Gov. Kathy Hochul spoke to New York state business leaders Friday about securing employment for asylum seekers, alluring businesses to New York and tackling large budget deficits in the years ahead.

Hochul addressed the Business Council of New York State at the group’s annual retreat in Bolton Landing on Lake George. It features meetings focused on issues impacting business in the state over the next decade or more.

New York farmers markets can apply for a share of $700,000 available through a second round of the Farmers' Market Resiliency Grant Program, state Agriculture Commissioner Richard Ball announced Friday.

The grant funding is aimed at helping farmers markets across the state make improvements to their enhancing infrastructure, online sales and delivery systems.

Erie County Executive Mark Poloncarz says this will be the last time he runs for his position.

Poloncarz, who is currently on the ballot for the upcoming November election, said he thought this current term would be his last. However, he says his plans have changed due to recent tragedies in the community.

Democratic officials in New York got a long-sought win Wednesday, with the White House granting Temporary Protected Status to many of the migrants who have surged into the city and state.

Officials say the decision will allow many asylum seekers to obtain work permits and soon.

Hundreds of state workers say they've had enough of perpetual bullying and abuse from their managers, and started an early legislative push Thursday to change state law and provoke a culture shift they say is decades overdue.

Hundreds of members of the state Public Employees Federation, or union that represents New York state employees, marched near the state Capitol and around the Empire State Plaza on Thursday calling for an end to a pervasive culture of workplace bullying and harassment.

New York state agencies are being ordered to freeze spending in their budget proposals for the next fiscal year as the state faces major budget gaps in the years ahead.

In a letter to agency commissioners Wednesday, New York state Budget Director Blake Washington Wednesday said budget requests should not exceed what was approved in this year's $229 billion budget. This is what's known as the annual "call letter" outlining the governor's priorities and any fiscal constraints.

Before the ink was dry on a series of 10 election reforms signed into law by Gov. Kathy Hochul on Wednesday, Republicans – including U.S. Rep. Elise Stefanik – filed a lawsuit arguing that one of the reforms, which expands the use of mail-in balloting during the early voting period “reverses the will of the people."

That’s a reference to a 2021 ballot question expanding absentee voting that voters defeated by a margin of 55-45%.

On Election Day this Nov. 7, New Yorkers will be asked to vote on two statewide constitutional amendments.

They both have to do with debt and in that regard, they are not all that exciting; however, they are very important to their constituencies. Amendment number 1, would allow small city school districts to carry more debt.

BUFFALO, N.Y. -- Department heads and representatives from migrant service organizations told Erie County legislators at a Thursday meeting the county has incurred nearly no extra costs since downstate migrants began arriving in early June.

They said the company DocGo, contracted and paid for by New York City, continues to handle all expenses connected to housing and providing things like food and clothing for the population staying in local hotels.

Gov. Kathy Hochul signed legislation aimed to make it easier to access geothermal heating and cooling systems in order to help reach the goals of the 2019 Climate Leadership and Community Protection Act, her office announced Thursday.

The legislation hopes to reduce costs for the installation of geothermal wells, helping New York meet the state’s building decarbonization requirements. It changes how certain wells drilled deeper than 500 feet below the Earth’s surface are regulated. Currently, they are regulated under the same provisions that cover oil and gas mines and drilling. This legislation will create new provisions, streamlining regulation of geothermal boreholes while ensuring that all deep well locations throughout the state are adequately reviewed and that potential impacts from the drilling process are mitigated.

Over $6 million will go toward protecting 2,000 acres of farmland in New York through the Farmland Protection Implementation Grants Program, Gov. Kathy Hochul announced Thursday.

“Protecting our state’s farmland is a critical component not only to protecting our environment but also maintaining the viability of the state’s agricultural industry for generations to come,” Hochul said in a press release.

The New York attorney general's office on Thursday sent a cease-and-desist letter to a group accused of confronting voters at their homes while claiming to be state election officials and falsely accusing people of committing voter fraud.

The letter orders the group NY Citizens Audit to immediately stop any voter intimidation efforts and turn over records on its training of and communications with its door-to-door canvassers.

