Statement from Senator Jim Tedisco (R,C-Saratoga Springs)
“Shhh…New Yorkers are Escaping! This State of the State speech was a message with hardly a whisper or any real recognition and plan to redirect an agenda that’s incentivizing New York citizens to flee in devastating numbers.”
“The Empire State is a beautiful state with talented people but it’s hard to say the ‘State of Our State is strong’ with a straight face when over 101,000 people escaped from New York last year, leading the nation in out-migration of population, with over 631,000 people leaving the state since the pandemic.”
“Under one-party total domination of all levers of power in Albany, we lost one congressional seat in 2022, and if this trajectory of population loss continues, New York is in danger of losing three more congressional seats after the 2030 Census, further eroding our state’s influence in Washington and ability to return people’s tax dollars back home. That’s a terrible indictment of the failed agenda in Albany.”
“Instead, it’s the doubling down on what are actually the leading causes of outmigration: TAXING and SPENDING at an unsustainable rate. This was no speech on affordability but of maintaining the status quo. The silence was deafening on a plan to keep folks in New York and provide them the tools to live, work, maybe build a business, get an education, and most importantly support and grow a family.”
“What good is raising the minimum wage if those who could take those jobs don’t exist. New York has a shortage of doctors, nurses, teachers, welders, plumbers, and you can just about name it. They have left the state because the minimum wage doesn’t come close to the cost of New York’s inflation and cost of living!”
“And taking away people’s gas stoves and making school districts pay $430,000 for each new electric school bus won’t keep our citizens in New York.”
“Accepting the failures of the present agenda of those who control all levers of power and have for the last five years and then making major course corrections must be the start. New Yorkers didn’t hear that today. What we heard is more of the same and our greatest fear must be that it will only lead to more of the same.”
“The state’s top priority must be to stop this out-migration and head-off what will become an existential threat to our state’s economic well-being. We need to cap runaway state spending, reduce burdensome regulations, focus on enhancing public safety by mitigating the impact of bail reform, raise the age and HALT, fix dilapidating infrastructure, fight rising antisemitism and protect Upstate communities who are dealing with the migrant crisis. It’s time for the Governor to put together an action plan to stop the population loss. No more empty excuses. We need solutions!”
