New York State SmartTranscripts:

[Speaker 0]: Of the state assembly ways and means committee. And today, we're convening the tenth in a series of 14 hearings conducted by the Joint Fiscal Committees of the legislature to consider the governor's proposed budget for fiscal year 2627. These hearings are conducted pursuant to the New York State constitution and legislative law. Today, the Assembly Ways and Means Committee, together with the Senate Finance Committee, will begin hearings regarding the governor's budget proposals as it pertains to higher education. I'm joined by my esteemed colleague, Senator Liz Krueger from the great city of New York, the chair of the Senate Finance Committee. I'll now introduce the assembly members that are in attendance. We have our chair of the Higher Education Committee, Alicia Hyndman. We have Assemblywoman Clark, Assemblyman Ichthus, and Assemblyman O'Pharrow with us. Senator?

[Senator Liz Krueger (Chair, Senate Finance Committee)]: Thank you. Good morning, and thank you to everyone for getting to Albany today, even though we're starting this hearing a little bit later than originally planned. And I have with me sorry I know we have Senator Toby Stivisky, who's our chair, and Senator Jackson, and Senator Liu, and Senator Fahey.

[Speaker 0]: J. Have no Republican assembly members with us as of yet. They're at a press conference, and I waited a little while for them. But they are doing something other than attending this hearing. So pass it off to the Senate.

[Senator Liz Krueger (Chair, Senate Finance Committee)]: Thank you. Apparently, the Senate Republicans didn't have anything as important as the higher education hearing. I have Tom O'Meara, our ranker in finance, and whoever else he has.

[Senator Tom O'Mara (Ranking Member, Senate Finance Committee)]: T. Kruger. We're joined on our side by senators Dean Murray and Peter Oberacher. And I'm sure the Assembly Republicans will be along shortly.

[Speaker 0]: Alright. I now wanna go over the rules of the road. All governmental witnesses will have ten minutes to testify, and nongovernmental witnesses will be elided three minutes to testify. The chairs of the relevant governmental committees will have ten minutes of questioning with an allowance of an extra three minutes at the end for a follow-up if they like. Ranking members of each committee will have five minutes and no follow-up. All of the members of the relevant committees will be alighted three minutes. To all witnesses, your written testimony has been submitted, so we would ask that you just sum up what your testimony is and leave room for questioning. And to all legislators, you are limited to the times I've just stated. Please be advised that there are flocks that are visible to all. That time includes the questions as well as the answer. So please don't start a question when the clock says twelve seconds left and expect somebody to answer because I will cut you off. Hearing barring that, I will now introduce our first individual to testify, the chancellor John, what is your title? Your lead. J. JOHN KING, Jr. Of SUNY.

[John B. King, Jr. (Chancellor, State University of New York)]: J. Thank you very much. Good morning. I want to thank the chairs, ranking members, members of the Senate Finance Committee, the Assembly Ways and Means Committee, and the Senate and Assembly Higher Education Committees for the opportunity to appear before you today. On behalf of the SUNY Board of Trustees, I also want to recognize Governor Hochul and the legislature for their confidence in SUNY and record investments in our students, faculty, and campuses over the last three years. As I come before you today, our nation faces a historic affordability crisis. In this moment, public higher education has never been more important as an engine of upward mobility, driver of groundbreaking discoveries and innovation, and cornerstone of our democracy. By freezing in state tuition, providing free community college to adults in high demand fields through SUNY Reconnect, and demonstrating the economic value of a college degree, SUNY is vital to New York State's affordability strategy. On every campus, every day, we help students from every background, including the 85% of our students who eligible for financial aid, graduate with real world skills and career prospects and without a mountain of debt. Over the last three years, SUNY has achieved back to back to back enrollment gains across every sector of the SUNY system. This is the first time that it's happened since February. Dedicated increases in state operating capital support are essential to this progress and to our continued success. As a result, we are delivering on the promise of SUNY's four pillars student success, research and scholarship, diversity, equity, inclusion, and economic development and upward mobility. On student success, we have implemented ASAP and ACE, the nation's leading college retention and completion initiatives for more than 7,000 SUNY students across 34 campuses. And we are building on these efforts with a system wide academic momentum campaign. Student success also extends beyond academics, from helping to meet our students' basic needs, like addressing food and housing insecurity, to expanding child care and mental health supports. It also includes helping students build their civil discourse and civic muscles. I'm especially proud of Governor Hochul's Empire State Service Corps, which enables more than 500 SUNY students to participate in paid public service internships in their campus communities. Our students are incredibly inspiring, programs like the Empire State Service Corps show the enormous potential of the next generation of New Yorkers. When it comes to research and scholarship, SUNY remains committed to Governor Hochul's goal to double research expenditures, even in the midst of the current administration in Washington's efforts to dismantle the eighty year partnership between federal research agencies and institutions of higher education. The Governor's Empire A. I. Initiative is an especially promising opportunity for SUNY researchers to shine as they advance the public good, from pursuing life saving medical cures to making the internet safer. Researchers at the State University of New York at Albany, Binghamton, Buffalo, and Stony Brook, along with researchers at SUNY Poly, ESF, Upstate, Downstate, and other campuses are driving the future in AI, quantum, semiconductors, sustainability, energy storage, and biotech, among so many other fields. Next, our commitment to diversity, equity, and inclusion is strong and unwavering. As I often say, DEI is literally written in SUNY's DNA. In creating SUNY more than seventy five years ago, this legislature established our mission to provide to the people of New York educational services of the highest quality with the broadest possible access, fully representative of all segments of the population. Our commitment is explicit in our SUNY LEAD leadership institutes, which have been championed by our partners in the legislature. It is integral to the requirement that every campus have a chief diversity officer. It's at the heart of our dedication to ensuring that every campus is safe and inclusive for all students, that we see and support every first generation college student, every Pell recipient, every student with a disability, every student veteran, every LGBTQ plus student, every student parent, and that we reject in word and deed racism, sexism, antisemitism, Islamophobia, xenophobia, and every form of discrimination and harassment. That is why this year, SUNY expanded our mandatory Title VI training to include not only faculty and staff system wide, but also every student organization leader at our state operated campuses. We also require all campuses to appoint a Title VI coordinator. One of New York State's hallmark programs that exemplifies our creed that there is a place at SUNY for every New Yorker, and that is a source of great pride at SUNY, as well as to its longstanding legislative alumni and champions, is our Educational Opportunity Program. And that's why we're working so hard to increase investment in EOP. And our final pillar is economic development and upward mobility. Governor Hochul's SUNY Reconnect program is a perfect example of how we are using our unique reach to connect students to economic opportunity by providing free community college tuition, fees, books, and supplies to eligible adults working to pursue their aspirations. Another essential component of SUNY's commitment to upward mobility is our work to ensure the value of every college degree. I'm especially excited about our ambitious goal to provide an internship or other experiential learning opportunity for every undergraduate student, as well as our ongoing work to embed industry recognized certificates into a wide range of degree programs. I want to underscore that SUNY's progress in all of these areas is built on our commitment to financial sustainability. And let me be very clear. I believe in every one of our campuses and every sector of the SUNY system. In order to thrive for the long term, our campuses need the resources to succeed. And I'm proud that together with historic operating support provided by the governor and the legislature, we have provided more than 30% increases in direct state tax support to every single one of our state operated campuses over the last three years, as well as implemented strategies to ensure academic and fiscal health. I appreciate the tough decisions that campus leaders sometimes must make, and our fidelity to fiscal stewardship is the context in which we seek your annual budget support. The SUNY Board of Trustees and I are profoundly grateful to Governor Hochul and the legislature for three years of historic investments in SUNY. And I want to quickly highlight just a few of Governor Hochul's key proposals in this year's budget. The executive budget maintains the SUNY tuition freeze by increasing state operated campus funding by $54,000,000 Right now, 54% of resident undergraduate students attend SUNY tuition free, thanks to our ability to maintain a low tuition level alongside state, federal, and institutional financial aid. Increased operating support makes this possible. The executive budget also maintains the community college 100% funding floor to prevent SUNY community colleges from losing nearly $65,000,000 in state funding. In addition, I'm especially pleased that Governor Hochul is proposing to invest $8,500,000 to expand SUNY Reconnect to provide free community college to eligible adult learners preparing for careers in logistics, air traffic control, transportation, and emergency management, as well as to make it easier for adult learners to pursue nursing if they already have a prior degree. As I mentioned, SUNY has implemented ASAP and ACE as part of our college retention and completion strategy. The executive budget invests an additional $8,000,000 to bring these programs to a total of 10,000 SUNY students by fall twenty twenty six. Next, since we launched the Empire State Service Corps, we've received approximately four applications for every available slot. I'm thrilled that Governor Hochul is proposing to double the Empire State Service Corps to 1,000 students as part of the SUNY Career Connect investment in additional paid career focused internships. The executive budget also includes $595,000,000 in critical maintenance capital funding, an increase over the traditional $550,000,000 allocation. While we are grateful, the reality is that SUNY currently has $10,000,000,000 in unmet critical maintenance needs. That is why the SUNY Board of Trustees requested $1,000,000,000 in critical maintenance funding for FY 2027 as part of a dedicated multi year capital funding plan. Finally, we're appreciative of the executive budget support for SUNY hospitals, including $100,000,000 in operating aid for SUNY Downstate Hospital while the governor's $1,100,000,000 capital investment for modernizing the hospital is implemented, along with $50,000,000 in capital funding for each of SUNY's three hospitals. Working together, I'm confident that this year's budget can sustain and accelerate the affordable excellence for which SUNY is renowned. In so doing, New York will continue to cement its national leadership as a state that recognizes the unique value of public higher education, advances the economic security of its families, and that is at the forefront of the pursuit of discovery. I look forward to your questions.

[Speaker 0]: J. Thank you, chancellor. Assemblywoman Hyndman. HYMAN:

[Assemblymember Alicia L. Hyndman (Chair, Assembly Higher Education Committee)]: Thank you, chair. Good morning, chancellor. Thank I you for your just want to say thank you visiting my alma mater, SUNY New Paltz, and seeing firsthand capital needs that they have. Of course, I would like New Paltz to get it, but we understand how things go. So a couple of questions for you. We all know how fortunate it has been with the New York Opportunity Promise scholarship and other measures that the state has taken to make college affordable for New Yorkers. Can you speak about how these changes have affected students and the system in general with this scholarship program?

[John B. King, Jr. (Chancellor, State University of New York)]: Certainly. So the SUNY Reconnect program has been fantastic in making clear to adult learners that they can come to SUNY and change their lives and their family's trajectory for free. For many of our adult learners, that was already true with Pell and TAP, but they didn't know. So the messaging clarity of SUNY Reconnect has been fantastic. We have 5,600 students across SUNY who are using SUNY Reconnect dollars, but many more adult learners who've come to SUNY because of the Reconnect program. CUNY has similar numbers. And the governor, as I mentioned, has proposed to expand the program beyond health care, cybersecurity and IT, advanced manufacturing, and green jobs to new areas like emergency management and logistics. So it's a wonderful investment for the state. We saw a 5% increase in enrollment in our community colleges this past fall, in no small part because of initiatives like SUNY Reconnect.

[Assemblymember Alicia L. Hyndman (Chair, Assembly Higher Education Committee)]: How are you supporting the adult learners who may face barriers child care, transportation? And I think those are some of the things that when we think about that population, they encounter that more. So what are you doing to help those students, especially the ones in Reconnect program?

[John B. King, Jr. (Chancellor, State University of New York)]: J. Absolutely. So one strength of Reconnect is that it covers not only tuition, but also fees, books, and supplies, which is incredibly helpful. We also have child care on 22 of our 30 community college campuses. Governor and I actually recently visited our child care center at SUNY Broome Community College and met with two Reconnect students who said they could only be in Reconnect because their kids were at the on campus child care. That's an area where we'd love to expand support. We also, because of the appropriation, were able to provide resources to community colleges to improve supports for adult learners, targeted advising, as well as, in some cases, campuses rethinking the scheduling of courses to better align with the schedules of adults that might need evening and weekend classes, for example. One of the key things that has been helpful is the last two years, we had an $8,000,000 operating aid increase for our community colleges, which was used to support these high demand workforce programs. That was not included in this year's executive budget. But the SUNY Board of Trustees, in their budget request, asked for that additional $8,000,000 in operating support.

[Assemblymember Alicia L. Hyndman (Chair, Assembly Higher Education Committee)]: Can you talk about the executive budget proposal includes funding for emergency aid for students. Can you elaborate on how those funds will be utilized?

[John B. King, Jr. (Chancellor, State University of New York)]: J. Yeah. So it's about $600,000 for SUNY focused on emergency aid. We would use that to really expand our commitment to emergency aid across all of our campuses. Today, many of our campuses provide emergency aid through campus foundations. Imagine the student who is an adult learner at community college, their car breaks down, and for want of $200 to repair their car, they may end up losing their job and losing their ability to complete their education. So that's where we step in with these emergency dollars. We're grateful to the governor for including that funding in the executive budget and hope that we can continue to build on that over time.

[Assemblymember Alicia L. Hyndman (Chair, Assembly Higher Education Committee)]: Okay. Equity across SUNY system, how are you ensuring that both maintenance funding and research capital investments are distributed in a way that reflects regional economic needs and does not widen disparities between research universities and community campuses?

[John B. King, Jr. (Chancellor, State University of New York)]: J. Our biggest challenge there is that we have this $10,000,000,000 critical maintenance backlog across the system. So at every campus, we have significant needs. For example, at SUNY Purchase a couple of weeks ago, they had to go online for some of their classes because academic buildings were without heat. At Buffalo State in the fall, we had dorms that were without hot water that required students to shower in trailers. This is because of the lack of sufficient critical maintenance dollars. So the last few years, we've gotten five fifty million dollars in critical maintenance. And we have basically a set of criteria for triage, for addressing the most urgent needs, whether that's pipes that, if they're not fixed, could cause a loss of heat or HVAC systems that are going to break down or a roof that needs repair. So we try to prioritize the most urgent needs. When we get research capital, we try to deploy that to areas that are going to allow maximum growth in our federal research dollars, help us capture additional federal research dollars. Last year, we were able to direct resources towards quantum at Stony Brook, towards RNA research at U Albany, biofabrication at University at Buffalo, and AI at Binghamton. We also were able to create a brain institute to mobilize researchers across the SUNY system, focus on improving the treatment of neurodegenerative diseases, for example. But again, there too, it's not enough dollars to meet the needs. That's why the SUNY Board of Trustees suggested a $10,000,000,000 five year capital plan. We don't have a five year capital plan at SUNY. We used to before the financial crisis of two thousand and eight. But MTA, Department of Transportation, they have a five year plan that allows them to deploy their resources more strategically.

[Assemblymember Alicia L. Hyndman (Chair, Assembly Higher Education Committee)]: How much have you lost in federal funding for research? J.

[John B. King, Jr. (Chancellor, State University of New York)]: So to date, we've lost 102 grants or subgrants, dollars 43,000,000, 13,000,000 of that for research and $30,000,000 for student supports, like the cancellation of the Hispanic Serving Institutions program at the US Education Department. So that's partly a result of a lot of litigation, some of which the Attorney General, to shame, has been very involved in that has helped restore various attempts by the administration to cut federal grants. So we worry about what the federal research picture will look like moving forward. Although good news is that Congress has appropriated essentially level funding for federal research despite the administration pushing for cuts. So we're hopeful. But still, the administration is going to have to staff those agencies and put those dollars out.

[Assemblymember Alicia L. Hyndman (Chair, Assembly Higher Education Committee)]: J. Okay. My last question we all know how EOP, educational opportunity programs, have been essential in enrollment, retention, and graduation rates. And the legislature has been a long supporter of that. The governor did push reduce in her executive budget. Can you talk about what changes you've made to EOP in recent years, your retention numbers, graduation numbers, and why we should reinstate the full amount?

[Speaker 0]: J.

[John B. King, Jr. (Chancellor, State University of New York)]: Yeah. The great news is that EOP has just been such a tremendous asset for New York State. We have about 8,500, 9,000 students in EOP today. But over the nearly sixty years of the program, 90,000 graduates have gone through that program. And they're leading across every sector in the New York State economy, from business to health care to members of the legislature. That's a tremendously successful program. In recent years, we've enhanced the financial aid for students to reflect the growing costs of attendance to college, things like housing and room and board. We've added additional counselors to make sure that we can improve completion rates. And we have. And we've tried to grow the program to make up for some of the enrollment loss that we saw during the COVID period. So in the last three years, we've grown enrollment in EOP by 21%. That's because of more first year students, but also improved retention and completion. But state support has only gone up by 3% in that same period. So the SUNY Board of Trustees had hoped that we could see a $17,000,000 increase in EOP funding That would support these changes that we've made to the program. We also have added EOP internship programs, an EOP pre med program, pre mental health, pre engineering, pre teaching, pre nursing to get EOP students oriented toward those careers. But unfortunately, as you mentioned, the governor actually in the executive budget reduces the EOP program by about 2,600,000.0.

[Speaker 0]: Thank you.

[Senator Liz Krueger (Chair, Senate Finance Committee)]: Thank you. Excuse me. We've been joined by Senator Webb. Do we have any assembly members?

[Speaker 0]: Yes, we've been joined by assembly members Simon and Jackson.

[Senator Liz Krueger (Chair, Senate Finance Committee)]: Thank you. And our first questioner will be our chair of higher ed, Senator Stavitsky.

[Senator Toby Ann Stavisky (Chair, Senate Higher Education Committee)]: D. Oh, there it goes. Sorry. I need artificial intelligence to work this microphone. Thank you, chancellor, and thank you for what you're doing at SUNY. Let me follow-up on some of the questions that Assembly Member Hyndman asked. You alluded to some of the federal cuts, particularly in terms of the student loans and the graduate programs and the loss of research funding at SUNY and obviously other institutions as well. How has HR1 affected SUNY and the SUNY students, obviously?

[John B. King, Jr. (Chancellor, State University of New York)]: J. Yeah. So we're very concerned about some of the steps that the education department is taking as a result of HR1 to restrict student borrowing in ways that will undermine certain professions. So one of the things they're doing is capping how much graduate students can borrow. Of course, that disproportionately affects low and middle income students who are more likely to borrow. And they are moving certain career areas from the higher professional cap to a lower graduate cap. So this would be programs like pursuing a doctorate in nursing, doctorate in physical therapy. So we worry that some of these career areas where we actually need folks, it will now be harder for folks to access those career areas because of these caps on borrowing. Now, that's still in the public comment stage. There may be changes to what ultimately is produced by the education department, but that is a very worrisome direction. The administration also proposed in their budget last year cutting the Pell Grant program, which would be a disaster for SUNY, for New York State, and for the country. Fortunately, Congress rejected that and maintained the Pell program. But it's going to be important for us to be vigilant in advocating for the Pell program, which is so crucial to students' ability to access higher education.

[Senator Toby Ann Stavisky (Chair, Senate Higher Education Committee)]: You also mentioned the fact that SUNY has a very vibrant five year plan. How does this year's capital budget fit in with your wish list of the five year plan and the aspects that are included as well?

[John B. King, Jr. (Chancellor, State University of New York)]: J. Yeah. So we're certainly grateful to the governor for increasing the critical maintenance allocation from five fifty, which has been tradition over the last few years, to $595,000,000. That's progress. But we had hoped really this year for 1,460,000,000.00, dollars $600,000,000 for critical maintenance, dollars 400,000,000 for emergency avoidance. Again, these are not glamorous projects, but they are crucial pipes, fixing a roof, so forth. And then $460,000,000 for research capital, which was left out of the executive budget. That would allow us to continue to pursue these areas of real leadership for SUNY in research and important areas of potential growth in the New York state economy. So we are hopeful that in the enacted budget that capital number could be significantly higher. And we really would like to see a five year capital plan for SUNY so that we would know what dollars we will see over the next five years, and we can plan accordingly.

[Senator Toby Ann Stavisky (Chair, Senate Higher Education Committee)]: J. Yeah. I met with some of the student leaders at SUNY. And they are and so we're obviously concerned about students with food insecurity. How is SUNY meeting the needs of these students? I did a hearing a couple of years ago, and a student spoke about how he lived in his car for six months because he couldn't afford housing. He couldn't afford food. He had trouble. He had to go to food pantries, etcetera. How are we helping those students with food insecurity?

[John B. King, Jr. (Chancellor, State University of New York)]: J. Yeah, so there are really two main strategies. One is we have food pantries at every campus. And because of the support of the government and legislature, we've been able to invest recurring operating dollars in supporting those food pantries across our campuses. But unfortunately, that's really just a Band Aid, right? That's where students go when the situation has already become desperate. We also are working to help students who qualify for SNAP benefits access those benefits. And so we've worked with our campuses to make sure that staff on the campuses, sometimes with the support of our Empire State Service Corps members, can help students complete the SNAP application and get those SNAP benefits because that's a more reliable source of funding. But ultimately, this comes back to student financial aid. And Senator, your leadership, along with then Chair Fahey on expansion of TAP, was a really important step forward. We need students to have more financial aid to address the total cost of attendance. We've been able to keep tuition very low, dollars 7,070 at our four year institutions. But the cost of room and board and books and so forth, that adds a lot to the total cost of attendance. And financial aid is critical there.

[Senator Toby Ann Stavisky (Chair, Senate Higher Education Committee)]: J. One last question in terms of you and I have discussed the role of the SUNY police on campus versus perhaps local authorities, etcetera. Can you give us an update on how the state SUNY police can be better utilized in terms of providing security and dealing with other incidents? Because they have very real issues here. And we want to make sure they stay at SUNY and not do the training and then get hired by an outside police force.

[John B. King, Jr. (Chancellor, State University of New York)]: J. That's right. So student safety is certainly our first priority. The University Police Department does a very good job. One of the things we've been talking about is the degree to which it's very decentralized today, with each campus doing all of the management of its individual university police. And then we have a statewide office that coordinates efforts. But one of the things that we are looking at is whether additional centralization and standardization around things like training, HR procedures, communication would be helpful. And we actually have engaged Institute to do an analysis on centralization of the university police. And we're expecting a report from the Rockefeller Institute very shortly.

