adapted from a post at the albany project
New York State Senate Republicans are awfully sore losers and, well, they are taking it out on the pooties. Seriously.
Some Background: Republicans, who control our state Senate, actually lost a seat this year (Woo-hoo! We won a seat! ). Actually, they lost a seat this year that they lost two years ago, but that's another diary.
The loser? One Nick Spano. Seems Spano promised all sorts of state money (we call them pork "member item" grants here in New York) to various organizations in his district during the campaign. Those grants were approved before the vote.
Then he lost. Now the GOoPers are taking their pork and going home.
The full TAP post and a call for help on the flip...
As it appears at TAP:
Senate Republicans Lose Seat, Take Their Pork And Go Home
State Senate Republicans are apparently playing the Grinch for residents of District 35. Much of the pork "member Item" grants promised to organizations in the district by recently defeated state Senator Nick Spano, are being retracted as new Senator Andrea Stewart-Cousins prepares to take office says Politics on the Hudson:
Democratic state Senator-elect Andrea Stewart-Cousins is pressing her soon-to-be Republican colleagues to honor commitments made by her predecessor Nick Spano, whom she defeated last month.
In a press release issued yesterday, Stewart-Cousins said she was “shocked and outraged” to hear Senate Republicans are pulling member item, or “pork” funding for non-profits promised by Spano.
In a Dec. 18 Journal News story by political reporter Glenn Blain, Spano said some organizations already were being informed they would lose promised funds. One such organization to acknowledge its funding had been pulled is the SPCA of Westchester.
Spano, a 28-year state legislator, had a lot of pull in the Senate and often touted his ability to bring member item dollars to his district as one reason voters should choose him.
Wow. Can you say "sore losers"?
This illustrates one of my biggest problems with member item spending, the lack of any discernible standards or formal process for the "awarding" of such grants. Many supporters of the funded organizations will say that their programs are worthy of public funding for the good that they do and for many, many of these entities, I have to agree. They are indeed worthy, though I feel they should be funded from the general fund as opposed to this highly partisan "process" of legal bribery.
That said, either the SPCA of Westchester is worthy of state funding or it isn't and this should have nothing to do with who won their recent local state Senate race. Why are the SPCA and all these other organizations being forced to go without because the voters of the 35th District decided to change state Senators?
Stay tuned for a new albany project project, much in the vein of No Reform? No Raise! to be announced shortly.
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OK. So here's our plan:
We are going to make as big a stink about this as possible. We are also going to raise as much money for the SPCA of Westchester as we possibly can. "Member Item" spending has been a pretty big issue here in the Empire state as of late and this seems to be a perfect opportunity to show just what a purely partisan boondoggle it really is. We also think the pooties are a perfect cudgel with which to bang the GOoPs over the head with.
What can you do?
Well, you can bring your mad photoshop skillz to bear on these assholes. We need pics of the cutest freakin' pooties ever with text making these goons look like the sore losers that they most obviously are. Go nuts, be creative and be merciless. Our state Senate Republicans have the purse strings and real bad attitude. What do we have? We have the pooties. I like our chances.
Also, you can help make up the shortfall that the SPCA of Westchester is now facing thanks to the GOoPs being such sore losers. Please consider making a donation to help save the pooties now at risk because the Republicans are taking their funding and going home. If you are willing and able to make a donation, please add $.01 to your gift and consider mentioning the albany project in the note. I would tell you to mention "OPERATION......" in the message but we have yet to name this project.
And that's where you can help as well. I've been playing with "OPERATION SAVE SPANO'S KITTENS", but it's just not good enough. Do you have a better name for this thing? If you do, care to share?
Won't you come out for "Pootiegate"?
I'm really hoping the community is willing to come out and play with this one.