Comptroller What state employee makes almost $100,000 more than Eliot Spitzer is paid as governor?

  Raudline Etienne, who will be paid $275,00 a year as  Chief Investment Officer for the $154 billion New York State Common Retirement Fund, Comptroller Thomas DiNapoli announced today.

The job is worth so much because Etienne will be in charge of one of the largest investment portfolios in the country – all of the assets the state is counting on to pay retirement benefits for hundresd of thousands of retirees of state and local governments.

  DiNapoli is the sole trustee of the fund, and therefore one of the largest single investors in the world. Most other large public funds are controlled by boards rather than individuals.

  Etienne formerly was a Connecticut-based condultant to public pension systems.

   The job has been vacant since last May when,David Loglisci,  a holdover from the adminisration  of former Comptroller Alan Hevesi, resigned. Prosecutors are probing charges that some investment fees from the fund were steered to a political ally of Hevesi. Hevesi quit in disgrace in December of 2006 after admitting using state resources to pay for his wife to be chauffeured around Queens and Westchester.

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Upstate community leaders today endorsed Gov. Eliot Spitzer’s Upstate Revitalization plan that would bring $1 billion to the upstate economy.

Business groups have called on him to lower taxes on businesses and reform the state’s Wicks Law, which drives up costs of public construction projects. Yet Spitzer’s budget calls for new fees and closing business loopholes that some leaders warn will drive up the cost of doing business in New York.

Still, the $1 billion state infusion of cash seems to be to the business groups’ liking.
They said in a news release that the fund is an important part of Spitzer’s pledge to focus attention and resources on improving the upstate economy.

“An economic infusion of this magnitude will go a long way toward jump-starting the Upstate economy and creating much-needed jobs,” said Sandy Parker, president and CEO of the Rochester Business Alliance.

Those who are backing the plan include: Garry Douglas, president, North County Chamber of Commerce; Frank Elias, president, Mohawk Valley Chamber of Commerce; Catherine Glover, president and CEO, Greater Binghamton Chamber of Commerce; John Lincoln, president, New York Farm Bureau; Darlene Kerr, president, Greater Syracuse Chamber of Commerce; Patrick Mannion, chairman, Greater Syracuse Chamber of Commerce; Andrew Rudnick, president and CEO of the Buffalo Niagara Partnership; Robert M. Simpson, president-elect of the Metropolitan Development Association of Syracuse and Central New York; Bill Towsley, president, Greater Syracuse Building Trades; Ken Warner, executive director, UNICON Rochester; Frank Wirt, president, Rochester Building and Construction Trades Council and Randy Wolken, president of the Manufacturers Association of Central New York.

Meant to post this one yesterday, but Sen. Hillary Clinton announced yesterday that on Monday she’s hosting a live webcast town hall with 21 Super Tuesday states participating simultaneously in the conversation by satellite.
Her campaign says it’s “the first time in presidential campaign history that voters in the Super Tuesday states can have their voices heard in a single national town hall.”
The event, called “Voices Across America: A National Town Hall� will take place in New York City and be simulcast starting at 9 p.m. EST on hillaryclinton.com.
Clinton will take questions submitted by voters online at www.hillaryclinton.com/townhall

Sen. Hillary Clinton also has two new ads out today playing in Feb. 5 primary states.
Here they are.
The first is called Free Fall; the second is called “Can Do.” Both focus mainly on the economy.

Here’s the Barack Obama ad that’s been running in New York City featuring Caroline Kennedy. Obama’s campaign said it’s unclear whether he’ll be running ads in upstate, but I did see an Obama ad here in Albany the other night that’s probably part of a national cable ad buy.
Obama has also picked up the endorsement of the New York Post.

The State University of New York’s interim chancellor told lawmakers today that he likes Gov. Eliot Spitzer’s plan to privatize part of the State Lottery to generate a $4 billion higher-education endowment. But John Clark is not happy that the governor’s proposed budget has “some significant challenges” because it does not include full funding for a number of initiatives, including:
—$34.2 million SUNY needs for operating support;
—$29 million to cover enrollment growth;
—$12 million to hire more research faculty as part of the Empire Innovation Program;
—$32.1 million to cover salary and fringe benefits at SUNY’s three hospitals;
—$20.4 million for additional campus safety programs.

SUNY wants the Legislature to add $33.3 million to restore $50 of the state’s share of community-college tuition that Spitzer’s budget cut and add another $200 per student, to assist smaller community colleges with fixed costs, and to cover mandatory fringe benefits. 

SUNY announced this week that its student enrollment increased for the 10th consecutive year. Fall enrollment went up 2.4 percent to 427,398 students on SUNY’s 64 campuses.

   The New Jersey-based New York Giants have come through for Gov. Eliot Spitzer.

