Congressman Ritchie Torres introduced a bill that would allow the Department of Education to impose a “third-party antisemitism monitor” for any institution of higher education that receives federal funding.

Torres coined the legislation the COLUMBIA act — Columbia being an acronym for College Oversight and Legal Updates Mandating Bias Investigations and Accountability Act.

AMHERST, N.Y. — Whether it's to stay active or enjoy a good meal, seniors like 79-year-old Mary Strefeler have been going to the Amherst Senior Center in Erie County for years.

"It's more for socialization, meeting up with people [and] discussions around the lunch table," said Strefeler.

New York Gov. Kathy Hochul has nominated former state Assemblyman Walter Mosley to serve as the next secretary of state, the governor announced Wednesday.

Mosley would replace Robert Rodriguez, who is leaving the office on May 8 to begin a new role as acting president and chief executive officer of the state Dormitory Authority.

The families of Flight 3407 are applauding members of the U.S. House and Senate on presenting a new bipartisan FAA re-authorization bill.

The flight crashed on Feb. 12, 2009, in Clarence Center, just outside of Buffalo. All 49 people on the plane were killed. There was one casualty on the ground.

BUFFALO, N.Y. — Democratic state Sen. Timothy Kennedy won a special election Tuesday for the New York congressional seat vacated by Democrat Brian Higgins.

Kennedy easily defeated Republican Gary Dickson for the upstate New York seat, helped by a 2-to-1 Democratic registration advantage in the district, which includes Buffalo, Niagara Falls and several suburbs.

Tuesday is the special election for the seat representing New York's 26th Congressional District in the U.S. House of Representatives. It includes parts of Erie and Niagara counties and the cities of Buffalo, Lackawanna, Niagara Falls, Tonawanda and North Tonawanda.

The early voting period ended on Sunday. Nearly 11,000 votes were cast from April 20-28.

Many of New York state’s mayors are celebrating a bump in state funding for their municipalities in the state budget.

AIM, or aid and incentives for municipalities, will see a $50 million boost in unrestricted funding for cities, the first in 15 years.

Votes were being cast Tuesday in a special election to fill New York’s open 26th Congressional District in and around Buffalo. The seat had been held by Brian Higgins for 19 years until he stepped down in February to become president and CEO of Shea’s Performing Arts Center in Buffalo.

Democratic state Sen. Tim Kennedy and Republican Gary Dickson are running in Tuesday's special election, which is not considered competitive by the Cook Political Report, which rates the seat a "Solid D" district with a Cook partisan voting index of D+10.

The New York state Department of Agriculture and Markets and Office of Temporary and Disability Services (OTDA), unveiled a $1.1 million funding injection for two vital Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program’s Nutrition Education and Obesity Prevention (SNAP-Ed) grant schemes.

The grants, geared toward bolstering access to fresh, affordable foods in marginalized communities across New York state, is designed to reinforce the state’s commitment to combating food insecurity and supporting its agricultural industry.

The New York hush money trial against Donald Trump is underway, the first criminal case against a former president in U.S. history.

Trump faces 34 charges of falsifying business records around purported efforts to cover up his alleged infidelity with an adult film actress during his 2016 presidential campaign. The former president has pleaded not guilty and denied any wrongdoing.

Mark Grisanti, a judge on the New York Court of Claims who is also an acting justice of the state Supreme Court, will not be removed from the bench following a confrontation between Buffalo officers back in 2020.

The state Commission on Judicial Conduct recommended in a 6-4 vote that Grisanti be censured.

A court ruling will allow former Rochester Mayor Lovely Warren to stay on the primary ballot for the office of Rochester City Court judge.

Paperwork from Monroe County Supreme Court shows a suit was filed by Democrat and local attorney Michael Geraci, who is also running for the city court judge seat, when Warren appeared on both petitions for city judge and also a party committee seat. The documents say Warren's name was penciled in without her consent for the latter position by another person in the party and the judge ordered that petition be struck.

Monroe County District Attorney Sandra Doorley has issued an apology, saying she is taking "full responsibility" for her conduct during a traffic stop last week that was caught on camera. The incident prompted Gov. Kathy Hochul on Monday to refer the case to the Commission on Prosecutorial Conduct.

Lawmakers from across Rochester and Monroe County have been calling for investigations after the town of Webster on Friday released body camera footage showing Doorley being uncooperative as an officer pulled her over on April 22.

