Press Mentions

October 13, 2017

Mario Cuomo Bridge tolls may double to $10 to pay for span, watchdog says

Drivers will foot part of the bill for building the new Mario Cuomo Bridge, with tolls potentially doubling, according to estimates from a fiscal watchdog released Friday.

The Citizens Budget Commission projected tolls reaching $10 on the state’s latest construction marvel, which replaced the Tappan Zee Bridge between Westchester and Rockland counties. Gov. Cuomo is keeping tolls frozen until 2020.
October 04, 2017

Cuomo, de Blasio spar over state cuts to city hospitals

Gov. Andrew Cuomo, facing billions of dollars in federal cuts to two health programs, said that public hospitals across the state, including New York City Health + Hospitals, will have to make due with less money than their executives anticipated.

"We know today we don't have enough money to pay every public hospital 100 percent," Cuomo said. "What percent can we pay? We're not sure."

Patrick Orecki, a research associate with the Citizens Budget Commission, agreed that the city should receive the money. "The payments in question have already been earned for services rendered and should be released when earned," he said.
September 29, 2017

Hospital Cuts Set for Sunday Will Hit New York’s Latinos Hardest

If the extension expires as scheduled on Sunday, hospitals in New York state will immediately start losing about $60 million a month in funding.

“There’s this chunk of money that was originally scheduled to phase out under the Affordable Care Act,” says Charles Brecher, senior advisor for health policy at the Citizens Budget Commission. The idea was that as more people got insured under Obamacare, hospitals wouldn’t need as much in additional compensatory payments.