[Senator Toby Ann Stavisky (Chair, Senate Higher Education Committee)]: J. I've spoken to the president, Mr. Wagner, Bob Wagner also on that issue. And I've had legislation, as you know, which I held because of the report that's due from Rockefeller. Downstate, can you give us a progress report? Because we put quite a bit of funding in there, and we want to make sure that it's moving along and that the SUNY hospital is maintained or at least form of the hospital.

[John B. King, Jr. (Chancellor, State University of New York)]: J. Very good news there. Obviously, Downstate's a critically important institution for the borough of Brooklyn and is the medical school that produces the largest number of doctors for New York City. So we are making very good progress on the $1,100,000,000 renovation plan. We have already awarded design contracts for both the hospital renovation and the construction of the new annex that will provide additional ambulatory surgery services with a focus on oncology and cardiology. We also, just last week, announced award of the contract for demolition of the condemned parking facility that is in the location where the annex will be built. And so we are moving very quickly to put the $1,100,000,000 to use. And we also just recently appointed a new hospital CEO. We had an interim CEO there and are looking forward to his leadership going forward.

[Senator Toby Ann Stavisky (Chair, Senate Higher Education Committee)]: J. Some of the colleges have been facing some economic difficulty, particularly well, I'm not going to name them, but you know who they are. And you've had to eliminate programs and staff layoffs. What's the status on that? How many folks have been laid off? Well, yeah.

[John B. King, Jr. (Chancellor, State University of New York)]: J. Yeah. So there five campuses where we've been particularly focused because of their financial challenges, largely as a result of significant drops in enrollment in three cases, a 40% drop in enrollment over a ten year period. The good news is two of those campuses are already in the black, and three are anticipated to achieve fiscal balance in 'twenty seven, 'twenty eight, 'twenty eight, 'twenty nine, and 'twenty nine, 'thirty. So they are all on the path to long term financial sustainability.

[Speaker 0]: Thank Thank Thank you. M. We've been joined by Assembly Member Giglio and Assembly Member Simon for questions. That's you, Jo Anne.

[Assemblymember Jo Anne Simon]: I guess they just put me on the list. Didn't actually ask. So I do have a couple of questions for you. Thank you, Chancellor. It's good to see you again. You mentioned a couple of things I just wanted to ask you to clarify. One is you mentioned about the federal caps for pursuing certain professions and comments. Do you or someone in your staff can let me know what that deadline is for comments?

[John B. King, Jr. (Chancellor, State University of New York)]: We'll come back to you on that.

[Assemblymember Jo Anne Simon]: Extremely important. The other thing you talked about was research capital. What do you mean by that? Like, I don't know what that means. I'm assuming labs or something. What does it mean?

[John B. King, Jr. (Chancellor, State University of New York)]: Exactly. The primary focus with research capital is the construction of labs. And it's critical not only for conducting the research, but attracting the faculty members who do cutting edge research. They want to know, will their lab facilities have the most up to date equipment, accommodate their graduate student assistants, so forth?

[Assemblymember Jo Anne Simon]: Does that also go to computer stuff, or not just science?

[John B. King, Jr. (Chancellor, State University of New York)]: J. Yeah. So for artificial intelligence, for example, part of the investment of those capital dollars is in constructing the computing capacity to do the artificial intelligence research.

[Assemblymember Jo Anne Simon]: J. The other thing I wanted to ask you about is, as you know, there are a lot of students up today with disabilities who are asking for $15,000,000 from the budget. We've been asking for $15,000,000 now for quite some time. And there are increased needs and increased enrollments of students with disabilities throughout New York State. I know that CUNY has a particular request. What is SUNY's dollar amount? How much goes to central administration? How much goes to those campuses to actually provide those services?

[John B. King, Jr. (Chancellor, State University of New York)]: J. You. And thank you for your long leadership on this issue. So we have about 40,000 students with disabilities across the SUNY system. Those are students who self identify as having a disability. Because of the support of the governor and the legislature, we were able three years ago to dedicate $10,000,000 in recurring annual funding to support students with disabilities. And that allowed us to add additional staff across our campuses, purchase assistive technology across our campuses. And that's recurring. So that's really enhanced our ability to support students with disabilities. Then there is that allocation for the state education department that SUNY gets a portion of, along with other higher ed institutions in the state, that's a smaller dollar amount, maybe $2,000,000 With that, we focus on a few initiatives. We have an ambassador's initiative for students with disabilities to support their leadership. We have professional development for faculty that we support with those dollars. We have a faculty fellowship where faculty are working with their colleagues to ensure accessibility of curricular material. And then we have a new Disability Support Leadership Institute to help folks who are faculty members and staff members who want to move into leadership roles do so.

[Speaker 0]: Thank you. Thank you.

[Senator Liz Krueger (Chair, Senate Finance Committee)]: J. Thank you. Next, we have Senator Fahey.

[Assemblymember Patricia Fahy]: J. Thank you. Thank you, chair. Thank you, chancellor. Great to hear all the encouraging news despite the challenges. Just a couple of comments, and then I have a couple of questions. Thank you for the great update on community colleges. Really wonderful to see that growth. And the free college, that it is making a difference. We try to put it out everywhere.

[Senator Liz Krueger (Chair, Senate Finance Committee)]: Thank you.

[Assemblymember Patricia Fahy]: Huge boost, we certainly support you on that. Also, thank you for mentioning your commitment to diversity and inclusion, that DEI and diversity in general is not a dirty word. Really appreciate that. A couple of things with questions. You mentioned, and it was in our newspapers the other day, about the need for capital and critical investment. In fact, you've got some big numbers there, with a billion this year and possibly 10,000,000,000 over the years. And of course, we have a huge interest in the Health Innovation Building here at University of Albany. Tell us why that is so important, especially at a time when we are seeing these cuts from Washington. I also mentioned to you I'd read about sliding enrollments in Illinois, dramatic drops in enrollment. Tell us how that helps your enrollment, and explain why such a big number and why it's so needed.

[John B. King, Jr. (Chancellor, State University of New York)]: Sure. So look, having facilities that are high quality is part of how we attract students. We've had three years back to back to back enrollment gains in no small part because students see affordable excellence at SUNY. But if they're finding that their dorm doesn't have hot water or their academic building doesn't have heat, we're not going to be able to keep attracting those students. So it's critical that we have that investment in critical maintenance. On the research side, the research facilities help us to secure those key federal dollars. Congress actually increased the funding for NIH this year. So there will be more health research dollars to go get, but we'll only be positioned to do that if we have the labs and the faculty to make that possible. And so these investments in research capital really are an investment in growing our federal research dollars and ultimately economic development in the state.

[Assemblymember Patricia Fahy]: Thank you. It is alarming to see how much higher ed is slipping in other states if we don't make those investments. Along that same vein, career connects. Why explain as you know, I've supported legislation and actually adopted legislation before on encouraging internships. Explain how that benefits New York overall. I see the governor is proposing to double that program, which is important, but fifteen seconds left, sorry.

[John B. King, Jr. (Chancellor, State University of New York)]: J. Students who have internships are more likely to get a good job when they graduate, and they get a job more quickly when they graduate. And knowing that there's an internship also can help us attract students because students and families want to know when they get their college degree, it's going to translate into economic J.

[Senator Toby Ann Stavisky (Chair, Senate Higher Education Committee)]: Thank you.

[Assemblymember Patricia Fahy]: Thank you. I hope they stay in New York. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Thank

[Speaker 0]: you. Assemblywoman Clark.

[Assemblymember Sarah Clark]: J. Thank you, Chairman. Hello, chancellor. So a couple questions. First, you alluded to it earlier. We've seen a lot of the registration increases in our community colleges because of the SUNY Reconnect program. We also know that those are high demand fields, but also high cost education programming. If this $8,000,000 given the fact that that trajectory of enrollment is really a lot focused on the Reconnect program, the trustees know that if we don't put that $8,000,000 in, this is going to continue to grow if we don't really invest in that program. Can you explain a little bit about the high cost of these education programs?

[John B. King, Jr. (Chancellor, State University of New York)]: J. Sure. I mean, you need the faculty who have the right training, and you need the equipment to make the programs work, like the optics program at Monroe Community College, which we visited together. So look, we know last year's $8,000,000 We can point directly to 1,800 additional slots in these high demand programs that were created. These are things like nursing, advanced manufacturing, cybersecurity. Without those operating dollars, it is very difficult to have the slots. And we want to grow these programs because good for the New York's economy.

[Assemblymember Sarah Clark]: J. Perfect. And sort of to piggyback on that, I mean, I understand in the governor's proposal this year that she waived sort of all the requirements around the nursing, but not for the other programs in Reconnect. One of the things that we've tried to tackle, particularly as we notice the change in jobs and as you are in your career and you're in your 40s, and all of a sudden you're like, my job is becoming obsolete. I want to go back to one of these high in demand careers, but I already have a college degree. One of the things we've looked at is how we could expand Reconnect to capture some of those who may be needing to look for a second phase in their careers, given that it both meets high demand and gives self sufficiency. So I think the cost was around $1,500,000 if we sort of did a twenty year look back and said, if you haven't had a degree in twenty years, you could maybe do Reconnect?

[John B. King, Jr. (Chancellor, State University of New York)]: J. Yeah, I can get back to you on our estimate on the cost of that. What I would say is I think our community colleges would be very enthusiastic about the opportunity to help people make a change in their lives. And the governor particularly focused on nursing because we know we're going to have this huge nursing shortage that continues to grow over time. This is a way to combat that, to say folks can come back for that nursing degree and change their career.

[Assemblymember Sarah Clark]: J. And I would say as AI impacts other industries, looking at these high demand as a way to absorb those who may be losing jobs or losing job opportunities would be a really good idea. I won't I will just say EOP. I understand that one of the needs is both more people are enrolling, but also more people are staying in it. Hence, the costs have grown.

[John B. King, Jr. (Chancellor, State University of New York)]: J. That's exactly right. We've improved retention, which is a good thing. J. L. J. But we need the resources to support the students.

[Unidentified timekeeper/clerk]: All right.

[Speaker 0]: J.

[Senator Liz Krueger (Chair, Senate Finance Committee)]: Thank you. You. Next we have Senator O'Baracker. J.

[Senator Peter Oberacker]: O'Brien: Chancellor, good afternoon.

[Senator Tom O'Mara (Ranking Member, Senate Finance Committee)]: Good to see

[Senator Peter Oberacker]: you in Albany.

[Assemblymember Phil Palmesano]: J. Good to see you.

[Senator Peter Oberacker]: J. Real quick, the executive board recommends a $12,900,000,000 increase in the state operations, about $205,280,000 increase. One of the areas I'd like to focus in on is there's threefour of 1,000,000 for first responder counseling scholarship programs at SUNY. First and foremost, I think it's a great ROI on this investment. And in fact, I'd like to see it go up to $1,000,000 which still wouldn't be enough, but it's a great start. So I want to commend you on that program for that.

[John B. King, Jr. (Chancellor, State University of New York)]: Thank you.

[Senator Peter Oberacker]: Being a forty year member first responder, I can speak to it, how well that would work. And let's not forget, too, you have the memorial scholarship that covers tuition for children, spouses, and financial dependents for deceased firefighters, police officers, and EMS workers in that. And also, the upstate paramedic program scholarship, dollars 5,000 for scholarship students in SUNY upstate paramedic programs. Great uses of

[Speaker 12]: our money.

[Senator Peter Oberacker]: I would also like to plant a seed. Back a ways, we used to have some funding that would go to local municipalities that host state universities within their residential outliers schools, colleges, and universities to help offset some of the costings that providing some of that public service brings to those institutions. So we'd love to see us maybe start to look at that as being something that could be driven under SUNY. You know, as one who has six in district SUNIs, two that are in the county that I represent but just outside, eight out of the 64, it could be a really nice way of also cementing that relationship within the communities. Lastly, chancellor, I just have to make a shout out to SUNY Delhi, my alma mater, and so go Broncos. So we have forty four seconds if you'd like to put anything else on that. But again, I thank you for the job you're doing and for your focus in on these programs.

[John B. King, Jr. (Chancellor, State University of New York)]: J. You, Senator. And I'd just say quickly about Delhi. That was one of the campuses that three years ago we were concerned about their financial sustainability. And the president took smart, thoughtful steps in conjunction with the faculty and staff. And today, they are operating with a surplus.

[Senator Peter Oberacker]: J. Yeah, President Bandarrow did a great job. And we've got good stewardship, I think, at all levels. So thank

[Speaker 0]: you.

[Senator Peter Oberacker]: I'll yield back my ten seconds.

[Speaker 0]: J. Thank you. We've been joined by Assembly members Palosamo and Smullen. Our next questioner will be Assemblyman Echoes.

[Assemblymember Chris Eachus]: J. E. You. Thank you for being here, and thank you for being our chancellor. I really appreciate that. I'm going to stick with community colleges, though, today. As you know, the state made a commitment to pay for onethree of the tuition of our community college students, basically. And we're not even close to that. I mean, one of the community colleges is stating it's only 18% of the total cost. Along with that, we know that the comptroller put out a report just recently about TAP not keeping up with inflation. So it is my hope that you, along with us, will continue to fight for more money for the operating costs. I appreciate the $8,000,000 in operating support from the governor. But hopefully, we can get even more because we can't afford to lose these community colleges. The SUNY Reconnect program was mentioned already. And I'm not going to repeat what Assembly Member Clark said, but I totally agree. We have to watch that because that's not being beneficial. It's increasing enrollment, but financially, it's not beneficial to the community colleges. But one of the things that I did notice, again sticking with community colleges, is your initiative with AI for four year colleges. And I was wondering, of that $15,000,000 that's being appropriated, do you know approximately how much is going to go to community colleges or the types of programs you might support in community colleges?

[John B. King, Jr. (Chancellor, State University of New York)]: J. We can get you additional detail. In that effort, what we've essentially done is partner each of the university centers with comprehensive college and community college, in some cases multiple colleges, to work together on both adapting curricula to reflect AI so that students are prepared for the jobs of today and tomorrow, but also working with faculty on research projects connected to using artificial intelligence for the public good. So the projects vary a little bit between the different university centers. But we can get you more in detail on the community college role in each of those partnerships.

[Assemblymember Chris Eachus]: I appreciate that. Community colleges really educate the community right around them. So they're very important economic as well as educational institutions for those areas. And I do appreciate that. That's all I have. I yield back the rest of my time. Thank you.

[Speaker 0]: R. L.

[Speaker 14]: Thank you. Thank

[Senator Liz Krueger (Chair, Senate Finance Committee)]: you very much. Next up is Senator Liu.

[Senator John C. Liu]: J. You, Madam Chair, and thank you, Chancellor King, for joining us. Madam Chair, I love that title, Chancellor King. I mean, very powerful. Anyway, Senator Stavitsky already asked you about the five year capital plan that you're asking for. And as you stated, SUNY doesn't have a five year capital plan. But if it did, what would be on it?

[John B. King, Jr. (Chancellor, State University of New York)]: J. Yeah. Well, I'll tell you, we have over $1,000,000,000 in shovel ready critical maintenance projects that we could start now.

[Senator Toby Ann Stavisky (Chair, Senate Higher Education Committee)]: J. B.

[Senator John C. Liu]: The executive budget does have capital money, right?

[John B. King, Jr. (Chancellor, State University of New York)]: J. Yeah, only $595,000,000 right. J.

[Senator John C. Liu]: Okay. But you have shovel ready 1.2.

[John B. King, Jr. (Chancellor, State University of New York)]: J. Yeah, that's exactly right.

[Senator John C. Liu]: J. And presumably, if you have a five year capital plan, a capital plan is like a wish list. You put the plan together just like the NTA does, and then we figure out how to fund it.

[John B. King, Jr. (Chancellor, State University of New York)]: That's exactly L.

[Senator John C. Liu]: Mean, how big is the wish list

[Speaker 0]: right now?

[John B. King, Jr. (Chancellor, State University of New York)]: J. So the SUNY Board of Trustees put forward a $10,000,000,000 wish list over the next five years. And that includes both critical maintenance as well as areas of research where we would like to make additional investments. So we developed the list of projects. We just don't have that commitment of funds. And one of the results is we can't start a project till we know we

[Senator John C. Liu]: have No, I understand dollars that. That $10,000,000,000 list available somewhere?

[John B. King, Jr. (Chancellor, State University of New York)]: J. There is a version of that $10,000,000,000 plan. I wouldn't say we're ready to commit to every one of those projects.

[Senator John C. Liu]: But Right. Well, some of them would need can't commit until have the money in place. That's right. Is that something that's available to us?

[Assemblymember Alicia L. Hyndman (Chair, Assembly Higher Education Committee)]: J. We can get you

[John B. King, Jr. (Chancellor, State University of New York)]: our most recent listing of expected projects.

[Senator John C. Liu]: Thank you. In past years, I've appreciated your prioritization to keep DEI among SUNY's priorities. My belief is that you have done so. Has SUNY faced any fiscal impact by sticking to the guns properly? J.

[John B. King, Jr. (Chancellor, State University of New York)]: Some of that $43,000,000 that we've lost in federal grants were grants where we were notified that our grant activity no longer corresponded to federal priorities. And our best guess is that that was driven by issues of diversity, equity, inclusion.

[Senator John C. Liu]: J. L. $43,000,000 out.

[Speaker 0]: J. J.

[Senator John C. Liu]: Okay. And then my last question for you is when the affirmative action decision was rendered by the Supreme Court, I think SUNY had committed to keeping track of what impact it had on enrollment. Do we have any more information about that?

[John B. King, Jr. (Chancellor, State University of New York)]: J. Yeah, the good news is that we continue to fulfill our mission to serve all segments of New York. So if you look J.

[Senator John C. Liu]: So no impact on enrollment or applications?

[John B. King, Jr. (Chancellor, State University of New York)]: J. A. If you look over the last three years, African American, Latino, and Asian American numbers are up. Great. You. Thank you.

[Unidentified Senator (R), Upstate/Rural]: Thank you, Chair. Chancellor, thank you for appearing before the Higher Education Committee. You know, I represent many of the rural areas of Upstate New York. And we've got some serious issues with inflation and increased cost and affordability. And one of them is in higher education, particularly with our small SUNY colleges and the community colleges that are in the areas that I serve. One of the things that the tuition assistance program had in the past had been linked to tuition costs. And it was delinked in 2011. Have we made any progress? Or isn't it time to relink TAP to the actual cost of tuition so those who want to go to school in the rural areas of Upstate New York have the ability and the means to do so based a cost effective solution, either in a SUNY four year or a community college?

[John B. King, Jr. (Chancellor, State University of New York)]: R. We certainly would love to see the maximum TAP award increase. The legislature took important steps to expand TAP access, which was an important step forward. Part of the challenge at community colleges is if they don't get additional operating aid, that ends up translating into local tuition increases. That's one of the reasons we think it's so important to add $8,000,000 in operating aid this year.

[Unidentified Senator (R), Upstate/Rural]: Well, certainly. But the actual linkage, true cost of the college to the actual award, it then puts that student that has economic challenges. It puts them in the ability to afford not only the tuition, but then also the rising cost of food and housing and transportation. A lot of these students are commuter students. So it's all part of the same thing. But I think relinking TAP to tuition is critical there. So staying on the theme of community colleges and what we're actually facing in the areas that I represent, what's the current headcount and full time enrollment compared to twenty nineteen levels in community colleges? We've been very concerned what COVID did to our community colleges. Have we recovered? And if not, what is the difference at this point?

[John B. King, Jr. (Chancellor, State University of New York)]: I don't have the 2019 number in front of me. But over the last three years, community college enrollment has gone up by 9.1%. So I don't think we've recovered yet to the level prior to COVID. So we're still below that number. But we have seen steady increases. That 9.1% over three years is fantastic progress. And we think that will continue, particularly with the continued investment in SUNY Reconnect and operating dollars that would support continued growth of high demand programs.

[Unidentified Senator (R), Upstate/Rural]: J. And Reconnect is going well, from what I understand. The pilots and the programs that I've seen at the community colleges are up and running. Is there any other need for emphasis in the reconnect program at this time?

[John B. King, Jr. (Chancellor, State University of New York)]: J. We're pleased that the governor proposes adding emergency management, transportation, air traffic control, logistics. Those are all areas of need for the state's economy, as well as allowing folks with a degree to pursue nursing through Reconnect, making that exception. That's all, I think, very good progress.

[Unidentified Senator (R), Upstate/Rural]: J. Very good. That's good to hear. So a little bit of talk. SUNY runs about 40% of the state's buildings in New York State. And electrification seems to be faltering from a technological perspective, but also from a cost perspective, specifically with rate increases. How are the rate increases that the Public Service Commission is allowing the utilities to charge based on the climate leadership and the Community Protection Act? How is that raising costs for SUNY? And is there anything that we can do to be able to reduce those costs? Wouldn't you be in favor of, say, for instance, keeping natural gas plants online so we can keep costs down for SUNY?

[John B. King, Jr. (Chancellor, State University of New York)]: J. Well, what would be most helpful for us is additional capital investment in the steps necessary to move to renewable energy. For example, last year, we were able to get $140,000,000 to move towards geothermal networks. SUNY is very well positioned to lead on renewable energy. We have a number of our campuses that have moved towards solar. We have campuses that are taking advantage of hydropower. So we're optimistic. Actually, we're going to hit the 40% reduction in greenhouse gas emissions by 2030 target because we've been so diligent about our energy efficiency and moving to renewable energy. But the biggest thing we're lacking is enough capital investment to move that process faster.

[Unidentified Senator (R), Upstate/Rural]: Great. Well, thank you. I'm running out of time, so you might have to respond to this one in writing. But how about the number of anti Semitic instances on SUNY campuses? Have they increased or decreased? And have they trended downwards in the last four years?

[John B. King, Jr. (Chancellor, State University of New York)]: J. L. Think the whole country has seen this increase in anti Semitic incidents. But we've been very committed to Title VI enforcement and swift response to any incident on

[Speaker 17]: our J.

[Félix V. Matos Rodríguez (Chancellor, City University of New York)]: You could

[Unidentified Senator (R), Upstate/Rural]: let me know what the numbers are, that's what I'm actually interested in. Thank L. You.

[Speaker 0]: Senator?

[Senator Liz Krueger (Chair, Senate Finance Committee)]: J. Thank you. Senator Murray.

[Unidentified Senator (R), Upstate/Rural]: J. MELISSA

[Senator Dean Murray]: Thank you. Thank you, Chairwoman.

