Office of Rep. Greg Meeks
Rep. Gregory Meeks refers to himself as an “elected official by accident,” though he’s been a public servant from a young age.
Growing up in East Harlem, Meeks says he was inspired by the civil rights movement and Supreme Court Justice Thurgood Marshall to attend Howard University School of Law and eventually become an attorney.
Prior to running for public office, Meeks worked as a Queens County assistant district attorney, a prosecutor for a special anti-narcotics task force, and a chief administrative judge for New York state’s worker compensation system.
In 1992, he was elected to the state Assembly, and in 1998 he won a special election to represent New York’s Fifth Congressional District. While in office, Meeks has co-chaired the National Democratic Congressional Committee Trade Task Force and has chaired the House Subcommittee on Consumer Protection and Financial Institutions. In the upcoming session, Meeks will become the first Afr
There’s gonna be a showdown.
Even after the MTA delayed a planned 4-percent fare hike that the board was set to vote on this week, progressive activists are vowing to keep up the fight to find alternate sources of revenue for the state’s mass transit system and head off a potential vote on the fare hike later this year.
“We want to make clear that postponing a fare hike is not canceling a fare hike,” said Riders Alliance Organizing Manager Stephanie Burgos-Veras at a rally in front of MTA headquarters on Tuesday morning. “In two to three months, people’s financial situations will not magically get better. People are facing food insecurity, housing insecurity, they have seen their families pass away and have had to take on the costs of having to bury loved ones because of a scary and deadly virus.”
NY lawmakers poised to enact law to help renters, homeowners and small-scale landlords
Updated Dec 27, 2020;
Posted Dec 27, 2020
Members of the New York State Assembly meet for a legislative session in the Assembly chamber at the state Capitol Monday, June 8, 2020, in Albany, N.Y.Hans Pennink | AP Photo
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Syracuse, N.Y. State legislative leaders plan to vote Monday on legislation that would extend eviction moratoriums for renters and pause foreclosure proceedings for property owners facing financial strains caused by the coronavirus.
The proposal builds on changes already in place meant to help renters avoid losing their homes as economic hardships continue throughout the state.
What to expect in the 2021 state legislative session
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Will a Democratic supermajority and newly elected left-wing lawmakers shake up Albany?
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New limits on solitary confinement. Higher taxes on the wealthy. The legalization of recreational marijuana. Democrats in the Legislature have big ambitions about what they can get done in the state legislative session that begins Jan. 6. This will be the third straight year of one-party rule in Albany, and state lawmakers appear more emboldened than ever, now that they control more than two-thirds of the seats in the Assembly and the state Senate. “We recognize the mandate we’ve been given by voters,” state Senate Majority Leader Andrea Stewart-Cousins told reporters at the Capitol in late November. “We will assert ourselves accordingly, as we work with our colleagues in government.” That suggests an eventful year is coming up.
New York State Team
ALBANY - When Gov. Andrew Cuomo ran for governor in 2010, he vowed to let a income tax surcharge on the rich expire in 2011.
But facing budget gaps, the Democratic governor reached a deal with the Republican-led Senate to keep the surcharge, but at a lower rate than had been on the books along with a small middle-class tax cut and a cut in a corporate income tax rate.
Flash forward a decade: Cuomo now faces another call for raising taxes on the wealthy as the state faces a $13 billion deficit due to the COVID-19 pandemic, the largest since he first took office.