In this episode, Joanna Pasceri and Jack O’Donnell discuss the pressing legislative issues in Albany as lawmakers race against time before the session ends. They cover topics such as prison reform, environmental policies regarding packaging, the controversial medical aid in dying bill, advocacy for dyslexia education, and the implications of federal budget negotiations on state legislation. The conversation highlights the complexities and challenges faced by lawmakers in addressing these critical issues while navigating political dynamics.
Summary of this Episode
Guests
- Joanna Pasceri: Director of Communications at O’Donnell and Associates.
- Jack O’Donnell: Managing Partner at O’Donnell and Associates.
Major Topics Covered
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- Lawmakers are racing against time in Albany.
- Prison reform is a key focus with potential for early inmate release.
- The Packaging Reduction Act faces intense lobbying from businesses.
- Medical aid in dying remains a divisive issue in the legislature.
- Dyslexia advocacy highlights the need for educational reform in New York.
- Future legislative sessions may be necessary due to economic concerns.
- The SALT deduction debate showcases the conflict between state and federal interests.
- Political dynamics complicate the passage of significant legislation.
- Advocates for various issues must find ways to gain attention in a crowded legislative environment.
- Personal reflections on political life reveal the challenges faced by public servants.
Full Transcript of the Episode
Note: This is a generated transcript. Please excuse any typos.
Joanna Pasceri (00:01.712)
Crunch time in Albany as lawmakers race to the end of session. Hi everyone, and thanks for joining us from the lobby with Jack O’Donnell. Welcome to another edition of Monday Morning Minute, the podcast version of our award-winning Monday Morning Memo, a newsletter from Jack O’Donnell, managing partner of O’Donnell and Associates. This week, Jack dives into the high stakes issues up for debate in the legislature in the final weeks before it gavels out and will get his take on the high drama in D.C. as lawmakers negotiate a budget on Capitol Hill. Let’s bring him in for the latest. Welcome to the podcast, Jeff.
Jack O’Donnell (00:34.509)
Hi, Joanna. Great to be talking with you again from the lobby.
Joanna Pasceri (00:47.054)
You are in Albany today watching how some key bills are faring in the legislature. Some of them involve prison reform. You wrote about it in the memo this week. And ways to allow the early release of inmates to lessen the stress on the system. Are these going to pass?
Jack O’Donnell (01:06.009)
I think so. I think they are. We’re at an inflection point here. During the budget process, the governor pushed really hard on the public safety side of the criminal justice piece and had some victories there. But the legislature really comes down on the the civil rights, individual rights side of this. you know, the governor also pushed some changes, some help for prison guards. This is the flip side of that, which is, you know, getting some people who’ve served their time, who are older, getting them out of prison. So I suspect these are gonna pass, but, you know, it’s not a done deal. That’s why the last…four weeks here, last three and a half weeks here in Albany are so interesting because nothing, and I mean nothing is done until it’s actually done. So there’s going to be a lot of horse trading, a lot of pushing, pulling, a lot of excitement.
Joanna Pasceri (02:22.115)
A lot of patience, right? Well, another bill that keeps circulating is the Packaging Reduction and Recycling Infrastructure Act. It’s a mouthful. It requires some businesses to reduce their use of plastic packaging over the next several years. You mentioned in the memo an intense lobbying effort to kill this bill. What’s at stake here? How are businesses impacted?
Jack O’Donnell (02:45.972)
Yeah, I mean, this is a big deal. This has been around for a while. There are a lot of loud voices on either side. And a lot of it is, you know, who is responsible for all that packaging, all that waste, not even the product. you know, we saw one of the sponsors, Pete Harkom, was displaying, he had ordered a small battery. And it came in a foot wide Amazon box with a bunch of paper and other stuff in between. And so, who’s responsible for that packaging? Is it Amazon? Is it the battery company? When you make a shirt or buy anything else, right? Who’s responsible? so, this would be another.
Another real burden on businesses in New York, again, they would have to have different packaging just for their New York customers, which is always something that’s hard. But at the same time, you’ve got environmentalists saying that the landfills are too full and it should be the responsibility of the producers rather than the consumers to deal with this. This bill passed the Senate last year.
There were some intense negotiations about changing the bill, making some modifications to try to get it through the assembly. Those didn’t get done last year, but I think it’ll be fast and furious again this year. And again, this one really is kind of a jump ball about whether it gets done or not.
Joanna Pasceri (04:31.736)
You write in the memo about the divisive issue of medical aid in dining, essentially a bill allowing doctors to assist the terminally ill in ending their lives. This has passed the assembly. Does it make it through the Senate?
Jack O’Donnell (04:47.115)
I’d be surprised if this makes it through this year. mean, this is a big issue. It has been around for a while. It does have some really loud, some very vocal supporters, but it’s a really big change. Maybe radical is too loaded a word, but it is a really big change for people. And usually before those changes get done, it takes a couple years.
And I know this is a really serious issue for folks on both sides of it. We have a lot of folks who’ve been here all year, been here for the last couple of years lobbying on it. And so they’ll be pushing. But I wanna take one second and just give you a sense of what it’s like in the Capitol today as we get into this silly season.
