Bernadette Hogan reports for New York State of Politics that several new state laws will take effect on New Year’s Day, including a rise in the minimum wage. That goes up to $16 an hour in New York City, Westchester, and Long Island on Jan. 1, and up to $15 an hour in the rest of the state. That will rise upstate to $15.50 next year, and to $16 in 2026. A few election laws are updated on Jan. 1, with more time for people to register ahead of an election and the state now allowing registration on the first day of early voting.

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Raga Justin reports for the Times Union that Gov. Kathy Hochul announced on Dec. 20 that New York will offer a $50 million tax credit for employers to build child care centers for their employees or hire third-party providers for those services. Hochul said, “Let’s find a pathway for new businesses, as they’re setting up shop, that they can actually start incorporating a child care facility on their premises.... In a tight labor market, this can be the difference between someone working for one employer or another, based on whether or not they have child care available.” Hochul also announced $50 million in capital funding to build or expand child care centers. More than 28,000 families in New York need lack child care because of understaffing, according to a report published earlier this year by the advocacy group Empire State Campaign for Child Care. The eligibility cutoff for child care assistance was also raised recently in New York, from $83,000 for, a family of four to $93,200. Read more about this story in the Times Union.

Annie Karni in The New York Times reports that Rep. Marc Molinaro's first year in Congress was historic. The House of Representatives only voted for 27 bills that became law. That is an average of one law every two weeks. Many of the 27 bills passed were not substantial, such as naming a facility after someone. And Democrats provided more votes than the Republican majority to approve the most important governing bills, from funding the government to prevent a shutdown to raising the debt ceiling to avert a default. The Republican majority in the House held 724 votes in all, with only 27 becoming law, and that is more voting and less lawmaking than at any other time in the last decade, according to the Bipartisan Policy Center. Last year, when Democrats had unified control of Congress, the House held 549 votes and passed 248 bills that were signed into law. The House did oust Republican serial-liar George Santos, and they also sanctioned three Democrats. But they. did not pass many laws. Read more about this story in The New York Times.

Paul Kirby reports in the Daily Freeman that Central Hudson Gas & Electric Corp. electricity costs have reached their lowest levels of the year. The current 6.4 cents per kilowatt hour is down from 13.7 cents per kWh a year ago. Central Hudson price of natural gas is now 49.3 cents per hundred cubic feet, down from 87.5 cents last year at this time. Central Hudson is asking the New York Public Service Commission to increase electric rates by 16 percent and natural gas rates by 19 percent, and a decision on that is expected next year. The Public Service Commission has recently criticized the utility’s billing practices, citing negligence, defects, and mismanagement. Read more about. this story in the Daily Freeman.

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Roger Hannigan Gilson reports in the Times Union that the Columbia County Sheriff's Office have been scanning inmate's retinas since July at the Columbia County Jail. Those eyes are checked against more than two million retinal scans in the database owned of BI2, a biometrics company that is installing their system in every county jail in the state. The Albany County jail began using the retinal scans 11 months ago while Rensselaer County is currently training jail guards to use the scanners. Columbia County Sheriff Don Krapf said the system insured that the right inmate was receiving the correct medications, and that his office was releasing the person at the end of their incarceration who is supposed to be released. The story also says, "People entering the jail would also have their irises scanned to check their identities," but is not clear if that has already begun. The company says that mobile technology “enables law enforcement across the country the wireless ability to positively identify offenders from any location where there is cell service supporting Internet connectivity,” using their database. Read more about this story in the Times Union.

MSNBC reports that so far Rep. Elise Stefanik has not denounced former President Donald Trump's echoing Adolf Hitler from "Mein Kampf." Trump doubled down after speaking of immigrants as vermin, saying this week that "It's true that they're destroying the blood of our country. That's what they're doing.... They don't like it when I said that and I never read 'Mein Kampf.' They said, 'Oh, Hitler said that in a much different way.'" In Hitler's book "Mein Kampf," the dictator wrote that, "All great cultures of the past perished only because the original creative race died out from blood poisoning." Stefanik, who was shouting at college presidents about anti-semitism last week, was not only silent on the issue, but she met with Trump at his Mar-a-Lago resort and posted a photo with him on social media on Dec. 19. Stefanik represents Rensselaer County and the rest of the 21st Congressional District. Trump is the leading Republican candidate for president, though, more and more, running a fascist campaign. Read more about this story at MSNBC.

New York State of Politics reports that New York Attorney General Letitia James filed suit Dec. 20 against SiriusXM, saying that the satellite radio and streaming service made it intentionally difficult for its customers to cancel their subscriptions. SiriusXM allegedly forced subscribers into an automated system before often lengthy interactions with agents trained to avoid accepting a request to cancel service. In a statement, James said, “Having to endure a lengthy and frustrating process to cancel a subscription is a stressful burden no one looks forward to, and when companies make it hard to cancel subscriptions, it’s illegal." Jessica Casano-Antonellis, a SiriusXM spokesperson, said, "Like a number of consumer businesses, we offer a variety of options for customers to sign up for or cancel their SiriusXM subscription and, upon receiving and reviewing the complaint, we intend to vigorously defend against these baseless allegations that grossly mischaracterize SiriusXM’s practices." The lawsuit seeks financial penalties for the time customers spent online during what the attorney general called “a deliberately lengthy” cancellation process. Read more about this story at New York State of Politics.

