As lawmakers return to Albany on Wednesday, they'll brace for six months of legislative work they hope to boast about to constituents when they campaign for re-election in the second half of the year amid a torrent of national contests.

Fiscal uncertainty and a projected $4.3 billion budget deficit hangs over elected officials as they wait for the details of Gov. Kathy Hochul's annual State of the State and budget addresses later this month. And Democrats and Republicans are expected to continue their annual spar over public safety measures and other policies affecting the affordability of the state — top concerns for New York voters, especially after hundreds of thousands of people have left the state.

Here are five things to watch for as the 2024 legislative session gets underway:

1. Housing

The Legislature last year deadlocked to address the state's affordable housing crisis — leaving Albany last June making little progress on how to build more units across New York, and quickly, while also keeping people in existing homes.

Lawmakers and Gov. Hochul are feeling heightened pressure to address housing affordability after they clashed on details of possible tax credit programs and anti-eviction provisions to reach a consensus on a housing plan last year.

It led Hochul to sign a handful of executive orders, including $650 million in grants for local governments most open to new housing projects. Localities continue to wait for state Homes & Community Renewal to select which communities will be prioritized for the funds.

Democrats don't see eye to eye on the best way forward for housing in New York, with the more progressive arm fighting against too many incentives for wealthy developers, arguing the state cannot build its way out of the crisis.

But lawmakers leading the Senate and Assembly Housing committees are revisiting a legislative housing proposal from the end of last session that Hochul rejected. They'll have to balance building incentives, stronger tenant protections, tax breaks like replacing New York City's expired 421a program and programs to transform unused office or retail space into new apartments to reach a compromise so everyone gets something they want. 

Housing is expected to be at the forefront of state budget discussions as the governor and Legislature must work together to close a $4.3 billion project deficit ahead of the April 1 deadline.

2. Migrants and asylum seekers

More than 168,000 migrants have arrived in the state since 2022 — up at least 18,000 people in the last two weeks. 

The ongoing humanitarian emergency will be addressed in the next budget after the state spent more than $2 billion this year to provide assistance to asylum seekers.

As the influx isn't slowing down, officials say they will petition President Joe Biden's administration and members of the state's Congressional delegation harder to expedite workforce authorization for more asylum seekers or rules to ease the tide of newcomers after their pleas have gone largely unanswered for more than a year.

"The bottom line is, we need a federal solution," Hochul told reporters Tuesday. "We have not stopped our request to have more controls at the borders. The volume of people coming here is untenable and unsustainable."

Some state lawmakers want the Legislature to pass measures this session to help connect asylum seekers with housing, employment opportunities and health care, and will push for the state to lead through federal inaction. But it may not be a realistic legal, or fiscal, expectation for the state.

3. A looming $4B budget deficit

New York's fiscal leaders have revealed little about Gov. Hochul's budget plans, except they will avoid cutting health care or education services in FY 2024-25 as state agencies were directed to keep spending flat.

Updated financial estimates show the Legislature must pass its next budget and close a $4.3 billion shortfall.

But the State University of New York system will amass a $1 billion budget gap over the next decade without additional state assistance or permission to increase tuition costs, according to a report SUNY filed with the Legislature last week. And the steady flow of migrants means a need for more services and related resources, making it more difficult to reduce spending with higher costs across the board.

Gov. Hochul has said the state will not further increase taxes on the wealthy, or New York's millionaires and billionaires, to raise revenue — backed by the state comptroller and state's fiscal watchdog the Citizens Budget Commission.

But a growing number of Democrats, including Assembly Speaker Carl Heastie, say they won't back down in pushing for New York's highest income earners to pay higher taxes and help the state provide necessary services.

Lawmakers have floated other ideas to raise revenue, including legalizing mobile casino betting or reforms to open more cannabis dispensaries across the state, with about 40 open nearly two years after legalization.

4. Redistricting

Members of the state Independent Redistricting Commission met last week with less than two months to draft new congressional district lines.

Commissioners must submit amended New York U.S. House of Representatives maps to the state Legislature by Feb. 28 after a ruling in the state Court of Appeals last month, which could have a pivotal impact in helping Democrats secure control of the House in November.

If the commission fails to submit maps to the Legislature by the deadline, the Legislature will again draw the maps themselves, as it did in 2022 when the commission failed to reach a consensus. The state's highest court is open to issuing an order to force the commission to vote on a set of maps to advance the constitutional process, according to the ruling.

The Legislative Task Force on Reapportionment oversees the redraw of elective district maps that come to the Legislature. 

"We're not drawing maps, we're not thinking about drawing maps," Senate Deputy Majority Leader Michael Gianaris told NY1 on Tuesday.

Gianaris co-chairs LATFOR with Assemblyman Kenneth Zebrowski.

"We're just waiting and hoping that the commission gives us something that we can work with," Gianaris said.

5. Hochul's relationship with the Legislature

Gov. Hochul and the Legislature have done each other favors and collided in the past, but it's unclear how the governor's recent decision to veto several high-profile bills at the end of the year will fracture their relationship in 2024.

The governor vetoed the Grieving Families Act for the second time and others for the first, including a ban on noncompete agreements, an amendment to the upcoming statewide public campaign finance system and legislation to require the disclosure of information relating to lobbying for the nomination or confirmation of someone tapped for a state office position, among others. 

She signed an amended version a transparency bill to make it more clear who owns LLCs, and squashed more than 30 bills that would have created task forces or study groups on various subjects, arguing it would cost the state tens of millions of dollars to complete the work.

It's past the time where the Legislature could override the governor's vetoes, which would have required a 2/3 majority vote before Dec. 31. Democrats secured a veto-proof majority in 2020, but have yet to use their numbers to upend Hochul's use of her veto pen. Heastie and other top lawmakers have said they are not interested in taction and risk rupturing their relationship with the governor.

Hochul and lawmakers Tuesday disagreed on the factors that led to the vetoes. The governor criticized the Legislature for passing hundreds of bills at the end of session without public hearings and little engagement with the Executive Chamber. She argued it put her office in an unnecessary time crunch.

"We can get to fewer vetoes, but let's have more common sense involved in the process of developing the legislation," Hochul said. 

Gianaris said the governor's comments were concerning, and reveal the executive does not understand nuances of the legislative process.

But Heastie on Tuesday pointed to last year's budget, which was adopted more than one month late, after the governor insisted on including large policy items in the $229 billion spending plan.

"I don’t agree with her assessment, but I also say this: Then I hope that means we won’t see any policy in the budget because the policy she put forth in her budget, there was no hearing … when she proposed it to us,” Heastie said.

*An earlier version of this story indicated Gov. Hochul vetoed the LLC transparency legislation. She amended the policy before signing it into law.