Testimony is set to resume Tuesday in the Manhattan criminal hush money prosecution of former President Donald Trump.

Trump's defense team includes lead attorney Todd Blanche.

As state lawmakers weigh ideas to aid New York's struggling health care workforce, physical therapists across the state want the Legislature to consider their solution to ease the burden — though it will be a tall order to convince policymakers before session ends in five weeks.

Members of the state chapter of the American Physical Therapy Association met with state lawmakers about legislation last week that pertain to physical therapy care. At the top of their list is a bill to end restrictions on how long they can treat a patient without a referral.

The New York State Police have traveled an especially bumpy road over the past couple of years. In 2022, then-Superintendent Kevin Bruen stepped down after Gov. Kathy Hochul’s office began investigating allegations of his handling of workplace complaints.

The following year, a separate investigation was launched into Bruen’s acting successor about whether he mistreated employees. Steve Nigrelli denied the allegations, but opted to retire because the governor had informed him he was no longer in the running for the permanent superintendent position.

ROCHESTER, N.Y. -- New York State's Commission on Prosecutorial Conduct is an idea more than a decade in the making.

Finally passed in 2018, a lawsuit led to an updated bill approved in 2021, allowing the commission to move forward. Russell Neufeld, of Accountability NY, an oversight advocacy group, said it's almost fully realized.

BUFFALO, N.Y. -- Non-competes are clauses in employment contracts meant to stop employees from working for or starting with competing companies within outlined geographic and time limits.

Hodgson Russ litigation partner Jody Galvin said the agreements are traditionally legislated by states.

President Joe Biden signed a bill last week that could lead to a ban of TikTok nationwide.

While the potential of a TikTok ban is still a little way’s away, small business owners are concerned that banning the app could negatively impact their businesses.

In a letter, House Democratic Leader Hakeem Jeffries, D-N.Y., urged his counterpart in the chamber’s Republican majority, Speaker Mike Johnson, R-La., to put a bipartisan bill aimed at fighting antisemitism up for a vote.

Earlier this month, a bipartisan group of House and Senate lawmakers — Sens. Jacky Rosen, D-Nev., and James Lankford, R-Okla., and Reps. Kathy Manning, D-N.C., Chris Smith, R-N.J., and Brian Fitzpatrick, R-Pa. — introduced the Bipartisan Countering Antisemitism Act, a bill that would establish a National Coordinator to Counter Antisemitism within the White House.

We’re only a couple of months away from swimming pools and lakes opening for the season. But for cities across upstate, a shortage of lifeguards continues to be a challenge.

It’s been an unfortunate but familiar sign across many city and county parks: Lifeguard shortages are forcing pools to be closed — some for the entire summer.

New York's newly minted budget commits $10 million to train thousands of teachers in literary science to revamp their reading instruction strategies as the state's literacy rates suffer — plummeting nationwide since the COVID-19 pandemic.

State leaders are taking action to ensure teachers will help elementary schoolers become skilled readers after state Education Department data shows only about half of New York students scored "proficient" in English Language Arts exams last year.

Once again, the NY HEAT Act did not make the state budget. The bill is at the very top of environmentalists’ priorities.

The NY HEAT Act would align utility regulations with the state’s emissions reduction targets and remove a residential customer’s legal entitlement to utility gas services, but maintain the entitlement for electric service.

Renewable energy projects in New York have been taking more than three years to receive siting permits due to application delays, according to an audit released Thursday by state Comptroller Tom DiNapoli's office.

The audit of the Office of Renewable Energy Siting (ORES), which was created in 2020, found permit applications were often delayed due to missing or insufficient documentation.

New York can move ahead with a law requiring internet service providers to offer heavily discounted rates to low-income residents, a federal appeals court ruled Friday.

The decision from the 2nd U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in Manhattan reverses a lower court ruling from 2021 that blocked the policy just days before it went into effect.

The New York state Child Care Availability Task Force released its latest report Friday highlighting progress and initiatives that it says has enhanced child care services in the state.

The report comes after the state budget recently passed by the New York Legislature that continues the ongoing four-year $7 billion investment to expand access to affordable child care and invest the child care workforce.

A bipartisan pair of lawmakers from New York introduced legislation Friday to impose antisemitism monitors on college and university campuses that receive federal funding.

U.S. Rep. Ritchie Torres, D-N.Y., and Rep. Mike Lawler, R-N.Y., introduced the bill as demonstrations by thousands of pro-Palestinian protesters disrupt college campuses across the country.