The Senate voted to confirm three top military leaders in the last two days, its first significant action to bypass Alabama Republican Sen. Tommy Tuberville’s monthslong blockade on military promotions.

On Wednesday, the Senate voted 83-11 to confirm Gen. Charles “C.Q." Brown Jr. as the next Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff hours after Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer, D-N.Y., moved to advance military nominees who have been impacted by Tuberville's hold.

An audit of a state-run program that sends surplus food from farms to people who are struggling with food insecurity found agencies managing it may have limited funding for certain food bank purchases, benefiting fewer farmers and needs better oversight, according to state Comptroller Tom DiNapoli's office.

Nourish New York originated from the beginning of the COVID-19 pandemic when schools and restaurants had to shut their doors and the demand for products like milk plummeted. With nowhere to go with their products, many farmers were forced to dump hundreds of thousands of gallons of milk while at the same time thousands of New Yorkers lined up at food banks, many for the first time, leaving empty shelves and concerns over a possible food shortage.

Gov. Kathy Hochul said that the Biden administration’s announcement that it was granting Temporary Protective Status to — and expediting work permits for — hundreds of thousands of Venezuelans who are already in the country is “an important first step” for her goal to get expedited work status for all migrants.

In an interview with NY1’s Cheryl Wills Wednesday evening, Hochul said she, Mayor Eric Adams, Sens. Charles Schumer and Kirsten Gillibrand, and the New York delegation had been pushing to expedite permits for migrants as far back as last summer.

The surge of asylum seekers into New York was in the spotlight on Capitol Hill Wednesday, with Republicans using it to argue that the migrant situation in the U.S. is financially unsustainable.

A Republican member of the New York City Council was among those to testify before the House Homeland Security Committee.

SUNY Potsdam administrators announced steep reductions in staff and programming too soon, leaders in SUNY's labor union said Wednesday, as state officials begin to compile their budget requests for next year.

Potsdam is one of 19 State University of New York campuses known to be in distress, or sporting a multi-million-dollar budget gap. Tuesday's announcement of the college's plans to cut at least 14 programs, related staff, clerical positions and other services comes as the North Country campus operates at a $9 million deficit.

Something is wrong with Cayuga Lake.

Harmful Algal Blooms, or HABs, have been widespread there. While New York state is supposed to be doing assessments and comprehensive watershed cleanup of the blooms, it hasn’t been, according to Walter Hang, president of Toxics Targeting, an independent environmental monitor.

New York state has a long to-do list to meet its aggressive climate goals. Under the umbrella of education, the state is required to ensure that all new school buses sold in the state be zero-emission by 2027 and all school buses on the road be zero-emission by 2035.

To assist school districts with the monumental task of transitioning to all electric school buses, the New York State Energy Research and Development Authority (NYSERDA) released a roadmap this month which outlines costs, procurement measures, fleet planning options and much more.

BUFFALO, N.Y. -- When the New York State Association of Counties met last week for its annual fall conference, delegates representing 57 counties, including more than 300 town supervisors who serve on their county boards, unanimously adopted a resolution asking Gov. Kathy Hochul to veto legislation moving local elections to even-numbered years.

Republican Onondaga County Executive Ryan McMahon is part of the bipartisan group opposing the bill.

New York Gov. Kathy Hochul on Wednesday signed a bill setting the state’s presidential primary for April 2, potentially putting former President Donald Trump on the ballot as he stands trial in Manhattan for a hush-money criminal case.

The new primary date could add a new layer to an increasingly chaotic calendar for Trump next year, as the Republican frontrunner attempts to navigate court cases in multiple states while he seeks a return to the White House.

U.S. Sen. Chuck Schumer and New York Gov. Kathy Hochul announced one of the first major awards from the CHIPS & Science Act is going to a New York-based consortium.

Known as the Northeast Regional Defense Technology Hub, the consortium will get $40 million from the Department of Defense’s Microelectronic Commons Program and aims to bring together academia, industry and government organizations to help New York’s chips industry with innovation, attract new companies, strengthen the workforce and bolster the industry.

Voting law changes are coming for New Yorkers.

Gov. Kathy Hochul signed legislation approved earlier this year that she says expands and strengthens the basic right to vote.

