 21 New York, contractors not getting paid -- 22 earning interest, by the way, for nonpayments 23 that are due from the State of New York, which 24 will further exacerbate the state's cash flow 25 position.

Candyco Transcription Service, Inc. 1 Number two, there is such a thing 2 as SUNY constructions that take place, and 3 there's a very short window for SUNY projects 4 to be done. There's only a 90-day recess, and 5 that's the only construction window unless 6 you're going to displace students. This work 7 is going to be not done, we're going to lose 8 the construction window, and we're going to 9 have projects that were stalled for another 10 year in order to get to that window. 11 Number three, Senator LaValle in 12 his motion indicated another upstate/downstate 13 dichotomy, and not a good one. I won't 14 restate all the other ones we've brought up 15 over the last year and a half, but this one is 16 a serious one. Because of the statute, CUNY 17 projects can go forward -- CUNY, from the City 18 of New York, they can go forward. SUNY 19 projects cannot. 20 Now, if that isn't a disparity 21 between upstate and the downstate area that 22 clearly controls this budget process that has 23 gone nowhere and is over a month late now, 24 then I don't know what does display that 25 disparity.

Candyco Transcription Service, Inc. 1 Lastly and most importantly, while 2 whatever is not going on continues to not go 3 on behind closed doors, the Comptroller has 4 advised us and advised the world that by the 5 end of May -- it's not too far off, it's three 6 more extenders -- the General Fund balance in 7 the State of New York is going to be 8 $500 million. And the DOB estimates that the 9 short-term investment pool and other sole 10 custody accounts will be $1 billion short as 11 of June, making emergency bill payments and 12 the payments to the schools unable to be paid 13 made. So although we get the same answers to 14 our same questions week after week, this is 15 serious business. 16 And the most -- and lastly, the 17 thing I almost forgot, the Governor has 18 mentioned furloughs of state employees. And 19 he's threatened next week that if we don't 20 handle the furlough bill as a stand-alone 21 bill, it's going to be part of the extender 22 next week. 23 Now, that's going to put a lot of 24 people in a very difficult vote. Do you vote 25 to not have an extender as long as it has

Candyco Transcription Service, Inc. 1 furloughs for state employees? It's going to 2 be a very difficult vote. 3 So I'm urging everyone, in view of 4 all of those factors, in view of the fact that 5 no progress has been made, we're over a month 6 late, that we vote no at this time -- not wait 7 till next week when we have to furlough 8 employees -- so that we can make sure we get a 9 budget. And a budget is necessary for all of 10 us for many reasons, in addition to the 11 reasons I gave you. 12 So I'm going to vote no when the 13 vote is called today on this bill. Thank you. 14 ACTING PRESIDENT BRESLIN: Thank 15 you, Senator DeFrancisco. 16 Senator Flanagan, on the bill. 17 SENATOR FLANAGAN: Thank you, 18 Mr. President. On the bill. 19 I'm going to refrain from asking 20 questions and just make a couple of points 21 relative to the education portion of this 22 budget. 23 Last week when we did the extender, 24 there was about $2.5 billion appropriated in 25 aid to education. All meritorious, all

Candyco Transcription Service, Inc. 1 valuable, all beneficial to our school 2 districts. Last week we offered an amendment 3 to allow for the employee liability reserve 4 funds to be used as the Governor had proposed, 5 as the Senate Democrats had proposed, and as 6 the Assembly Democrats had proposed, and the 7 amendment was defeated along party lines. 8 Last week, or as we came into this 9 week, the Governor sent up two bills -- an 10 appropriation bill, which we have before us, 11 and an Article 7 bill, which very simply would 12 have allowed for the use of those funds. 13 So I marvel at the discussion that 14 we've had today talking about charter schools 15 and the Race to the Top and public policy and 16 education, and we spent about two hours 17 talking about $700 million that we may get. 18 And I think that discussion was worthwhile. 19 But it is appalling to me that 20 we're standing here now and we are not going 21 to take up a bill that was introduced by the 22 Majority. That's a bill, ladies and 23 gentlemen, that everyone knows doesn't cost 24 the State of New York a dime. It doesn't cost 25 the financial plan anything. The Comptroller

