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This belongs to you. Take it back...
Member Items 
Sat Feb 28, 2009 at 09:49:23 AM EST
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Member items, basically money handed to municipalities and organizations on the say-so of legislators, have been an ugly spot in New York State for a long long time. We've seen the majority parties in both houses outspend their minority brethren, using pots of money to help seal their reputation for bringing pork to their districts.
While it is, I think, a corrupt system, and the Senate Republicans played it for all it was worth, Democrats seem to have fumbled an opportunity to end it with style. This morning's Ithaca Journal carries a story about local local member item losses, with a list of specifics, that's just guaranteed to make the Democrats look bad. Turning the mike over to one of my least-favorite State Senators:
"The reason why it's partisan is because the only people impacted are Senate Republicans," Winner said. "And while there is technically Democrat money that was swept up, (state Assembly Speaker Sheldon) Silver has significant reserves to cover (them)."...
"In the deficit reduction package that was just passed, (Democrats) swept the member-item account of any cash," Winner said.
And, of course, on the Assembly side, there is no local damage:
State Assemblywoman Barbara Lifton, D-125th Dist., said none of her $200,000 of member items is in jeopardy....
"There is politics with member items. There always has been," she said.
Now I know there's precedent for this - Republican Senators stripped member items Nancy Larraine Hoffman had promised after Democrat Dave Valesky defeated her. Precedent, though, doesn't make it look any better. "Just as ugly as the Republicans" is not a good campaign slogan.
The local impact is real, and well-worth complaining about. Pulling another quote from a politician I'm happy to say is retiring in March:
"We had a signed contract with the state of New York for $20,000 for the generator. The voucher has been sitting up in Albany since November. Then I got a letter from Sen. Seward on Jan. 29 saying the governor killed the grant," said [Village of Dryden] Mayor Reba Taylor, a Republican.
"As far as we're concerned it's a done deal. Now the governor has said 'No, we're not going to pay for it," she said.
I know it's a rough year, and I'm not at all surprised when Albany politicians act like power is all that matters. But this is counter-productive, basically rubbing people's faces in it by pulling funding already agreed to. People, even Democrats, will get even more disgusted with Albany because of this.
Yes, let's fix member items. Let's abolish them as a separate category, or set fixed amounts per legislator. Let's not use them for a power play when times are already looking bleak.
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Tue Oct 21, 2008 at 15:09:35 PM EDT
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(Fighting back. I love it. - promoted by phillip anderson)
Cross-posted from my blog, Left of the Hudson.
As many people who read TAP know, "member items," or these personal pork-barrel slush funds used by the majority parties in the State Senate and Assembly, are a very big problem. They're something that many of us want cleaned up as soon as we establish a Democratic majority in the State Senate.
However, we also must be reminded that our State representatives are using these funds to insure their incumbency, making it harder to defeat on November 4. One of the most cynical uses of using these public funds for campaigning purposes is the "Halloween safety" flyers distributed in our school districts. These flyers are campaign flyers masquerading as public-service announcements. They use public assets and our children as campaign tools.
In my Senate district (SD-38), I am challenging the legality of GOP State Senator Thomas P. Morahan's distribution of these flyers. And today, I started with my campaign, by sending the e-mail (below) to the Superintendent of Nyack Public Schools. If you live in a Republican Senate district, you're likely getting similar flyers sent home with your children. I urge you to send similar letters to your local school superintendents.
Read on:
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Mon May 05, 2008 at 18:15:17 PM EDT
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(Again, my thanks to Bill Mahoney of NYPIRG who compiled this information and sent several Excel files to me regarding Assembly and Senate member items. I greatly appreciate it.)
As we have seen with the Assembly, the allocation of member items is a rich business. Members of the Assembly, especially those with the Democratic majority, enjoy a great advantage in pork barrel spending. The same can be said of the majority in the New York State Senate.
This spreadsheet gives you the breakdown of member items among all state senators for 2007. The total amount for these member items is $85,900,387.00. That works out to $1,385,490.11 per senator.
The Republicans enjoyed a clear advantage, just as their Democratic counterparts in the Assembly do as members of the majority. The average total in member items for Republican senators is $2,324,745.06 while the average among Democratic senators is $296,251.61.