Discussions have started in earnest between Gov. Kathy Hochul's staff and lawmakers who led the effort this session to pass legislation to study reparations for descendants of enslaved New Yorkers and the consequences of the state's lasting impacts on the slave trade.

The discussions are ongoing, sources said Tuesday, as the governor weighs her decision to sign or veto the measure before the end of the year. It's one of more than 400 bills waiting for Hochul's action, or about half of what state lawmakers passed in Albany this year.

Redistricting is a never-ending story in New York state. Both sides of the political aisle are fighting over whether New York should have another go at drawing congressional district lines by the 2024 elections, a critical question considering how close the numbers are in the House of Representatives.

The latest ruling, which came down Tuesday morning from the state Court of Appeals, was an order that said the state’s Independent Redistricting Commission (IRC), which is tasked with drawing congressional lines, may start to work on new lines while litigation progresses.

Construction is underway at a Con Ed facility in Queens for a project called the Champlain Hudson Power Express, an underground transmission line that will bring hydroelectric power from Quebec, Canada to the city, cutting down on polluting emissions.

“People won’t even know it’s there. It will be able to take thousands of homes and power them with clean energy,” Gov. Kathy Hochul said.

According to the latest Siena College poll, 62% of New York Democrats and 74% of Republicans feel that the 2024 presidential election is the most important of their lifetimes.

But pollster Steve Greenberg told Capital Tonight that independent voters, those who are not affiliated with a political party, don’t see the election as being quite so significant.

BUFFALO, N.Y. — This week, the New York State Association of Convenience Stores sent cease and desist letters demanding rapper Snoop Dogg, former professional wrestler Hulk Hogan and former boxing heavyweight champion Mike Tyson pull their names from flavored nicotine vapes.

"We're trying to elevate this issue for policymakers to understand that a way forward is to stop making these products look so glamorous and start cracking down on the retailers and the manufacturers and distributors and now the celebrity endorsers," NYACS President Kent Sopris said.

Elections boards across New York state say they are hoping to recruit more people to the polls. Jeremy Zellner, the Democratic elections commissioner in Erie County, said they need thousands of people every election and always need more.

“They’re critical. We simply can’t run our elections without good poll inspectors,” Zellner said. “They are actually the people who are at the table signing people in. They’re the people giving you your ballot. And you know there’s thousands of them that work that one day who keep the election going every year.”

New York will take new comprehensive actions to fight antisemitism, Gov. Kathy Hochul's office announced Tuesday.

The governor announced the creation of the state Anti-Hate in Education Center and an annual meeting that she said aims to combat hate and create a safe and inclusive environment.

A majority of registered voters in New York feel the quality of life in the state is worsening, with 80% calling the cost of living a major problem, and most polled believe the leading presidential candidates are unfit to serve four years as president, according to a Siena College poll released on Tuesday morning.

At least 80% of New Yorkers rank pocket-book issues as most important, and 57% of New Yorkers said the quality of life in the state is declining, compared to 14% that said it was improving, the poll found.

Gun owners in the state say they've been improperly denied, or experienced lengthy delays to purchase ammunition for their legal firearms in the days since a new law took effect requiring a New York State Police background check to purchase firing rounds.

Gun rights advocates are questioning how efficiently State Police can process incoming applications, and if the department has the necessary technology and staff to manage appeals in a timely manner.

A victory for several upstate counties, including Oneida.

In May, Oneida and several other upstate New York counties put in place states of emergency that prohibit hotels and shelters from accepting migrants from New York City.

ALBANY, N.Y. -- A new lawsuit in Albany County state Supreme Court lays out a timeline of what it calls New York's disastrous rollout of cannabis regulations, including litigation that has effectively stalled the industry's growth.

Amid all this, the Cannabis Control Board approved new regulations last week that appear to address concerns that resulted in a court-ordered pause on the approval of new licenses or opening of new dispensaries.

Help-wanted advertisements in New York must disclose proposed pay rates after a statewide salary transparency law went into effect on Sunday, part of growing state and city efforts to give women and people of color a tool to advocate for equal pay for equal work.

Employers with at least four workers will be required to disclose salary ranges for any job advertised externally to the public or internally to workers interested in a promotion or transfer.