[Senator Liz Krueger (Chair, Senate Finance Committee)]: It's five minutes because he's the replacement ranker. Thank you.

[Senator Toby Ann Stavisky (Chair, Senate Higher Education Committee)]: MELISSA Replacement,

[John B. King, Jr. (Chancellor, State University of New York)]: right? Top 10. So J.

[Senator Dean Murray]: Thank you. Thank you, Chancellor. So you and I have had conversations before, and I admitted that I had a little bit of skepticism regarding the Reconnect program. But I've since become a huge fan because I'm seeing that it's working, but I'm also seeing the potential there, both for the students and the college, but also for the private sector and the businesses and the areas where we're helping. So I'm looking at economic development. And I'm looking at the comment in your testimony where you said, I'm especially excited about our ambitious goal to provide an internship or other experiential learning opportunity for every undergraduate student. And I'm listening to all of the conversations here about the need for capital and research investment and all of this. And I'm hearing terrible federal government taking all this money away. But I'm wondering, are we tapping into the potential for more public private partnerships? For example, community college Suffolk Community College has a great partnership where and you know this where the labor unions have invested quite a bit of money in connection with training for production and maintenance of wind turbines. It's a great partnership. Now, talk about nursing programs and the need for nurses. It's desperate. Are we tapping into the large hospitals and health care facilities, not just for internships or any residency or anything like this? But are we tapping into them for actual investments? Are we doing enough there is my question.

[John B. King, Jr. (Chancellor, State University of New York)]: J. We're certainly trying. We created, not long ago, a vice chancellor for workforce development role at SUNY. And Chris White has been leading on efforts to grow these public private partnerships around internships, around apprenticeship programs as well. And then our campus presidents work hard to try to get some of these private sector partners to invest in our campuses. That's sometimes a little more challenging, depending on how those companies are doing economically.

[Senator Dean Murray]: J. Sure. But then I'll move to the four year colleges. And like SUNY Stony Brook, for example, does a lot with biomedical and things like this. A lot of pharmaceutical companies might want to invest in this or come in with partnerships. Some of that research could turn into literally millions or billions of dollars for some of these companies. Again, what are we doing to tap into that to say, look, if we're going to do a partnership, we need you investing, too. Because you had mentioned, for example, research capital projects. Are we getting top of the line laboratories there and equipment that can further those partnerships? Again, are we being aggressive enough, in your opinion? And what more could we do?

[John B. King, Jr. (Chancellor, State University of New York)]: J. You know, I think we are working hard to create those partnerships. And there are some great examples. Global Foundries, for example, has a very strong partnership with Hudson Valley Community College. Micron has worked with Onondaga Community College on the creation of a simulated clean room on the community college campus for community college students, but also that can be open to K-twelve students. So we have some of those examples. Certainly, if there's any way to incentivize employer partners to do more with their local universities, that would be very helpful.

[Senator Dean Murray]: J. Would you are you suggesting maybe like tax credits or something like this? S.

[John B. King, Jr. (Chancellor, State University of New York)]: Certainly happy to explore those things with you. Because look, our goal of an internship for every student we're at about 62% now. So we need a lot more internships. So we are going to need the private sector to play a large role there.

[Senator Dean Murray]: J. Sure. But we also have to recognize that the private sector is benefiting from that. If they're getting these internships and possibly some really good employees out of this, hey, they've got a pony up, too. And maybe we need to take a harder line to say, look, we need not just opportunities there, because they'll have those opportunities. We need investment from you. And in getting so, maybe we have even more and more down the road. Is there a way we could put together maybe a commission or something to really investigate this more and look into this more of where we can focus to get more out of these public private partnerships.

[John B. King, Jr. (Chancellor, State University of New York)]: J. We'd love to explore that with you and with Empire State Development as well. Mean, they're oftentimes providing incentives to companies to locate in New York. Part of the condition of that ought to be partnering with the state university system.

[Senator Tom O'Mara (Ranking Member, Senate Finance Committee)]: J. Sure.

[Senator Dean Murray]: That's a great idea. Well, thank you very much, and I'll yield back my eighteen seconds. Thank you. Thank you.

[Speaker 0]: Thank you. Assembly member Griffin.

[Assemblymember Judy Griffin]: Thank you, Chair Pretlow. Good afternoon, Chancellor King. I am on another topic. I am very concerned about the rapid approval process of the SUNY charter board on Long Island and in my assembly district. I believe it is long time for another funding stream to be established rather than diverting taxpayer dollars in school districts. Due to the most recent approval of our charter in West Hempstead, just about every school district I represent has been negatively impacted. Two of the districts most negatively impacted are Freeport and Baldwin. For example, Freeport School District has to absorb over $4,000,000 in tuition costs to charter schools and then another $2,000,000 in transportation costs. This is getting to be unfeasible for school districts to absorb these costs. And now I just recently met with my superintendents. Every single school district in 8021 is impacted. This is I also have a portion of school districts like Hempstead and Uniondale that have been decimated by charter schools. So I would like to know what is your position on this issue. How can Long Island schools keep sustaining these costs? And what ideas do you have to resolve this?

[John B. King, Jr. (Chancellor, State University of New York)]: Well, certainly, charter schools are an emotional issue. They come back to the question of, for every parent, where is their child going to be most successful? The way we structure charter school oversight at SUNY is we have the Charter School Institute, which functions really as a separate institution reporting to the charter school committee of our SUNY Board of Trustees. And the Charter School Institute, I think, does an excellent job implementing the charter law. They have a high bar for awarding a charter. They provide rigorous oversight. They have been willing to close charters that are underperforming. But they don't determine the financial model for charters or the way that school funding works, obviously. So they really focus on their role on oversight of the academic quality of the charter.

[Assemblymember Judy Griffin]: So another question is then, one of the things that's supposed to happen is there's supposed to be a hearing in the impacted communities. And the SUNY Board of Trustees is supposed to listen to that community to those people showing up at the hearing. Just about all the hearings have a great deal of opposition because many people in the communities have thriving public schools. And it's not about choice. It's just about how can schools keep absorbing this. And when despite public opposition, they're still left with that, with the charter schools coming into their communities.

[Senator Liz Krueger (Chair, Senate Finance Committee)]: JUDY WOODRUFF: Thank you. Senator Webb.

[Senator Lea Webb]: J. Hi, Chancellor King. Nice to see you.

[Senator Rachel May]: J. Nice to see you, Senator.

[Senator Lea Webb]: J. So I mean, a number of the questions I had have already been raised. You know, I absolutely have continued to see the is that me? Somebody else. Okay. The positive trajectory with SUNY Reconnect. I do believe we need to actually increase operational funding for our community colleges in light of the success of this initiative. And so definitely want to advocate for more than just the floor on operational funding. Similarly, I'm a proud EOP alum, so I understand how crucial that program is. And so most certainly support restoring funding and actually increasing funding for that program. My two questions that I have relate to other funding programs like Bundy. I know that this is something that is often kind of a controversial issue and I know we've kind of kept the well, it's actually been decreased. And so I was hoping you could speak to that. But then also land grant funding within SUNY. I have Cornell University in my district. They are a part of the SUNY system. So I was hoping you could speak to those two issues. And hopefully I'll have time for my other question.

[John B. King, Jr. (Chancellor, State University of New York)]: J. Yeah. Thank you for that. Usually, on Bundy aid, we are silent on that at SUNY, given our focus on the public side funding. On the land grants, we certainly are very proud of the statutory colleges within SUNY. And one of the things that's been very challenging for CALS, for example, is the loss of some of the federal grants that were an important part of their funding on issues of agriculture and the environment that are very important to New York State. So we certainly are interested in efforts at the state level to try to provide research support for those institutions as well as for our university centers. The capital support that is provided also benefits those statutory colleges within Cornell. We see advocacy for the land grants as a part of our broader advocacy for capital dollars, for example.

[Senator Lea Webb]: J. Absolutely. And then my last question, you talked about critical maintenance. Can you just expand on just how important these dollars are, especially given some of the examples you shared earlier?

[John B. King, Jr. (Chancellor, State University of New York)]: It's absolutely critical to the student experience, right? If a student is showering in a trailer, they're not going to have a positive experience of college, and they're less likely to persist in college. It's important to our ability to attract new students. And it's important to our ability to attract the best faculty and staff. People want to work in good conditions.

[Speaker 0]: R. Yes, they do.

[Speaker 14]: You. You.

[Speaker 0]: Al Stirpeman Pallasano.

[Assemblymember Phil Palmesano]: Afternoon, chancellor. Thank you for being here. I want to talk about TAP a little bit, if I could. There was a new report from the State Comptroller that came out that said New York's TAP program has an at cap pace with inflation or rising tuition costs since 02/2009, and the undergraduate TAP recipients dropped by 77,000 or 21, with steep declines among two year programs, 45% private sector schools, 40% and lower income households, 38%. How many SUNY students would qualify for the maximum award today if the income ceiling had been indexed to inflation?

[John B. King, Jr. (Chancellor, State University of New York)]: J. I can get back to you on that exact data point. I can tell you that more than 40% of SUNY full time students are taking advantage of the TAP program today. J.

[Assemblymember Phil Palmesano]: Okay. You believe the $7,000 income ceiling for maximum awards is realistic in 2026?

[John B. King, Jr. (Chancellor, State University of New York)]: J. B. The good news is we've been able to keep tuition frozen at SUNY, at the $7,070 at our four year institutions, but costs outside of tuition that are often the biggest challenge for students. So additional financial aid for students would help our SUNY students without question.

[Assemblymember Phil Palmesano]: J. I think you're touching on the next point I want to make regarding that. What impact do you think the erosion of TAP's purchasing power has had on SUNY's lower income students having to deal with those challenges?

[John B. King, Jr. (Chancellor, State University of New York)]: J. Well, again, because our tuition has stayed frozen, that has had less impact than maybe for students who are attending private institutions, for example. But what we see is, because of inflation, the costs of room and board has certainly gone up. The cost of books has certainly gone up. And so additional financial aid for students for those costs would be hugely beneficial to SUNY students as well as CUNY students.

[Speaker 23]: J. Okay.

[Assemblymember Phil Palmesano]: The other question I wanted to ask is kind of a piggyback off my colleagues relative to the decoupling. Since TAP and tuition were decoupled in 2011, do we have any idea and maybe you have to get back. I'm just curious the cumulative value of the TAP gap across SUNY campuses?

[John B. King, Jr. (Chancellor, State University of New York)]: R. Well, thanks to the governor and the legislature, that tap gap is closed for the students who have the maximum award. So they are able to have their tuition covered.

[Speaker 0]: J. I

[Assemblymember Phil Palmesano]: want to pivot to workforce development a little bit, if I could. I have Corning Community College, Finger Lakes Community College in my districts. They are really good on workforce development, able to quickly turn around programs. Based on your experience, are community colleges able to expand high demand programs, or are they constrained by any faculty shortage or facility limitations? What is your assessment of that? J.

[John B. King, Jr. (Chancellor, State University of New York)]: They are the biggest constraint is operating aid and not having the level of operating support. That's why the $8,000,000 increase we've asked for this year is so important. Another particular challenge is nursing faculty, where folks make so much more as practicing nurses than they would make teaching at one of our institutions. So one thing we've launched recently is program to subsidize the master's degree for folks who will commit to teach in one of our community colleges. That's a program we'd love to grow because we need more nursing faculty to grow the number of nursing slots.

[Speaker 17]: J. Okay.

[Assemblymember Phil Palmesano]: Just in general, do you have an assessment? Like, how quickly can a community college stand up or start up new programs in response to a regional employer demand? Is there a timeline that they I mean, think community colleges do it pretty well. B.

[John B. King, Jr. (Chancellor, State University of New York)]: They do quite well. Look, in a year's time, we can expand seats, launch a new program. I'd point out last year, with the $8,000,000 that we received in operating support, we were able to add almost 2,000 slots in health care, advanced manufacturing, cybersecurity and IT, and green jobs. So we can deliver the programs that the economy needs. We just need the support to do it. J.

[Assemblymember Phil Palmesano]: Sure. And I want to go back to the electrification question because, obviously, there's this push to electrify everything in the state of New York. Have you done an assessment of what it would cost you to fully electrify campuses across the city? And if so, how much is that?

[John B. King, Jr. (Chancellor, State University of New York)]: J. A. Essentially what we try to do is, as we do a building renovation, we try to make it as efficient as possible and move to renewable energy where we can. We think it's on the order of several billion dollars that we will need over the next decade to get to the goal of net zero.

[Assemblymember Phil Palmesano]: J. Several billion dollars?

[John B. King, Jr. (Chancellor, State University of New York)]: J. Yeah. And I can get you a more precise estimate.

[Assemblymember Phil Palmesano]: J. All right. Thank you, chancellor. I appreciate your time.

[Speaker 0]: J. L. Thank you.

[Senator Liz Krueger (Chair, Senate Finance Committee)]: Senator Rachel May. Thank

[Senator Rachel May]: you. And hi, Chancellor, sorry. Great to see you.

[John B. King, Jr. (Chancellor, State University of New York)]: Great to see you.

[Senator Rachel May]: So for about fifty years, I would say, in my region of the state, eds and meds have been the driving the economic drivers and the main employers in our area. That's changing a little bit, but it's still really important. And I have SUNY ESF, SUNY Upstate, the downtown campus of SUNY Oswego, and two community colleges in my district. So it's probably the case that public higher ed is the top employer and one of the major drivers of our economy. I'm wondering what kind of what you do to track the impact, not just now on the economy, but how many of your students are staying in the state and contributing to the economy? How can we get a picture of the overall impact of SUNY?

[John B. King, Jr. (Chancellor, State University of New York)]: J. L. It's a great question. The Rockefeller Institute has a report on this. It is coming out shortly. And I think the overall annual economic impact is somewhere in the order of $31,000,000,000 And I think our best analysis is that five years graduates are working in New York State.

[Senator Rachel May]: J. Great. And then I know with SUNY ESF, one of the things that they are really proud of is that a very large proportion of the state workforce, especially in environmental conservation and parks. It comes from their graduates. Is that something you track, the impact of the colleges on the state and state employment?

[John B. King, Jr. (Chancellor, State University of New York)]: Yeah, don't have the number in

[Assemblymember Alicia L. Hyndman (Chair, Assembly Higher Education Committee)]: front of

[John B. King, Jr. (Chancellor, State University of New York)]: me, but I can get back to it. I know ESF tracks the number of ESF alums who are working at DEC. And I think the number is quite high. And that's been a wonderful partnership with DEC over many years.

[Senator Rachel May]: J. Yeah. So as you know, I've been a big booster of ESF and want to figure out ways to make them stronger, like have a stronger economic position. We talked a little bit about developing their capacity to do mass timber, because this is the direction of the future, I think, in at least wood based construction. And it is a way to sequester carbon and build beautiful buildings at the same very highly functional buildings and be more efficient in the way we use our timber resources in this state. So I just wanted to ask you we have put in a proposal for a new institute and also a pilot project at SUNY ESF. Is that something that you look favorably on?

[John B. King, Jr. (Chancellor, State University of New York)]: We would love to have a mass timber institute and to contribute to that area of the state's economy.

[Senator Liz Krueger (Chair, Senate Finance Committee)]: J. Thank you.

[Speaker 0]: J. Thank you. Chancellor King, it's refreshing to hear the procedure that SUNY uses when they're looking over charter school applications. But just to follow-up on Assemblywoman's Griffith's observations, the facts don't hold that up. It's an unwritten open secret that anyone that wants to open a charter school, they submit their application to SUNY, and it's almost automatically approved. And that's really problematic. And I've seen this in a number of cases. And I personally have issues with charter schools, as the world knows. And that's mostly because of how it's funded. And I agree, if parents want their children to go somewhere else, they should be actually paid for it. And taxpayers should be responsible for it. But that's another story that's not part of this discussion. But I do wish that you look more closely at how the SUNY board is looking over the applications for charter schools because more than one school district has come to me and said that they were just appalled by the application that was submitted by the charter school applicants and was approved by SUNY. And one of them happens to be in my district. And you can look that one up if you'd like. A second point is there has been, in recent years, a number of private colleges that have closed. Does SUNY have any ambitions to expand and maybe take over some of those campuses? Or is your capital position such that that's not possible now?

[John B. King, Jr. (Chancellor, State University of New York)]: J. L. Don't have any place currently where we expect to take over facilities that belong to a private college that close, although we continue to have conversations about some of the College of St. Rose facilities in Albany that might be of use to the University at Albany. That's probably the best example. We are working very hard, I will say, to make sure that none of our campuses ends up in financial position of those private colleges that have had to close. J.

[Speaker 0]: Yes, you did mention that to the community colleges, the enrollment is decreasing. Is there a reason for that? Because as affordable as SUNY is, I can't see why it would decrease unless there were some other issues.

[John B. King, Jr. (Chancellor, State University of New York)]: J. The decreases were really during the COVID era and the immediate aftermath of COVID. But over the last three years, every sector within SUNY community colleges, tech colleges, the comprehensive colleges, and the university centers have all grown in enrollment in each of the last three years.

[Speaker 0]: J. Okay. Is that for

[Senator Dean Murray]: me? L.

[Senator Liz Krueger (Chair, Senate Finance Committee)]: No, you don't want it.

[Speaker 0]: Okay. Land, available land on SUNY campuses. I've had this discussion with them. I can go into my issue with it. But SUNY purchased there is a lot of additional land that's not really being used for the school facility itself. Are you looking to expand more in the, say, the senior housing area or lease land to outside entities to get or to increase your capital position to do repairs on some of the existing campuses?

[John B. King, Jr. (Chancellor, State University of New York)]: J. We are open to those kinds of partnerships. We want to, of course, make sure that they are set up financially where the benefit for the state is maximized. But we certainly have campuses where there's a need in the immediate region for workforce housing. And so we're looking at those possibilities. But they require a ground lease and obviously have to come back to the legislature for

[Speaker 0]: that. And you might want to look at building some day care facilities on some of your campuses. Since you're only charging $7,000 for tuition, you get $23,000 for child care, you know it's a win win situation. That's all I have, Senator.

[Senator Liz Krueger (Chair, Senate Finance Committee)]: Thank you very much. And I apologize. My phone went off. Okay, Senator O'Mara.

[Speaker 14]: Senator Weber. Who was here?

[Senator Liz Krueger (Chair, Senate Finance Committee)]: Oh, excuse me. Senator Weber. Good

[Senator Bill Weber]: afternoon, chancellor. How are you?

[John B. King, Jr. (Chancellor, State University of New York)]: L. Good afternoon.

[Senator Bill Weber]: J. L. Good. Thank you. So I represent Rockland County. I know you've been down most recently as well visiting Rockland Community College. And I think like most two year colleges, you know, they've been struggling financially for a number of years, you know, with enrollment and with, you know, the inability to really raise tuition or at least credit tuition credit fees. What in this budget and maybe in future budgets, what do you think is the right recipe to help them? Has the free college tuition increased enrollment and really helped get that college on more firm footing?

[John B. King, Jr. (Chancellor, State University of New York)]: J. Don't have the Rocklin number in front of me, but across our community colleges, SUNY Reconnect has been very effective in raising enrollment. 5,600 additional students had a 5% growth in community college enrollment this past fall. We think that will grow as people become familiar with the program. And we're glad that the governor proposes expanding that program in her executive budget. We do think operating aid is crucial. And the last two years, we had $8,000,000 in the last two years. First time the community colleges saw back to back operating aid increases in decades. We were hopeful that that would be a part of this year's enacted budget. It was not in the executive budget. But we remain hopeful because we think those operating aid dollars really help the community colleges, especially to grow these high demand programs. That would be helpful to Rockland. We also are optimistic the federal government is moving towards workforce Pell, allowing Pell grants to be used for short term workforce programs. And we are working closely with our community colleges to make sure they're able to take advantage of that as well.

[Senator Bill Weber]: Thank you. And secondly, as you know, they're no different than any other colleges. You know, they're it's very old, right? A lot of the stuff's outdated. And it obviously needs a lot of capital improvement to help. Is there anything you could relay to me that I could bring back to the college in terms of capital improvement?

[John B. King, Jr. (Chancellor, State University of New York)]: R. You know, the state has been very consistent about the match. But the challenge there is that sometimes the counties have such limited resources that they're not able to take advantage of the match. So to the extent that the match could somehow be made more generous so that the county was bearing a lower share of the project, I think we'd end up seeing more projects at our community colleges. J.

[Senator Bill Weber]: Well, thank you. Thank you for your candidness today. And I look forward to seeing you back down in Rockland at some point soon.

[John B. King, Jr. (Chancellor, State University of New York)]: Absolutely. Thank you.

[Assemblymember Phil Palmesano]: J. Great.

[Speaker 0]: Thank

[Senator Liz Krueger (Chair, Senate Finance Committee)]: you. Our next up is Senator Tom O'Mara.

[Senator Tom O'Mara (Ranking Member, Senate Finance Committee)]: Good afternoon, chancellor. Thanks for being with us today. Just a couple of quick questions here. The governor has proposed $10,000,000 in her initial budget for AI investments at SUNY. And then in the thirty day amendments, she just added another 2,500,000.0 for Binghamton in particular. Can you tell us first how that first 10,000,000 is to be distributed? And why the 2.5 on top of that just for Binghamton? Is Binghamton eligible for part of the 10 as well?

[John B. King, Jr. (Chancellor, State University of New York)]: J. The idea there with the 10 is to build on the momentum we have around Empire AI, which now is a more than $500,000,000 public private investment focused on the campus of University at Buffalo, but involving all four of our university centers, as well as Cornell, NYU, Columbia, RPI, all of whom will have researchers using the computing power of Empire AI to pursue research for the public good, treatment for disease, improvements to advanced manufacturing, and so forth. So that's the $10,000,000 Then there's the $2,500,000 focus on the project at Binghamton that will be really the first of its kind in the country center on AI ethics and AI accountability for using AI to advance the public interest. And that's a project that involves both state capital money but also a very significant philanthropic gift, one of the largest in Binghamton's history, to match the public dollars invested there.

[Senator Tom O'Mara (Ranking Member, Senate Finance Committee)]: J. Okay. Thank you. So is that the initial $10,000,000 so I'm clear? Is that being spread around these other institutions, or is that all going to Empire A. I. In Buffalo?