The Pork King of the Senate is none other than Senate Majority Leader Joseph Bruno. Bruno will have $4,211,000.00 in member items distributed to his district (and others, I'm sure) this fiscal year.
The Democrats top ranked Pork King is Sen. Carl Kruger, who will have $850,000 in member items for fiscal year 2008-09. Kruger came in 34th overall among "porkers," with the top 33 spots occupied by Republicans.
Here is a list of the top five Senate "Kings of Pork."
| Legislator |
Total Amount Of Member Items |
| Joseph Bruno |
$4,211,000.00 |
| Dean Skelos |
$3,740,000.00 |
| Tom Libous |
$3,497,000.00 |
| Owen Johnson |
$3,275,500.00 |
| Joe Robach |
$2,550,000.00 |
To see the spreadsheet, click here.
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Mon May 05, 2008 at 15:59:41 PM EDT
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(My great thanks to Bill Mahoney, the Legislative Operations and Research Director at the New York Public Interest Research Group for supplying me with the spreadsheets and his work on this. The information provided in these spreadsheets is invaluable.)
The New York State Assembly member items for 2008-09 show us that the huge Democratic majority is alive and well and that a certain Speaker of said Assembly is reaping the rewards of his post.
This spreadsheet shows you the breakdown of Assembly member items for this fiscal year. But this spreadsheet shows you the party breakdown of where these member items are going.
In all, Assembly Democrats used $57,356,822.00 to fund their member items, averaging out to over $541,000 per Democratic assemblymember. Assembly Republicans have allocated $4,875,000.00 for member items this fiscal year, averaging out to over $121,000 per Republican assemblymember.
Assembly Speaker Sheldon Silver is the Assembly's King of Pork. He has over $3 million allocated for member items.
The top five assemblymembers who are bringing home the bacon are:
| Legislator |
Total Amount Of Member Items |
| Sheldon Silver |
$3,020,000.00 |
| Robin Schimminger |
$2,227,500.00 |
| Susan John |
$2,141,800.00 |
| Bill Scarborough |
$1,602,891.00 |
| Bill Magnarelli |
$1,035,000.00 |
One thing pointed out to me by Bill Mahoney of NYPIRG is that not all member items are indicated in those totals because not all member items are given by individual legislators. Some member items are given jointly by multiple legislators, so while it is not a true representation of how much in member items were given by individual legislators, it provides you with the necessary information to know who received the most and who is bringing home the bacon.
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Thu Feb 28, 2008 at 12:25:36 PM EST
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How long do you think it will take for Bruno to cancel member item funding to the 48th or do you think he's done so already?
I'm sure you remember how he did just that to SD-35, even cutting off funding for the Westchester SPCA after Andrea Stewart-Cousins defeated Nick Spano in '06. He did to SD-7 after Craig Johnson won a special last year.
How long before he punishes the North Country voters who have, in his words, "been taking a Republican majority for granted"? Or has he already pulled it?
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Fri Oct 19, 2007 at 10:18:20 AM EDT
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Am I the only one who remembers this?
Senate Republicans Lose Seat, Take Their Pork And Go Home
In a press release issued yesterday, Stewart-Cousins said she was "shocked and outraged" to hear Senate Republicans are pulling member item, or "pork" funding for non-profits promised by Spano.
In a Dec. 18 Journal News story by political reporter Glenn Blain, Spano said some organizations already were being informed they would lose promised funds. One such organization to acknowledge its funding had been pulled is the SPCA of Westchester.
I can't seem to remember Jim Tedisco howling about unfair it was that Uncle Joe pulled all those member item dollars from a district that dared to send one of his caucus members packing.
That said, the entire "member items" racket is a sham. It's a mess and it desperately needs to be reformed. This has got to be the stupidest and most corruptible way to fund what are often very worthy projects.
Don't believe me? Check out these numbers from this morning's Albany Times Union showing the amount of unspent member item money from past budgets:
Senate Republicans: $37.2 million
Senate Democrats: $2.2 million
Assembly Democrats: $94.2 million
Assembly Republicans: $2.1 million
Notice anything out of whack there? The system is a sham. Hell, the TU had to sue just to find out who was getting money and who was giving it to them.
Oh, and put a sock in it, Jim, and knock off the whole "I'm shocked!" bit when the corrupt system you've helped perpetuate turns around and bites you in the ass.