Local sales tax collections in New York grew by 4% in August compared to the same month in 2022, according to data released Monday by state Comptroller Tom DiNapoli's office.

DiNapoli said collections reached $1.78 billion, which is higher than the $67.9 million collected in August of last year.

Drivers taking the New York State Thruway will have to cough up more money in tolls starting in January.

The state Thruway Authority's board of directors voted Monday to pass two 5% toll increases, one in January and again in January 2027.

U.S. Rep. Brian Higgins and several other Democratic members of Congress are introducing a bill aimed to prevent individuals convicted of violent misdemeanor hate crimes from purchasing or possessing firearms.

Higgins' office said Monday that the Disarm Hate Act addresses a gap in current federal law. Those who have been convicted of a misdemeanor-level hate crime or received an enhanced sentence for a misdemeanor crime after a judicial finding that they acted with hate or bias motivation would be prohibited from buying or having guns.

Lawmakers and advocates focused on child poverty in the state will push for a further expansion of New York state's child tax credit program in the next budget, they said Friday, as the issue of the state’s affordability is one of the largest drivers of people deciding to move out of the state.

Conversations about how the state can help struggling families have started after child poverty across the nation has more than doubled since federal pandemic aid expired amid rising inflation, according to new data released by the U.S. Census Bureau.

BUFFALO, N.Y. — Some lawmakers on both sides of the aisle continue to call for the state Legislature to return to Albany for a special session.

There’s a number of issues the Legislature could address if they return to Albany. However, the top priority on the docket would be dealing with the more than a 100,000 migrants that have arrived to New York City and subsequently other parts of the state, and the costs and challenges associated with the population.

ROCHESTER, N.Y. — Gov. Kathy Hochul on Friday unveiled a plan aimed at stopping car thieves in their tracks.

It's in response to the skyrocketing problem of the thefts of Kias and Hyundais triggered by a TikTok challenge.

The governor and legislative leaders are still deciding whether there is enough common ground to be found in a slate of proposed bills to call a special session to deal with the influx of migrants into New York.

There are several proposals that have been introduced by Democrats who are in the majority in both houses.

Freshman Rep. Brandon Williams, a Syracuse-area Republican, says GOP colleagues on Capitol Hill who want to use a government shutdown as a “tool” do not have a “very good grasp of the history of how this place works.”

With the Oct. 1 funding deadline fast approaching, Williams said Friday he believes lawmakers will ultimately be able to keep the government open.

Gov. Kathy Hochul on Friday announced the state has rolled out a roadmap for public schools to transition bus fleets to zero-emission vehicles, as required by the state's 2019 Climate Act.

The law bars school districts from purchasing additional buses that burn diesel starting in 2027 in preparation for a 2035 deadline.

Gov. Kathy Hochul signed a bill into law Friday that makes a change to the state's Extreme Risk Protection Order law, also known as the Red Flag Law on guns, her office announced.

The Red Flag Law, signed by Hochul in June 2022, aims to prevent those who show signs of being a threat to themselves or others from purchasing or having firearms.

New York state Sen. John Mannion has picked up a few more local endorsements in his bid for the Democratic nomination in the 2024 race for the state's 22nd Congressional District.

Mannion's campaign said Friday the two-term state lawmaker has received the backing from:

A last-minute legal challenge by Donald Trump 's lawyers could disrupt a trial scheduled for next month in the New York attorney general's business fraud lawsuit against the former president and his company.

A state appeals court judge on Thursday ordered a potential postponement of the non-jury trial, scheduled to start Oct. 2, after Trump's lawyers filed a lawsuit accusing the trial judge, Arthur Engoron, of repeatedly abusing his authority.

Democrats in Washington are pushing back on the blunt warning by Mayor Eric Adams that a surge of immigrants threatens to “destroy” New York City.

Rep. Jamaal Bowman, who represents parts of the Bronx and Westchester County, called the comment “disgusting and deplorable.”

Housing leaders from all corners of the state analyzed ideas Thursday to increase housing in New York and address its insufficient supply at an annual affordable housing conference in Albany.