Jay-Z the rapper is also here as are several costume stormtroopers from Star Wars. you know, as much as there are these big issues that a lot of folks care about, there are an awful lot of other issues fighting to get attention. And that’s one of the biggest challenges, I think, for our clients. And one of the things we try to do really well is, you know, things that may be really important to them.
Joanna Pasceri (05:52.044)
Hang on.
Jack O’Donnell (06:11.018)
How do you make them important to a few more people? How do you get them attention? But that’s the struggle that everybody’s gonna have through the end of session.
Joanna Pasceri (06:20.929)
Some interesting news in the memo on the push to create a center to improve academic outcomes for children with dyslexia. This, as the legislature last week, marked the 10th annual Dyslexia Advocacy Day. So what’s taken so long to address this issue?
Jack O’Donnell (06:39.027)
Well, man, mean, this is one of those places that the inaction of New York state is just unconscionable. mean, you New York is now one of five states, only five states in the country that doesn’t have a comprehensive approach to literacy. And that is such a shame. We are leaving so many.
So many kids behind. There’s recent studies that show as many as one in five kids are facing these challenges. So it is really frustrating about why it hasn’t gotten done. There’s a lot of bureaucracy here around education and sort of how that works, a lot of stakeholders. But man, I just need to give a lot of credit to assembly members, Joanne Simon and Bobby Carroll who’ve been running this. Senators Brad Hoylman Siegel and John Lew, they have been steadfast, loud advocates. They got some money in the budget for this dyslexia center. I’m optimistic that this bill will pass and get done this year. We owe it to those kids in New York to do that.
Joanna Pasceri (08:02.88)
We certainly do. The New York legislature, as we’ve mentioned, gavels out in June. What do you think are the chances lawmakers reconvene later this year to address either federal cuts or a drastic economic downturn?
Jack O’Donnell (08:16.649)
I think it’s highly likely. mean, the whispering or conventional wisdom here has been that that would be a September thing. As the federal reconciliation kind of drags on, I know we’ll talk about that. I know the speaker has a Memorial Day deadline. I wouldn’t be surprised if that bill doesn’t pass for a couple more months and that this gets delayed until later in the year. But I expect the legislature to be back and reacting to those factors.
Joanna Pasceri (08:56.52)
Speaker Johnson did have some good news last night, that late night re-vote on the GOP’s one big beautiful budget bill. It was approved and advanced out of committee. So is that any promising? Is that promising or what comes next?
Jack O’Donnell (09:13.106)
Well, it certainly is promising. mean, look, you’ve got to give a lot of credit to Speaker Johnson for being able to get as far as they’ve gotten. But we’re at the point where they’re having late night meetings on Sunday to revote. And even then, it got through because some folks, they didn’t vote yes, but they just didn’t vote no and allowed it to advance.
He’s got to cut a deal. He’s got to cut a deal between folks who want to see a lot deeper cuts and folks who want to see a lot more services and want to see things like the salt cap increase. Those members are marginals and those are the real ones that will say they put the GOP in the majority.
They still need to come to a conference-wide agreement, and they’ve got to be able to hold that. And that’s just going to be hard to do. And even then, it faces some headwinds in the Senate. We’ve seen the senator from Wisconsin, Ron Johnson, say he wants even deeper cuts.
You know, it’s still a long way to go on this. That said, it was an accomplishment to be where they are today.
Joanna Pasceri (10:43.466)
Speaking of the salt issue, you write in the memo about a very public fight between Congress members Mike Lawler and Marjorie Taylor Greene. The state and local tax deduction issue, salt, hurts blue states like New York. These two are battling it out. Who wins?
Jack O’Donnell (11:03.248)
I don’t know. But it’s been really, really, really fun to watch for people like me. You know, I think this is the epitome of the battle that Mike Johnson has. know, folks on the far right who just say everything the president does is right and they want cuts and they want what they want and they want it now.
Joanna Pasceri (11:08.51)
Yeah.
Jack O’Donnell (11:31.431)
And they’re in safe districts. They’re more worried about primaries than they are general elections. And the competition with members who, you know, like Mike Lawler, who won a, it was a Biden or a Harris plus, I think, eight to 10 seed, and he won that. ran ahead of President Trump in that district. That’s how you make majorities, Democrats have had those same challenges throughout the Biden years with the folks on the far left saying they needed the Green New Deal and folks in moderate districts saying we need relief now. And when you don’t do those things, you lose the majority. And so I think that’s the challenge the Republicans face right now.
Joanna Pasceri (12:20.787)
Stay tuned. Well, what was your favorite news link this week?
Jack O’Donnell (12:25.115)
you know there was a really speaking of congress there was it was a really fascinating story about steve israel on the former congressman from from long island and and he had wrote wrote something about how much more he enjoyed running a bookstore then i enjoyed his time in congress you know he’s a new yorker and so we don’t know really well someone i have a lot of respect for
So reading about why running a bookstore, which I think we all know is challenging in this Amazon world, the fact that that’s a better job because of the people he sees was a really interesting read.
Joanna Pasceri (13:08.105)
Exactly. Well, political life, as you know, Jack, not for everybody, right? Thanks so much for that deeper dive.
Jack O’Donnell (13:11.366)
Amen.