Shannon Thomas thought he was in trouble when he got a call from his manager Monday night.

He wasn’t.

Utica University professor Clemmie Harris is ending his campaign for the Democratic nomination in the race for New York's 22nd Congressional District.

Harris wrote on X, formerly known as Twitter, said the move was a result of a dispute over ballot signature requirements with another candidate, DeWitt Town Councilor Sarah Klee Hood.

This week, tensions have risen at Columbia University as students continue protesting the Israel-Hamas War. Negotiations between students and faculty to dismantle the encampment that students have set up on campus have been ongoing. Meanwhile, on Wednesday, House Republicans joined Speaker Mike Johnson on campus to call for the resignation of Columbia University’s president, Minoushe Shafik. All this, as faculty and students of the university senate are expected to vote to censure Shafik. NY1 investigative reporter Courtney Gross and political reporters Bobby Cuza and Kelly Mena weigh in on the campus protests and how the NYPD and city have reacted to them.

After that, Mayor Eric Adams released his executive budget on Wednesday, which included restorations of cuts made to the NYPD but did not include restored library funds. Many city lawmakers pushed back and said the Adams administration’s budget announced months ago had too many unnecessary cuts, and library advocates warn these cuts will lead to reduced service. The “Off Topic” team discusses the budgeting dance between City Council and Adams, and what this means for libraries going forward.

New York lawmakers said they will prioritize enhancing the state's consumer protection laws before session ends after the bolstered law Gov. Kathy Hochul originally wanted in the budget didn't make the final $237 billion spending plan.

With the state budget completed last weekend, lawmakers are working on items they can campaign on back home before November's critical elections.

Former tabloid publisher David Pecker resumed his third day of testimony Thursday. Pecker faced questions from prosecutors over what they say was a conspiracy with Trump and his longtime lawyer and fixer Michael Cohen to help Trump's presidential bid by killing unfavorable stories about him.

Also, for the first day, Pecker was cross-examined by Trump's legal team.

Landlords of rent-stabilized apartments in New York City are saying this year’s budget was a lost opportunity.

Jay Martin, executive director of CHIP-NYC, the Community Housing Improvement Program, which represents the owners of New York City’s 400,000 rent-stabilized rental properties, told Capital Tonight’s Susan Arbetter that the math doesn’t add up.

BUFFALO, N.Y. -- New York state has already announced its Empire AI Consortium, named the University at Buffalo as the program's hub and even secured private contributions.

However, UB Vice President of Research and Economic Development Venu Govindaraju said it wasn't until lawmakers passed the budget over the weekend, including $250 million for the initiative, that it officially became a reality.

President Joe Biden traveled to Syracuse, N.Y., on Thursday -- home of his law school alma mater, Syracuse University -- to announce $6.1 billion in federal funding for Micron Technology to boost the production of advanced memory computer chips.

Biden hailed the CHIPS and Science Act -- a 2022 bill championed by Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer, D-N.Y., that aims to boost domestic manufacturing -- for luring Micron to Central New York, where the company, the president said, plans "to build the biggest semiconductor manufacturing site in all of America.”

For the second time in a year and a half, President Joe Biden visited Syracuse on Thursday to tout Micron's coming investment in the region, this time announcing a preliminary agreement between the Department of Commerce and Micron to provide up to $6.14 billion in direct funding to support both Micron’s new semiconductor plant in the town of Clay, as well as another fab in Boise, Idaho.

Biden's visit also coincides with the announcement that Syracuse has been named as one of four “Investing in America Work Hubs.” The others being Milwaukee, Philadelphia and Michigan. It comes after a first round of hubs were designated by the White House, including centers in Phoenix, Arizona, and Columbus, Ohio, that focus on semiconductor training.

An increase in teen depression and mental health disorders over the last decade has largely been attributed to the widespread adoption of the smartphone by adolescents. Parents are obsessively worrying about screen time and the effects it could have on their children.

One such parent is Zephyr Teachout, attorney, author, political candidate and associate professor of law at Fordham University. Teachout joined NY1’s Errol Louis to discuss the dangerous and addictive content teens are being fed by social media platforms. They also talked about the government’s role in regulation, the status of the TikTok ban and how the algorithm preys on children’s weaknesses.

As school districts begin to prepare their budgets, they now have a better idea of what they are preparing for.

