The budget is finished. No phones in classrooms.

0:00 Speaker 1 Sunday morning. Well, every Sunday morning, Governor David Patterson is with us to give us his thoughts, and he is one common sense Democrat and a good guy. Well, Governor Patterson, Sunday morning, what is your vision? What the heck is going on in our city or state or country wherever you want to lead?

0:21 Speaker 2 Well, John Wright. As the budget was being finalized, the legislature passed and the governor signed the MTA capital Plan. And the interesting thing about it is it’s not far off of what the MTA submitted Now when I was there, these to submit them really high payments that they wanted the state to continue to support them. But in this

0:46 particular situation they have, they’re going to have to do some closures. There’s a bridge and I’m not exactly sure where it is it on May ninth, you’re going to close that for like fourteen months something like that. But it looks like the usual struggle between the MTA and the governor isn’t occurring now. Right now, the mt and

1:09 the governor would be side by side because it’s not clear what the federal government is going to do. Because a lot of money that comes to the state and the MTA comes from the federal government. By the way, John, just something for our listeners to know. The state of the highest debt in this country is California. New York

1:31 is number two, New York City is number three, the state of Massachusetts is number four, and who’s number five the MTA. They’re not even a state and they have a deficit higher than forty six states in the Union.

1:48 So this is why this is always a big battle, because there’s a lot of money getting spent and then the state has debt and then they have trouble closing it.

1:58 Speaker 1 I mean, it is crazy because I hate to say it this way. A governor is those states were depending on Joe Biden or Vice President Harris to fund them, and when you have a gop Washington, they’re not going to do it. They’re not gonna give him a free ride.

2:21 I mean, and then you have to say, well, what is the common sense solution. Well, my feeling is I think in New York State, if Governor Hokeel cooperates with President Trump, that she’s going to get some help. I mean, what do you think of the situation.

2:41 Speaker 2 Well, I think that she has been rather outstanding when you think about it. Because the President just concluded his one hundredth day in office on Tuesday. Last Tuesday, he met with Governor Hokeel three of those hundred days, now there were forty nine other governors that I don’t think it can even come close through the amount of time

3:04 that she has spent with him, and I think that there is a modicum of respect that he actually has for her. She’s usually a you know, I.

3:14 Speaker 1 Agree, and don’t forget President Trump wants to help New York City and New York State because it was his home for over seventy years.

3:25 Speaker 2 And I think that’s why he was not averse to talking to the state’s governor and talking to the states mayor, which he’s done in that first one hundred days. But the hopefully the NTA officials will get that message and recognize that just because they have a plan, it doesn’t mean that it can be fully funded. They may have

3:57 to make a concession in that area. Really kind of an issue. One thing that I saw in the newspaper on Thursday, actually I think you tweeted it to me is the fact that New York City in the last five years has lost nine billion dollars to palm Beach and Miami. People are leaving, and it is only compounding

4:25 the city’s problem, in addition to the need that they have expressed to the state.

4:32 Speaker 1 It’s compounding the city and the state. And at some point you blow up, and you know, I don’t know what to do. I mean, you were the governor. You know the critical things going on, and I mean I depend on you on your opinion because I trust your opinion.

4:53 Speaker 2 Well, when I became governor, by the fourth month that I was Governor’s in March two thousand and eight to July two thousand and eight, that’s when the real recession hit and people were taking all their money out of the banks, and it was a very dangerous and serious period, and it resulted in New York State having a twenty

5:16 one to zero point three billion dollar deficit, which was twice the highest deficit that the state had ever had. We’d never been up that high. So I thought that my colleagues would follow me in extending some serious cuts to preserved money so the state could be run and not the piling up debt and piling up debt interest.

5:45 I was shocked because I finally found something that Republicans and Democrats could agree on. I was a person who brought people together. They were all sick of me for saying this and quite adamant that there were other ways to affect this. And even at that time, a person in my administration had a plan to borrow six billion

6:08 dollars to help defray the debt and it would get paid back over time. Well, that’s how we got the debt up in the first place, because we borrowed. But inevitably we were able to pass that. But I think only when the legislators saw that it was just getting progressively worse and they couldn’t bring home the bacon to

6:30 their constituents with a budget deficit that high because they had no there was no money left over. So that’s I think that what the approach that whoever are in the leadership positions, those people who have decision making capacity have got to think of the long term value of the entity that they served, as opposed to the negative

6:56 reaction that they’ll get in the media from their colleagues.

7:00 Speaker 1 Well, I love New York, you love New York. We don’t want New York to fail. We want we want to do whatever is possible to help New York and David, Governor David Patterson. Common sense has to prevail.

7:16 Speaker 2 Yeah, sometimes it does.

7:19 Speaker 1 Let’s hope we get lucky this time. And please look you you you know, Governor Huckle. Please give her whatever advice you can give her.

7:29 Speaker 2 I’ll do that.

7:31 Speaker 1 Thank you so much for coming on, and we’ll see you again. Well, you’re in a studio every Thursday and Friday. We’ll see you Thursday Fridays in the studio.

7:41 Speaker 2 Fantastic, Thanks Jean, thank you.