City Newspaper Archives - 4/2007
SPITZER: Rotary speech replays some themes
Published by Jeremy Moule on Apr 10, 2007
Governor Eliot Spitzer touched on some familiar topics during his speech to the Rochester Rotary Club Tuesday afternoon.
During the address, he told Rotarians that the state is lagging in job growth and is tops in terms of state and local taxes.
But he sided with local leaders who have long said the state needs to stop pushing unfunded mandates onto counties and municipalities, calling it a "shell game." At the same time, he didn't say how the state was going to stop doing that.
He did note that the state budget included $1 billion in cuts to Medicaid, a compromise from his proposed $1.3 billion in cuts that rankled health industry groups. Medicaid spending still grew by 1 percent this year, he said, but that's a reduction from the 8 percent a year increase in recent years.
Spitzer ducked a question about whether the state plans to do anything to protect Hemlock and Canadice Lakes. He joked that he would leave that up to his new Department of Environmental Conservation commissioner, former Assembly member Pete Grannis, then left the podium.