Hundreds of stakeholders arrived at the one-day event, led by the state Association for Affordable Housing, ready to get their hands dirty. Early discussions were centered on ways the Legislature could increase the number of affordable housing units statewide next year — needed by more New Yorkers are prices continue to rise.

It's been more than two years since the state Legislature passed the Marijuana Regulation and Taxation Act which legalized recreational cannabis in New York. However, since then the rollout of the retail market has been stymied by lawsuits, location issues and more. State Assembly Majority Leader Crystal Peoples-Stokes, who sponsored the MRTA, told Capital Tonight that legal challenges and other roadblocks were anticipated, but not this early in the rollout.

Peoples-Stokes is "totally confident" in the Office of Cannabis Management's leadership.

Mayor Eric Adams is tired of the barrage of criticism he is getting for his administration’s handling of migrants.

On Wednesday night, that frustration bubbled over in a sharp statement to other local leaders at a community event in Queens.

The debate surrounding how to handle the influx of migrants arriving in the state by way of New York City runs the gamut.

Large-scale issues like how those seeking asylum will be educated, housed or fed have taken up a lot of the conversation, but local community officials do have other concerns.

The New York State Attorney General’s Office is asking the Village of Monroe, in Orange County, to hold off on adopting a law it says restricts the rights of Orthodox Jewish residents.

Proposed Local Law 5, also called the Village of Monroe Place of Worship and Schools Local Law, would amend zoning law to create regulations on residential gathering, places of worship and schools. It would also require special use permits. The law is on the agenda to be adopted by the Village Board of Trustees Thursday night.

Gov. Kathy Hochul on Thursday signed three bills into law dealing with workers' rights, her office announced.

One of the pieces of legislation requires employers to give notice to their employees that they are eligible for unemployment insurance whenever the employer makes a permanent or temporary separation of the employee or reduces hours to a point that the employee qualifies for total or partial unemployment.

The New York state Department of Health could save hundreds of millions of dollars if it had better oversight of enrollment in Medicaid and other public health plans, according to two audits released Thursday by state Comptroller Tom DiNapoli.

His office said audits found thousands of instances where state Medicaid paid costs that another federally funded health care plan like the Essential Plan, New York's basic health plan, or Medicare should have paid.

As House Republican leaders on Capitol Hill forge ahead on an impeachment inquiry into President Joe Biden, New York’s frontline Republicans — who represent congressional districts Biden won in 2020 — are largely lining up in support of the investigatory step.

“I want to see facts. I don't want to come to any conclusions,” Rep. Nick LaLota told reporters Tuesday.

Officials with the state's ethics watchdog are doubling down on efforts to enforce New York's ethics and lobbying policies and investigate complaints while a lawsuit threatening to dismantle its authority works through the courts.

Members of the Commission on Ethics and Lobbying in Government held a special meeting Wednesday afternoon, meeting publicly for fewer than five minutes before heading into an executive session. It marked the commission's first meeting since a state Supreme Court judge ruled Monday that the entity is unconstitutional.

As students start a new academic year, New York state lawmakers in Albany are pushing to lower the number of lockdown drills in schools from four to one.

Assembly sponsor Jo Anne Simon, a Brooklyn Democrat, told Capital Tonight that students are “tired of being the lockdown generation” and that multiple lockdown drills make them feel less safe.

New York state Assemblyman Daniel O’Donnell will have to be retrained on the Assembly’s “Policy Prohibiting Harassment, Discrimination and Retaliation and what conduct constitutes a violation thereof” after he was found to be in violation of that policy, Assembly Speaker Carl Heastie announced Wednesday.

Heastie said he made the decision based on a recommendation of the Assembly’s Committee on Ethics and Guidance.

New York tourism spending and economic impact in 2022 returned to pre-pandemic levels and even exceeded previous records set in 2019, Gov. Kathy Hochul's office announced Wednesday.

The state had a record 291.5 million visitors in 2022, the largest number in the state's history. Those visitors generated more than $78.6 billion in direct spending and $123 billion in total economic impact, a 4% increase from 2019, the governor's office said.

A new law in New York on background checks for ammunition purchases went into effect on Wednesday, surviving a last-minute legal challenge.