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Fri Apr 20, 2007 at 17:24:31 PM EDT
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The State Senate has finally released their member items. You can get the huge pdf file here
This took WAY too long. But, at least we did not have to have a newspaper bring a lawsuit to have access to it at all, like last year.
Hopefully, someone will convert this to a more usable (i.e., spreadsheet) version soon, I will post that when it happens. Meantime, have a look-see in this version if you are interested.
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Mon Jan 22, 2007 at 16:01:41 PM EST
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Not by the USDA, but by the NYAG.
Capitol Confidential is reporting that Attorney General Andrew Cuomo is introducing a new procedure that will shed some badly needed light on just how "member items" are allocated in our state legislature.
Certified Pork
Attorney General Andrew Cuomo is unveiling today a new procedure through which recipients of member items - a.k.a. legislative pork - will have to disclose "any potential conflict of interest and financial relationship with sponsoring members or their staff."
The certification will also have to include the "public purpose" that the money will be used for.
Here's all the legal language.
I'm particularly interested in the "any potential conflict of interest and financial relationship with sponsoring members or their staff" part. That should be interesting...
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Fri Jan 19, 2007 at 02:39:37 AM EST
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Ben Smith's anonymous super data dude has done it again. He's created a super spreadsheet with all the Senate and Assembly pork (member items grants) compiled into one, huge file with the grants broken down by zip code.
How cool is that? So, being who we are and what we do, we have it right here for your downloading enjoyment.
Have at it. Next step? A GIS mapping of the grants?
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Fri Jan 12, 2007 at 14:08:21 PM EST
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(Nice Sleuthin' - promoted by lipris)
Thanks to the timesledger.com, (registration required) Boro Dems' pork money bank no match for GOP apparently the Democrats had released their member item reports but on paper, and for whatever reason, those reports weren't scanned in as part of the Community Projects Funds Reports prior to this year. The two spokesmen each blamed the other's party last week for the failure to post online Democratic member items for the three years prior to the 2006 fiscal year even though Republican items for those years were available. That is why the data used for the graph posted earlier this week was missing the 05-06 Democratic member item numbers. That being said, you can look at the graph, double the length of the blue lines (to approximate the 05-06 Dem member items), and it still doesn't change the picture much. Surprising, the majority spokesman doesn't blame a "computer glitch" this time, but the Dems: (my emphases)
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Tue Jan 09, 2007 at 23:41:34 PM EST
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Here's a graphic depiction of the Member Item allocation for 2005-2006 by Senate District (number on the left). The Red bars are Republican (majority) and the blue are Democratic (minority).
Update: Member Items for 2005-2006 and 2006-2007.
Nothing political about this process at all. The longer red bars are the real Bruno ring kissers.
hat tip robinia
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Thu Dec 14, 2006 at 00:40:56 AM EST
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Is it just me, or is there something wrong with this transaction? You be the Judge.
Among the thousands of member items listed in the Senate's Community Project Fund, labeled as Round 1 of '06/'07, is one that Senator Seward secured for purposes of replacing and improving sidewalks in a town in his sprawling 51st District.
This particular member item of $25,000 went to the Town of Oneonta, with the form showing Town Supervisor, Duncan Davie, under the "Program Contact Information" heading. This same Duncan Davie also serves as Senator Seward's Chief of Staff. Please express your opinion in the following poll:
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Wed Dec 13, 2006 at 18:56:06 PM EST
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Okay, let's get to the straight reporting, courtsey of James Odato at the Times Union.
 ALBANY -- State Sen. Efrain Gonzalez, D-Bronx, was indicted today for allegedly stealing member item money he directed to a nonprofit organization in his district.
Manhattan-based U.S. Attorney for the Southern District Michael Garcia claimed that the member item money -- more than $420,000 over six years -- ended up being used by Gonzalez on homes in the Dominican Republic and other personal expenses. Member items are discretionary funds in the state that lawmakers and the governor send to groups and organizations they feel are deserving.
Gonzalez and three of his ``criminal associates'' engaged in mail fraud, wire fraud, theft of federal funds, conspiracy, and money laundering, the indictment alleges.
This is bad news for all New Yorkers. Let me explain after the flip.
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