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Natalie Duddridge reports for CBS News that Gov. Kathy Hochul signed legislation on Dec. 19 to create a committee to consider reparations for slavery. The commission will study the history of slavery in New York state and what reparations could look like. Nicole Carty, executive director of the group Get Free, said, "You can see the unreckoned-with impacts of slavery in things such as Black poverty, Black maternal mortality." New York abolished slavery in 1827. Hochul said, "Let's be clear about what reparations means. It doesn't mean fixing the past, undoing what happened. We can't do that. No one can. But it does mean more than giving people a simple apology 150 years later. This bill makes it possible to have a conversation, a reasoned debate about what we want the future to look like. And I can think of nothing more democratic than that." Read more about this story at CBS News.

William J. Kemble reports in the Daily Freeman that the Woodstock Town Bear Task Force wants a local law with heavy fines for business owners who fail to secure trash containers. Bear task force Chair Anula Courtis said, “We want this legislation and we want it fast.... We’re requesting that the Town Board look at legislation in January.... It’s a tight timeframe but this way it doesn’t fall by the wayside and we get it before the bears wake up.” Courtis said she knows that bears don’t sleep during the entire winter but said that the animals are unlikely to leave their dens and turn over trash cans in the winter. Courtis said, “We want regulations that say ‘put a bear-resistant trash can in place and do it all the time.... There are apartments right now that have disgusting garbage all over the place and then those bears don’t know better and then the next thing they’re at your house.” They are considering fines of more than $100 for anyone leaving trash accessible to bears. Local residents can weigh in on the proposals next month. Read more about this story in the Daily Freeman.

H. Rose Schneider reports in the Times Union that there is little chance of a White Christmas locally this year. The forecast is warm and dry Christmas Eve and Christmas Day, according to Joe Villani, meteorologist for the National Weather Service in Albany. He said, “It’s not looking good locally for a white Christmas.” Highs are forecast in the lower 40s and lows in the upper 20s Christmas Eve, and highs in the mid-40s and lows in the low-30s on Christmas Day. Villani said there was about an inch of snow on the ground the last two Christmas mornings, but the last truly white Christmas was in 2017, with about five inches of snow on the ground. It has also been very warm on Dec. 25 in 2020 and 2015, reaching 72 degrees in 2015. The snowiest Christmas recently was in 2002, with more than 19 inches of snow. Read more about this story in the Times Union.

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Emilie Munson reports in the Times Union that New York saw the nation's largest public school enrollment drop from the 2019-20 to the 2022-23 school years as more students were home-schooled during the COVID-19 pandemic. The state saw a six percent decline in public school enrollment, about 157,000 students fewer than usual. The largest decreases in the state were in New York City, as well as Greene, Schuyler, Ulster and Columbia counties. Private schools in New York only saw about a three percent decrease during the same time period. In all, nearly 19,000 more students were homeschooling last school year than in 2019-20, an increase of 57 percent. Stanford University economist Thomas Dee said, “There was a sustained exodus from public school.... There has been this resetting of enrollment patterns across public and non-public settings that is enduring.” Read more about this story in the Times Union.

Patricia R. Doxsey reports in the Daily Freeman that the Ulster County Legislature voted Dec. 19 17-to-5 to approve two contracts with Axon Enterprise Inc., despite many protests from residents about the company's ties with a company that is supplying Israel with weapons used in its war in Gaza. Many speakers opposed the contracts during a long, rowdy public comment period during the legislature meeting. Kingston resident Callie MacKenzie Jayne said Axon is “profiting off the atrocities” taking place in Gaza, and that, "What is happening to Palestine is disgusting.... U.S.-funded bombs” are killing children, she said. Marvin Warren, a Hurley resident who described himself as a Jewish American, said Axon was “war profiteering,” and that, “‘Never again’ means ‘never again,'.... ‘Never again’ for anyone, not ‘never again’ just for us.” But the legislature voted against the wishes of the many speakers for a contract for $111,588.50 for cameras, wired mics, camera cover sensors, switches, serve lights, motion sensors and thermostats, and a second for $440,172.43, for body cameras and related equipment, software and accessories to the Sheriff’s Office. The five legislators who voted against the purchases were Phil Erner, D-Kingston; Laura Petit, D-Esopus; Chris Hewitt, D-Kerhonkson; Peter Criswell, D-Kingston; and Abe Uchitelle, D-Kingston. Read more about this story in the Daily Freeman.

Jack Arpey at New York State of Politics reports that government transparency advocates are pushing to require that all public meetings in New York have free, unrestricted remote video and voice access to the public. During the COVID-19 pandemic, New York meetings were online, so it is not a question of capacity. Rachael Fauss, a senior policy advisor for Reinvent Albany, said, “It’s a really important part of the transparency of our state government.... The open meetings law is about how the public can watch and see government decisions happen.” The proposals for more transparency would allow public comment at meetings from both people who attend in person and online. Read more about this story at New York State of Politics.

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