Senate GOP Leader Skelos Says He Will Not Allow Vote on Mayor de Blasio's Pre-K Tax

[hrmjustin]

BY GLENN BLAIN
Senate Republican Leader Dean Skelos isn’t budging from his opposition to Mayor de Blasio’s plan to hike taxes on the wealthy to pay for expanded prekindergarten.

Skelos told reporters at the Capttol Monday that he would not allow legislation containing such a tax hike on city residents to advance to the Senate floor and he shot down arguments made by Assembly Speaker Sheldon Silver (D-Manhattan) and others that the matter should be treated like any home rule request from a locality.

A tax hike on wealthy residents in the city, Skelos said, would impact the entire state and could reduce overall tax revenues.

“The last thing we need is to see high earners leave New York state because then we lose their tax dollars,” said Skelos, who also noted that Gov. Cuomo has proposed funding Pre-K statewide without a tax hike.

http://www.nydailynews.com/blogs/dailypolitics/2014/02/senate-gop-leader-skelos-says-he-will-not-allow-vote-on-mayor-de-blasios-pre-k

[Squinch]

1. We knew something like this was coming, didn't we?

[hrmjustin]

2. Yes we did. It looks like state might just pay for the whole thing but with no tax increase.

[Squinch]

3. Which I have a REAL problem with. Cuomo is using your money and mine, when we already

pay a higher rate than most of the "wealthy" guys who would be affected by the new tax.

AND, Cuomo can say to DiBlasio, "Here's a blank check for the pre-k so you don't raise taxes." At the same time, he has decimated Early Intervention for disabled babies by cutting the pay of Early Intervention therapists by 20% or more, doubling the paperwork, and holding back payment for 6, 7, 8 months, so that providers are losing their homes and leaving the job in droves.

So he "had to" take all this money out of EI, causing all kinds of hardship for middle class people whose life work is to help disabled babies, but he has a bottomless pocket to offer to DiBlasio so that those making 500K are not taxed at a rate that is STILL lower than the tax rates paid by all those EI providers who are losing their livelihoods.

As you might have guessed, this makes me furious. As a former provider (driven out by this process), I know that the major cost of this is the babies who are not getting the services early, and who will never make the same kind of progress they would have made if we got to them at 4 or 5 or 6 months of age.

[hrmjustin]

4. Great points.

Cuomo likes to cut essential services and that is heartbreaking.

They need to raise taxes on the rich and Skelos needs to bring it up for a vote.