[John B. King, Jr. (Chancellor, State University of New York)]: J. Well, that's the beauty of Empire AI, that it actually is a multi institution initiative. And so the Empire AI research projects will be conducted by faculty at all four of our university centers, as well as the other participating research institutions.

[Senator Tom O'Mara (Ranking Member, Senate Finance Committee)]: J. Okay, great. One last question. I see the governor is proposing expanding eligibility under the Reconnect and Opportunity Promise programs for those that already have a degree. Is that limited to students just looking to get a nursing degree that have a prior degree?

[John B. King, Jr. (Chancellor, State University of New York)]: R. That would apply just to nursing, as the governor has proposed it.

[Senator Tom O'Mara (Ranking Member, Senate Finance Committee)]: R. Now, there are a lot of students out there, former students, that have degrees that either are really unmarketable or they're very dissatisfied in having chosen that career or that academic programming. And we want people to get into these other things, too, other than nursing. Are you considering opening up those other programs, cybersecurity and the others, to advanced manufacturing to prior degree holders as well that may have really an unmarketable degree.

[John B. King, Jr. (Chancellor, State University of New York)]: I can tell you very confidently our community colleges would welcome expansion of that exception to additional programs. We certainly desperately need folks in advanced manufacturing in cybersecurity. There are many open cybersecurity jobs in the state. So if there was a path for folks who already had degree to pursue associate degrees in those areas, our community colleges certainly would be eager to provide that program.

[Senator Tom O'Mara (Ranking Member, Senate Finance Committee)]: R. Right. But it's not open.

[John B. King, Jr. (Chancellor, State University of New York)]: R. That is not proposed in the governor's budget.

[Senator Tom O'Mara (Ranking Member, Senate Finance Committee)]: Right. And the question came from one of my community colleges because they are interested in that. Are you open to that idea as chancellor of SUNY to pursue that in the future?

[John B. King, Jr. (Chancellor, State University of New York)]: J. Absolutely. The challenge will be just ensuring that the resources are there to support that in the enacted budget, but we're certainly open to it.

[Senator Tom O'Mara (Ranking Member, Senate Finance Committee)]: J. Thank you very much. J.

[Senator Liz Krueger (Chair, Senate Finance Committee)]: Thank you. I think I'm up next, and then we'll be followed by the three minute follow-up for our chair, Toby Stavitsky. But I'm not going to use all ten minutes, trust me. One, just for the record, I completely agree with my two colleagues from the assembly. We shouldn't have you doing charter schools. There should be one consistent system statewide using the same standards. Because in New York City, we know for a fact the ones that shouldn't get the charters are going specifically to the SUNY system to get approved because nobody doesn't get approved. And I think it actually hurts your reputation as a university for being seen as playing that role, which in different parts of the state has serious impacts on the budgets of the local school districts and causes real problems in many areas. So I just wanted to go on record as saying I think the legislature should do something about this and not have to dual a system, which isn't a fair system. Now some questions. One, you were asked about how much money the cost of changing the electric system throughout the SUNY system would be over the course, I think you answered, of a decade, and you said several billions. My understanding is, though, we're also exploring and even investing in heat pump networks for several of the SUNY upstate systems. Am I correct in saying that that will save you an enormous amount of money in ongoing heating costs?

[John B. King, Jr. (Chancellor, State University of New York)]: J. Absolutely.

[Speaker 0]: J. Do

[Senator Liz Krueger (Chair, Senate Finance Committee)]: you have any estimate of what that will be?

[John B. King, Jr. (Chancellor, State University of New York)]: J. We can get you a precise number, but the geothermal work that we're doing with $140,000,000 in last year's budget is, without question, going to save us on heating costs. It's also allowing us to make more rapid progress on our goal to get to net zero and to eliminate our greenhouse gas emissions. But the SUNY system has been leading on this. It's just we do these projects typically as we do renovations. And so the capital investment is not only an investment in the quality of campus experience, it's also an investment in our moving quickly to renewable energy.

[Senator Liz Krueger (Chair, Senate Finance Committee)]: Right. I believe that is correct and very important for people to understand. Thank you. So the next question is probably controversial even between myself and many of my colleagues. So here it goes. I am under the belief, personally, doesn't mean I win, that we shouldn't divvy up the money for the CUNY system or the SUNY system of exactly how the dollars should be spent, but rather allow the board to decide what are the priorities and looking at it system wide. Is there more need here for whatever reason? Is there more advantage there for whatever reason? Should there be a restructuring systemically over here? Because it's not 1965, it's 2026. But I get lobbied, as do all of my colleagues, by the individual schools within both systems to urge us to give them the money they claim they need. I'm sure they're telling us the truth, that they do need that money. But we also know that we never give any of your CUNY or SUNY campuses all the money they actually need so that somebody has to make very tough decisions about what's your priorities for this year, how does it fit into the overall goals that your university has for itself over the long term?

[John B. King, Jr. (Chancellor, State University of New York)]: Because

[Senator Liz Krueger (Chair, Senate Finance Committee)]: nothing is a one year decision. Where are you on that?

[John B. King, Jr. (Chancellor, State University of New York)]: I agree with you. And I know our assuming board of trustees would agree with that. There aren't enough resources to satisfy every aspiration of every individual institution. But we try across the SUNY system to make sure that every campus is set up to thrive for the long term and that we are positioning SUNY to lead in areas that are important to the state's workforce and the state's long term economic development.

[Senator Liz Krueger (Chair, Senate Finance Committee)]: J. See, and I chose to be one of the last, so nobody has any time left to challenge But you can tell me afterwards. Thank you very much. I'm Oh, excuse me.

[Speaker 0]: A late bloomer.

[Senator Liz Krueger (Chair, Senate Finance Committee)]: A late bloomer to challenge me. That's new

[Senator Toby Ann Stavisky (Chair, Senate Higher Education Committee)]: meeting else?

[Assemblymember Brian D. Miller]: Yes. Thank you, Chair. Thank you, chancellor, for being here today. And I really like what you had to say about all of the things that you're doing for people with disabilities. As the ranker for people with disabilities, I have some concerns about the governor's proposed executive budget with a cut of $2,000,000 to the disabilities post secondary success. And I'm told that there was a 34% increase in those students since COVID. So I I know that you're very supportive of education for people with disabilities, and I'm just hoping that you will help us advocate to get not only that 2,000,000 restored in the budget, but an additional 2,000,000 to accommodate the people with disabilities that want a continued education.

[John B. King, Jr. (Chancellor, State University of New York)]: We are very hopeful that the enacted budget will restore that additional funding and build on top of it. There's certainly a lot of need. And I mentioned earlier, there are 40,000 SUNY students who self identified as students with disabilities. But there are some students who maybe haven't self identified. And so there is an opportunity for us to continue to provide additional supports to our students.

[Assemblymember Brian D. Miller]: J. Great. And the Disability Support Leadership Institute that you spoke about earlier, can you just tell me what that's about and what funding you have for that and whether or not additional funding is needed?

[John B. King, Jr. (Chancellor, State University of New York)]: J. Yeah. So we are funding that institute through that students with disabilities post secondary funding allocation that runs through the state education department to us. Those are the dollars that are supporting that program. The goal is to identify faculty and staff members who've worked on issues of supporting students with disabilities and give them additional professional development, leadership development, so that they can move into more senior leadership roles throughout the SUNY system. And we've had a lot of success with our other leadership institutes that are similarly structured. And we're very excited about this one. And it's also a recognition of the importance of serving students with disabilities well across the SUNY system.

[Assemblymember Brian D. Miller]: That's great. And then there was also an ask for $15,000,000 for students with disabilities, that the increased investment would provide more opportunities for people entering into the college. So where where are we with that? Mean, we're the budget is a $640,000,000,000 budget, and 15,000,000, in my opinion, is a small ask for higher education for people with disabilities, especially that are in the self direction program and people that want to gain work workforce development, which you do such a great job at. So I am just curious as to, you know, what what you're going to do to be able to support the increase in the number of students with disabilities.

[John B. King, Jr. (Chancellor, State University of New York)]: Look, we can certainly use more resources, and we will put them to good use. Three years ago, we were able to put $10,000,000 in recurring funding towards supports for students with disabilities. We added staff in our tutoring centers. We added assistive technology. But

[Speaker 0]: there

[John B. King, Jr. (Chancellor, State University of New York)]: is much more to be done.

[Assemblymember Brian D. Miller]: Thank you, sir.

[Senator Liz Krueger (Chair, Senate Finance Committee)]: Thank you. And I believe now to close for the Senate, unless I see another late bloomer.

[Senator Toby Ann Stavisky (Chair, Senate Higher Education Committee)]: I think the assembly was.

[Senator Liz Krueger (Chair, Senate Finance Committee)]: No? Toby Savicki, three minutes.

[Senator Toby Ann Stavisky (Chair, Senate Higher Education Committee)]: Thank you. A couple of quick questions, Chancellor. When SUNY approves all of these charter schools, are there any fiscal implications to it to SUNY?

[John B. King, Jr. (Chancellor, State University of New York)]: J. To SUNY? No. I mean, it's really just the local fiscal implications. But again, I'm not personally involved in that process. But our charter school institute has been nationally recognized for the rigor of their review of the academic program of potential charters and their ongoing review of the academic performance of charters.

[Senator Toby Ann Stavisky (Chair, Senate Higher Education Committee)]: So there are no fiscal implications when you approve all of the applications?

[John B. King, Jr. (Chancellor, State University of New York)]: J. Well, there are fiscal implications for the local districts, but there's not a fiscal implication for SUNY system.

[Senator Toby Ann Stavisky (Chair, Senate Higher Education Committee)]: J. Let me add a totally different issue. Earlier, you mentioned the fact that tuition at SUNY and CUNY has been frozen. And that was like music to my ears, Cause in the past, too many programs have been denied students who couldn't afford. And I had a hearing here in Albany right after the pandemic. And the acting chancellor said, you don't raise tuition during times of economic strife. Let me ask you one question. You've indicated that enrollment is starting to come back and that both the community colleges and the senior colleges have had increases, to what do you attribute that increase? Is that the issue of the SUNY and CUNY Reconnect? To what do you attribute the success?

[John B. King, Jr. (Chancellor, State University of New York)]: J. Certainly Reconnect has been helpful. I think scaling ASAP and ACE has been helpful to improve retention. The TAP expansion that we discussed earlier is certainly helpful. And we're also doing a lot of marketing efforts to make sure people know about the affordable excellence at SUNY. We've also been the beneficiary of such tremendous investment from the governor and the legislature, including, importantly, covering the costs of our collectively bargained raises. And I do want to note, the governor has the $54,000,000 in operating support in her executive budget. We are currently doing our contract negotiations with our bargaining units. Well deserved raises, like a 3% raise, would translate into $133,000,000 in additional costs. And so the state's continued commitment to support those costs is critical to our financial health.

[Senator Toby Ann Stavisky (Chair, Senate Higher Education Committee)]: J. So can you quantify the number of students?

[Speaker 0]: We'll quantify that at a later date.

[Senator Toby Ann Stavisky (Chair, Senate Higher Education Committee)]: Well, ask that question.

[Speaker 0]: I would ask. Thank

[Senator Liz Krueger (Chair, Senate Finance Committee)]: you.

[Speaker 0]: Mr. Chancellor, I want to thank you for your testimony today. This concludes your portion of this hearing. I'll now call up Chancellor Felix Rodriguez from the City University of New York, my alma mater. Thank you so much. FELIX Thank you.

[Senator Liz Krueger (Chair, Senate Finance Committee)]: Thank you very much.

[Speaker 0]: Will? Okay.

[Senator Liz Krueger (Chair, Senate Finance Committee)]: Thank you.

[Speaker 0]: How are you? Mister Pharaoh, can we get ready? Sorry? Sit. Please. I was talking to you. Okay. Good afternoon, chancellor. Good morning.

[Senator Dean Murray]: Oh.

[Félix V. Matos Rodríguez (Chancellor, City University of New York)]: Good morning chairs Kruger, Stavinsky, Hyndman and Pretlow, and members of the Senate and the Assembly, Higher Education, Finance, and Ways and Means Committees. I am Felix Mato Rodriguez, the chancellor of the City University of I New am joined by the incredible CUNY Dream Team with the University Provost Alicia Hyndman, our Chief Operating Officer Hector Batista, and the Chief Financial Officer Kenneth Godiner. Thank you first and to Governor Hochul and to all of you, our state legislators, for your continued partnership and support which enables CUNY to expand access and deliver strong results for our students, family, and the communities we serve. Your investments have been essential to stabilizing public higher education, expanding access for students across New York, and strengthening CUNY's role as a potent driver of upward mobility and economic development for our state. Year after year, we expand access to high quality educational opportunities at a cost that allows 72% of CUNY students to attend tuition free and 77% to graduate without any debt. Recent national rankings again underscore the value New Yorkers already know our university delivers. CUNY took the top seven spots on the Wall Street Journal's best value colleges list with Baruch College ranked number one for the third consecutive year. One clear sign of our momentum is that more New Yorkers continue to choose CUNY. The university's enrollment has grown for the third consecutive year in 2025, a 3.8 increase that brought total enrollment growth to 9% and almost 21,000 additional students since the 2022. The enrollment gains have been driven by a number of intentional efforts. We have strengthened our partnership with New York City public schools, personalized our engagement with high school seniors, and boosted our recruitment and marketing efforts. And we have seen the payoff of targeted recruitment initiatives like CUNY Reconnect, Governor Hochul's free community college program for adults who pursue degrees in high demand fields. Nearly 6,000 New Yorkers have enrolled in the program since it began last summer. A central focus of CUNY student success work has been CUNY beyond, our ambitious system wide initiative to ensure that every student graduates prepare for success after college. Launched in the fall, CUNY Beyond embeds career readiness from day one, expands paid internships and experiential learning, and integrates career advising across academic programs. This is important because students who work in paid internships, for example, are three times more likely to receive a job offer at graduation with a higher starting salary. Complementing this work is Power Your Business with CUNY, a new industry facing campaign. CUNY is already a major pipeline to New York City workforce with 30,000 employers actively recruiting our students and graduates. The new campaign, you might have seen it already in taxis in the city, connects industry partners to CUNY talent and addresses workforce needs in healthcare, technology, and teaching. CUNY's AI programs, along with more than 200 AI related initiatives on our campuses, position our students and our university at the forefront of the evolving tech economy. This include new AI post doctoral fellowships, a highly competitive Google funded faculty institute, and the CUNY AI Innovation Fund. In addition, we are recruiting the first and hiring the first of the 25 new AI faculty for the Empire AI Consortium funded by the Simon the Simons Foundation. And just as importantly, at this time of teacher shortages, CUNY is New York's teachers' pipeline. CUNY prepares more than one third of all New York City public school teachers and more than 40% of the teachers of color in New York State. New teachers with CUNY degrees have a 17% higher five year retention rate in city public schools than new teachers with degrees from other universities. That scale of success and our programs in early childhood leadership and administration will be critical to our state's and city's universal child care and early childhood agendas. And we are continuing to build on our multi pronged approach to fostering a safe and inclusive environment with centralized support from our new center for inclusivity and equal opportunity. We have enhanced the system for reporting incidents of discrimination, harassment, and retaliation to ensure that they are addressed promptly, fairly, and consistently. We have introduced mandatory Title VI training for employees and expanded programming on navigating difficult conversations through a partnership with a constructive dialogue institute. We are working to provide that same safe environment for immigrant students who currently face significant uncertainty and fear. Over the past year, for example, critical funding from the Petrie and Robin Hood foundations allowed us to offer rapid response legal guidance for immigrant students, faculty and staff through the new CUNY Immigration Assistance Project. We also remain focused on advancing essential capital projects that modernize classrooms, laboratories, and student spaces, improve energy efficiency, and address deferred maintenance across our system. Over the past two fiscal years, CUNY has invested about $850,000,000 in facilities completing or substantially advancing more than 100 projects. Now, let me turn to the governor's executive budget. I would like to express my gratitude to Governor Hochul for an executive budget that provides new operating and capital funding for CUNY. For CUNY's operating budget, there's an increase of $36,000,000 in operating support for senior colleges. However, this would cover only half of the cost of our wage increases in fiscal year twenty twenty seven associated with our collective bargaining agreement. An additional 36,500,000.0 is needed to fully cover the cost of those salary increases. The executive budget provides partial funding for the increase of our fringe benefit costs. However, we need an additional 29,000,000 to fully cover these cost increases related both to the faculty contract and other cost increases including sharply rising health insurance costs. Additionally, the university and colleges are required to cover inflationary cost increases on goods and services, building rentals and energy. We did not receive any funding for this cost in the executive budget. If we do not receive additional funding in the enacted budget, other areas will have to be reduced to make up for this shortfall. CUNY's unfunded mandatory cost increases, apart from collective bargaining costs, totaled $31,900,000 for fiscal year 2027. We are pleased to see that the community college funding floor is continued at 100 percent of the previous year's funding with a continuation of $10,600,000 We also appreciate the expansion of the Reconnect program to include additional high demand programs. And we are very grateful for the governor's inclusion of 6,800,000.0 for our CUNY Beyond initiative that I described earlier. Let's build on that strong foundation with a 26.6 investment in artificial intelligence, a 9,200,000.0 investment in health professions, a 5,900,000.0 investment to support academic and career advisement, a 5,200,000.0 investment to expand disability services, and a 3,100,000.0 investment in student mental health services. Turning to CUNY's capital budget. The executive budget provides critical infrastructure investments to modernize our 26 campuses. The plan allocates $421,000,000 in new capital funding for our four year schools and community colleges. This support will be used to pay for critical repairs and maintenance as well as strategic investments in research facilities. However, additional capital resources would be needed to enable us to maintain our campuses in a state of good repair and further invest in classrooms and research infrastructure. Our request totals approximately 1,900,000,000.0. There are various key initiatives, but I would just highlight a 400,000,000 request to bring 55% of our CUNY buildings to a state of good repair by 2028. This is critical considering that the current estimated value of the deferred maintenance backlog is about 7,000,000 or more than 52% of CUNY buildings who are 50 years old and older. My time is up. I look forward to answering all your questions. Okay. So, this budget season presents significant challenges for all of us entrusted with stewarding public higher education in New York. As we face great shifts in federal policies that impact higher education, our shared commitment to access, excellence, and opportunity is more important than ever. Your support has driven progress and I am confident that together we will keep making CUNY a national model for student success and public purpose. Thank you.

[Assemblymember Alicia L. Hyndman (Chair, Assembly Higher Education Committee)]: Thank you, chancellor, and your dream team for being here today. And I see we all got out of the city to So make if I can tell you how much snow I shoveled. So because you brought this up about the Title VI and the reporting mechanisms, What do you have to say? Can you tell us what's going on with the assistant professor at Hunter College, Alison Friedman, and the racist remarks that she said on that community council meeting that she was overheard. I guess her mic wasn't off when she thought it was.

[Félix V. Matos Rodríguez (Chancellor, City University of New York)]: I appreciate your question. And obviously, the comments made by the professor are clearly offensive and abhorrent. And something that was echoed also by President Cantor from Hunter College. We are conducting a review and investigation at Hunter. I understand also that the district, the Department of Education is conducting an investigation also. And we look forward to hearing the reports at the end of the investigation. But we are, like you, totally appalled by the comments.

[Assemblymember Alicia L. Hyndman (Chair, Assembly Higher Education Committee)]: So, when you say, how long will the investigation take?

[Senator Toby Ann Stavisky (Chair, Senate Higher Education Committee)]: Do you I

[Félix V. Matos Rodríguez (Chancellor, City University of New York)]: mean, that is always difficult to quantify. I think the important thing is that the investigation is conducted thoroughly. I don't think it should be a lengthy investigation. But, you know, we're clearly aware about the sensitivities around this issue.

[Assemblymember Alicia L. Hyndman (Chair, Assembly Higher Education Committee)]: Is she still in the classroom? Is she still permitted to teach while the investigation?

[Félix V. Matos Rodríguez (Chancellor, City University of New York)]: Yes.

[Assemblymember Alicia L. Hyndman (Chair, Assembly Higher Education Committee)]: I'll move on to my questions regarding budget items. CUNY has, I believe, three institutions, the College of Staten Island, Medgar Evers, and New York City Tech that offer associate degree programs as well as bachelor degree programs. Correct. Have the presidents of this college told you that they want to be included in the CUNY Reconnect program because they offer the associate degree programs?

[Félix V. Matos Rodríguez (Chancellor, City University of New York)]: So it is something also that is part of our budget request. It's not just the presidents from those three schools. It is also one of the

[Assemblymember Alicia L. Hyndman (Chair, Assembly Higher Education Committee)]: things that Because they we reached out to me so

[Senator Toby Ann Stavisky (Chair, Senate Higher Education Committee)]: I'm just

[Félix V. Matos Rodríguez (Chancellor, City University of New York)]: No, no, it's so just so you know that we, you know, fully support that, we think it'd be extremely beneficial. The success that we've had with that program in the community college indicates that it would be a great addition to those three schools that also offer associate's degrees.

[Assemblymember Alicia L. Hyndman (Chair, Assembly Higher Education Committee)]: Okay. The executive budget proposal includes funding for emergency aid for students. Can you elaborate on how the funds will be utilized?

[Félix V. Matos Rodríguez (Chancellor, City University of New York)]: Well, thank you so much. Currently, most of the emergency funding that is provided by the campuses, and just to give some sense of what that is, it can be students that have at times issues with buying food. Students that might have issues paying for their rent. They might have, you know, car repairs, different things that come and they have to make a decision between doing that and paying for their studies or being able to buy books. Normally, we've depended a lot on private funding for that. The Petrie Foundation, for example, has been a great partner to many of our campuses in doing that. So that aid that is in the budget would be helpful in two ways. One, allowing us to do a lot more for the students. And we have good data that shows that sometimes the impediment for someone to graduate is a small sum of money. Being able to do that but also being able to leverage that money and go to our private supporters and say, we could do a lot more with this additional state funding and leverage that. So, I think it would be a great help for our students.

[Assemblymember Alicia L. Hyndman (Chair, Assembly Higher Education Committee)]: Can you provide any information on the efforts CUNY has made to reduce the burden of graduate student fees, particularly fees charged to graduate students employed by the university?

[Félix V. Matos Rodríguez (Chancellor, City University of New York)]: So, can go back to you in terms of details on that. We try I mean, for many, many years, we minimized any kind of fees to graduate students and all our students. So, that's something that I'll be happy to sort of get back to you on.