Questions surrounding foundation aid clouded much of the first part of the year and raised questions about if districts would see their funding levels drop.

A TikTok video put Abbey Kowalec and her business on the map.

“I find that when someone reaches out to me, the first thing they say is, ‘Oh, I found you on TikTok,’” Kowalec said. “I would say 70 to 80% of my customer base comes from TikTok.”

More than three years into President Joe Biden’s term, White House National Climate Advisor Ali Zaidi says the administration has made “historic progress at a massive scale” in combating global warming.

“But,” he continued, “there's still a lot of work to be done.”

This week, former President Donald Trump’s fate is on the docket in two separate courtrooms: The hush money case in New York City continues. Plus, arguments regarding Trump’s claim of absolute immunity from prosecution take place Thursday before the U.S. Supreme Court.

Separately, a critically important case called Roman Catholic Diocese of Albany v. Vullo, dealing with the mandatory coverage of abortion, was argued earlier this month in New York’s highest court.

Mayor Eric Adams insists that things are looking up.

“The city is not coming back folks. The city is back,” Adams said Wednesday.

BUFFALO, N.Y. -- In a Siena College poll released this week, 66% of New York voters who answered the survey said they support requiring high school athletes can only compete against others of the gender they were assigned at birth.

While 83% of Republicans and 77% of independent voters support the idea, even a slight majority of Democrats are in favor.

President Joe Biden is making his second trip to Syracuse in less than two years on Thursday. This comes after the recent announcement that Micron will receive $6.1 billion in federal funding through the CHIPS and Science Act.

The last time Biden visited Syracuse, he came to Onondaga Community College (OCC). A professor discussed the memory chips Micron will produce, and how OCC is growing a pipeline of workers to build them.

Abortion rights activists aren't pleased with New York's budget that passed over the weekend — saying Wednesday the $237 billion spending plan will not assist health care providers experiencing large gaps to cover medication abortions for Medicaid patients.

Reproductive rights continue to be a national conversation after the U.S. Supreme Court heard arguments Wednesday on an Idaho abortion ban and nearly two years after the overturning of Roe v. Wade.

New York’s mental health court system will soon see an extra $33 million investment for treatment services, as part of the newly minted $237 billion budget.

“[I] just took a tour of former cells, holding centers, that are now going to be turned into rooms of healing where we can address people and help them get on a healthy path towards recovery,” Gov. Kathy Hochul said at the Midtown Community Justice Center on Wednesday.

ORCHARD PARK, N.Y. — In celebration of Earth Week, the New York State Commissioner of Agriculture visited Western New York to announce the availability of grant funds for climate-resilient farming.

Commissioner Richard Bell announced that $28.75 million is being made available to farmers through the Climate Resilient Farming Grant for 2024. He announced the Providence Farm Collective in Orchard Park.

A coalition of attorneys general led by New York's Letitia James is calling on Congress to expand access to in vitro fertilization and other reproductive health services.

The group wants lawmakers to pass the Access to Family Building Act.

New York local government sales tax collections increased 1.6%, totaling $5.6 billion, in the first quarter of 2024 compared to the same period last year, state Comptroller Tom DiNapoli’s office said Wednesday.

It is the lowest rate of growth in the first quarter since 2021, the comptroller added.

President Joe Biden has pardoned a Capital Region resident and commuted the sentence of a Hudson Valley resident who were sentenced for drug-related offenses.

The White House announced that Stacy Lynn Wilder, 49 of Albany, was pardoned after serving a sentence for a non-violent drug offense. Margaret Ann Vandyke of Ellenville saw her sentence for conspiracy to possess with intent to distribute crack cocaine and fentanyl commuted to end in late August.

Public sector union advocates pushing for state pension reform saw a victory in this year's state budget.

They say previous reforms that took place in 2012 under then-Governor Andrew Cuomo gutted some of the benefits that attract people to public service in the first place. This budget cycle, they achieved part of a push to make benefits for Tier 6 employees, hired after those reforms, look more like those hired as part of Tier 4.

A new poll from the nonprofit No Kid Hungry New York details that 79% of New Yorkers across the state are saying it had become harder to afford groceries over the past year, a rise from the year before.

Rachel Sabella, the director of the New York branch, joined NY1 political reporter Ayana Harry on “Inside City Hall” Tuesday to break down the results, including a focus on New York City households.

