Video, Audio, Photos and Rush Transcript: Governor Hochul Highlights $2.3 Billion in Tax Relief for Nearly 3 Million New Yorkers

Earlier on Sep 19th, Governor Kathy Hochul highlighted New York State’s ongoing efforts to deliver $2.3 billion in tax relief to nearly three million New Yorkers under the State’s School Tax Relief program. More than two million New Yorkers have already received their STAR tax relief and nearly one million will receive their benefits in the coming weeks. The Governor also highlighted that New Yorkers on Long Island can still sign up for direct deposit before their STAR credits are issued in the coming weeks.

VIDEO of the event is available on YouTube here and in TV quality (h.264, mp4) format here.

AUDIO of the Governor's remarks is available here.

PHOTOS of the event will be available on the Governor's Flickr page.

A rush transcript of the Governor's remarks is available below:

Hello, everyone. Hello. Here we are talking about putting more money back in the pockets of New Yorkers. This is a great day, my friends. You know, we've been talking about affordability all summer long, and I want to thank the leaders and the members of the legislature for being phenomenal partners in our desire to just lift the burden from hardworking New Yorkers in any way we can.

So, I'm grateful for the presence of our Leader, Andrea Stewart-Cousins. Thank you for your friendship, your partnership, and being a real driver of these conversations with the members of the Senate as we go forward. Also, I want to acknowledge Carl Heastie, our Speaker, who was so adamant that we find the resources that we're talking about today back in people's pockets as well. I want to thank him for his leadership and everything he has done and I'm sorry he couldn't be here today, but he certainly sends his best. And also, to all the legislators who've been recognized here today, I take nothing for granted in this business. Your partnership, your willingness to roll up your sleeves and get the job done is something I'm so grateful for.

So, as I said, we've been talking about affordability. Started off the summer with $200 million in food assistance for 1.5 million children. Then we distributed $350 million in child tax credits to over one million families. And then we worked together to cap the cost of child care, something I've spoken a lot about because this was personal to me. When we could not find child care that was affordable when I was starting out in my career, we capped it for families earning less than $108,000 to $15 a week. That's money back in their pockets. So, we've worked together, worked really hard to get all this back in people's pockets.

And some other good news. Inflation is finally going down. When we were doing our Budget, it was still up there and unpredictable, but it's finally plummeted down from its 40-year high down to pre-pandemic levels and even gasoline has dropped to $2 a gallon. We didn't think we're going to see this for a long time.

So, you know what? With all this backdrop and the good news from the economic front, New Yorkers still don't feel that relief yet. It takes time. It takes time to trickle down and benefit them. And I know this because I went back to school shopping in Albany last month – not for myself. I'm good. But Melissa Anderson was a young woman, a single mom, who was so grateful to the checks that we gave her just in time for that back-to-school shopping when shopping with her twin sons. And to watch these kids, it was actually heartbreaking because they knew that they couldn't grab the $89 backpack. They immediately gravitated to the $39 one because they knew that there would be too much for their mom. Already at age 12, they knew they could not get that extravagant backpack.

And we went shopping. We bought pens, and paper, and notebooks, and the water bottles they picked out, and the lunch pails. And we got to the checkout, and she turned to me and said, “I couldn't do this without the help from the state.” That, my friends, is why we do what we do. It's those voices that feel that no one ever listens to them, yet we do. We do. And it's so hard to make ends meet. And we're always working to find ways to just get money back in people's pockets.

So today, a continuation of this long effort, we're announcing that we're sending $2.3 billion in school tax relief, the STAR program to nearly three million homeowners across New York. That deserves a round of applause. Now, two-thirds of the recipients already have checks, which is great because we wanted that in time for school. And there's a couple districts that are still looking to get them because of their timetable with their own school districts and their own finances, but this program has been around a long time, no doubt about it. But we keep ensuring that it gets bigger and bigger every year.

And also, for seniors on a fixed income. My gosh, life is hard. The cost of the copays, every time they turn around there at a doctor's office, the cost of prescription drugs, and they want to get a little gift for the grandkids once in a while. Receiving the Enhanced STAR and putting $1,000 back in their pockets, this makes a world of difference and helps our seniors actually enjoy their retirement just a little bit more instead of being there late at night worrying about how to pay the bills. So, it goes a really long way. The groceries – I go shopping in the city. I'm stunned at the cost of toothpaste and bananas. I walk to them. No deliveries for me. Or even just if you have a car, car payments and insurance and everything else.

So, here's the other thing. Since the beginning, the checks would show up in the mail, right? Now sometimes people move and you're not always there and sometimes mail gets stolen. A little bit of unreliability. We have technology finally catching up with this program. Even seniors do online banking, right? I'm a senior, I do online banking. I can speak for seniors. So, we want to meet taxpayers where they are. We wanted to make sure that the people who deserve this relief get it immediately. And so, we have made sure that we have a digital portal now. This is a brand-new digital portal for the first time ever. They can get their STAR payments by direct deposit. Direct deposit right there, right away.

Now, as I said, many people have already received their checks for this year, but if you live on Long Island, for example, which is on a different cycle, you can still sign up for direct deposit this year. So, we want to make sure that happens. Go to ny.gov/STAR to get started. So, everybody should do it for next year. It's available. Get that money as soon as you can. It's yours, and you can set up a direct deposit to come day or night.

So, let me wrap up with this: Affordability will always be the top priority of my administration and your representatives in the legislature. We are aligned with this. No New Yorker should have to lie in bed at night and worry about these bills or make decisions, choices, that they should not have to make between the groceries, the prescriptions, being late on a payment. It's just too hard sometimes.

So, if we can continue finding ways to give people relief, and I mentioned Long Island. I think about the fact that a recent visitor to Long Island just last night was responsible for driving up the cost of living in places like Long Island and Westchester County and other areas when he obliterated the state and local tax deduction that had been there since the beginning of the tax code when President Abraham Lincoln was in office.

So, now it comes back here. What a hypocrite. Oh, we're going to get rid of that. You know how much Long Islanders and Westchester residents and other New Yorkers have had to pay since the time of the end of this? It's cost individuals in these areas about $5,500 more a year that they used to be able to deduct. Over the six years, it's $33,000. It should have been in their pockets, so they could finance a big tax cut for the wealthiest and really stick it to the blue states is how they define this.

So, we're doing what we can, but these are changes we're going to need at the federal level. I'm not personally trusting the person who got rid of this. I'm not believing him at his word to say, “Oh, I'm going to put it back.” So, that's up for voters to decide. This is not a political conversation.

School taxes have eaten up so much of the relief and we're just trying really hard to get people's head above water. So, we're going to keep focusing on the STAR program. We're going to work hard to restore the state local tax deduction known as SALT and make sure that we can have New Yorkers thriving once again.

And with that, I'm really proud to announce someone who's a champion of these causes, has been an ally at my side. We've gone through a lot of negotiations together. I'm sure you miss it. Right now. No? Okay, we're good. It's right around the corner. Leader, it's right around the corner. Honored to introduce my friend and our Senate Majority Leader, Andrea Stewart-Cousins, to talk about the positive impact of STAR across her district in the State of New York.