[Assemblymember Alicia L. Hyndman (Chair, Assembly Higher Education Committee)]: Okay. One of the things York College is close. I split York College with Assembly member Vivian Cook. And this current president, Schrader, and the previous president has said that a lot of things are being centralized by CUNY now with the central program database. Have these initiatives, are they still continuing? Are they growing? And what can the campus see from that? What can York College look forward to with the centralization of certain services that CUNY is taking

[Félix V. Matos Rodríguez (Chancellor, City University of New York)]: hold of? So, if the reference there is to, for example, what, shared services, which I think is one of the things that we've enacted to address some of the budget challenges that we face. A very concrete example of that is something that is going to be operational hopefully at the end of the spring in which that we are taking away the responsibilities for the work in facilities on the campuses and we're creating four hubs that are going to be serving all our campuses to do that. That would allow us to A, be more efficient in the way that we handle repairs and things of that nature on our campuses. It would allow us to save money on contracts by centralizing some of those services, avoiding examples of duplication in some of the campuses, addressing shortages in some of the campuses. We have created also a ramp in which we're going to be subsidizing some of those costs the first couple of years for the campuses so they will see some savings in their budget. So, we feel confident this is one example of being able to do things in a centralized way both making sure that the service we provide to the campuses are more efficient and better and that we save money for the campuses and for the system in the process and your good benefit, to your point, from that initiative.

[Assemblymember Alicia L. Hyndman (Chair, Assembly Higher Education Committee)]: Okay. Lastly, and I'll probably come back again. You have Baruch College renovations, Brooklyn College, the Medical School, Lehman College. This is all from the gold sheet. I love the gold sheet, minus minus

[Félix V. Matos Rodríguez (Chancellor, City University of New York)]: So do we.

[Assemblymember Alicia L. Hyndman (Chair, Assembly Higher Education Committee)]: Mega Evers, York College. How do you decide which campus gets what and when with all the requests that come in? How do you just determine

[Félix V. Matos Rodríguez (Chancellor, City University of New York)]: Well, thank you for that. So there's there are critical maintenance needs, right? And they're the needs that you identify here that are more associated with longer term renovations and projects, right? We have and our COO can fill you in a very detailed inventory of all the infrastructure needs in all the campuses, the repairs that are needed, the life of equipment and things of that nature. So, the state of good repair is done based on the age of the needs, right, and how rapidly we need to be able to address that in each of the campus. This that is updated all the time. And on the larger projects, right, we work based on the needs of the campus. When was the last campus that got additional funding for a large renovation? We take all those things into account in making the decisions on capital.

[Assemblymember Alicia L. Hyndman (Chair, Assembly Higher Education Committee)]: Okay. Thank you, chief.

[Speaker 0]: Thank you.

[Senator Liz Krueger (Chair, Senate Finance Committee)]: Excuse me. Thank you and welcome. You're welcome. Toby Savitsky, the chair of higher ed, will be our first questioner.

[Senator Toby Ann Stavisky (Chair, Senate Higher Education Committee)]: Thank you, and good afternoon, chancellor.

[Félix V. Matos Rodríguez (Chancellor, City University of New York)]: TOPI Great to see you. Thank you.

[Senator Toby Ann Stavisky (Chair, Senate Higher Education Committee)]: I noticed at the top of your gold sheet you had the pay bill, so to speak, and the fringes. And yet the amount in the governor's budget, her executive budget, is not sufficient to cover the charges that are outlined in the goal sheet. How does CUNY expect to pay it?

[Félix V. Matos Rodríguez (Chancellor, City University of New York)]: So, thank you for the question. We are a firm believer in the budget process here in Albany. So this is why we're here letting you know of the needs that we have to be able to fulfill the contract that we signed with our labor unions and the cost that contract. And given that in our university, about 90% of our costs are personnel costs, right? Making sure that we're fully funded for all our collective bargaining needs and fringe is really, really essential. And this is why we're making the case here before you at this budget hearing.

[Senator Toby Ann Stavisky (Chair, Senate Higher Education Committee)]: Shifting to another area, does CUNY have a five year plan in effect particularly for capital funding?

[Félix V. Matos Rodríguez (Chancellor, City University of New York)]: So, I'm going to allow our COO to address that. But the short answer is that we do have plans for that.

[Hector Batista (COO, CUNY)]: Thank you for the question. So we do have a five year plan. Our five year plan is roughly about, our need is about $10,000,000,000 And we get about 2,500,000,000 in a five year capital plan. And the plan is really, as the chancellor stated earlier, is really made up of consultation with the presidents. We have quite a few new presidents and their priorities. We've done a facility assessment of all facilities and know when certain systems are going to go offline. And then we have maintenance records for those systems. And that is what sets up the capital plan. That plan then is discussed with the presidents. And then we have a conversation with the chancellor. And then we present that plan to our board of trustees. But it's a plan that is constantly being updated to make sure that we meet the needs of all our colleges.

[Senator Toby Ann Stavisky (Chair, Senate Higher Education Committee)]: So there is a lined list of capital projects.

[Hector Batista (COO, CUNY)]: J. Yes. I'm happy to leave you a copy of our post.

[Senator Toby Ann Stavisky (Chair, Senate Higher Education Committee)]: That's all right. I'll tell you what. I'll read it.

[Assemblymember Phil Palmesano]: J. L.

[Senator Bill Weber]: Next year,

[Senator John C. Liu]: we'll have CUNY go first.

[Speaker 27]: Yeah.

[Senator Toby Ann Stavisky (Chair, Senate Higher Education Committee)]: As you know, I'm a member of the CUNY Construction Fund.

[Speaker 17]: J. Yes.

[Senator Toby Ann Stavisky (Chair, Senate Higher Education Committee)]: J. And we have a meeting coming up on Thursday, which I don't know if I'll be able to attend or not. But here's the agenda. And it's a very typical agenda, including almost completely of critical maintenance. Replete over the years has been the idea that the buildings were built. They're old. Some of the one when I went to Hunter and CUNY Queens for graduate school, those buildings are still being used. They need new boilers. And many of the items are for the HVAC, and particularly the boilers. And the cost for the boilers is somewhere between 45,000,000 and $50,000,000 First of all, the building is not subject to the city council's local law 97, which is a major issue in the district that I represent in Queens. Those are the co ops. They have to pay it. Is there any way and I have asked this question publicly is there any way that the boilers can be more energy efficient to perhaps cut down on the pollution? And the second part of the question is, how did these items get on the agenda? Is it from the five year plan? How did these items Queen's College, which obviously I support, John J, etcetera they are all on Thursday's agenda for critical maintenance.

[Hector Batista (COO, CUNY)]: So I'll answer the last question first. Those items get on the CUCF agenda. By the way, we could use you on Thursday. We need a quorum. Items get on the agenda because they're part of the that is part of the five year plan and is part of our deferred maintenance. So they go to, first of all, to CUNY's Board of Trustees. Once the Board of Trustees approve those plans, then it goes to the CF Board for final approval. So they're all part of the five year plan. And as I stated earlier, that five year plan is constantly being updated. With regards to boilers, we have a couple of particular problems we have to do when it comes to boilers. We are required by the City Of New York to have two types of boilers in our campus. One that's run by oil and another one that's run by gas. There are certain points during the year when we're asked to reduce the consumption of gas and we have to turn on the boilers that are run by oil. We obviously are on target to meet our 2030 goal when it comes to efficiency. When we pair new boilers, we bring new boilers, it's all really focused on bringing in boilers that are more efficient. I know you're a big proponent of electric boilers because we we spoken about it personally. But for us, those particular boilers are more expensive. And even though you think that these boilers are expensive, those other boilers are a lot more expensive. And frankly, don't meet the requirements that, in a lot of cases, we need to meet when it comes to city regulations.

[Senator Toby Ann Stavisky (Chair, Senate Higher Education Committee)]: The reason I said they were the Local Law 97 has had a devastating impact on most co ops in my Senate district, including my own, where Con Ed came in, looked at the gas lines a couple of years ago, and just shut off the gas. That's not going to happen with CUNY, fortunately. However, how does CUNY intend to be more energy efficient, particularly in light of the co ops, which are nonprofit, or other housing, or whatever, to comply with Local Law 97?

[Hector Batista (COO, CUNY)]: J. Yeah. We're very fortunate of the partnership we have with NYPD and some of the energy that we're able to buy at a lower cost. Unfortunately, some of the co op and condos in your area are not able to take advantage of that. When we put in a new system, we make sure that that system not only addresses some of those challenges that you pointed out connected to Con Edison, But we also make sure that that system is a system that is going to actually help us meet the goal for 2030. So the boilers are more efficient. They save a lot more energy. And we think that the issue that you're pointing out is particularly being addressed by the type of borders that we put in some of our campuses.

[Senator Toby Ann Stavisky (Chair, Senate Higher Education Committee)]: J. Thank you. I suspect the chancellor will answer my next question, the opportunity programs. Particularly, let's start with SEEK. How has the reduction in the governor's executive budget affected SEEK? It's cut the amount by quite a bit. And the other opportunity programs as well.

[Félix V. Matos Rodríguez (Chancellor, City University of New York)]: J. Well, you. Thank you for your question. I mean, we have had such great results with both Sikh and College Discovery. I think you're aware that we're celebrating the sixtieth anniversary of the Sikh program this year. And adequate funding to be able to recruit, to go out to the campuses and let people know about the opportunities of Sikh to be able to bring the students and give them the mentoring and the support that are part of the of how the program operates indispensable. So, we're making a push for additional recruitment of students with Sikh. So, those that funding will be very, very important. And also particularly for the College Discovery Program, which is a community college component of the Sikh opportunity program.

[Senator Toby Ann Stavisky (Chair, Senate Higher Education Committee)]: Thank you.

[Félix V. Matos Rodríguez (Chancellor, City University of New York)]: Thank you.

[Senator Liz Krueger (Chair, Senate Finance Committee)]: You're done?

[Senator Toby Ann Stavisky (Chair, Senate Higher Education Committee)]: Yep. The light tells me I'm done.

[James Davis (President, Professional Staff Congress-CUNY)]: Good afternoon, chancellor. Good afternoon to your team. I have a two part question. In light of the associate professor's reported comments, what immediate actions is the university taking to address the matter to ensure accountability and to reaffirm its commitment to providing a safe and respectful and equitable learning environment for all? And part two, how can you as an education institution funded by tax dollars allow someone to continue to educate minds given this incident?

[Félix V. Matos Rodríguez (Chancellor, City University of New York)]: So, thank you for for your question. And I I reiterate what I mentioned earlier with the question from Assemblywoman Hyndman that we found the comments to be incredibly offensive and insensitive and as I've said so publicly and equally has President Cantor from Hunter. The best way to address any claim of discrimination or harassment is that there needs to be a process for it, right? And that's what is being done both in the Department of Education with their investigation and then with our review they're doing at Hunter. We need to make sure that we have due process and then and that way, that's the way that you get the complete accountability that would be required for any kind of disciplinary action in this case.

[Assemblymember Phil Palmesano]: All right. Thank you.

[Félix V. Matos Rodríguez (Chancellor, City University of New York)]: Thank you.

[Senator John C. Liu]: Thank you, madam chair. And good to see you again, chancellor.

[Félix V. Matos Rodríguez (Chancellor, City University of New York)]: Same here.

[Senator John C. Liu]: And my old friend Hector there. I call him old because he is like I am. In any event, I appreciated your comments about CUNY's role in the teacher pipeline, particularly for New York City public schools. And you say that CUNY is also well positioned to play a critical role in addressing the shortage and diversity of teachers in our state. So is there anything CUNY's been doing differently these last couple of years? As you know, we need a large number of teachers to address the overcrowded class sizes in New York City public schools.

[Félix V. Matos Rodríguez (Chancellor, City University of New York)]: Well, thank you for your question. I know that that is an issue deep at heart in your leadership with the bill on getting the smaller class size in New York. We have our dean of education, Ashley Thompson, that works with all our schools of education working hand in hand with the New York City public schools in making sure that everything on our end to create new programs, to accelerate training opportunities for students, all the things that are under our command that we get to do them in a more expeditious way. I have my first meeting with the new chancellor from the New York City public schools, Chancellor Samples. And we've reiterated that this is our first priority. We're also ready to go advocate here at the state level for maybe some flexibility in some of the licensing requirements so that we can get individuals who are competent and trained in front of those students more quickly. But it is one of our highest priorities. I've already mentioned in my meeting, my monthly meeting with the Council of Presidents for all the presidents that have education programs on their campuses to make sure that they're part of this conversation so that we can meet the objectives of the bill. And we can have the really wonderful, prepared, talented teachers that CUNY produces in front of the schools.

[Senator John C. Liu]: So more courses towards the attainment of education degrees?

[Félix V. Matos Rodríguez (Chancellor, City University of New York)]: Yes. And particularly in some of the areas that they're also in high demand. Bilingual education, some of the things that we historically know that we've, you know, that we've been even short before and is going be more acute as a result of the law.

[Senator John C. Liu]: Chancellor Samuels has also informed me that you're seeking some legislative changes with regard to the certification of teachers. Is that going to affect the quality of teachers at all?

[Félix V. Matos Rodríguez (Chancellor, City University of New York)]: We we would not support anything that would lower the quality of the teachers. We believe that we have enough evidence to be able to do that in an expedited way and in ways that meets the expectations of the students and the parents in

[Senator John C. Liu]: the So long as we're still getting top quality teachers, I certainly will support your efforts in looking at legislation that will make it easier for people to become teachers.

[Félix V. Matos Rodríguez (Chancellor, City University of New York)]: Absolutely, absolutely.

[Hector Batista (COO, CUNY)]: Thank Thank you.

[Senator John C. Liu]: We've got six seconds left. Hector, did you want to respond to my calling you old?

[Speaker 0]: You'll time's grow a little older before you get that answer.

[Félix V. Matos Rodríguez (Chancellor, City University of New York)]: Yeah.

[Speaker 0]: Assemblywoman Griffin.

[Assemblymember Judy Griffin]: Thank you, Chair Preppau, and thank you all for being here today. I was looking at your testimony and also our briefing of budget reductions. And I was disappointed to see the executive proposal eliminating funding to such an array of incredible programs in the CUNY system. And I know I represent Southwestern Nassau County, but a number of my constituents do travel in to the CUNY schools and really appreciate the wide variety of programs you offer. So with if these proposed eliminations come if that comes to fruition, what do you have plans of what to do, how these programs will be impacted?

[Félix V. Matos Rodríguez (Chancellor, City University of New York)]: So thank you for your question and I got so excited about the hearing that I forgot to, in the previous comments, remind each of the members how many students they have in the district. In your case, six forty five junior students are in your district. So, you were dead on about that Thank

[Senator Toby Ann Stavisky (Chair, Senate Higher Education Committee)]: you.

[Félix V. Matos Rodríguez (Chancellor, City University of New York)]: That engagement. You know, we are a firm believer of this budget process, of the advocacy that we have in engaging with both the members of the assembly and the senate, the support in the governor's office. So, we're confident that at the end of the journey, we're going to be able, like we had last year, to be able to have those costs covered because particularly in our case that's why I shared the 90% of our costs are people, right? So if this component of the cost for our collective bargaining, the fringe, which for us, in the case of SUNY, fringe is included with all the other state agencies. We need to have that allocation directly from you all to be able to have it. And all the other mandatory needs is absolutely indispensable that we get that funding and we think that we're going to get there at the end of the journey. And thank you for pointing that out.

[Assemblymember Judy Griffin]: Okay. You're welcome. And thank you pointing STEPHANIE

[Assemblymember Phil Palmesano]: Thank you. Thank

[Senator Liz Krueger (Chair, Senate Finance Committee)]: you. Hi.

[Félix V. Matos Rodríguez (Chancellor, City University of New York)]: J. I

[Senator Liz Krueger (Chair, Senate Finance Committee)]: don't think I need the ten minutes, but you can press 10. Thank you, Will. So the governor is creating a new program that she is calling the New York Opportunity Promise Scholarship Expansion. And it's both for CUNY and SUNY, and a new model that talks about covering specific kinds of degrees. So one, do each of the colleges or universities have the ability to recommend the kinds of programs they actually think work best with themselves or even with colleges within their university system? And how do you see that playing out for you at CUNY as opposed to SUNY?

[Félix V. Matos Rodríguez (Chancellor, City University of New York)]: Well, thank you for the question. So, you know, we've been part of the conversation about which programs get included for that. And actually, Provost Alvero and her team was critical in the first iteration of which kinds of programs we felt sort of met that criteria of being in demand and then being able to be ready on our end to be able to meet that demand. I think that we've seen very, very positive engagement and results so far. I actually think we're going to do even better in this current year because there's been more mature in the program. We'll be able to get the word out and more effectively to different people to so they know about this opportunity. So, I think this has been an incredible component to the affordability that CUNY has. But we've been very much engaged in the conversations of which programs to include.

[Senator Liz Krueger (Chair, Senate Finance Committee)]: Okay. So, because Senator Savicki and Senator Liu aren't the only Queens College connected senators up here, my husband taught at Queens College for And one of the things he did when he was there was a study on how much of the business community in Queens was correlated to air flights and the air industry, of course with both Queens having Kennedy and LaGuardia, and a huge percentage of the businesses that the airlines did business with, the crucial issue we know for this country right now of having adequate air traffic controllers. So can I take a leap that we're looking at that industry for some of your schools?

[Félix V. Matos Rodríguez (Chancellor, City University of New York)]: Well, thank you for that. And absolutely. And you know that your college has been a pioneer in designing programs for that and then the feeder schools in LaGuardia and Queensborough also, right? So, those sort of keep it within that Queens universe. So, absolutely. And we look forward to the recommendations. We also go to the data from the labor department to look at what the demand looks like. But, you know, very much the other good thing about this program too is that even if there might be some programs that might not be included, the fact that you're bringing traffic of students who are interested, right, allows us to have a conversation with each student and expose them to other programs that even if they're not included in reconnect, we are so affordable that they might actually, between TAP and Pell, also be fully covered, right? So, that additional attention of individuals who have some college and no degree and want to come back is a victory for us because we are so affordable that whether it is within the Reconnect package or also within some of the other things that we do, we're probably going to be able to meet their demands and bring them back and give them a diploma that allows them to go to the workforce and earn more money.

[Senator Liz Krueger (Chair, Senate Finance Committee)]: Okay. Thank you.

[Félix V. Matos Rodríguez (Chancellor, City University of New York)]: Thank you.

[Senator Liz Krueger (Chair, Senate Finance Committee)]: And I think a variation on the same question that was asked of the SUNY chancellor. And and Senator Souffrant Forrest was getting at it from a slightly different angle. We know we all have obligations to up the ante on sustainability for electricity and heat in the buildings that we are trying to modernize or any buildings we're trying to build. Is CUNY also looking into what I see in the budget for SUNY moving into geothermal heat opportunities, particularly in like campuses where there's just, it seems, according to the research, enormous opportunity for expansion where, well, yes, there is cost with going geothermal, but then once you do, there's almost no cost forever afterwards. So are you all also looking into this for yourselves?

[Félix V. Matos Rodríguez (Chancellor, City University of New York)]: So absolutely. And I'll have our COO maybe go into more detail. But just to give you an example, we're exploring at City College, for example, we're using canopies for some of the parking lots that have, that you know bring up electricity, right? And then we can store energy in batteries. I mean, that's a pilot that we're doing that is probably showing incredible results that can be clearly replicated in other parts of the campuses. We are exploring some of those efficiencies with pilots also at Brooklyn College and at Hunter. So, we're clearly in that frontier going to be using some of the $50,000,000 of the bond to be able to do some of those investments. But if there's a couple of better examples, Hector, feel free to jump in.

[Hector Batista (COO, CUNY)]: No, those are great examples. But I would just say that of the three forty buildings that we control, we're moving into multiple sort of components of this. One of them is, as we're doing renovations in terms of critical maintenance, we're repairing roofs. One of the things we're doing, we're also putting in some of those kind of roofs that allows us to be able to take advantage of solar and things along those lines. So there are about at least four or five projects right now in the pipeline. The chancellor, when we're looking at how the capital budget is sort of allocated, has allocated between 80,000,000 and $100,000,000 of the funds that we get from you all to be able to allow us to be able to invest the kind of thing that you're referring to. So next year, we'll be able to report more on some of those projects that are ongoing right now.

[Senator Liz Krueger (Chair, Senate Finance Committee)]: J. And it's taken quite a few years to get this project, I think, actually going. The Brookdale campus, the rebuilding of a nursing school for CUNY, which is obviously critically needed at this point in time, and then connections between the city Of New York, the state of New York, and CUNY going forward. And then there seemed to be well, a lot of times, it wasn't going forward at all. Then it changed. Then there was announcement. Then it still wasn't going forward. Just give me an update. Where are we?

[Félix V. Matos Rodríguez (Chancellor, City University of New York)]: So thank you. Thank you for that. And I mean, that is an exciting partnership between the state and the city, particularly the city providing capital dollars for one of our senior colleges, which, you know, that doesn't happen often, right? So Right. We're very happy that that allowed that entire project to move forward and to be part of a really wonderful life science ecosystem that is going to be developed there too, which I think is going to be an additional benefit to the Hunter Nursing School, which will be the anchor there. But remember that we're also moving the School of Public Health, which is now in Harlem, is going to be also part of that ecosystem with also some additional research capacity for some of our campuses down there too. We'll be moving along that project very, very complicated. We are we moved the nursing school to a temporary site, You know, which would you know, all those things are always complicated when you do that so that we can begin to tear down the current site at Brookdale so that we can begin construction fairly, fairly soon. So, we're excited that we're finally moving along. And I want to also appreciate the faculty and the administration at Hunter particularly because all those moves are always complicated. Kudos to CEO Batista and the facilities team for keeping that project going. But we look forward to being there by 2030.

[Senator Liz Krueger (Chair, Senate Finance Committee)]: 2030. Yeah. J. Thank you. And I used up almost my ten minutes. J. So thank you very much. Assembly?

[Speaker 0]: J. Thank you. Assemblyman Polisano.

[Assemblymember Phil Palmesano]: J. Afternoon, chancellor. How are you J.

[Félix V. Matos Rodríguez (Chancellor, City University of New York)]: Good to see you.