Supreme Court Justice Sonia Sotomayor issued an order Tuesday night rejecting a challenge to measures in the Concealed Carry Improvement Act, which was signed into law by Gov. Kathy Hochul in July 2022 after the Supreme Court overturned the state’s century-old concealed carry law.

Gov. Kathy Hochul signed legislation Wednesday that aims to crack down on telemarketers by nearly doubling the fine for telemarketers violating the Do Not Call Registry, the governor's office announced.

The legislation amends the general business law to raise the maximum fine for violators of the Do Not Call Registry from the current $11,000 penalty set in 2004 to $20,000.

New York workers continue to say that flexibility in their job is their top priority while attracting new employees and retaining current ones remain the top challenges for businesses, according to a survey released Wednesday by the state Department of Labor.

The 2023 Workforce Development Survey found that paid time off, health insurance and higher pay are still high priorities for the state's workers. For the first time though, the ability to work remotely full time is a top incentive job seekers desire. Workers have preference for online training, virtual workshops and job fairs and one-on-one career guidance.

Gov. Kathy Hochul continued her calls to Congress Wednesday to tackle immigration that addresses the migrant influx New York currently faces, taking direct aim at Republicans in the House of Representatives who have recently called on her to call a special legislative session in Albany to handle the crisis on the state level.

“Speaker [Kevin] McCarthy, other than wasting his time pursing idiotic ideas like impeaching the president based on nothing, ought to bring back the Republicans, of which there are nine from the state of New York, who should be feeling this and hearing about this, instead of calling on us to do something,” Hochul said at a briefing in New York City. “Immigration is a federal problem. It calls for a federal solution. President Biden has bills out there, ideas out there on how we can work together with Republicans, and they won’t get back to work and deal with this.”

The newest COVID-19 vaccine will be made available in New York starting Friday as the state sees a slight increase in case numbers and hospitalizations now three-and-and-half years after the pandemic began, Gov. Kathy Hochul announced Wednesday.

“I know everyone wants to be done with COVID, but COVID is not done with us,” Hochul said at a briefing in New York City.

Anyone with aspirations to legally grow, process or sell cannabis in New York can apply for a state license this fall after the Cannabis Control Board voted Tuesday to expand the state's recreational marijuana rollout to the general public as an ongoing lawsuit keeps the industry at a standstill.

The board, which operates under the auspieces of the state Office of Cannabis Management, voted to approve the applications for cultivators, processors, microbusinesses and retailers to open Oct. 4. Applicants do not have to have a previous marijuana conviction as required for initial licenses awarded through the Conditional Adult-Use Retail Dispensary program, mired in a legal battle.

For over a year, migrants have been moved from southern states, including Texas and Florida to New York, which has seen more than 100,000 migrants come to New York City.

A new Siena poll on Tuesday finds that a majority of New Yorkers are in favor of federal action on housing and work permits.

New York Attorney General Letitia James is calling on the National Weather Service to send wireless emergency alerts to residents in an effort to warn them about severe winter weather events. This would include major blizzards, ice storms and other dangerous conditions.

According to the attorney general’s office, the NWS currently sends regionalized wireless emergency alerts, or WEAs, to cell phones for some kinds of extreme weather, but not winter storms.

Family, friends and state lawmakers gathered Tuesday for a ceremony celebrating the ascent of Judge Rowan Wilson, who was sworn in last spring as the first Black chief judge of the state’s highest court, the New York Court of Appeals.

He had previously served as an associate judge on the court.

Fifty federal workers are set to arrive in New York starting this week to help with the arrival of asylum seekers in the state, a senior White House official said Tuesday.

The news comes less than two weeks after Gov. Kathy Hochul had a 2.5 hour meeting at the White House, after which she told Spectrum News in an exclusive interview that she had been promised a “surge” of resources.

Days after a 16-year-old was arrested for allegedly shooting a security guard at a high school football game in Utica, two New York state lawmakers say they plan to introduce legislation that includes increasing penalties for people under 18 to illegally possess a gun and make it easier for them to be tried in criminal court.

Republican state Sen. Joe Griffo, of Rome, and Democratic Assemblywoman Buttenschon, of Marcy, said the bill would also allow judges to use mental health evaluations during a pre-trial detention hearing and allow them to issue a secure order if a defendent is determined not to have strong ties to the area.