Candyco Transcription Service, Inc. 1 has come out and said there's over 2 $400 million available to over 251 school 3 districts in the State of New York where they 4 could access that money to help prevent 5 layoffs, help reduce their tax levy, and help 6 the overburdened property taxpayer in the 7 State of New York. 8 You failed to get it out here on 9 the floor. That's a $400 million member item, 10 like that [snapping fingers] that goes right 11 to school districts that would be very 12 beneficial to the vote that's coming up the 13 third Tuesday in May. 14 So as we move ahead, I can 15 guarantee you I'm going home and I'm putting 16 the blame right at the Senate Democrats' door 17 and the Assembly Democrats' door, because the 18 chance is there, it's a no-brainer, it should 19 have been done. 20 And I give credit to the Governor 21 because he listened, he listened and put it in 22 his appropriation bill. We should have acted 23 on it. It should be here now, it could be 24 chaptered tonight and school districts could 25 plan accordingly and benefit the property

Candyco Transcription Service, Inc. 1 taxpayers. But you chose not to do the right 2 thing, and they're going to be hurting as a 3 result. 4 I'm going to vote no. 5 ACTING PRESIDENT BRESLIN: Thank 6 you, Senator Flanagan. 7 Senator Marcellino, on the bill. 8 SENATOR MARCELLINO: Thank you, 9 Mr. President. On the bill. 10 As I have on all the other extender 11 bills that have come before us, I fully intend 12 to vote no on this bill. I don't believe we 13 need an extender, I know we need a budget. 14 It's that simple. We need an on-time budget, 15 we're a month past that deadline, and frankly, 16 from what I'm hearing, absolutely nothing 17 seems to be happening. Talk to people on the 18 other side, they say they're not talking to 19 us. Talk to people here, they don't know 20 whether they're talking to them. 21 We are not getting the facts here. 22 And there doesn't seem to be any movement 23 moving along. 24 Where the Governor is picking to 25 pay certain projects -- if it's federal money,

Candyco Transcription Service, Inc. 1 those workers who are lucky enough to be on 2 that job will get paid. If it's state money 3 or local money with some state add, those 4 workers will not work. Now we're picking and 5 choosing which families are going to have 6 bread on the table or not. I think that's 7 outrageous and not credible. 8 SUNY is not going to get its 9 projects. These are projects with new 10 buildings, repairs and maintenance of existing 11 buildings that are necessary. Infrastructure, 12 roads, all that not being done. 13 Now, Senator Little before was 14 mentioning at one of our conferences that some 15 of the asphalt plants upstate will close down 16 when the weather starts getting cold. Which 17 means those projects for road improvements and 18 the like are not going to be able to move 19 ahead because there's not going to be any 20 asphalt. Well, that's going to be great. 21 More workers unemployed, more people not 22 getting a paycheck. 23 School districts, as our colleague 24 Senator Flanagan just pointed out, have a vote 25 coming. They're not sure what to do. Will

Candyco Transcription Service, Inc. 1 they take a high number, a low number? What's 2 their state aid? What's going to impact their 3 levy? What's going to impact their taxpayers? 4 They don't know. They can't answer the 5 question. They call me, I say I don't know. 6 I go and ask my colleagues on the other side, 7 and they don't know. So we're getting no help 8 from anybody. 9 This is not a healthy situation. 10 This is not a good situation for any one of 11 us. And it looks bad, it smells bad and it is 12 bad, quite honestly. Nobody can say this is a 13 good thing. And I don't hear that happening. 14 We're not moving forward in the right 15 direction. The taxpayers are saying "What are 16 you doing? Where's my budget? What's the 17 deal? What are we going to do here?" And all 18 we're getting is stall, stall, stall. Not 19 helpful. 20 Mr. President, I'm going to vote no 21 on this extender, and I intend to vote no on 22 every extender until we get a budget. Because 23 we don't need extenders, we need a budget. 24 ACTING PRESIDENT BRESLIN: Thank 25 you, Senator Marcellino.