Gov. Kathy Hochul delivered a big public thank you to labor leaders Tuesday for their help getting her controversial — and at times seemingly elusive — housing package over the finish line.

“I will tell you, it also helped to have labor on our side,” Hochul said Tuesday during a rally at Service Employees International Union 32BJ’s headquarters on West 18th Street.

More than 600,000 children are abused in the U.S. each year, according to the National Children's Alliance.

In New York, child advocacy centers investigated more than 1,000 cases of child abuse in 2023. Of those, there were more than 700 alleged offenders and almost 50 arrests.

One sheriff’s deputy and one police officer were killed in a single incident in near the city of Syracuse last week.

A third police officer was shot and killed in New York City during a routine traffic stop in late March.

All 435 seats in the United States House of Representatives are up for reelection in November, including the 26 in New York. Spectrum News political reporters will be providing updates throughout the campaign season on New York's congressional races.

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Former Rep. George Santos has ended his short-lived run to get back into the U.S. House of Representatives, he announced on social media Tuesday evening.

Santos, who was expelled from the House in December, wrote in a post on X, formerly known as Twitter, that he is dropping out of the race because he does not want to “be responsible for handing the house” to the Democrats.

BUFFALO, N.Y. -- As the nation follows closely former President Donald Trump's hush money trial in Manhattan, details of what happened in the courtroom will have to come from reporters and others on site.

With the exception of pool photos taken of the former president last week before the trial began in earnest, cameras and audio recorders are not allowed in court.

You can find over-the-counter dietary pills and supplements at grocery and big-box stores all over New York state. But a new law is trying to limit their reach to the youngest demographic.

A law that goes into effect on Monday bans the sale of the supplements to anyone under the age of 18. Experts say they are underregulated and could have harmful health effects on kids.

ROCHESTER, N.Y. — There is growing concern by some artificial intelligence experts that AI-generated deepfakes could impact the 2024 presidential election campaign. It’s a complicated issue, but there are ways to detect whether what you’re seeing is fake.

It doesn’t take long for Kelly Wu to find something that’s just not right.

New York state’s budget for the 2025 fiscal year was passed over the weekend. It came after weeks of debate among legislative leaders and Gov. Kathy Hochul, negotiations largely focused on a deal to address the state’s housing crisis.

Coming in just shy of three weeks late, it was by all accounts a largely collegial process, but it has left many to wonder why a late budget in New York seems to surprise very few.

Former President Donald Trump returned to court Monday for the start of the second week of proceedings and opening statements.

He is being charged with 34 felony counts of falsifying business records in New York.

Gov. Kathy Hochul visited small businesses and educational facilities on Monday, celebrating what she calls wins in her recently passed a $237 billion state budget.

The legislature passed the state budget over the weekend, and the governor quickly signed it into law.

As Donald Trump's criminal trial connected to alleged hush money he paid to former adult film star Stormy Daniels begins in earnest Monday morning, a majority of New York voters believe the trial is "legitimate," according to a new Siena College poll.

Among registered voters polled, 60% said they are paying attention to the court proceedings in which the former president and current expected Republican nominee is accused of falsifying business records. Fifty-four percent said the trial is "legitimate" as opposed to 30% who believe it is a "witch hunt."

On the surface, the housing deal in the enacted state budget includes many of the provisions that activists had fought for, including elements of the Good Cause Eviction bill and union wages for construction workers.

It also includes a new tax incentive for New York City developers and incentives to convert unused office space into affordable housing.

There will be new temporary import requirements for dairy cattle coming to New York after detections of Highly Pathogenic Avian Influenza, more commonly known as bird flu, in dairy cattle and goats in several other states, the state Department of Agriculture and Markets announced Monday.

The regulations include:

New York state lawyers and an attorney for former President Donald Trump settled their differences Monday over a $175 million bond that Trump posted to block a large civil fraud judgment while he pursues appeals.

The agreement cut short a potential day-long court hearing in Manhattan that was to feature witnesses.

President Joe Biden will visit Central New York on Thursday on the heels of an announcement of funding for Micron, Spectrum News 1 learned Monday.

The president will visit Syracuse to discuss the economic impact of the CHIPS and Science Act, the White House said. The exact details of his visit have not been released.

Over the weekend, state legislators passed a $237 billion budget. As usual, the big story isn’t the budget itself—it’s all of the policy decisions that were rolled into it, sometimes as a result of last-minute negotiations. NY1 anchor Pat Kiernan breaks down some of the highlights.