[Speaker 0]: J. Good

[Assemblymember Phil Palmesano]: to I noticed in your comments you said 72% of CUNY students attend tuition free. I kind of want to talk about that area, if I could, with Similar to what we asked with the SUNY chancellor, As you know, prior to 2011, TAP and Cooney tuitions were linked. So when when tuition went up $100 TAP would increase $100 We decoupled that in 2011. Do you think it's time for us to relink TAP and Cooney again? Would Cooney and you support that?

[Félix V. Matos Rodríguez (Chancellor, City University of New York)]: Well, thank you for that. I mean, I think that we've done lot of great work lately to be able to deal with changes in eligibility, making more students eligible for TAP. Increasing the minimum amount in TAP is a step in the right direction. The support from you all to be able to address the TAP gap from our end, a really, really important sort of nuance to the kind of issue identifying. So, I think that we've been seeing increasingly investments in TAP, the additional TAP for part time students, huge too, and for workforce programs. So, think that we're moving in that direction. I think we also have to keep an eye on the federal side on Pell, right? As Pell has been able to be Sure. Increase, helps a little bit on the state side. So again, any additional support for more affordability and support for a student is something that we would embrace.

[Assemblymember Phil Palmesano]: So that you would support the decoupling of that? Yes. Okay, great. That's want to pivot to another question. Obviously, we're aware of the anti Semitism that's been happening. A colleague of mine has a legislation called the Dismantling Student Anti Semitism Act, which would require all higher education accredited institutions in New York to adjust mandatory sensitivity training seminars for administrators, faculty, staff, and students to include training pertaining to antisemitism awareness and prevention, as well as require these institutions to report incidents of hate and discrimination related to antisemitism to the state education department on an annual basis. Is Cooney currently implementing any of these measures on their own to protect our students from antisemitism and other forms of discrimination?

[Félix V. Matos Rodríguez (Chancellor, City University of New York)]: Well, thank you. Thank you for your question. And I think we all look for a day in which we don't have to answer questions about antisemitism or any kind of hate, not just in our college campuses but in our communities. But while that is out there, we need to remain vigilant. And it's something that I've been really, really addressing since I became chancellor even before some of the more recent because I saw the results of investing in that when I was president at Queens College. We just, for example, brought in line in January an entire new mechanism to be able to report incidents of hate and discrimination and harassment, which I think is going to A, facilitate for individuals that we have a campaign to let people know about it, but also be able to investigate more quickly, more consistently any case that might come before us and address any disciplinary or educational remedy that we might that we might require. And we've been reporting on that data in the past and we're happy to keep reporting those numbers in the future to go back to the question that you have identified. We began mandatory Title VI training for faculty and staff this year ahead of the legislation that would mandate us to have that happen I think in the next year. So, we've been in

[Senator Dean Murray]: the

[Félix V. Matos Rodríguez (Chancellor, City University of New York)]: forefront of doing that. Many of our campuses have also created training on anti Semitism, anti hate for student leaders and others in our campuses. So we believe that additional resources in that direction are a great way to fight hate. In addition to that, I also would add that our initiative about constructive dialogue

[Assemblymember Phil Palmesano]: J. A.

[Speaker 0]: Go ahead.

[Assemblymember Phil Palmesano]: Yeah, you can send me the rest of that in writing. I the point. That's great. O'Pharrow. Sorry. You don't have to apologize. One quick question on that. Has the number of incidents of antisemitism at your campuses increased or decreased from last year?

[Félix V. Matos Rodríguez (Chancellor, City University of New York)]: So in 2024, we had 68, and in twenty twenty five, thirty three. So it's decreased.

[Assemblymember Phil Palmesano]: Okay, good. My next question sometimes comes up. Should TAP income eligibility thresholds reflect the regional cost of living differences?

[Félix V. Matos Rodríguez (Chancellor, City University of New York)]: Can you say that again?

[Assemblymember Phil Palmesano]: Yes. Should TAP income eligibility thresholds reflect regional cost of living differences?

[Félix V. Matos Rodríguez (Chancellor, City University of New York)]: That I mean, again, that is something that I'm not really ready to answer. I mean, in the sense I think that we need to just think about the cost for our families and what would make it affordable to attend college.

[Assemblymember Phil Palmesano]: Okay. Thank you, Chancellor.

[John B. King, Jr. (Chancellor, State University of New York)]: Thank Thank you.

[Senator Liz Krueger (Chair, Senate Finance Committee)]: Thank

[Senator Toby Ann Stavisky (Chair, Senate Higher Education Committee)]: you to my colleagues for mentioning the Hunter College professor who made some deplorable, horrible, just unbelievable comments. And I thank them for raising that issue. And I also was troubled and I've spoken to your office about the incident at City College. I am the sponsor of the law that requires incidents of hate to be reported on campus websites, as you well know. Secondly, last year with Assembly Member Rosick, we passed a law, the governor signed it, requiring a Title VI officer for each campus. Has this occurred? And what has been your experience?

[Félix V. Matos Rodríguez (Chancellor, City University of New York)]: Well, thank you for that. And you

[Speaker 0]: and

[Félix V. Matos Rodríguez (Chancellor, City University of New York)]: I go way back and I know about your complete commitment on these matters. And so first, I'm happy to report that we are ahead in the Title VI mandatory training. We're doing this year mandatory for all full time faculty and staff. And then, you know, we'll be moving to everybody in compliance with the with the bill. We have all the Title VI officers already identified on our campuses for the most part. They'd be also part of the legal counsel's office. So we've done that part of the bill. Of your previous bill of the reporting, we're in full compliance your bill about the posting of hate crimes and informing the campus community, which is one of the things that your bill did on that. I mean, sometimes, as you know, hate crimes can only be defined as hate crimes by NYPD, right? So we need to wait until NYPD does its part for us to be able to do that. But thank you for your leadership and all those things and we're in compliance.

[Senator Toby Ann Stavisky (Chair, Senate Higher Education Committee)]: Thank you. One other I should have mentioned it earlier. Thank you for your service as president of Queens College. That's in response to what Senator Kruger said. Lastly, I asked this question of the SUNY chancellor. Students have spoken to me from SUNY and CUNY both on food insecurity. What do you and I attended a ribbon cutting at Queensborough a number of years ago where the former president, Diane Call, funded a food pantry at Queensborough. What is CUNY doing about this?

[Félix V. Matos Rodríguez (Chancellor, City University of New York)]: Well, you. It is one of our important priorities. You were happy to know that the current president of Queensborough actually moved the pantry to a central location on the campus so that everybody knows it's there and there's no shame in being able to go and get those resources. We also changed the rules. And any CUNY student can get food pantry access in any campus, not just on your campus. Our student leaders recommended that. And I'd be happy also to show we have a great pilot in the Bronx CUNY Cares, is addressing

[Speaker 0]: Thank you. Sorry, Chancellor. Okay. Deputy Woman Simon.

[Assemblymember Jo Anne Simon]: Thank you, chancellor.

[Senator Liz Krueger (Chair, Senate Finance Committee)]: It's good

[Assemblymember Jo Anne Simon]: to see you again.

[Félix V. Matos Rodríguez (Chancellor, City University of New York)]: J. I'm here. Thank you.

[Assemblymember Jo Anne Simon]: J. Have a couple of questions for you. First, I'm glad to hear about what you're doing in terms of energy efficiency and your buildings. Guess one question I have is how many of the because you mentioned the number of buildings that you control. How many buildings that are used by CUNY schools are not owned by CUNY? What's that percentage? Do you like rent buildings from the city?

[Félix V. Matos Rodríguez (Chancellor, City University of New York)]: J. Do you want to ahead.

[Assemblymember Alicia L. Hyndman (Chair, Assembly Higher Education Committee)]: No, no, go ahead. J.

[Félix V. Matos Rodríguez (Chancellor, City University of New York)]: L. No, no. I don't know the number offhand.

[Hector Batista (COO, CUNY)]: J. Many buildings are owned by CUNY, you're saying?

[Assemblymember Jo Anne Simon]: Like that you control, in other words.

[Hector Batista (COO, CUNY)]: Technically, CUNY does not own any of their buildings. They're owned by DASNY. But I say of the three forty buildings that I mentioned to you, probably about three twenty of them are owned by CUNY. The rest we lease through some

[Assemblymember Jo Anne Simon]: Okay. All right. So that's good. Thank you. And then the other thing I wanted to follow-up on is today we have a lot of students here, not as many from CUNY because of the snow, but really lobbying for more money for student disability And the executive put in $2,000,000 We had gotten 4,000,000 Previously, we need at least 15,000,000 and that's around the state system wide. That's not even necessarily individually on your campuses. I think you've asked for like $5,000,000 plus for disability services. How much of that is for, you know, sort of central stuff like digital access for everybody and how much is individually for campuses so that they can actually provide support services?

[Félix V. Matos Rodríguez (Chancellor, City University of New York)]: So I'm going to have our university provost who's been working with this, with CUNY Accommodate, all the things that we've been doing to address that. But we mostly want those resources to go to staffing to support the student.

[Wendy F. Hensel (Executive Vice Chancellor and University Provost, CUNY)]: Yes. Thank you for your question. I first want to say that in spring 'twenty five, we rolled out CUNY Accommodate. So it's a digital platform for accessibility where students can request accessibility and faculty. And the goal was a two week turnaround from the moment a student requests accommodation receives it. And we have met that. And so we're very excited about it. The number of students that accessed it in the spring was 11,000. It's already jumped up to 13,900. So it allows us now to get a better sense of how many students by making it much easier for them to request it. So our request is really for increasing professional staff in the disabilities offices and really the assistive technology specialists and the evaluators that are necessary with this increasing number of students that now we are able to accommodate providing those services to

[Assemblymember Jo Anne Simon]: And that includes assistive technology as well? Mean, I know you have to make all technology accessible. Absolutely.

[Senator Dean Murray]: Thank you. The

[Senator Liz Krueger (Chair, Senate Finance Committee)]: Senate is done.

[Speaker 0]: The Senate is done, then. Well, I just have one question for you, Mr. Chancellor. I think

[Félix V. Matos Rodríguez (Chancellor, City University of New York)]: you know what the question L.

[John B. King, Jr. (Chancellor, State University of New York)]: A clock.

[Speaker 0]: A clock that was previously located at the campus of Queensborough Community College in the early '70s. It's been my quest, and I've been attempting to transfer that quest to you. And you have not come through yet. We have your underlings, your right hand and left hand people. And I'm just trying to find this beautiful, iconic clock I couldn't tell time on when I attended there.

[Félix V. Matos Rodríguez (Chancellor, City University of New York)]: We're going to put some ransom notice out there that we're going to look at every, every locker and every storage facility.

[Speaker 0]: You won't fit in a locker. It was like maybe 60 feet tall.

[Félix V. Matos Rodríguez (Chancellor, City University of New York)]: We're going to search and we're going to we're going to find that clock. My yeah, it's we talk about it as part of our prep hearing, it's the clock.

[Speaker 0]: Okay. I look forward to it.

[Félix V. Matos Rodríguez (Chancellor, City University of New York)]: Thank you.

[Speaker 0]: Assemblywoman Hyndman for her three minute follow-up.

[Assemblymember Alicia L. Hyndman (Chair, Assembly Higher Education Committee)]: Thank you, chair. I just wanted a comment and then, I think another comment. But I just want to thank you for the work that you're doing around immigrants. I think in our CUNY system, students feel protected, and that's because visiting campuses, knowing as a formerly undocumented individual, it is reassuring to hear what your presidents are doing on campuses. And I did hear Chair Souffrant Forrest talk about the Title VI training. So you are doing it with full time faculty, what about part time faculty?

[Félix V. Matos Rodríguez (Chancellor, City University of New York)]: Well, we're rolling it out first with full time faculty and then we need to move into part time. And we're going to do that to be in compliance with the law. But we have a year to do that. So we began with the full time faculty and staff.

[Assemblymember Alicia L. Hyndman (Chair, Assembly Higher Education Committee)]: Okay. All right. Thank you very much.

[Félix V. Matos Rodríguez (Chancellor, City University of New York)]: And just I want to give a shout out thank you for that to the P3 and the Robin Hood Foundations that have been providing us the funding to be able for us to do the legal assistance for immigrant students and their families so they might get some triage support initially. So I want to give them a shout out for doing that, supporting that.

[Speaker 0]: Thank you for your testimony. Yes, that is it.

[Senator Liz Krueger (Chair, Senate Finance Committee)]: Thank you very much.

[Speaker 0]: We'll call the lab.

[Senator Liz Krueger (Chair, Senate Finance Committee)]: You always want more.

[Speaker 0]: Doris Gonzalez, president of the New York State Higher Education Services Corp. We'd like to move along by Selma Woman Grippe. Want to start? O'Sellie Woman Hyndman, are you joining us?

[Speaker 14]: You start.

[Doris González (Acting President, NYS Higher Education Services Corporation)]: Good afternoon, chairs Kruger, and esteemed members of the Senate and Assembly. I'm Doris Gonzalez, acting president and executive vice president at the New York State Higher Education Services Corporation, Hesk. Joining me is Patricia Thompson, Hesk's vice president of grants and scholarships. As many of you already know, Doctor. Guillermo Linarez retired in December after fifty years of distinguished public service. I'm proud to carry forward his legacy at Hesk and to continue serving New York students. Today, I'm pleased to discuss the twenty six-twenty seven executive budget recommendations, our agency's successes in 2025, and our collective commitment to ensuring all New York State students have access education. Through the steadfast and visionary commitment of Governor Hochul and this legislature, we continue to expand financial support and opportunities that reaffirm our dedication to student success. At Hess, our mission is clear. We help you pay for college. We're guided by our vision of making higher education affordable, accessible, and achievable for every eligible New York student. In the twenty four-twenty five academic year, Hess distributed over $935,000,000 in financial aid to more than 294,000 students through our 30 plus grant, scholarship, and loan forgiveness programs. Governor Hochul's twenty six-twenty seven executive budget reinforces the commitment to advancing New York's higher education system by allocating $1,020,000,000 to Hess financial aid and scholarship programs. This includes over $827,000,000 for TAP building upon a year of transformative progress. In 2025, we consolidated part time study, the part time scholarship award program, and part time TAP into a single, unified part time TAP program. In addition, the minimum required credit hours per semester were reduced from six to three credits to be eligible for part time TAP. These changes made it easier for more part time students to qualify for the financial support they need. These changes also build on historic improvements, including raising the maximum income threshold, which so far has opened the door for 135,000 students who previously were not eligible due to income limits. While TAP does not cover all costs associated with going to college, it makes a difference for students. Since inception more than fifty years ago, 6,300,000 New Yorkers were awarded $31,000,000,000 solidifying TAP's role as a cornerstone of student success. The March 2025 TAP performance reports looked at student cohorts from 2013 to 2017, which revealed that over seventy percent of these students graduated. Notably, TAP recipients at SUNY four year colleges and independent institutions achieved completion rates exceeding seventy five percent, far surpassing the national average of sixty two percent. These findings, alongside the 2024 top difference report, underscore the need for continued investment to bolster New York's educational and economic future. Governor Hochul's twenty six-twenty seven executive budget proposes key enhancements to various programs, including the Master's in Education Teacher Incentive Scholarship. Recognizing the importance of early childhood education, the post graduation service obligation is being expanded to include workplaces that provide public pre K programs such as Head Start and community based organizations. In addition, an extra $1,000,000 in funding is being allocated to support more awards. Enhancements to the Veterans Tuition Award are providing robust services to veterans and their families. Beginning in the twenty seventwenty eight academic year, eligible veterans can transfer their unused award eligibility to a spouse, a child up to the age of 26, or a financial dependent. To be eligible, veterans must have served in combat or completed at least four years of active duty. VTA provides awards that can be used for tuition at undergraduate, graduate, and approved vocational training programs. These updates enhance flexibility for veterans and their families while building on previous improvements that have already expanded access for students. This is evident in the 61% increase in applications received for the twenty twenty four-twenty five academic year compared to twenty twenty three-twenty four, with preliminary data indicating further growth in twenty five-twenty six. Starting with the class of 2027, changes to the scholarship for academic excellence is going to allow scholarships that are declined by the first awardee to be reassigned to the next most qualified high school student. The SAE program provides 8,000 scholarships annually to top students pursuing higher education in New York. These updates help maximize the program's impact and ensure that the awards are fully used. The executive budget builds on the success of the Governor's Opportunity Promise Scholarship Program, expanding opportunities for adult learners ages 25 to 55. An additional $12,500,000 will extend eligibility to students with prior undergraduate degrees who choose to pursue a nursing degree and expand the list of qualified fields of study, giving students more career options while at the same time helping to strengthen the workforce in high demand fields. Since fall twenty twenty five, nearly 12,000 adult learners have enrolled in SUNY and CUNY, underscoring its impact in empowering New Yorkers and addressing workforce shortages. We understand the importance of making sure all students know about the resources available to them. In 2025, Hess outreach efforts led to unprecedented success, solidifying New York's position as a national leader in FAFSA completion. Along with our partners, as of February 13, Hess helped elevate New York to fifth in the nation for FAFSA completions with over fifty percent of high school seniors already submitting their twenty twenty six-twenty seven applications, well above the national average of 43%. We hosted three ten virtual and in person events, a 35% increase from the prior year, reaching over 18,000 attendees. With our FAFSA Ready training program, we equip counselors and educators with the information they need to help guide students through what can often be seen as a daunting financial aid process. We also recognize that it's never too early or too late to spread the word about college aid. So we expanded our texting program to include middle school families and adult learners. Now we have more than 68,000 text subscribers. This year marks a pivotal year for Heska in building modern, efficient platforms to better serve our students, families, and educational partners. We began in May 2024 with our redesigned website that attracts 3,000,000 visitors annually, underscoring its role as a vital resource for families navigating the financial aid process. We made significant progress in 2025 when we released the student aid processing portal RFP, or Request for Proposal, and developed a comprehensive financial aid system modernization roadmap that's using agile methodology to improve the user experience and so much more. I'm pleased to report that next month, Heska will start taking incoming calls from students, which we hadn't been able to do since COVID. Through a contract with the Office of Children and Family Services call center, which will be handling level one support, we'll reduce the wait time and improve the delivery of service. I thank Governor Hochul for her unwavering dedication to New York students. Thanks also to state operations director Jackie Bray, Deputy Secretary of Education Maria Fernandez, and New York State budget director Blake Washington for their invaluable partnership and support. Together with the continued commitment of the governor and legislature, New York remains at the forefront of advancing equitable access to higher education, empowering students, and strengthening the future of our state. Thank you, and I look forward to your questions.

[Speaker 0]: Thank you for your testimony. Assemblywoman Hyndman.

[Assemblymember Alicia L. Hyndman (Chair, Assembly Higher Education Committee)]: Thank you to you and your staff for being able to meet recently. And you gave me some insight on my question regarding a loan fund for the graduate students, professional students. So I think it was just disappointing because we think about the detrimental effect it will have, particularly on women pursuing higher education in the state of New York. So one of the things that your office talked very highly about was the FAFSA and the number of students that you were able to complete the form. But how many of those students has it transferred into actually receiving aid, and what was the average awards in New York State? If you don't have that information, you can provide me with it.

[Doris González (Acting President, NYS Higher Education Services Corporation)]: I can definitely provide that

[Assemblymember Alicia L. Hyndman (Chair, Assembly Higher Education Committee)]: over Because I know it's important that students fill out the FAFSA, but I just want to know, like, what do those numbers look like?

[Doris González (Acting President, NYS Higher Education Services Corporation)]: The percentage? Yeah.

[Assemblymember Alicia L. Hyndman (Chair, Assembly Higher Education Committee)]: Who's receiving aid and the average amount of awards that is coming in? You also talked about how you're excited about the modernization that's happening with your department, but not being able to answer phone calls since COVID? Like, how No, is

[Doris González (Acting President, NYS Higher Education Services Corporation)]: it's not that we didn't answer phone calls. We were

[Assemblymember Alicia L. Hyndman (Chair, Assembly Higher Education Committee)]: The wait time.

[Doris González (Acting President, NYS Higher Education Services Corporation)]: Yes. What was happening was that during COVID, we had to completely shift our operations because we didn't have the equipment literally to answer the phones. So we had to stop the way that we were managing our information system. And so we had to revert to doing not a live person responding, but we actually had to have appointments being done. So unfortunately, what that had done over the years, especially like it was two years ago, there was a backlog of students who had been calling into the agency and had not in order to make appointments. And those appointments were just taking too long. Sometimes students were waiting two weeks to be able to speak to a representative. So we wanted to immediately address that. And that's why we're really pleased that now we will be able to have level one support through the Office of Children and Family Services, their call center. They'll be doing the first level support. And then they would be able to transfer over any additional questions to our team, our own individual call center.

[Assemblymember Alicia L. Hyndman (Chair, Assembly Higher Education Committee)]: Regarding the controls report, you suggested it presents a skewed view of college affordability by missing university level aid. If we include SUNY and CUNY institutional aid, do you know what the true net cost would be for a student who doesn't have tuition free status? You can get back to me with

[Donna Stelling Gurnett (President, Association of Private Colleges)]: an Yeah.

[Doris González (Acting President, NYS Higher Education Services Corporation)]: I'm not sure about that one, but we can certainly get back to you on that.

[Assemblymember Alicia L. Hyndman (Chair, Assembly Higher Education Committee)]: Okay. All right, thank you. Thank you, chair. I'm complete.

[Senator Liz Krueger (Chair, Senate Finance Committee)]: You. Toby Savicki, chair of Higher Ed.

[Senator Toby Ann Stavisky (Chair, Senate Higher Education Committee)]: Congratulations on your appointment as the acting director. And we thank your predecessor, Doctor. Guillermo Linares, for his service, 50 of public service. A couple of questions. I started to ask I think it was the SUNY chancellor question today. We've done increases in TAP with the assembly that I think are very significant, particularly not just increasing the minimum amount, but the income eligibility from $80,000 per family income to $125,000 a year. That was, I think, two or three years ago. Have you seen an increase in the number of applications due to this change in the TAP requirements?