Candyco Transcription Service, Inc. 1 Senator Saland, on the bill. 2 SENATOR SALAND: Thank you, 3 Mr. President. 4 Mr. President, I believe it was 5 about three weeks ago when we did another 6 extender bill -- and this is starting to seem 7 like Groundhog Day -- that I stood up and 8 said, "I've always supported extenders but at 9 some point in time I'm not sure if I can 10 continue to support extenders." 11 That point in time has arrived. We 12 have passed with the great fanfare, great 13 patting ourselves on the back in 2007 a budget 14 reform act. And that Budget Reform Act was 15 supposed to take us away from the bad old days 16 and set us on a course where late budgets 17 would now be a thing of the past. 18 Well, they're a thing of the 19 present, and they seem to be going on here 20 now, today, interminably. And it seems like 21 there's nothing in sight, no light at the end 22 of the tunnel. 23 The simple fact of the matter is 24 that bill, as best as I can recall, was much 25 heralded everywhere. We gave ourselves a lot

Candyco Transcription Service, Inc. 1 of credit, in bipartisan fashion, for 2 accomplishing it. It was the beginning of a 3 new day. It was a reform. And that reform 4 has been absolutely, totally ignored. And 5 instead, we get week by week these extenders. 6 And what we're doing is trying, 7 somehow or other, to delay the inevitable. 8 Dealing with the absolutely horrible fiscal 9 plight that we find ourselves in, perhaps 10 closing our eyes and trying to wish it away -- 11 perhaps some of us would prefer putting our 12 heads in the sand and maybe it will go away. 13 It is not going to go away. It 14 will be here until we deal with it. No 15 extender is going to get us any closer to a 16 resolution. It requires the ability to make 17 difficult decisions and make them now. Nobody 18 enjoys that prospect. But delaying of its 19 inevitability merely compounds the problem. 20 So why not, why not do what we were 21 sent here to do and surprise people by showing 22 that we can do it and get to the task of 23 passing a budget? Is that not our 24 responsibility? The Governor has given us his 25 budget. Where is the legislative response?

Candyco Transcription Service, Inc. 1 I look around the other side of the 2 aisle, I don't think there's eight to 10 3 people sitting in the chamber. This is an 4 extender. It's supposed to be important 5 stuff. This is the stuff that's supposed to 6 keep us going. Well, the simple fact of the 7 matter is it's not keeping us going, it's 8 merely digging the hole deeper as we mire in 9 our own mess. It's time for us to act. 10 Mr. President, I cannot support 11 another extender. I will not support another 12 extender. I implore this body, I beg this 13 body to accept our responsibilities and get 14 the job done. Delay is not an ally, it just 15 causes more pain. 16 Thank you, Mr. President. 17 ACTING PRESIDENT BRESLIN: Thank 18 you, Senator Saland. 19 The debate is closed. 20 The Secretary will ring the bell. 21 Read the last section. 22 THE SECRETARY: Section 2. This 23 act shall take effect immediately. 24 ACTING PRESIDENT BRESLIN: Call 25 the roll.

Candyco Transcription Service, Inc. 1 (The Secretary called the roll.) 2 ACTING PRESIDENT BRESLIN: 3 Senator LaValle, to explain his vote. 4 SENATOR LaVALLE: Thank you, 5 Mr. President. Very briefly. 6 All of us have heard throughout the 7 preceding months about having projects that 8 are shovel-ready. Shovel-ready, those were 9 the magic words. Here we have projects that 10 are being stopped. Others that should be 11 online have never made it across the line. 12 It is shameful. And I don't know 13 what the Governor is thinking to pit one area 14 of the state, New York City, against those 15 communities outside of New York City who will 16 be hurt by not having their construction 17 projects moving forward. 18 I vote no. 19 ACTING PRESIDENT BRESLIN: 20 Senator LaValle will be recorded in the 21 negative. 22 Senator Stavisky, to explain her 23 vote. 24 SENATOR STAVISKY: Yes. I vote 25 aye.

