Watchdog Groups Again Urge NY Leaders to Publish Financial Plan Tables

March 10, 2026

March 09, 2026

The Honorable Kathy Hochul
Governor of the State of New York
New York State Capitol Building
Albany, NY 12224

The Honorable Andrea Stewart-Cousins
TemporaryPresident and Majority Leader
New York State Senate
Legislative Office Building
188 State Street, Room 907
Albany, NY 12247

The Honorable CarlHeastie
Speaker
New York State Assembly
Legislative Office Building
188 State Street, Room 932
Albany, NY 12248

Re: Please publish basic financial plan tables with one-house budget proposals and the enacted budget agreement

Dear Governor Hochul, Senate Majority Leader Stewart-Cousins, and Assembly Speaker Heastie:  

As in years past, we again urge you to publish basic, multi-year financial plan tables with the Legislature’s one-house budgets and the enacted budget to provide New Yorkers the information they deserve and to ensure a transparent budget process.  

The Assembly’s one-house budget summary has provided useful information for years. The Senate made progress recently, publishing summaries of receipts, disbursements, and fund balances. Still, each of these reports falls short by only providing one year’s worth of highly aggregated information. Reasonably detailed multi-year financial plans are needed to show the long-run fiscal impact of each houses’ proposals.

The Division of the Budget’s Enacted Budget Financial Plan provides excellent insight into the State’s fiscal condition—but it is released up to 30 days after enactment.

This delayed release provides legislators and the public little to no clarity on the enacted budget deal at the most crucial times: when the budget deal is announced and when the bills are being voted on.

A press release with scant details on basic topline and program spending, year-to-year growth rates, and major fiscal actions does not support responsible, informed legislative decisions or public understanding of the budget’s long-term fiscal impact.  

Whenever new budget bills are introduced—with both the one-house and enacted budgets—we recommend that you:  

  • Publish at least one financial plan table each for All Funds, State Operating Funds, and the General Fund;
    • Each of these three tables should provide reasonably disaggregated and totaled lists of receipts, disbursements, transfers, annual bottom-line results, and allocations of fund balances for the budget year and three out-years; and  
  • Codify in State law the requirement to publish these tables.  

To be clear, we are not suggesting that you produce a full 400-page financial plan report at the time of budget agreement—although we note that New York City releases a financial plan on the day the budget is adopted and thousands of pages of supporting documentation within the following week.

The three basic financial plan tables we are requesting are essential to ensure legislators and the public have a timely, basic understanding of the budget and its implications for the State’s immediate and long-term fiscal health. A sample basic financial plan table for the General Fund, available here, illustrates the level of information we recommend.  

Thank you for considering our recommendations.

Sincerely,

Andrew S. Rein
President
Citizens Budget Commission

Grace Rauh
Executive Director
Citizens Union

Susan Lerner
Executive Director
Common Cause New York

Zilvinas Silenas
President
Empire Center for Public Policy

Blair Horner
Senior Policy Advisor
New York Public Interest Research Group

John Kaehny
Executive Director
Reinvent Albany  

cc: Blake Washington, Director of the New York State Division of the Budget  
Senator Liz Krueger, Chair of the Senate Finance Committee  
Assembly Member J. Gary Pretlow, Chair of the Assembly Ways and Means Committee  

Click here to view the original post on Citizens Budget Commission’s website.

Click here or below to see the full letter.