[Doris González (Acting President, NYS Higher Education Services Corporation)]: Absolutely. In fact, that was one of the key changes that resulted in an additional 135,000 students being eligible. So that was definitely something that benefited our students. And of course, doubling, the TAP minimum award from $500 to $1,000 as well as making TAP available for more part time students by simply reducing the minimum credit from six to three. And again, I just want to thank the legislature and, of course, the governor for making these historic changes because they were incremental and really are making a huge, huge difference for our students.

[Senator Toby Ann Stavisky (Chair, Senate Higher Education Committee)]: J. And for the economic development, frankly, that Senator Murray mentioned. These folks tend to stay in New York, hopefully. One other quick question. I mentioned this to you when we had our Zoom meeting. The Office of State Controller, Controller DiNapoli, issued a report saying that TAP was not keeping pace with the cost of living with inflation. How do you see that as affecting the number of applicants and the awards and so on?

[Doris González (Acting President, NYS Higher Education Services Corporation)]: J. Sure. Thank you so much for that. Well, we certainly appreciate the controller's analysis. And we share his commitment to ensuring that students have the financial support that they need to pursue higher education. I just want to point out, and I know I'm preaching to the choir here, that TAP is only one of many financial aid programs that students can access, including Excelsior, which covers tuition for eligible students. And in fact and I know that you've heard this from both chancellors TAP, the Excelsior and other financial aid, makes it possible for 72% of CUNY students and 54% of SUNY students to attend college tuition free. So, you know, everyone here knows as well that any changes to TAP or any programs would have to go through the legislature. And HESC is committing just to making sure that our students have access to all the financial aid information that they need in order for them to continue their higher education dreams.

[Senator Toby Ann Stavisky (Chair, Senate Higher Education Committee)]: And one area that I think we really should be taking a look at is the question of independent versus dependent students. Do you have any feelings about that? Well, independent students, the income I'm sorry, the independent students, I think it's at $10,000 a year, which is below the poverty line.

[Speaker 0]: MARY

[Doris González (Acting President, NYS Higher Education Services Corporation)]: And the question is that it should be consolidated? I'm sorry, I didn't hear the question.

[Senator Toby Ann Stavisky (Chair, Senate Higher Education Committee)]: Okay, thank you. Thank you.

[Senator Liz Krueger (Chair, Senate Finance Committee)]: Thank you.

[Speaker 0]: Thank you, Assembly Member Clark. Before Ms. Assembly Member Clark says, we've been joined by Assembly Members Gray and Miller. Sarah, you're you're on.

[Assemblymember Sarah Clark]: SARAH Sure. Thank you. First, quickly on the FAFSA form. It would be wonderful to follow-up on our chair's question about making sure that's broken down to us as assembly members by school districts, I think, would be really helpful. My guess is some of our more marginalized school districts or districts that are struggling are probably going to have less completions than others. And I think it highlights some deeper dives that we need to take as to why they're complicated. There are a lot of forms people need to track down and get sometimes those to the kids with the most need who would qualify for programs. So I think it would help us evaluate what more needs to be done as we targeted resources to districts that have lower numbers in terms of completion. Second thing, given the changes for grad school loans that may or may not be coming final this summer, Has there been some conversations about reinstituting TAP for graduate programs? I just think we require a lot of professions in our state to operate with graduate degrees, yet we don't offer TAP as assistance. And as we've looked at Reconnect New York and we've looked at our SUNY Reconnect and we've looked at all these pilot programs, even when Excelsior started, we were really targeting particular students or particular fields. And I think particularly around the professions that require graduate degrees and what's happening at loan capacity borrowing for the professions, that we may need to start looking at those, given its success in undergrad.

[Doris González (Acting President, NYS Higher Education Services Corporation)]: Well, of course, we'll work with the legislature on any changes. We can't really implement changes or recommend specific changes. But absolutely, we would work with the governor, with the legislature to make sure that we can be responsive. I don't know what else we can That's about it. Yeah.

[Assemblymember Sarah Clark]: I mean, think teaching is one very, very specific profession we could look at. We could start with, I think, looking at pilots maybe as a way to say, we know there's a teacher shortage. We know they require a graduate degree. We know many of our universities and schools across the state offer programs for master's in teaching. So I think even starting with a pilot to just start figuring out how we could do that would

[Assemblymember Judy Griffin]: be helpful.

[Assemblymember Sarah Clark]: So thank you.

[Doris González (Acting President, NYS Higher Education Services Corporation)]: And do have our master's in education program.

[Assemblymember Sarah Clark]: J. Helps support loan for that. Thank you.

[Senator Liz Krueger (Chair, Senate Finance Committee)]: J. Thank you. I just want to check. Anyone? Senator Murray. Excuse me. Let's try again. Senator Murray. Yes.

[Senator Dean Murray]: J. MELISSA Thank you, Chairwoman. Thank you for being here. Just I want to go back to TAP for a second. And you're right. We have made incremental changes, all for the better, in my opinion. And I think it has opened the doors. But I think we need to go further. I think we need to factor in the regional economic differences. And I'd like to get your thoughts and your input on if we modeled it after basically the economic development regional economic development councils, maybe we separated it like that. Do you think that would, A, be better? And B, would it allow and maybe open it up to more students that otherwise might not qualify in, I want to say, wealthier areas, but maybe where the cost of living is higher?

[Doris González (Acting President, NYS Higher Education Services Corporation)]: Right. Well, we would have to take a look at what that impact would be, which very often and especially around this time of year, we get a lot of requests for estimates, cost estimates based on different positions that are being presented. So we'd have to take a look at what that impact would be. And again, HESC is an implementing agency for financial aid. So at the risk of repeating myself, we will absolutely work with the legislature, with the governor, to see whatever changes are made. But the bottom line is any way that we can offer support, financial aid support for our students, You know, that's our mission. We help you pay for college. So whatever it takes.

[Senator Dean Murray]: And to somewhat put you on the spot, but do you think this would benefit more students if we move to that?

[Doris González (Acting President, NYS Higher Education Services Corporation)]: I would have to say that we would have to take a real look at it and look at not just what the impact would be, but also the cost. And then we would be able to tell you yes or no. Sure.

[Senator Dean Murray]: Okay. Thank you very much.

[Senator Rachel May]: Of course. Thank

[Speaker 0]: you. Assemblyman Paulosano.

[Assemblymember Phil Palmesano]: Hi. Good afternoon.

[Doris González (Acting President, NYS Higher Education Services Corporation)]: Hi. Good afternoon.

[Assemblymember Phil Palmesano]: Good afternoon, President Gonzalez. How are you?

[Doris González (Acting President, NYS Higher Education Services Corporation)]: I think, President.

[Speaker 0]: J. Good. Appreciate

[Assemblymember Phil Palmesano]: you sticking it out for the duration. In the past, we have had some difficulties getting some responses from our legislative staff, and that was in the past. So I just wanted to report to you things have improved, and I wanted to share that with you. If you could just please share that with your staff and just remind them that, prompt responses to our legislative staff is greatly appreciated. So I just wanted to say that first. So thank you.

[Doris González (Acting President, NYS Higher Education Services Corporation)]: Thank you very much. And that's really appreciated. And I will make sure that I communicate it back to our team. We really are we're an agency that has, again, this very noble cause of helping you pay for college. But we're a small agency. We're just about 130 employees. So it really hardens me to hear that from you. So thank you so much, assembly member.

[Assemblymember Phil Palmesano]: J. You're welcome. There's been a lot of talk about the New York Opportunity Promise Scholarship both chancellors have gotten. I kind of wanted to ask you questions. Because with this, the expansion would allow individuals to go back for nursing and get that opportunity. From your perspective, is there any idea why just nursing was chosen and not others? Or do you have any suggestions on what might be others that would be good to include?

[Doris González (Acting President, NYS Higher Education Services Corporation)]: I don't have an understanding of what I mean, I know that there is definitely a shortage of nurses. That's pretty well known. But I don't know why others might not have included.

[Assemblymember Phil Palmesano]: J. That's Okay. I just wanted to ask. In last year's enacted budget, it's my understanding $112,400,000 and $3,800,000 were appropriated for the Excelsior scholarship and the Enhanced Tuition Award, respectively. Do you know what are the levels of participation for the Excelsior scholarship and the Enhanced Tuition Award are?

[Doris González (Acting President, NYS Higher Education Services Corporation)]: What are the what? I'm sorry. What

[Assemblymember Phil Palmesano]: are the levels of participation?

[Doris González (Acting President, NYS Higher Education Services Corporation)]: Let's see. With ETA, in 'twenty four-'twenty five enhanced tuition awards. In 'twenty four-'twenty five, roughly 1,500 students received ETA awards. That's for new and returning students. And it totaled $1,800,000 And that would mean another $1,800,000 would be paid by the participating college because they have to match it. And then in terms of Excelsior, in 2425, we had approximately 25,000 students attending one of New York's 84 public colleges and universities who received Excelsior. And that was at almost $101,000,000 to cover the tuition gap. And that was just a slight drop from the prior academic year.

[Assemblymember Phil Palmesano]: And just as a follow-up to that, just from my own understanding, how many students qualify for the Excelsior scholarship and enhanced tuition award compared to maybe those who are awarded? Does everyone who qualifies get awarded it? Or how does that work?

[Doris González (Acting President, NYS Higher Education Services Corporation)]: No, they would have to qualify. And we can get back to you on those specific numbers to make those comparisons of what comes in as an application and how many would be denied.

[Assemblymember Phil Palmesano]: Okay. Yeah, we'd definitely like to know those numbers. That'd be helpful.

[Assemblymember Chris Eachus]: Thank you for your time. Absolutely.

[Senator Tom O'Mara (Ranking Member, Senate Finance Committee)]: Absolutely. I'll

[Assemblymember Phil Palmesano]: yield that the rest of my time.

[Senator Liz Krueger (Chair, Senate Finance Committee)]: Thank you. I think I'm the last senator. Aye. I guess in follow-up to that last question on Excelsior, when Excelsior was implemented under Governor Cuomo, some of us were very concerned that the model of eligibility was biased towards the SUNY system compared to the CUNY system. So I'm curious, what has the data shown since we started?

[Doris González (Acting President, NYS Higher Education Services Corporation)]: On Excelsior, I think I'm going to have to get back to you just to be able to do the correct breakdown between SUNY and CUNY students that are receiving it.

[Senator Liz Krueger (Chair, Senate Finance Committee)]: Okay. Because the concern was it was a model that worked if you could be a full time student who was completing college within four years, which was statistically much more likely to be a SUNY, so to speak, suburban story, versus a CUNY, very often older adult with a full time job or part time job in a possible storyline that they could pull off a degree within four years?

[Doris González (Acting President, NYS Higher Education Services Corporation)]: I'm going to go on the ledge, I'm going to say that CUNY students probably are benefiting more, just even based on the percentages that are attending CUNY tuition free in the four year colleges, which is 72% compared to SUNY at 55%. But we will definitely come back to you with those numbers.

[Senator Liz Krueger (Chair, Senate Finance Committee)]: Appreciate it. Because I don't want to, you know, continue a bias I might have based on what the math looked like before the program started. And I think it's worth, you know, half looking into how's it actually going, right?

[Doris González (Acting President, NYS Higher Education Services Corporation)]: It's a solid point. It's a solid point.

[Senator Liz Krueger (Chair, Senate Finance Committee)]: Thank you. So we also know that this federal administration seems to be attempting to radically reduce the ability of young people to get scholarships and loans and be able to pay them back. And a pretty low lifetime cap, I think is what they're talking about, for this money. So how do we think that impacts us, our students, and our colleges?

[Doris González (Acting President, NYS Higher Education Services Corporation)]: I would say, I mean, we are keeping track. We don't track it. We just are aware of the major changes that are going to be happening when these student loans are no longer going to be provided by the feds. We don't administer student loans. And we continue just simply to monitor that situation. We've seen other states that are looking at how to provide support. So one of the things that chamber had also been looking at was in terms of providing support to students who require student loans, there are programs that are available. We have on our website, for example, all of the resources that are provided by the New York State Department of Financial Services just to give them as much information as possible. And then there was some discussion also in chamber about looking at the Keystone. Pennsylvania has this Keystone program that they're opening up for students not just in New York but in other states. So that is an option that would be available to them as well. But we would have to have further discussions. Okay.

[Senator Liz Krueger (Chair, Senate Finance Committee)]: Because I know some things I've read about project that particularly for lower income students, first generation Americans, without the ability to take loans to get through an advanced degree into a more professional career path, they need to be able to borrow the kinds of money that is not going to be available to them anymore. So I would assume that would mean somewhere we have some data projecting we're going to see fewer first generation Americans, low income New Yorkers who can't make the same career decisions for themselves because they literally know walking in they're not going be able to take enough loan money and scholarship money to make it through the kinds of degrees that they really want to get and would offer them far better opportunities for moving themselves and their families out of poverty. And I guess I would want to know that information so that you could also help me understand what kind of change programs and rules we ought to have in New York so that our kids aren't left at disadvantages. So I don't know what that Keystone program is. Maybe that's exactly the kind of program we should be looking at.

[Assemblymember Sarah Clark]: But I

[Senator Liz Krueger (Chair, Senate Finance Committee)]: think it's pretty important for our future, especially if these federal policies stand up in court and continue, for us to understand how this is going to change the outcome for our young people about what kind of career paths they can realistically go down and what the impact is for us if they can't.

[Doris González (Acting President, NYS Higher Education Services Corporation)]: Absolutely. I'd love

[Senator Liz Krueger (Chair, Senate Finance Committee)]: to all that information if possible.

[Doris González (Acting President, NYS Higher Education Services Corporation)]: And I do know that Governor Hochul is going to be announcing or has announced expanding services through the EDCAP, Education Debt Consumer Assistance Program, to help educate borrowers or students on the increasingly very complex and complicated process of obtaining student loans and to make sure that they avoid going into delinquency. So there are resources. We can provide information. And that's one thing that Heska would be able to do. We already have a lot of information on this on the Heska website, hsc.ny.gov, just to guide students on what is available to them. So we will keep track of how this impacts our students.

[Assemblymember Alicia L. Hyndman (Chair, Assembly Higher Education Committee)]: J. Okay.

[Senator Liz Krueger (Chair, Senate Finance Committee)]: I think that's very important for us to all understand what other people's actions are doing to our young people and our state. So thank you.

[Speaker 0]: Thank you. Assemblywoman

[Assemblymember Judy Griffin]: Thank you. Good afternoon to you both. Thank you both for being here. And congratulations to you, Mr. Gonzales, on your appointment to be the acting president of HEST.

[Dr. Betty A. Rosa (Commissioner, NYS Education Department)]: Thank you.

[Assemblymember Judy Griffin]: I appreciate the outreach, the increased outreach in support of universal FAFSA completion. And this aligns very nicely with a comprehensive proposal I received from the Solidarity Group. They are located in my assembly district in Freeport, and they serve the Hispanic population. So they have proposed this project to me titled Equitable Access to Higher Education Project. And their goal is with a purpose to facilitate how to use FAFSA loan and or scholarship assistance to the Latino junior and senior students and their parents navigate this sometimes cumbersome process. The expected impact, of course, is to have more equality in reach and equitable higher education enrollment rate. And because what they found is even though there's support, they just find that these students that they serve and their families have a lot of challenges to providing like, to being able to know how to navigate the system, complete all these forms. So my question to you is, is there something, like, that Hess could do, or is there something where someone from Hess could come out and maybe work with this center? I know you don't you have limited resources, but is there something you could tell me that you might be able to do to help them?

[Doris González (Acting President, NYS Higher Education Services Corporation)]: Absolutely. And we're already doing that. As a matter of fact, the short answer is yes.

[Dr. Betty A. Rosa (Commissioner, NYS Education Department)]: Okay.

[Doris González (Acting President, NYS Higher Education Services Corporation)]: And we also have someone who goes out to some of these communities and we do them in Spanish, all in Spanish. We also have virtual drop ins. So we do a lot of outreach. And so the one thing I would say to that organization is make sure that all their constituents check-in to hesc.ny.gov and sign up for text messages. They will never miss out on an opportunity to learn about all of the programs that are available to them.

[Assemblymember Judy Griffin]: Okay, terrific. Well,

[Senator Toby Ann Stavisky (Chair, Senate Higher Education Committee)]: thank you So

[Doris González (Acting President, NYS Higher Education Services Corporation)]: yes, absolutely. Just tell us when and we're there.

[Assemblymember Judy Griffin]: Terrific. Thank you. I appreciate it. Sure.

[Speaker 0]: Thank you. And that officially ends your portion of this testimony.

[Doris González (Acting President, NYS Higher Education Services Corporation)]: You so much. For This was an honor. I just want to say thank for making me feel so welcome. And I appreciate every single one of you. And we'll be back with all of the responses that we promised. Thank you.

[Senator Liz Krueger (Chair, Senate Finance Committee)]: Thank you. Next,

[Speaker 0]: Commissioner Betty Rosa. It's your third appearance here. A second?

[Senator Liz Krueger (Chair, Senate Finance Committee)]: I think just a second, right?

[Speaker 0]: There's more than one, I know.

[Senator Liz Krueger (Chair, Senate Finance Committee)]: Did more than one

[Assemblymember Phil Palmesano]: this year. Just

[Speaker 0]: a second? Okay. Just a second.

[Senator Liz Krueger (Chair, Senate Finance Committee)]: I thought, did we give her another job?

[Speaker 0]: Commissioner, whenever you're ready.

[Dr. Betty A. Rosa (Commissioner, NYS Education Department)]: So I'm I'm

[Speaker 0]: You must your your mic's not on.

[Senator Liz Krueger (Chair, Senate Finance Committee)]: So it's green.

[Dr. Betty A. Rosa (Commissioner, NYS Education Department)]: Thank you. Okay. Good afternoon. Oh, there's an echo there. Is there somebody Okay. Good afternoon, Chairs Krueger, Pretlow, Stavinsky, and Hyndman and members of the Senate and Assembly. I am Doctor. Betty A. Rosa, Commissioner of Education for the State Of New York. And today I am joined by members of my senior leadership team. Senior Deputy Commissioner, Doctor. Jeffrey Madison Deputy Commissioner of Adult Career and Continuing Education Services in the Office of Special Education, Salon Mayes Ruff Deputy Commissioner of Higher Education, Doctor. Bill Murphy Assistant Commissioner of the Professions, Doctor. Owen Donovan. I also want to acknowledge and thank Chancellor Lester Young and the members of the Board of Regents who I know are watching today. The New York State Education oversees one of the most complex and interconnected educational system in the nation and our mission is clear and unwavering to raise the knowledge, skills, and opportunities of all New Yorkers. Everything we are requesting today is an investment in human potential grounded in three principles: equity, access and opportunity. Let me begin with our opportunity programs, the Higher Education Opportunity Program, the Science and Technology Entry Program, the Collegiate Science and Technology Entry Program and the Liberty Partnership Program. For decades, these programs have transformed lives and expanded pathways to economic mobility. While the executive budget includes support for these programs, it reduces them to prior funding levels. We respectfully request restoration to last year's level and targeted increases to meet growing demand. HEOP continues to demonstrate extraordinary impact with retention rates equal to peers at participating institutions. When access is paired with support, students succeed. In addition, 4,900,000.0 would extend that success to more students. STEP and C STEP prepare economically disadvantaged students for high demand STEM and health professions. Together, an additional 3,800,000.0 would strengthen those pathways and reinforce workforce readiness. The Liberty Partnership Program provides comprehensive dropout prevention and pre collegiate services. An additional $2,500,000 would help us reach more young people before they disengage from school. These are proven programs. They work and they deserve sustained investment. Please see Exhibit eight in your document and that Exhibit eight is our information to give you outcomes of these programs. Similarly, the Foster Youth College Success Initiative recognizes that Foster youth face unique barriers to completing their education. The proposed 483,000 reduction will limit services at precisely the moment when these students need expanded financial aid, advising, and summer bridge support. We respectfully request restoration and an additional $1,000,000 to ensure foster youth are not left behind. We must also address institutional stability. Since 2016, 28 independent and proprietary colleges in New York have closed. So to ensure that these closures disrupt students, families and communities, we are looking for support. Through our Office of College and University Evaluation, we have strengthened oversight and accelerated teach out approvals, preserved transcripts and facilitated mergers. In 2024, the regions adopted regulatory amendments permitting mergers with highly qualified out of state institutions. And in 2025, we approved the first such transaction. We have moved from reactive to proactive oversight because students deserve continuity and certainty. Teacher recruitment remains central to our vision of New York's future. Through our partnership with teach.org and the teach New York platform, we have generated more than 82,000 sign ups since April 2024, of which 64 of whom self identify as people of color. Although we are only in the second year of this initiative, the early indicators are strong and encouraging. We look forward to sharing measurable outcomes with you in the years ahead, hopefully by next year. While we appreciate the 500 included in the exact budget, an additional 800,000 is necessary to sustain the full scope of this statewide effort and build on a diverse representative educator workforce. For students with disabilities, our work through Access VR and the Office of Special Education has expanded pre employment transition services. Participation, you will see, from 2,630 to 8,805 students in just two years. We request restoration of $2,000,000 eliminated from the postsecondary disability support and an additional $2,000,000 to strengthen campus based services. We know that our students need the support on our campuses in order to really transition and be successful. Students with disabilities deserve the same opportunity to complete college and enter meaningful careers. We also seek a targeted exemption from contracting requirements that currently prevent Access VR from efficiently working with certain out of state institutions. The existing process can take anywhere from eight to ten months limiting informed choice and opportunities. This change would remove barriers, not safeguards, and ensure compliance with federal mandates. Public safety requires vigilant oversight and we request authority to transfer up to $500,000 from the tuition reimbursement account when appropriate to hire four additional staff dedicated to this work. In terms of the Office of Professions, our work protecting patients and students must remain paramount. Through that work, we support proposals allowing trained medical assistants to administer immunizations under supervision and permitting certified medication aids to administer certain medications with safeguards. However, we respectfully oppose transferring physicians and physician assistant discipline to another agency as well as addressing independent PA practice within the budget without full stakeholder engagement. Professional oversight must remain coherent, deliberate and focused on public protection. In closing, the executive budget includes many meaningful investments and we are very extremely grateful for them. But if we are serious about preparing every student for college, career, and civic life, we must think beyond a single fiscal year. Opportunity cannot depend on zip code. It cannot depend on disability status. It cannot depend on family income. And for that, I respectfully urge the restoration and strengthening. And I so thank you. J.