Candyco Transcription Service, Inc. 1 The budget resolution which we 2 passed in this chamber took the SUNY 3 Construction Fund off-budget so that it would 4 be comparable to the CUNY Construction Fund. 5 And I might remind you that everybody on the 6 other side of the aisle voted against that. 7 Thank you. I vote aye. 8 ACTING PRESIDENT BRESLIN: 9 Senator Stavisky will be recorded in the 10 affirmative. 11 Senator Owen Johnson, to explain 12 his vote. 13 SENATOR JOHNSON: I am voting 14 against this temporary budget measure, as I 15 did last week. 16 And I discovered that we did have a 17 procedure for conference committees to deal 18 with issues like this, but we don't use that. 19 We have a new system now we learned from 20 China. It's called the Chinese water torture. 21 And every week you drop a little piece of the 22 budget on top of the people of this state and 23 try to keep them happy. They're not happy. 24 They don't like that procedure. 25 Ten days from now, we have the vote

Candyco Transcription Service, Inc. 1 on the school budgets. The schools don't know 2 what money they have. They can't plan their 3 budgets accordingly. Every municipality has 4 the same thing, every business has the same 5 problem. 6 So we can't go on like this. It's 7 totally outrageous, it really is. And we had 8 lamentations years ago about three men in a 9 room. At least they got something done. 10 Where's our three men? Where's anybody 11 working on this budget? 12 It's terrible. I'm voting no. 13 ACTING PRESIDENT BRESLIN: 14 Senator Owen Johnson will be recorded in the 15 negative. 16 Senator Griffo, to explain his 17 vote. 18 SENATOR GRIFFO: Mr. President, 19 thank you. 20 I have voted against the extenders 21 because I believe that we need a budget. And 22 I was disappointed today with the Senate 23 Finance chair when he chuckled, actually, when 24 he was responding to the question that Senator 25 DeFrancisco asked because it was the same

Candyco Transcription Service, Inc. 1 question, indicating that there are ongoing 2 negotiations. And yet the Assembly Majority 3 Leader says that not the case. The Lieutenant 4 Governor says that's not the case. 5 So where are we? What are we 6 really doing here? You asked the people to 7 entrust you, to put you in charge. You're in 8 charge, and you're not getting the job done. 9 People don't care about the past, that there 10 were late budgets before. They want to know 11 what you're doing now, today, to meet the 12 challenges that are there before us. 13 I think this is unacceptable, to 14 ignore, purposely, deadlines, to wilfully 15 violate the Budget Reform Act of 2007. Get 16 your act together. Let's get the job done. 17 I vote no. 18 ACTING PRESIDENT BRESLIN: 19 Senator Griffo will be recorded in the 20 negative. 21 Announce the results. 22 THE SECRETARY: Those recorded in 23 the negative on Calendar Number 477 are 24 Senators DeFrancisco, Flanagan, Golden, 25 Griffo, Hannon, O. Johnson, Larkin, LaValle,

Candyco Transcription Service, Inc. 1 Leibell, Little, Marcellino, Maziarz, 2 Nozzolio, Padavan, Ranzenhofer, Saland, 3 Seward, Skelos, Volker, Winner and Young. 4 Ayes, 39. Nays, 21. 5 ACTING PRESIDENT BRESLIN: The 6 bill is passed. 7 Senator Klein, that completes the 8 reading of the controversial supplemental 9 calendar. 10 SENATOR KLEIN: Mr. President, is 11 there any further business at the desk? 12 ACTING PRESIDENT BRESLIN: No, 13 Senator Klein, the desk is clear. 14 SENATOR KLEIN: There being no 15 further business, Mr. President, I move that 16 we adjourn until Tuesday, May 4th, at 17 3:00 p.m. 18 ACTING PRESIDENT BRESLIN: There 19 being no further business, the Senate is 20 adjourned until Tuesday, May 4th, at 3:00 p.m. 21 (Whereupon, at 7:51 p.m., the 22 Senate adjourned.) 23 24 25

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