Issue: Business Subsidies Clean Contracting Archives

Report New Report Finds Fewer Than Half of NY’s Largest Local Ethics Boards Are Functional Only 20 of 45 local ethics boards operational; eight have no website, and just two publish electeds’ financial disclosure statements online.

Report NY Taxpayers Giving at Least $321 Million to Rockland County Data Centers Taxpayers on the Hook for $1.078 Million Per Full-Time Job

Report Structural Obstacles to Government Oversight in New York NY Has Many Watchdog Agencies, But Deprives Them of Independence, Resources, and Authority Needed to Effectively Combat Corruption and Misconduct

Report Despite Very Late State Budget, Legislature Passing Bills at Normal Clip Senate and Assembly May Be Adapting to Short “Regular” Sessions

Report NYS Agencies Failing to Make FOIL Easier for Public FOIL Fail: NYS Agencies Not Using GovQA Software Tools that Make FOIL Easier for the Public

Report NY Taxpayers Spend $77M for One JP Morgan Data Center Job Rockland County IDA's $77M sales tax abatement for JP Morgan's Orangetown data center expansion creates one full-time job; by far the largest subsidy for a single job in history.

Fact Sheet Five Reasons NY Must End Its Tax Break for Trump Opportunity Zones NYS should fully decouple from the federal Opportunity Zone tax program, which costs the state up to $424 million annually while funneling tax dollars into out-of-state luxury real estate, guns, oil, and crypto investments.

Report Watchdogs Release Q&A About “Lame Duck” Charter Commissions Q&A Regarding Charter Revision Commissions Appointed by Prior Mayors (“Lame Duck” Charter Commissions)

Report Key Sources for Amtrak’s “New York Penn Station Transformation Project” Reinvent Albany tracks key resources on Amtrak's New York Penn Station Transformation Project, raising concerns about transparency in the procurement process and project financing.

Report Fundamentally Flawed, Illogical ESD Report Massively Exaggerates Benefits to Taxpayers of NYS $800m/Year Film-TV Production Subsidies ESD's consultant report massively exaggerates the returns on New York's $800 million annual film and TV production subsidy, ignoring independent experts who have repeatedly found it a waste of taxpayer dollars.

Report NY Taxpayers Shelled Out $900 Million to Hollywood Producers in 2025 Months after the Governor and Legislature approve new subsidies, film/TV handouts continue to climb.

Fact Sheet Listening to FOIL 2025: Lessons from 11 New York State Agencies Reinvent Albany analyzed FOIL logs from 2024 provided by 11 units of New York State government to assess how well the Freedom of Information Law is working.

Report Transparency Gap: NY Senate Confirmation Votes Kept Behind Two Layers of Obstacles Reinvent Albany's report discovered two major obstacles when trying to understand how NY Senators vote on confirmations: 1) they do not publish votes on their website, and 2) they overuse slate voting.

Report Mayor Mamdani Must Fully Harness City Tech to Deliver for Everyday New Yorkers Our new report recommends a new management structure for NYC’s tech and data offices and urges Mayor Mamdani to take 5 steps to improve how technology can be used to deliver better services to everyday New Yorkers.

Building a 21st Century Judiciary: A Reform Agenda for New York City Our joint report with Scrutinize calls on the incoming mayor to make NYC’s little-noticed process to appoint judges modern and transparent

Policy Crossroads: Reconsidering IDA Housing Tax Breaks in New York Our new report with the State Policy Advocacy Clinic at the Brooks School of Public Policy at Cornell on constitutionally questionable housing projects being undertaken by IDAs across New York State

Backdoor to the Bench: NY’s Constitutional Cap on Supreme Court Spawns Dysfunction Our joint report with Scrutinize shows that the cap on the number of Supreme Court judges in New York’s constitution has created a double dysfunction

Investing in the MTA Is Investing in America – October 2025 Update New report shows that the Metropolitan Transportation Authority (MTA) spent nearly $19 billion outside New York from 2011 to 2024, supporting up to 247,000 jobs in politically blue, red, and purple states alike.

New York IDAs’ Reckless Assault on Public School Funding Harm to NY Schools from IDA Property Tax Breaks Multiplied by Flawed Tax Cap Law

NYS Taxpayers on Pace to Shell Out Nearly a Billion to Hollywood Producers in 2025 New ESD data reveals Q1 2025 payout of $230 million, $65,000 in taxpayer subsidies per full-time film/TV job

Listening to FOIL 2025 Report: Lessons from Five NYS Agencies In the 2025 “Listening to FOIL” report, we used government agency logs of FOIL requests to assess how well FOIL is working.

NYC Government Flouting Freedom of Information Law New Report Shows FOIL Requests and Delays Skyrocketing: NYC Gets Roughly 170,000 FOIL Requests a Year; 16% of FOIL Requests Still Open After a Year

New Report Update Highlights Transparency Leaders in NY’s Criminal Courts A small group of judges and counties leads the way in publishing decisions, demonstrating that open justice is possible—even as many decisions are not published online

MTA Spending County-by-County 2014-2023 From 2014-2023 the MTA spent $30 billion purchasing goods and services from businesses in NYS. This analysis provides a breakdown of MTA spending by county.