Gov. Kathy Hochul said Friday the recent resignation of one of her top aides who was accused of sexual harassment proves that changes she made to end a culture of abuse in Albany are working.

Avi Small, Hochul’s former press secretary, resigned in scandal on the Fourth of July after allegations he sexually harassed another staffer in the governor's office at a bar in Albany on June 16 after a staff retreat.

Small, who was one of the governor’s closest aides, was immediately placed on leave after the incident. But his resignation came after reports that he was the center of a separate investigation last year following accusations he berated multiple employees and allegedly perpetuated a pattern of abuse in the Executive Chamber.

"The environment was changed where people felt comfortable to come forward," she told reporters at an unrelated event in Albany. 

Hochul defended keeping Small in her administration after that probe ended and said she's kept her promise to change Albany's workplace culture of misconduct — saying the expectation was changes would be made.

"We have the strongest workforce protections," the governor said. "It's very clear there's no tolerance for misconduct in my administration."

Hochul took office in 2021 after former Gov. Andrew Cuomo resigned amid a sexual harassment scandal of his own, and vowed to overhaul state sexual harassment policies and improve accountability and transparency.

At the time, the governor said the changes would be a hallmark of her administration. 

"[There will be] no tolerance for individuals who cross the line," Hochul said in 2021. "We'll focus on open, ethical governing that New Yorkers will trust... To recap, the highest priorities of my administration in its first days: Combatting [COVID-19] delta, getting direct aid to New Yorkers more quickly and beginning to change the culture in Albany."

After taking office, Hochul created a human resources department with staff experienced in employee relations, mandated live discrimination, harassment and retaliation training for staff and directed departments to track that employees completed it. She also launched a workplace sexual harassment hotline allowing employees to file complaints with the with the state Division of Human Rights, and permit employees to file complaints anonymously.

She requires HR to file internal reports of potential violations of the law within three days of receiving a complaint and also signed a law that prohibits the release of personnel materials as a retaliatory action of filing a complaint.

"People came forward because they had been trained," Hochul said Friday. "People are required to be reporters when something comes to their attention." 

But Erica Vladimer, founding director of Harassment Free New York, said policies continue to favor an alleged harasser and not employees or staff filing a complaint.

She said better training won't change a culture of abuse and misconduct and the governor's office needs to review last year's probe into Small's treatment of employees and if the Executive Chamber took appropriate action. The sexual harassment investigation should not end because he resigned, Vladimer added.

"What can be changed in the future in case anyone else comes forward to report and a similar investigation took place?” Vladimer said. “It's very clear that Avi had an opportunity to harass someone after he was already investigated in the first place. Why? What wasn't done that allowed that type of behavior to continue? That's an internal investigation in itself that the Executive Chamber and the governor should be leading.”

Small did not immediately respond to requests for comment.