Senator Mayer Calls for Increased Education Funding [Times Union]

While Democratic lawmakers said they liked most of what they heard in the governor's speech, which elicited seven standing ovations, a fight could be shaping up over state education aid.

Cuomo wants to increase the state's share by $1 billion to $27.7 billion, while calculating a new model for distributing aid that focuses on the need of individual schools and not school districts. He said that under the existing funding formula the neediest schools aren't getting their fair share.

Senate Education Committee Chairwoman Shelley Mayer noted that advocates and the state Board of Regents have called for the state to double the investment proposed by the governor.

"Before we talk about how it's allocated - and that's a conversation worth having – we need to talk about how much money there is and this is not enough to get us to the place we need to go," Mayer said.

The fight over education spending is familiar in Albany, with state legislators annually proposing a much higher investment and the final number settling somewhere in the middle.