  The governor today received a box of brautwurst from Wisconsin Gov. Jim Doyle in payment of their bet for the Jan. 20 National Football Conference championship football game won by the Giants over the Green Bay Packers. The Giants, who train each summer in Albany before decamping for their in-season home on the west bank of the Hudson River across from Manhattan, will face the undefeated New England Patriots in Sunday’s Super Bowl. The Patriots are a 12-point favorite.

   “Congratulations,’’ the governor of the vanquished Packers’ home state said in a note to Spitzer. “Now beat the Patriots.’’

    Spitzer would have sent  Doyle pastrami if the Packers had won. Stay tuned for details tomorrrow on Spitzer’s bet with Massachusetts Gov. Duval Patrick.

Senate Majority Leader Joseph Bruno said this morning that he spoke with Rudy Giuliani and that he will leave the presidential race this afternoon and back John McCain.

Also, the state Republican Party held a conference call this morning with its county chairs and voted unanimously to back McCain, according to some chairmen.

“Everyone who spoke agreed he was the best candidate for the party,” said Schenectady County Chairman Thomas Buchanan.

Bruno said in a statement that “I spoke with Rudy Giuliani this morning and he confirmed that he is dropping out of the race and will endorse Senator John McCain for president.”

Bruno said he also spoke with McCain, who was seeking his support. Bruno said McCain is “a proven leader with an outstanding record in the U.S. Senate and as a war hero. He has the experience our nation needs in these uncertain times as we continue the war on terror abroad and seek to steady our economy at home.”

Republicans this morning said they expect McCain can do well in New York and be competitive against either Democratic candidate Hillary Clinton or Barack Obama. McCain, Republicans think, will attract independent voters and help draw voters to the polls as Republicans try to retain control of the state Senate and win or retain upstate congressional seats.

Linda Sanford of Chappaqua, Westchester County, received approval from the Senate today to serve as a State University of New York trustee. She is the third of three nominations Gov. Eliot Spitzer made to the 16-member board last June. Two others—former state Comptroller H. Carl McCall and former state Board of Regents Chancellor Carl Hayden—received approval in the fall. She joins the board as it searches for a new chancellor. SUNY has had an interim chancellor in place since June.

Sanford, 55, replaces the Rev. John Cremins of Queens, a trustee since 2002. She is senior vice president for on demand transformation and information technology at IBM. Before that, she was senior vice president and group executive in charge of IBM Storage Systems Group and held other jobs with IBM. She is co-chair of the state Business Council and serves on various boards, including St. John’s University, which she attended as an undergraduate, and Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute, where she earned a master’s degree.

“I believe in this transformation. I believe in the SUNY system and you will have my full commitment,” Sanford told Senate Higher Education Committee Chairman Kenneth LaValle, R-Suffolk County.

Committee members interviewed her this morning, then her nomination went through the Senate Finance Committee before being approved by the full Senate. Trustees are not paid.

Sanford said she would need to learn more about a proposal for modest annual tuition increases at SUNY before forming an opinion. Spitzer’s Commission on Higher Education  recommended annual increases to make tuition more predictable and prevent large spikes.  SUNY needs to stay true to its mission of affordability and access to all, and the system should focus on asking former graduates for contributions, she said.

Sanford said the next chancellor of the 64-campus system has to be a leader and an “agent of change” who thinks creatively and forms collaborations.

Sanford she’d like to be known on the board as the trustee for innovation and transforming SUNY to a great university system for the 21st century.

Advocates for women’s rights met with dozens of legislators today to push for passage of the “Reproductive Health and Privacy Protection Act,” which would recognize a woman’s “fundamental right” to make medical decisions about contraception and pregnancy, something not currently written in state law.

It is important that New York, a “pioneer” in legalizing abortion, “affirmatively defines  a woman’s right to choose or refuse an abortion and the right to choose or refuse contraception,” said Carol Love, head of Planned Parenthood of the Rochester/Syracuse region.

Gov. Eliot Spitzer proposed the bill in the wake of last year’s U.S. Supreme Court decision that upheld a 2003 federal law on abortion. The law prohibits abortions in which a partially delivered fetus that is largely intact is removed, but not those in which a fetus is removed in pieces or that don’t involve vaginal deliveries. State lawmakers didn’t pass the bill last year, so the governor recommended it again.

New York lawmakers passed an abortion-rights law in 1970, three years before the Roe v. Wade decision that ensured women nationally could access the procedure. The state law has never been updated.

“It was the first time after 35 years that the Supreme Court really put a restriction on abortion in terms of not having an exception for women’s health,” said Reina Schiffrin, head of Planned Parenthood Hudson Peconic, adding that she hopes New York will once again be a leader in reproductive rights by passing the governor’s bill. Read more of this entry »