A majority of New Yorkers support using federal properties as temporary migrant shelters, according to a Siena College Research Institute Poll.

By a 56%-36% margin, Siena poll respondents said they were in favor of the use of federally-owned land and buildings as shelters, and 59% said they were in favor of making it easier for migrants to get work authorizations.

Good-government advocates and lawmakers are weighing the necessity for a constitutional amendment to change New York ethics enforcement after a Supreme Court decision filed Monday declared the state's new ethics watchdog is unconstitutional.

A judge ruled Monday the structure of the state's ethics enforcement group, called the Commission on Ethics and Lobbying in Government, lacks executive oversight to appoint and approve its 11 members, violating the state constitution. The Legislature created the new agency last year to replace the former Joint Commission on Public Ethics — created by former Gov. Andrew Cuomo — after questions about its independence from the Executive Chamber.

A state Supreme Court judge ruled Monday the state's ethics watchdog panel is unconstitutional.

As a result, the Commission on Ethics and Lobbying in Government has no power or authority to enforce New York ethics laws.

Mayor Eric Adams’ dire take on the city’s migrants is continuing. Over the weekend, he announced a major belt tightening plan for all city agencies: cutting budgets by 5%.

“By law we are required to balance our budget in this context and to secure our city’s financial future unless the economy performs better than expected, we are forced to consider significant cost-saving measures,” Adams said on Saturday during his announcement of the new Program to Eliminate the Gap.

U.S. Rep. Brandon Williams and Central New York Republican state Assembly members called on Gov. Kathy Hochul to convene a special session to deal with the influx of migrants.

This comes as New York City Mayor Eric Adams last week used stark language, warning the migrant issue could "destroy" the city amid ballooning costs.

The group that enforces New York's ethics laws is in limbo after a state Supreme Court judge ruled Monday the structure of its new ethics commission is unconstitutional and fails to strike a mandated balance of governmental control.

The decision, handed down by Republican Supreme Court Justice Thomas Marcelle, rules the Legislature improperly created the state Commission on Ethics and Lobbying in Government without a constitutional amendment, and that the process to appoint its 11 members lacks proper government oversight.

Gov. Kathy Hochul signed legislation on Saturday declaring Asian Lunar New Year a public school holiday across New York state.

Proud to sign legislation declaring Lunar New Year an official school holiday in New York! This is an important step in recognizing the importance of New York’s AAPI community and the rich diversity that makes our state so great. pic.twitter.com/ZPvUyRHQJ8

Monday marks 22 years since Blake Allison’s wife Anna boarded American Airlines Flight 11, which struck the North Tower of the World Trade Center.

“She was a very gregarious and outgoing person. She loved gardening,” Allison remembers.

Gov. Kathy Hochul is expected to sign a bill into law to notify thousands of people who may be eligible for assistance through the September 11th Victim Compensation Fund or the World Trade Center Health Program.

The bill, known as the 9/11 Notice Act, was delivered Thursday to Hochul's desk, and would require businesses that operated near Ground Zero during 9/11 to notify employees who worked in downtown Manhattan at the time that they could be eligible for the federal benefits and health monitoring.

It's a concern for expecting mothers that is all too common: Dying from complications of pregnancy. Now, lawmakers are calling on the federal government to step in.

According to lawmakers, the U.S. has one of the highest rates of maternal deaths. Here in New York, the story is the same.

Many of New York’s energy laws were written decades ago when fossil fuels were the only game in town. Now that the state is moving away from fossil fuels and toward renewable energy, some of those old rules and regulations need to be updated, or even repealed.

One example is the 100-foot rule, which requires utilities to supply gas to any customer who wants it and demands that ratepayers foot the bill to hook them up if those customers live within 100 feet of an existing line.

Refresco Beverages will acquire a facility in Chautauqua County to expand its warehousing and distribution capabilities, Gov. Kathy Hochul’s office announced Friday.

The move comes following $500,000 in performance-based tax credits and a $500,000 Regional Economic Development Council capital grant.

