It’s been two weeks since Amazon announced it would pull out of a planned project for Queens that would have tied $3 billion in tax incentives to 25,000 jobs.
The background music that is the Amazon controversy continued to play in Albany on Tuesday after lawmakers returned from a mid-February break.
Senate Republicans unsuccessfully sought a hostile amendment that would have restructured how the Public Authorities Control Board functions. The little-known entity was thrust into the spotlight this month after Sen. Mike Gianaris, a critic of the Amazon deal, was recommended by Democrats in the state Senate to sit on the board.
The Republican amendment, rejected by Democrats, would have changed the threshold for approval at the board from a unanimous vote to a simply majority.
“Every single Senate Democrat showed New Yorkers that they were not ready for prime time when they chased Amazon and its 25,000 jobs out of town, and today Democrats are reaffirming their ‘New York is closed for business’ stance by refusing to relinquish the very veto power that killed Amazon,” said Senate Minority Leader John Flanagan. “The Republican Conference offered a common sense solution to create a more deliberative and fair process.”
Senate Democrats over the weekend recommended the appointment of Sen. Leroy Comrie to the board in Gianaris’s place.
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