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Democratic lawmakers are expected to push Gov. Kathy Hochul to spend the extra $1 billion in her executive budget to address climate change a few years faster than the governor proposed.
Hochul’s budget commits an extra billion dollars for sustainable energy projects and other programs to reduce emissions to keep up with requirements mandated under the 2019 Climate Act.
The governor wants to spread the $1 billion investment over five years, but lawmakers told Spectrum News 1 the money should flow faster than that.
"We think that needs to be accelerated," Assembly Environmental Committee chair Deborah Glick said. "We have hopes to move the money faster for two reasons. One, we see the federal retrenchment, and two, the climate is in crisis and we need to react quickly in many of these areas because communities across the state ahve suffered from extreme weather events."
Lawmakers are expected to push for the funds over three years or fewer. Hochul’s budget did not specify how the additional funding would be spent.
Glick said the $1 billion should be targeted for clean water infrastructure projects and the Environmental Protection Fund — two programs she says should each get an extra $100 million in the next budget.
"In a budget this size, that is actually a very modest increase, but a very crucial one," Glick said.
Budget negotiations will reach a new stage next week when the state Senate and Assembly release their counter offers to Hochul’s $252 billion spending plan.
It’s unclear how lawmakers will respond to Hochul’s decision earlier this year to delay the implementation of a cap-and-invest system to generate revenue for green energy projects. The governor did not include a proposal for the cap-and-trade system in her budget, which frustrated and disappointed policymakers.
Senate Environmental Committe chair Pete Harckham said he expect the topic to be part of budget talks.
The program, mandated by state law, would require companies to buy credits from the state to contribute to its greenhouse gas emissions and fund rebates to reduce utility costs for taxpayers.
Harckham would not comment on the Senate’s recent discussions to craft cap-and-trade regulations, but said the perameters need to advance sooner than later to get the program started and satisfy the state’s climate law.
"I don’t want to get ahead of anybody in my conference…[but] there are some of us who would like to see a date certain on that and get that expedited because it’s critical to reducing our emissions and also investing in our communities with the technologies to lower our carbon footprint," Harckham said.
But Glick said it’s up to the executive to advance regulations, adding she does not expect regulations to be in the Assembly’s one-house budget.
"That is an executive branch responsibility — we need to see the state [Department of Environmental Conservation] putting out regulations," Glick said. "We will not be putting regulatoins in the budget, but that is the state we are at and that is an executive function."
DEC acting commissioner Amanda Lefton said in a statement Tuesday the department will release draft regulations this month that establish reporting protocols for greenhouse gas emission rates and advance the state’s cap-and-invest initiative to fund a sustainable economy.
"The regulations will allow DEC — in partnership with local governments, environmental organizations and businesses — to establish the framework for this ambitious program and ensure a just and affordable transition to a cleaner, greener economy for all New Yorkers," Lefton said. "I am honored that Gov. Kathy Hochul has entrusted me to carry out the Department of Environmental Conservation’s critical work. My mission is clear: Tangible results to deliver clean air and water for every New Yorker while protecting the environment and our invaluable natural resources for future generations."
Democrats in the Senate and Assembly discussed their environmental spending priorities in closed-door conference discussions earlier this week. But lawmakers said it’s going to be a tough budget year, especially with the governor’s focus on affordability and threats of significant federal cuts.
At a rally in the Capitol on Tuesday, Harckham said New York declares the second-highest number of disaster declarations in the country, and spends almost $1,400 per resident per storm.
The senator is pushing to spend $7 million to create a new cabinent-level Office of Resilience under the Executive Chamber to coordinate with localities and make state agencies draft a resiliency plan in case of extreme weather events.
"We could hit our carbon targets tomorow and we would still have the impacts of climate change, and it’s only going to get worse," he said.
There’s also a push to put language in the budget to keep the state on track to generate 70% of its electricty from renewable resources by 2030.
Patrick Robbins, a chair of the Public Power New York Coalition, said lawmakers are working to tweak and reintroduce a bill to require the New York Power Authority to regularly share updates about publicly owned renewable energy projects as required by state law, and implement the Build Public Renewables Act included in the budget in 2023.
"Now, it’s a matter of implementation," Robbins said Thursday. "We need NYPA to really carry out the Build Public Renewables Act in the spirit with which it was intended."
Gov. Hochul included funding in her budget to hire 58 additional full time employees in the state Department of Environmental Conservation. The governor has said the state is ready to hire federal employees who were cut as part of significant slashes in spending by President Donald Trump’s administration.
Glick said the state should focus on hiring scientists who were cut from the U.S. Department of Agriculture and other national departments who could help with the state’s emission reduction benchmarks.
Several lawmakers, including Senate Finance Committee chair Liz Krueger, have expressed extreme disappointment that Hochul did not include provisions in her budget to curb the expansion of gas infrastructure throughout the state and end the mandated ratepayer subsidy for new gas hookups. Lawmakers said they had doubts the bill, known as the NY Home Energy Affordability Transition, or NY HEAT Act, would be included in the budget.
"The HEAT Act is the beginning of shifting resources away from the fossil fuel industry and to continue to build out fossil fuel infrastructure that will be there for decades and to shift it to what we need as a transition to electricity," Glick said. "[But] we need a lot of work done in that area — we have to strengthen the grid. We have to expand transmission lines."
Democrats in the Legislature nearly passed legislation last year to limit single-use plastic packaging in the state, known as the Packaging and Recycling Infrastructure Act. The measure remains a priority for lawmakers, but is not expected to be a budget item and will instead be an issue reserved for the end of session.
