Unshackle Upstate calls 2013 state legislative session a ‘disappointment’

The business group Unshackle Upstate believes state lawmakers’ efforts to fix the “ailing” economy of upstate New York “unfortunately stalled” during this year’s legislative session.

That’s according to a statement that Brian Sampson, the organization’s executive director, posted Monday on the group’s website.

Sampson used the word “disappointment” to describe the organization’s feeling about the effort in Albany.

After a budget that included a minimum-wage increase and an extension of an energy surcharge, Unshackle Upstate and others called on both houses of the New York Legislature to act on “important, common sense initiatives,” Sampson said in the news release.

“These included modifying the Scaffold Law, repealing the annual-notice requirement of the Wage Theft Prevention Act, and enacting regulatory reform and mandate relief. If enacted, these changes would have improved New York’s anti-business reputation. Instead, we’re stuck with the status quo,” Sampson said.

The group also contends that START-UP NY, the adopted legislation implementing Gov. Cuomo’s Tax-Free New York initiative, will help the respective communities create jobs in the future, but it also believes it will “take much more” to turn around the Upstate economy, Sampson said.

START-UP NY is short for SUNY Tax-free Areas to Revitalize and Transform UPstate NY, according to the governor’s office. The governor signed the bill into law Tuesday in Binghamton.

“The best we can say for the 2013 legislative session is that it has left lawmakers with plenty of unfinished business to address next year. We expect our elected officials to step up and deliver in 2014,” according to Sampson.

Unshackle Upstate is a coalition of over 80 business and trade organizations representing upwards of 70,000 companies and employing more than 1.5 million people.

Contact Reinhardt at ereinhardt@cnybj.com