With thousands of migrants arriving in New York City every week, Mayor Eric Adams raised some eyebrows when he said the crisis could “destroy the city.” The mayor’s strong words drew a wave of responses from across the political spectrum, with liberals generally criticizing him and conservatives praising him. NY1 political reporters Bobby Cuza, Kelly Mena and NY1 education reporter Jillian Jorgensen weighed in on the mayor’s words.

And with hundreds of thousands of children returning to public schools, the “Off Topic/On Politics” team looked at several of the major issues on parents’ minds this September, including migrants being absorbed into classrooms and a possible bus strike.

The emergency department at Strong Memorial Hospital in Rochester will more than triple in size with a $650 million expansion, Gov. Kathy Hochul's office announced on Friday.

The expansion will also add a new nine-story patient tower, resulting in a total of 650,000 square feet of new space.

Former President Donald Trump hosted a $100,000-a-plate fundraiser for disgraced former New York Mayor Rudy Giuliani at his Bedminster, New Jersey, golf club Thursday night as Giuliani struggles to pay his mounting legal bills.

Giuliani, a longtime Trump ally who also served as his lawyer, is facing a barrage of legal fees, fines, sanctions and damages related to his work helping Trump try to overturn the 2020 election and other cases. He was indicted last month along with Trump and 17 others in Georgia for what Fulton County District Attorney Fani Willis has described as a wide-ranging conspiracy to subvert the will of the voters after Trump lost to Biden in 2020.

Legal battles over the last few weeks have delayed the opening of some retail cannabis dispensaries in New York.

So officials are providing members of the legal adult-use-cannabis community a place to voice their concerns over a rocky rollout of the industry.

Fresh off a visit to three Latin American capitals, New York Congresswoman Nydia Velázquez says it is time for the U.S. to chart a “new path forward” with its neighbors to the south.

“It is in our own interest to try to engage Latin America in a way that is respectful, in a way that recognizes that we have mutual interests,” she said.

While the influx of migrants has been unfolding for more than a year now, one point of confusion has persisted: whether or not migrants are here legally.

The answer, in most cases, is yes — though an individual’s legal status could change.

Mayor Eric Adams’ frustration with the migrant influx and his push for more federal help was expressed in stark terms at an Upper West Side town hall meeting on Wednesday night.

“I don’t see an ending to this. I don’t see an ending to this. This issue will destroy New York City — destroy New York City,” Adams said. “We have a $12 billion deficit that we’re going to have to cut — every service in this city is going to be impacted. All of us.”

A special legislative session to address the migrant surge isn't out of the cards, as Gov. Kathy Hochul wouldn't rule out the possibility Thursday after a round of public events in Albany.

New York City Mayor Eric Adams this week said roughly 10,000 people seeking asylum come to the state each month.

BUFFALO, N.Y. — When migrants began arriving from New York City to Erie County in early June, the county said it was assured there would be no school-age children.

"Once we found out that that was not the case, they were in fact showing up on our door, we wanted to make sure that there was a cohesive plan for them to begin school," Deputy County Executive Lisa Chimera said.

Measures signed by Gov. Kathy Hochul on Thursday require school districts in New York to provide information about Advanced Placement courses offered, and establish high school student governments where they do not exist.

The amendments to state education law mean districts and charter schools must inform parents and students of the benefits of AP courses, how to enroll in them and what support is provided, including financial assistance, Hochul said. The information must be emailed or mailed, and posted on their websites.

Sixteen buildings on a block of Morris Street in Albany serve as a backdrop for a quiet success story.

The homes, which are in the Pine Hills neighborhood, are owned by Second Chance Opportunities (SCO), a not-for-profit organization that offers people in recovery a range of wraparound services. SCO was founded in 2001 when a group of people who knew first-hand about the barriers people in recovery face started working together to help others overcome those barriers.

As members of the Civil Service Employee Association, the state's largest public labor union, rallied Thursday morning in Albany about an increasing shortage of public service workers, Gov. Kathy Hochul joined them to sign two pieces of legislation to help fill thousands of open positions.

The new laws will require the state Department of Civil Service to notify public school districts, colleges and universities, local Board of Cooperative Educational Services and certain job training programs of upcoming civil service exams. The organizations will soon be able to sign up for electronic announcements of exam dates and other information.