Besides casting ballots for president, vice president, Congress, state Legislature and, in many cases, state Supreme Court justice, voters will be asked a ballot question on Tuesday.

   If approved, the constitutional amendment would provide disabled veterans who served during wartime with 10 extra points on original civil service exams, even if they’re not collecting disability benefits. Current law allows preference to be given only if a veteran is receiving disability payments from the U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs.

   About 745,000 of almost 1.1 million veterans living in New York in September 2006 had served during wartime.

   Voters often miss ballot questions, which typically are placed above or below the lists of candidates. 

   With high turnout expected Tuesday, Gov. David Paterson sent a letter reminding all boards of election in the state that voters who are in line at the time the polls close must be allowed to vote, he said in a statement today. He asked boards of elections to make sure they have enough staff on hand and plenty of affidavit ballots for people who are not on the voting rolls.

   The governor urged people not to be discouraged from voting because of long lines at the polls, which are open from 6 a.m. to 9 p.m.

   Nearly one million new voters have been registered since the last presidential election. All told, there are 11.9 million voters in the state. Newly registered voters should bring proper identification to the polling sites, such as a driver’s license or utility bill. ID is not required for other voters. 

   Beside casting a ballot for president and vice president, voters will make choices for Congress, state Assembly and state Senate, and Supreme Court justice in many districts. There is a ballot question.

    The governor said voters should be aware of their rights.

  —You have a right to cast a ballot if you are a valid registered voter. You have the right to cast an affidavit ballot if your name is not listed on the voting rolls. Read more of this entry »

  Ever wonder what the “core mission’’ of state government is? If so, today is your lucky day!

Gov. Paterson’s Budget Division today released a tome lining out just how every state agency spends its money and how it relates to that organization’s prime responsibilities.

“For years, state-government spending has increased at an exponential rate without a fundamental reevaluation of how taxpayer money is being spent,’’ Paterson said. “In our current fiscal crisis, we simply cannot continue this kind of budgetary inertia.’‘  He said the report will help him and other state leaders where to cut spending next year, when the state is facing a potential deficit of more than $12 billion. Here’s the link:
http://www.budget.state.ny.us/budgetFP/coreMissionBudgeting/coreMissionBudgeting08.html

NYPIRG’s Bill Mahoney has put together a list of the top spenders for state Senate races during this two-year election cycle.

Republican Serphin Maltese, R-Queen, has spent the most on the general election, when you discount Democratic Sens. Darrel Aubertine and Craig Johnson, who had to compete in separate special elections.

Maltese has spent $2 million. He’s facing a tough re-election battle against Joseph Addabbo, who has spend $535,189.

After Aubertine and Johnson, Democratic candidate Richard Dollinger spent the most so far at $1.5 million, records show. The numbers include money from third-parties.

Here’s the list:

Republicans
Serphin Maltese—$2,038,264.22
Dave Renzi—$1,215,512.06
Tom Libous—$1,133,034.44
Martin Golden—$1,006,531.28
Joseph Robach—$994,188.23
Dale Volker—$956,849.60
Mike Ranzenhofer—$826,431.46
Barbara Donno—$818,474.90
Dean Skelos—$795,131.89
Roy McDonald—$792,134.53
Liz Feld—$747,283.39
Mike Nozzolio—$652,350.52
John Murtagh—$643,521.00
James Seward—$629,090.42
Jim Alesi—$532,993.70
Caesar Trunzo—$496,901.23
Vincent Leibell—$473,264.05
George Maziarz—$401,979.24

Democrats
Craig Johnson—$2,885,302.68
Darrel Aubertine—$2,298,294.66
Richard Dollinger—$1,544,003.49
Brian X. Foley—$1,529,811.88
Malcolm Smith—$1,115,792.38
Joe Mesi —$1,061,092.51
Jeffrey Klein—$1,000,168.66
Bill Stachowski—$691,578.34
Jim Gennaro—$604,179.36
Kevin Parker—$566,817.02
Joseph Addabbo—$535,189.05
Andrea Stewart-Cousins—$519,975.58
Daniel Squadron—$462,756.18
David Nachbar—$359,458.27
Liz Krueger—$329,466.71
Thomas Duane—$323,960.65
Antoine Thompson—$304,615.76

New presidential ads today as New York Times/CBS poll shows Obama-Biden with a 13-point lead when Bob Barr and Ralph Nader are included, but a 52-41 lead if the race is narrowed only to the Democrats and Republicans.

John McCain’s ad, entitled “Obama Praising McCain,” highlights Obama’s past praise for McCain’s on global climate change. Obama released two ads in Arizona, North Dakota and Georgia, and they highlight Obama’s change message andhit McCain over his economic policies.

Gov. Paterson, who has increasingly become involved in helping Democrats try to take control of the Senate, will be Buffalo on Saturday to campaign for Sen. William Stachowski, D-Buffalo, aides said.

Paterson will join other prominent Democrats, including Sens. Hillary Clinton and Chuck Schumer, who have headed to Buffalo to help Stachowski as he tries to beat back a challenge against Republican Dennis Delano, who Republicans are still confident is going to win.

There was talk that Paterson would also head to Rochester to campaign again for Democrat Richard Dollinger, who is close with Paterson, but it doesn’t appear likely, aides said. Paterson held a fundraiser in Rochester for Dollinger recently, and transferred money from the state party to his account.

Here’s Schumer today talking up Stachowski.

   Barack Obama supporters who feel frustrated that their votes won’t count for much next Tuesday because New York is a lock the the Democrat have been given an option to make them feel better about it: voting for him on a minor-party line.