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Gov. Kathy Hochul has signed off on major parts of policy in the $237 billion state budget.

Both the New York state Senate and Assembly had approved the budget earlier Saturday, which was nearly three weeks overdue.

Weihua Yan had seen dramatic demographic changes since moving to Long Island’s Nassau County.

Its Asian American population alone had grown by 60% since the 2010 census. Why then, he wondered, did he not see anyone who looked like him on the county’s local governing body, the 19-member Nassau County Legislature?

Increases to the state's disability benefits cap were removed from New York's $237 billion budget during negotiations to the dismay of lawmakers.

Workers in New York who need short-term disability can receive a maximum benefit of $170 per week, which hasn't changed in 35 years, or since 1989.

As lawmakers vote on the remaining budget bills, the Fiscal Policy Institute’s Nathan Gusdorf joined Capital Tonight to share an early analysis of the budget that will be in place for the next fiscal year.

With the budget process seemingly wrapping up, lawmakers are beginning to reflect on what was accomplished and what is still left to do.

While Democrats control both houses of the state Legislature and the governor’s mansion, this year’s budget process demonstrated that there is enough differences among those lawmakers to hold up the process for nearly three weeks.

A new analysis from the Alliance for the Great Lakes found that over two decades, nearly 90% of the litter collected from the beaches was composed of plastic.

Environmentalists have been sounding the alarm about plastic pollution in the environment for years and in New York, they are pushing for legislation on the issue.

BUFFALO, N.Y. -– Tesla plans to layoff 285 employees in Buffalo, the vast majority of which work at its South Buffalo gigafactory.

Empire Center for Public Policy Research Director Ken Girardin is not surprised.

A law created to prevent Indian Point manager Holtec from dumping nuclear wastewater into the Hudson River is at the center of a lawsuit filed by Holtec against New York state.

The environmental advocacy group Riverkeeper fought to get the Save The Hudson act signed last year.

Illegal cannabis shops and their landlords are set to face harsher enforcement and steeper fines under measures included in the state budget, Gov. Kathy Hochul said Friday.

A five-point plan Hochul unveiled alongside Mayor Eric Adams in Manhattan will give the state’s Office of Cannabis Management and local authorities the power to padlock illegal shops.

Twelve jurors tasked with deciding the outcome of former President Donald Trump’s hush money trial have been seated. The panel consists of seven men and five women.

Trump is facing 34 charges related to the alleged falsification of business records in connection with efforts to conceal an alleged affair during his 2016 presidential campaign. Trump has pleaded not guilty to the charges and denied the affair.

BUFFALO, N.Y. — New York's 26th Congressional District has been without a representative for more than two months.

When Democrat Brian Higgins stepped down in February to take over as president of Shea's Performing Arts Center in Buffalo, he said it was in fact Congress that had become more about dramatics then results. Both candidates who are vying to finish his term agree.

The November 2022 winter storm wreaked havoc on parts of Erie County. It also did major damage to many agricultural businesses.

Now, county lawmakers on both sides of the aisle have agreed they need to help these impacted growers.

Stakeholders in New York's cannabis industry are growing apart about how regulators must fix its dragging rollout as the state Office of Cannabis Management undergoes a state executive review.

The Cannabis Farmers Alliance on Wednesday blasted the Cannabis Association of New York in response to a letter that the organization sent to the Cannabis Control Board last week warning against the swift issuing of several more retail licenses. As part of its ongoing OCM review, the executive chamber is pressuring board members to expedite hundreds of retail licenses to defeat the state's thriving illicit market.

This week Gov. Kathy Hochul announced she finally “had the parameters of a conceptual agreement” for the $237 billion state budget, claiming that only minor details need to be negotiated. Some lawmakers said they were caught off guard by the announcement. NY1 investigative reporter Courtney Gross, statehouse reporter Bernadette Hogan and political reporter Bobby Cuza discuss the reaction on the legislative side to Hochul’s announcement, as well as the issue of what’s in and what's out of the deal. They also touch on the mysterious cyberattack that was directed at the New York State Bill Drafting Commission that may delay matters even further.

After that, the commotion surrounding Donald Trump moved uptown this week when the former president visited a Harlem bodega while here in Manhattan for his hush money trial. Why was Trump in Harlem? And will this trial serve as an extended campaign stop for the Republican presidential candidate? The "Off Topic" team weighs in on the latest twists and turns of Trump’s stay in the city.

