Cuomo has always been a bully

Stefanik costs her district

Sunday, March 7, 2021

Morning briefing

Democrats must accept that Gov. Andrew Cuomo is their Donald Trump, or the closest they are going to get to a bully who pushes the boundaries of ethics policies in search of greater and greater political power.

It shouldn’t have turned out this way.

There was a fleeting moment shortly after he was elected governor when Cuomo vowed to clean up the scandal-a-week cesspool of Albany politics that Sheldon Silver and Dean Skelos ruled.

Gov. Cuomo created the Moreland Commission in 2013 to investigate public corruption. He insisted it would be an independent commission to investigate whatever needed to be investigated.

Except, maybe him.

News reports linked top Cuomo aides with efforts for the commission to drop subpoenas to entities connected to the governor. Then, Cuomo abruptly disbanded the commission a year later in exchange for some meek ethical reforms from the Legislature.

It didn’t look right.

Federal prosecutor Preet Bharara picked up many of the Moreland Commission investigations to save the day. That led to convictions against both Silver and Skelos.

When looking at any scandal, any politician, you should look at their overall record. The recent news that the information was left out of a health department report on nursing home deaths and the sexual harassment allegations against the governor are not the first time he has been in trouble.

It started with disbanding the Moreland Commission.

It continued when his former campaign manager, Joe Percoco, was convicted of bribery, and Cuomo’s economic guru, Alain Kaloyeros, was convicted  of bid-rigging.

In another case, Crystal Run Healthcare received $25.4 million in state grants after donating $400,000 to the Cuomo campaign.

It was part of a pattern. The New York Times also found a link between appointments to state government boards and campaign donations.

Gov. Cuomo collected approximately $890,000 in campaign donations from people he eventually appointed to a state board. While none of the appointees were paid, they held positions where they had the clout to decide how millions of dollars in state money is spent. That gave them significant power. The friends and families of the appointees kicked in another $1.3 million to the Cuomo campaign.

When ever I talked to journalists covering state government, they talked about the iron lock the governor held on information. Nothing was released without his approval. Their Freedom of Information requests were delayed for months and months.

  No one in his administration - right down to the janitors - is allowed to talk to any member of the press.

Gov. Andrew Cuomo is a bully. I’ve written that previously.

The state of New York would be better of without him.

Stefanik drops ball

Like all her fellow Republicans, Rep. Elise Stefanik voted against the Covid relief package this week, saying the plan was “filled with pork project, special interest giveaways, and the far left’s policy wish list.”

Including one project in her district.

Because of the closed border during the pandemic, the company that keeps the Massena bridge that crosses the St. Lawrence Seaway operating was losing over $100,000 a month in revenues from lost tolls. The funding from Congress was supposed to keep the maintenance going on the bridge.

The request for funds was first requested under the Trump administration and approved by his transportation department. But this week, Republican leaders said the funds for the bridge were unnecessary.

One tweet ridiculed the request as “$1.5 million to build Chuck Schumer’s bridge.”

Actually, since the bridge is in the 21st Congressional District, it was Elise Stefanik’s bridge.

After Republicans brought attention to the funds to maintain the bridge, it was taken out of the Covid relief bill.

I guess credit should be given to Rep. Stefanik for that.

APSE honors

The pandemic may have halted sports, but it didn’t stop Greg Brownell and his sports folks from telling stories.

They were named finalists in four different categories by the Associated Press Sports Editors this week. This is a national journalism contest and the competition is fierce. 

Greg was part of three of the entries.

Greg, Will Springstead and MIchael Goot (news reporter) were part of a March entry “Local sports go dark” that chronicled the impact of shutting down the sports seasons.

In August, Springstead and Pete Tobey looked took a closer look at one school’s and how its athletes might deal with no sports in the fall. That story was a finalist in the short feature category.

Greg was a finalist in two more categories - explanatory reporting and long feature. The value of having veteran journalists on your staff is the institutional knowledge they bring to the table. In this case.

For the explanatory reporting,  Greg took readers back 10 years to Jimmer Fredette’s return for the Hometown Classic and BYU’s game against Vermont and interviewed all the those involved.

For the long feature category, Greg took readers back to the Salem girls soccer team from 2008 to tell the story about how a loss championship games effected each member of the team.

This are the stories that great community newspapers like The Post-Star tell. It is great to see Greg and his staff honored nationally.