NY legislators set to hike own pay to $142G, highest in U.S.

Albany — Salaries for state legislators would jump to $142,000 annually under a bill that is set for a vote Thursday — making New York lawmakers the highest paid in the nation.

The bill also would limit — for the first time ever — lawmakers’ ability to earn outside incomes. The cap, somewhat modeled on the outside-income cap for congressional members, would be $35,000 annually.

State legislators currently are paid $110,000 annually. A “compensation commission,” created in 2018 had suggested salaries be increased to $130,000 in a series of step raises, along with a cap on outside incomes.

But that plan was struck down by a court ruling that said the commission had no authority over outside incomes. Any such limit would have to be imposed by the State Legislature in a new law, the court said.

Democratic house leaders have proposed to do just that in a bill jointly submitted late Monday. But the bill also bumped salaries all the way to $142,000 instead of $130,000, in part for forgoing an annual cost-of-living adjustment some lawmakers favored.

The new salary would be the highest in the nation, surpassing California where legislators’ pay is slated to near $123,000 next year.

Neither Assembly Speaker Carl Heastie (D-Bronx) nor Senate Majority Leader Andrea Stewart-Cousins (D-Yonkers) commented Tuesday on the bill. But aides confirmed the legislation is on track for a vote Thursday.

Gov. Kathy Hochul, however, endorsed the pay hike earlier this month.

"I believe they deserve a pay raise. They've worked extraordinarily hard," Hochul told reporters at a recent subway groundbreaking event. “It's a year-round job. I've been with them many times in their districts and they work very hard and they deserve it.”

Notably, the compensation commission also had called for hiking the governor’s salary from $179,500 to $250,000, as well as boosting pay for other statewide elected officials and state agency commissioners. Those changes sailed through without a court challenge — meaning the executive branch got its raise while the legislative did not.

Republicans, who are in the minority in the state Senate and Assembly, panned the pay raise as tone deaf. So did business groups who noted upstate jobs numbers haven’t recovered since the pandemic.

“New Yorkers have serious challenges and real concerns. A legislative pay raise isn’t one of them,” Assembly Minority Leader Will Barclay (R-Pulaski) said. “Returning to Albany this week must result in meaningful action to improve the lives of the people we represent. Anything short of that is unacceptable.”

Justin Wilcox, executive director of Upstate United, a business and trade organization, said: “Legislative pay raises should only be discussed once the Legislature has taken the necessary steps to revive our economy and communities. As of today, that’s not happened."

Good-government groups had called for a limit on outside incomes but wanted it to be 15% above salary, matching the one for Congress — not 25% as the Legislature is set to approve.

Further, they said, the limit falls short because it didn’t include an outright ban on any outside employment in which a legislator has a fiduciary responsibility to an employer or client. Such a ban would limit potential conflicts of interest, watchdogs said.

Also, lawmakers haven’t outlined a rationale for such a “gigantic” pay hike, according to the good-government groups.

Said Blair Horner of the New York Public Interest Research Group: “It’s up to the governor and legislators to explain why they should be, far and away, the highest paid legislators in the country.”

By Yancey Roy

yancey.roy@newsday.com@yanceyroy