After decades of what the state attorney general calls a mishandling of clergy sex abuse cases, the Roman Catholic Diocese of Brooklyn agreed to install an independent secular monitor.

“There are many people like me out there. We know that there are not hundreds, but thousands in the state of New York,” Stephen Jimenez, a survivor of clergy sex abuse, said.

New York's $237 billion budget is expected to include a pilot program in Western New York to make local mental health professionals the default response to incidents involving mental health issues or substance use instead of law enforcement.

State lawmakers have passed four of 10 budget bills, and continued Thursday night to conference the details of the program, which will likely be confined to the city of Rochester for the initial pilot.

New York Rep. Ritchie Torres is introducing legislation aimed at improving the federal government’s response to public health emergencies, citing shortcomings in how the feds handled an mpox outbreak two years ago.

Torres’s bill would require the Department of Health and Human Services to establish a department-wide strategy for after-action reviews of major health events, incorporating analysis from across the department’s various agencies, such as the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. The review should include people from outside the department.

Gov. Kathy Hochul celebrated what she’s calling the first of several victories in her $237 billion budget package, announcing that a majority of her retail theft proposal will make it into the final plan.

“A lot of critics said we couldn’t get it done, that we’d fall short, that it would be a watered-down version, but I’m here to say we got it done exactly the way we had hoped for, because it’s something I would not budge on,” Hochul said on Thursday from her Manhattan office.

Facing a possible $1 billion deficit over the next decade without additional support from New York state, this budget cycle presented high stakes questions for leaders of the State University of New York system.

That picture became clearer with state Senate Majority Leader Andrea Stewart Cousins telling reporters Thursday afternoon that the final budget is expected to include about $60 million in operating aid for SUNY. That’s $6 million more than what Gov. Kathy Hochul proposed in her executive budget.

Republican U.S. Rep. Claudia Tenney is teaming up with North Carolina Democratic Rep. Deborah Ross on a bill that aims to close a loophole in federal bankruptcy laws that impacts survivors of sexual abuse.

Tenney joined Capital Tonight on Thursday from Washington to discuss how the bill works and its chances of getting through the closely divided House of Representatives.

A New York man has pleaded guilty to sending death threats to the state attorney general and the Manhattan judge who presided over former President Donald Trump’s civil fraud case, prosecutors said Thursday.

Tyler Vogel, 26, of Lancaster, admitted to one felony count of making a terroristic threat and one misdemeanor count of making a threat of mass harm on Wednesday in state Supreme Court, according to Acting Erie County District Attorney Michael Keane’s office.

For more than eight years, Basil Seggos had led the state’s Department of Environmental Conservation, trying to help New York in its transition away from fossil fuels. Now leaving office, Seggos joined NY1’s Errol Louis to discuss New York’s pivotal 2019 climate law and his own tenure with two different governors. They also spoke about Seggos’ dramatic first day in office and his top priority for his successor.

Join the conversation, weigh in on Twitter using the hashtag #NY1YouDecide or give us a call at 212-379-3440 and leave a message. Or send an email to YourStoryNY1@charter.com.

Leaders in the state Office of Cannabis Management on Wednesday celebrated the opening of the state's 100th legal dispensary — putting on a brave face as the governor's office works to finish a review of the troubled department and needed changes to get New York's recreational marijuana industry off the ground.

State and local officials attended the grand opening of Big Gas Dispensary LLC in New Paltz, Ulster County, where emotions ran high.

Micron has agreed to a preliminary deal that would unlock more than $6 billion in federal funding toward its chip-manufacturing plans in Central New York and beyond, U.S. Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer announced Wednesday evening.

Schumer's office said the company has agreed to a $6.1 billion preliminary memorandum of terms, or a PMT funding agreement, covering its Micron project in Clay, near Syracuse, and one in Idaho.

Columbia University’s president and other school officials faced a grilling on Capitol Hill Wednesday over their handling of antisemitism on campus.

Officials acknowledged there is more work to do.

After announcing a conceptual agreement on the state budget earlier this week, Gov. Kathy Hochul said Wednesday that only minor details need to be negotiated.

Some lawmakers said they were caught off guard by the announcement of a deal. However, in an interview with NY1 political anchor Errol Louis on “Inside City Hall,” Hochul said she has done this type of agreement with her last two budgets.