Voting for the Illinois senator on the Working Families Party line will “send a clear message: be bold,’’ the party said in a release today.

The union-backed party,  which has endorsed Obama for president, is on Row E on the ballot, after the Democratic, Republican, Independence and Conservative parties. New York is one of the few states that allow candidates to appear on more than one line on the same ballot.

The party has pushed for universal health care, a raise in the minimum wage, more help for holder of sub-prime mortgages and ending the war in Iraq, among other issues.

The rationale is the more votes Obama gets on the party line, the more pressure he will feel to adopt their agenda.

“They will only be as bold as we can make them,’’ the party said in a statement.

The Senate Republican Campaign Committee has a hard-hitting ad out today against Democratic candidate David Nachbar in his bid to unseat Sen. James Alesi, R-Perinton.

Alesi had a nearly 3-to-1 lead in a Siena poll earlier this month, but Senate Republicans are still hammering Nachbar, who in the ad is criticized over his stock sales as a former executive with Bausch & Lomb in Rochester.

Nachbar is also named a federal lawsuit by former Bausch & Lomb employees who feel they got bilked through their pension fund.

“Our economy is crumbling and greedy corporate executives are lining their pockets. How can we possibly trust David Nachbar?” the ad concludes.

There’s also a new mailing coming out about it.

There have been rumblings about Nachbar’s sales of stock while at Bausch & Lomb. Sources produced documents that say Nachbar on Aug. 25, 2005, exercised options for 31,334 shares of stock and by the end of the day netted about $1.5 million.

They claim that the sale was made soon before B&L announced an internal investigation into misconduct within the company, which sent the company’s stock down.

Mike Williams, Nachbar’s spokesman, said that Nachbar sold the stock and properly reported it, saying that the stock actually rose after his sale so “it’s hard to say that he was capitalizing on any impending drop.”

Williams added, “All those stock transactions were legal, properly reported and declared. And he paid taxes on them.”

Williams said the lawsuit is standard after a company is bought out, and that it nothing to do with Nachbar’s stock sale.

Updated: Republicans countered, though, that the lawsuit, as shown in the ad, specifically mentions Nachbar’s stock sale as a reason some employees are seeking recourse from the company—not because the company was sold, arguing that he and others knew the stock price would slide while employees were still investing in the company.

Moreover, they said that Nachbar’s claim that the stock rose after he sold it is inaccurate because the stock didn’t falter until the company’s investigation was made public—an investigation Nachbar apparently knew about well in advance.

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After allegations of corruption in the development of wind energy across New York, Attorney General Andrew Cuomo announced today an agreement with two major wind farm companies for more transparency over the industry.

The agreement will require Noble Environmental Power, LLC and First Wind, who have wind farms in upstate New York, to no longer hire municipal workers or their relatives, ban gifts to public officials and maintain a Web site that lists their employees.

The attorney general’s office developed a Wind Industry Ethics Code that the firms will adhere to and created a task force made up of district attorneys and watchdog groups to monitor whether the wind companies are following the code of conduct.

The companies face up to $50,000 in fines for a first offense of the code, and up to $100,000 for subsequent offenses.

A Gannett News Service investigation in July revealed dozens of allegations from residents in small towns in which wind-farm companies were accused of running roughshod over ill-prepared town boards and specifically entering agreements with town officials to grease the process.

“Wind power is an exciting industry for the state that will be a cornerstone of our energy future,” Cuomo said. “But it is important to make sure that this alternative energy sector develops in a way that maintains the public’s confidence.”

Sen. Joseph Robach’s campaign is claiming that Democratic opponent Richard Dollinger illegally accepted two $9,500 donations yesterday from Melissa Schiff-Soros, daughter-in-law of billionaire Wall Street mogul George Soros which exceeds campaign finance limits.

Robach’s campaign points out that state law limits contributions from non-family members to a a maximum of $9,500 per candidate, per election cycle.

“These two donations from Mrs. Schiff-Soros are an obvious and egregious attempt by the Soros family and the Dollinger campaign to break our state’s campaign finance laws,” Robach’s campaign said in a statement.

“Citizens for Joe Robach is demanding Rick Dollinger immediately return the illegal $9,500 donation from Mrs. Schiff-Soros and we are calling on the Board of Elections to investigate this matter.”

Updated: Dollinger’s campaign said that it was a website error and the filing was double posted. It is now corrected online. The campaign said that never “at anytime was there more than the one check received by the Dollinger campaign.”

“If Robach had lent as much energy to researching this outlandish allegation as he did to making it he would have saved himself the embarrassment of being wrong,” said spokesman Sean Hart. “We warned voters about the desperate measures taken by Republicans in the final days of the campaign. Let’s take this for what it is, another failed attempt to distract voters from Republican Joe Robach’s failed record on the economy, job creation, property taxes, education and health care.”

Robach’s campaign also chided Dollinger for accepting $47,500 from Soros and his family since July, saying “Soros is one of the nation’s leading advocates for the legalization of illicit drugs that are harmful to our children and our families.”

George Soros’ son, Robert, also gave Dollinger $9,500 on Tuesday.

The recent spending showed up in the 24-hour filings before Election Day.

Robert Soros in recent days also gave $9,000 to Queens Councilman James Gennaro in his run against Sen. Frank Padavan, $9,000 to Brookhaven Supervisor Brian Foley in his run against Sen. Caesar Trunzo on Long Island, and $9,000 to Joe Mesi against Republican Mike Ranzenhofer in western New York.