[Speaker 0]: Thank you, Madam Commissioner. Assemblywoman Hyndman?

[Assemblymember Alicia L. Hyndman (Chair, Assembly Higher Education Committee)]: J. Thank you, Doctor. Rosa and your team, and Jennifer and Lindsay, for answering all my emails and getting all the answers in-depth for me. So it does prepare me and keeps me informed. So I have a few questions which I will ask, and anything that you don't have the answers to, I'm always willing to receive them via email. You mentioned that at Access VR, you've expanded services for individuals, and there's a problem with out of state locations. Please explain the institutions that you do with out of state. What states? Because I know that the oversight that NYISED provides in the state of New York is different than what other states do. So I'm just asking about the quality of those programs. And I didn't know you ever contracted with out of state agencies.

[Saloni Mays-Ruff (Deputy Commissioner, ACCES-VR, NYSED)]: So actually, it relates to higher education. So one of the services that we provide to Access VR customers is college supports tuition, books, fees. And students need the opportunity to attend whatever college they want. There's contracting requirements. So we have to formally contract with colleges in order to pay those fees. Some out of state colleges won't contract with us. That leaves the student in a position where they they get accepted, they have to pay out of pocket, they cannot afford it, the college goes after them. It's not a national requirement that we contract. It's it's state finance law, and so we're looking for an exemption from, colleges, having to contract with colleges. Right.

[Dr. Betty A. Rosa (Commissioner, NYS Education Department)]: And we're also grateful from the fee that was 50 I think it was $50,000 to $300 Do you want to mention

[Saloni Mays-Ruff (Deputy Commissioner, ACCES-VR, NYSED)]: Yeah. There's a proposal in the executive budget related, in general, to contracting. Right now, anything over $50,000 requires a contract. The proposal would be to raise that from $50,000 to 300,000 That would be helpful. However, you all know how expensive college is. And so if we have more than one maybe we have five Access VR customers that get accepted to Seton Hall, for example, that very easily would exceed the $300,000 And we would still have to go through a very extensive, labor intensive contracting process. That could take up to a year. In the meantime, what is the student supposed to do because they've been accepted, but they can't attend classes?

[Assemblymember Alicia L. Hyndman (Chair, Assembly Higher Education Committee)]: What is the turnaround time for reimbursement for access VR programs? Because I've been contacted in the past by people waiting for reimbursement of services provided to Access VR students.

[Saloni Mays-Ruff (Deputy Commissioner, ACCES-VR, NYSED)]: So some of that is related to the contracting process. So sometimes services are being provided, and the contract term ends. Typically, we do five year contracts. A provider may still be providing services waiting for an amendment, for example. The amendment can take another nine to twelve months. So they're providing services waiting to get paid. Until that that contract can happen. So as they're waiting for the contract to be fully executed, they haven't been paid yet. And those are probably examples That happens with psychologist contracts. It could be a vehicle modification. We've had a couple of examples where vendors are waiting to be paid.

[John B. King, Jr. (Chancellor, State University of New York)]: JULIE Okay.

[Assemblymember Alicia L. Hyndman (Chair, Assembly Higher Education Committee)]: J. You've mentioned the approval of out of state mergers, including Northeastern University and Marymount Manhattan College. That's considered Northeastern University is considered a what's the word you just used? You said

[Frederick E. Kowal (President, United University Professions)]: Highly qualified. A what? Highly qualified?

[Assemblymember Alicia L. Hyndman (Chair, Assembly Higher Education Committee)]: J. Highly qualified. Right. How many institutions do you consider highly qualified? Because I know Vanderbilt has come in, wanting to do open a college and certain other degree grants and institutes and there's a timeline that you have for degree granting institutions to go through approval. They pay a fee. They go through the approval process. The checks are cashed. And they could be waiting for a year to two years to get to become degree granted or even get notification from you where they are in the pipeline. What's the difference? So you say Northeast is a highly qualified institution and the other institutions are not. That's basically what you're saying.

[Dr. Betty A. Rosa (Commissioner, NYS Education Department)]: No, it's not that they're not. I think as we go through a whole process and as a matter of fact, we had discussions with various the presidents, and it's a pretty extensive process.

[Assemblymember Alicia L. Hyndman (Chair, Assembly Higher Education Committee)]: A. College presidents?

[Dr. Betty A. Rosa (Commissioner, NYS Education Department)]: A. With some of the

[Dr. William P. Murphy (Deputy Commissioner for Higher Education, NYSED)]: Yeah. And the provisions, there are some kind of quantitative provisions for how many years, in other words, that a college needs to be accredited by a regional accreditation agency. It can't just be a new college in another state that hasn't established itself for like twenty, twenty five years as a responsible accredited college that also meets all the different Title IV issues. They're not in, like, heightened cash monitoring and a bunch of other criteria.

[John B. King, Jr. (Chancellor, State University of New York)]: I know

[Assemblymember Alicia L. Hyndman (Chair, Assembly Higher Education Committee)]: all the lingo. You could say HCM with I understand. Okay. So what safeguards are in place to protect students? I mean, you know, the college comes in, projections aren't what they thought it was. We know enrollment across the country is not has been on the decline. So Northeastern comes in and they've, you know, spent the money with Mary Mount Manhattan College. What safeguards are for New York State students, academic, financial oversight, and so forth?

[Dr. William P. Murphy (Deputy Commissioner for Higher Education, NYSED)]: J. Yeah, that's a great question. So part of that vetting for highly qualified is we need to ensure that they meet, just like any other New York State College has to go through all the different provisions related to, like, if you need a master plan amendment or offer a new program that you've not done in a discipline, they need to meet all the different Part 52 standards related to finances, administration, governance, faculty. Northeastern, they're going to start off really adopting the footprint and portfolio that's already in place for Marymount Manhattan. And then they know that the next stage of this is going to be if they want to start now rolling out a new footprint of, say, engineering programs, as Northeastern does, and an externship model that Northeastern specializes in, they're going to have to go through the whole rigorous process of doing a master plan amendment with a canvas to other institutions in New York State and, of course, meet all the different rigorous requirements related to financial responsibility.

[Assemblymember Alicia L. Hyndman (Chair, Assembly Higher Education Committee)]: J. Okay. I think I'll come back for a second. But that's it for now, chair.

[Assemblymember Phil Palmesano]: Okay.

[Senator Liz Krueger (Chair, Senate Finance Committee)]: Okay. Hi. How are you?

[Assemblymember Sarah Clark]: Good. How are you?

[Senator Liz Krueger (Chair, Senate Finance Committee)]: Nice to see you today.

[Assemblymember Alicia L. Hyndman (Chair, Assembly Higher Education Committee)]: Same here.

[Senator Liz Krueger (Chair, Senate Finance Committee)]: And I'm going to hand it over to Toby Staviski, our chair of higher ed, as you well know.

[Senator Toby Ann Stavisky (Chair, Senate Higher Education Committee)]: Thank you. And thank you, Doctor. Rosa and your staff. I don't think you were here earlier when we spent quite a bit of time with both the SUNY and CUNY chancellor discussing five year capital plans. The State Education Department, by statute, is required, from what I understand, to have a five it's called a statewide higher education plan a plan for statewide higher education. When was the last time you issued because I think there's a requirement that you send it to various people as well. When was the last plan prepared or released?

[Dr. Betty A. Rosa (Commissioner, NYS Education Department)]: We're in the process now.

[Dr. Jeffrey Matteson (Senior Deputy Commissioner, NYSED)]: We're in process.

[Dr. William P. Murphy (Deputy Commissioner for Higher Education, NYSED)]: J. The last plan, I think, took us right to the beginning of the COVID era. And we started our new plan. We've started now we're in the middle of our new plan, which is going to be reflective of 2025 through 2032 or 'thirty three, I'm sorry, the eight year plan. So we're actually toward the latter stages of collecting. We've already collected the master plans from SUNY, CUNY, and the independent colleges. And now we're engaging probably in our third stakeholder meeting to ensure that our new plan I will say we were delayed. Because of COVID, we were about to engage to get the new plan going because it was expiring around the COVID time. And we had to delay it, because colleges obviously were in no position for long term planning at that time. But rest assured, we're moving along at the right pace now to get it to the governor and get it to the Board of Regents by the end of this year. So we'll be on track for the new statewide plan.

[Senator Toby Ann Stavisky (Chair, Senate Higher Education Committee)]: J. Is it fair to say then that the last plan was in 2015?

[Dr. William P. Murphy (Deputy Commissioner for Higher Education, NYSED)]: I think it ended I think the final part of the eight year was in like 2019 or 2020.

[Senator Toby Ann Stavisky (Chair, Senate Higher Education Committee)]: Would you get me a copy of that?

[Dr. William P. Murphy (Deputy Commissioner for Higher Education, NYSED)]: Yes. We'll get a copy

[Senator Toby Ann Stavisky (Chair, Senate Higher Education Committee)]: of Thank you. That's one question. I have a number of questions. Fortunately, the nurses strike has been settled. But unfortunately, there were, again, an influx of what we call travel nurses. And one of the radio stations reported they were making 10,000 to $15,000 a week, which to me sounded incredible. These are nurses, as you know, who are not necessarily licensed in New York State. How are you dealing with the licensure issue and the prompt since we have a nursing shortage the review of credentials and so forth from out of state nurses?

[Stephen (Office of the Professions official, NYSED)]: J. Senator Stebisky, in the months and weeks leading up to the nursing strike, in collaboration with the Department of Health and others, in collaboration with the hospital associations, we made a commitment to reprioritizing our resources internal to the department to prioritize applications for licensure in New York State. So what we were able to do in the weeks leading up to the strike and during the strike was continue to review applications for nurses, putting those that were affected by the strike at the top of the pile, and moving those forward for qualified candidates as fast as possible.

[Dr. Betty A. Rosa (Commissioner, NYS Education Department)]: I think the $10,000 we've done some research on the $10,000 a week. And we don't yeah.

[Stephen (Office of the Professions official, NYSED)]: And I yeah, we would have to That's

[Senator Toby Ann Stavisky (Chair, Senate Higher Education Committee)]: what I heard on the radio myself. Yeah.

[Dr. Betty A. Rosa (Commissioner, NYS Education Department)]: So we'll get back to you because, you know, I know when we spoke about it, we've done a little bit of research. And we have not found where that was what places that was taking place. But we will dig deeper into who was paying those salaries.

[Senator Toby Ann Stavisky (Chair, Senate Higher Education Committee)]: Because the commissioner and I have discussed this for several years, there have been some serious problems with licensure. How do you plan to speed up the process once all of the material for the review is complete?

[Stephen (Office of the Professions official, NYSED)]: Excuse me, sorry.

[Dr. Betty A. Rosa (Commissioner, NYS Education Department)]: J. I was going to start with the modernization process that we have in place, both for obviously, the modernization process is affecting OP as well as OQ.

[Stephen (Office of the Professions official, NYSED)]: J. Currently, our licensing time, once all application materials are received for registered nurses, is two to three weeks long. If you're coming from an in state school, it's one week or less. The key there is when that information is fully received by us. And oftentimes, the delay is when we don't receive information from a school or we don't receive information from a licensing authority in a foreign country or another state. Part of the struggles there is that we're trying to inform the applicant that those information those pieces of information are missing. And as commissioner mentioned, the modernization is key to that process. We are on target with our OP modernization with the investment that you made as a legislature in 2028 to have a full online portal where an applicant can go on, log on, and look at all of the documents that might be missing ahead of time, which might reduce the amount of phone calls we receive and improve our customer service as well.

[Senator Toby Ann Stavisky (Chair, Senate Higher Education Committee)]: J. Because, you know, obviously, you're collecting the fees but not processing the applications as quickly as needed. And I understand the problem. In fact, many years ago, I asked the commissioner about the foreign graduates because it was very difficult for you I know that to get the complete application process complete. On a similar note, on your program approval process, as luck would have it, I have a school in my senate district that submitted an application to become a degree granting college. They submitted the application in May. They received an acknowledgment from you that it was received. And they didn't hear anything. They contacted me. I sent a letter in October. And you acknowledged that they would be probably considered sometime 2026. This is a very slow process. And if we're talking about economic development and having these students receive a degree rather than the certificate or whatever they're receiving now. It's got to move faster. You've got to process these. And if it needs additional funding or whatever reason, what's the cause of the delay? Because to take several years simply to and acknowledging to them the fact that they would hear from them. They haven't heard. We checked yesterday. I can give whomever whom should I send the material to?

[Dr. Betty A. Rosa (Commissioner, NYS Education Department)]: You can send them to either Jen or directly. But Senator, let me just say that we have a standing meeting monthly where we meet with SUNY and the other presidents where if there is a delay and Jeff and I meet every single month, senator, and we go through what's outstanding and what are the barriers, what are the issues. And every single month, we go through, programs that are outstanding and we sent them immediately. Jeff either sent if it's an op issue or if it's an o q, we immediately send Now, are times when there are incomplete information that we request. There are times when we have situations that we get back. And I know that SUNY chancellor will look and have the conversation with the president of whatever the institution is and get back to us. But we have been pretty much having a very quick turnaround on many of these requests the various presidents. And in some cases, but as I said, we have these ongoing meetings monthly. So if there is someone that's on the radar, I would assume that there has to be some reason. So if you can share with us which college it is, that would be helpful.

[Senator Toby Ann Stavisky (Chair, Senate Higher Education Committee)]: Yes. They, in fact, received a letter from you saying that you were not considering applications because of the backlog. I guess maybe caused by the pandemic, but nevertheless, this was back in 2025 in May when they submitted their application. But I will get you the information. It's a school where the students have jobs waiting for them. As I said, it's in my Senate district. The Article Sevens. Well, we'll get to that later.

[Speaker 0]: I guess twenty seconds weren't enough of that, Assemblywoman Forrest.

[Senator Toby Ann Stavisky (Chair, Senate Higher Education Committee)]: Going log on these things.

[Assemblymember Phara Souffrant Forrest]: Thank you so much, chair. Question good afternoon, everyone. My question is for Commissioner Rosa. Youth across the state, especially those with foster care experience, are often unaware of financial aid programs and support services available to them in higher education. Many do not learn about these opportunities until they are several semesters into college, if at all. This informational gap is financially feasible. What is your department doing to address this gap and ensure that students beginning in high school are made aware of the full range of financial aid programs and support services available to them, including those specifically designed for foster youth, such as the Foster Youth Success Alliance Program.

[Dr. Betty A. Rosa (Commissioner, NYS Education Department)]: So right before, the reason I talked about the foster youth and the commitment, obviously, for those students is because this is an area that, you know, homelessness, foster youth, you know, it's something that, as a department, an entire across the board, for students with disabilities as well as our students who really are placed, and a lot of them have a mobility issue, as you know, seems to be one of those key issues. And this is something that we not only are making the awareness through going beyond guidance counselors, going, having conversations with all other agencies like HASC and others where funding is available to make sure that our schools, when we meet with our sanity stakeholders or superintendents, that we highlight the fact that these are very vulnerable students and need the kind of support and resources and awareness. And we do work with social workers. We work with agencies to make sure that there is a comprehensive response to their needs, even when they're in one school setting and they move to a different setting?

[Assemblymember Phara Souffrant Forrest]: J. I really I carry a letter for them because it really touches me when these young people who are wards of the state, you know? This we step in and we say, we're your mama and papa now. So we make sure that we're fulfilling our duty to them up until they graduate higher education.

[Unidentified timekeeper/clerk]: Thank you.

[Assemblymember Phara Souffrant Forrest]: And then I have one final thing is that, you know, I also have a bill, SNAP for students, which would ensure college students are provided information and resources resources about about SNAP eligibility and application. I just want to give a plug because I would love to work with you and your team closely on this.

[Dr. Betty A. Rosa (Commissioner, NYS Education Department)]: J. 100%. Thank you.

[Assemblymember Phara Souffrant Forrest]: J. Thank you so much, Commissioner Rosa.

[Speaker 23]: J. M.

[Speaker 0]: Thank you.

[Senator Liz Krueger (Chair, Senate Finance Committee)]: J.

[Senator Dean Murray]: Thank you, chairwoman. And thank you, commissioner and colleagues, for being here. I want to touch on something we've talked about many times before, and that's BOCES and CTE programs. Now, we hear way too often, and I think way too inappropriately, people make the comment, well, not everyone is cut out for college. And they're referring to maybe they should go to BOCES or CTE. I think it's a little ridiculous because I think people would be shocked at how many BOCES and CTE graduates go on to college. In particular, maybe a two year college. Maybe they learn to be an electrician, But then they want to open their own company and learn how to run it. So they want business classes or a degree in business. So could you speak to the importance of us properly funding BOCES and CTE programs and allowing them to expand and meet the needs of certain MELISSA

[Speaker 0]: fields, and then the importance of that tie in to going on to maybe a two year or four year college.

[Dr. Betty A. Rosa (Commissioner, NYS Education Department)]: I'm going to start and then turn it to my senior dep, who was a DS and has had firsthand with this. And as a matter of fact, today we met with our DSs. You are 100% correct that myth of, you know, we see our BOCES students as college and career, not or, Number one, we have had many exhibits where these students, as you know from some of you who went to our coffee and conversation, you really, really see not only the learning of content, but the application. Right. The beautiful application and conceptualizing, and critical thinking, and innovating. So for us, the whole idea that we really want to create multiple pathways for our students to make choices. And so with that, I'm going to turn it to my senior dev.

[Dr. Jeffrey Matteson (Senior Deputy Commissioner, NYSED)]: Well, thanks for the question, issue near and dear to my heart. Watching what has happened in the last five or seven years with the rapid jump of interest to go to career and technical education, both at a BOCES and schools wanting to open up their own programs. Part of the New York Inspires work that we're doing at the department is for every student to have a career connected learning experience. So our goal is not just the BOCES CTE experience, but for every student to leave high school with a career connected learning experience. Because this is where they learn, I had an interest in something, but I really didn't know what it looked like till I was in a workplace to see it, or I got to practice it at a BOCES setting, etcetera. You've done a great deal in the last few years. You've carried some leasing bills that has allowed some construction to happen at BOCES and allows the expansion of these programs. Please continue those things. When they come up for renewal, please support them again. You also, last year, carried the expansion of the raise of the cap of the reimbursable salary of BOCES instructors in CTE. This is the second year of it. We need it to continue, not stop, finish that off. One place where there could be some more movement in the CTE area is there was an increase last year in special services aid for the big five, which is what they use for career and tech education. That was only a one year bump, while the BOCES was given a three year bump. So if we look at investing and continuing to raise that and I will tell you that those big five plus school districts are working closer and closer with our BOCES because they have common missions and making sure we have these kind of work based learning outcomes for students that we just want to continue to make sure there's equity across the board on that and we can fulfill that mission and certainly making sure that our higher ed institutions have slots for them to go deeper because we know with technology what we used to do even with cars and what you had to know to work on a car is a lot different than what you need to know today. You have to have a technology background if you're going to go deeper in working on those vehicles. So all of those things looking at modernizing the career and tech education piece would be helpful, too.

[Dr. Betty A. Rosa (Commissioner, NYS Education Department)]: Thank you. J. We definitely want the we know that the big five plus has about 43% of our students. And with 43% of our students, we want to make sure that they have an opportunity to have

[Senator Dean Murray]: Real quick. I have thirty seconds. Let me just pivot real quick. Mentioned Liberty Partnerships and wanting 2,500,000 more. Can you speak to how this program for those who don't know what it is, speak to it real quickly about how it not only reduces dropout rates, but really encourages to continue your education.

[Dr. Betty A. Rosa (Commissioner, NYS Education Department)]: J. Right. So there's an exhibit in your document that we gave you about all of them. And Liberty, in particular, a lot of those students really, because of the support system, are able to really keep up and graduate almost on par with other students. So it really, really shows the commitment, the investment, and the success.

[Senator Dean Murray]: And it's

[Dr. Betty A. Rosa (Commissioner, NYS Education Department)]: in exhibit A. Thank you.

[Speaker 0]: Thank you. O'Pharrow.

[Assemblymember Phil Palmesano]: Hello, Commissioner. How are you? Listening to your testimony and reading, I kind of went through it as I was waiting. And a couple of things stood out that I wanted to focus on, if I could. You mentioned, since 2016, 20 colleges in New York, independent propriety sectors have closed. And you rightfully mentioned it disrupts the education of students. But as you know, it also disrupts those communities where those schools are located, particularly rural communities, obviously. A lot of times, they're the largest employer in that community. Without asking you to speculate, I mean, are we in danger of more of these schools closing? And what is the reason that you're seeing or thinking is causing? Is it decreased enrollment? Is it not enough aid from the state? I don't think it's tuition because, you know, tuition seems to continue to rise at many colleges. What are the reasons do you see that some of these schools have closed? And I know you want to be proactive, but what can we do as a legislature to help cut that off at the past so it doesn't continue to happen? I guess I'm just giving you the opportunity to talk a little bit more on that.

[Dr. Betty A. Rosa (Commissioner, NYS Education Department)]: Yeah, I'm going to start and then Bill. I think the diversifying of the actual needs in communities in responding to those needs is something that I think we have something like Bill, correct me about 83 educational institutions, higher ed.

[Dr. William P. Murphy (Deputy Commissioner for Higher Education, NYSED)]: For schools of education.

[Dr. Betty A. Rosa (Commissioner, NYS Education Department)]: For schools of, yeah. So I think part of it is diversifying our programs so that whether it's micro credentials or different ways to respond to preparation, you know, within those communities. Obviously, when you have situations where businesses come into a community, it's those alignments. And, you know, we've seen it in Syracuse, right, where you have Micron come in, you have the scene school, you know, kind of preparing those kids, you have the opportunities where there is that alignment with higher ed, business, and a high school where it's kind of almost like a triage. And those kinds of situations support the growth on all sides. But we also see you know, whether

[Dr. William P. Murphy (Deputy Commissioner for Higher Education, NYSED)]: J. And to answer your question as well, to just kind of piggyback off of that, we definitely expect to see more closures, unfortunately. We have in New York, as you know, we're one of the more kind of mature higher ed environments in the country. We have over two twenty plus IHEs. And the enrollment numbers are against us. This is the beginning of that so called enrollment cliff starting this year. So you project our high school graduates are going to continue to decline, which is the main feeder for our program. So this is why we've had to really be proactive and kind of shift to say, what do we need to do to consider in state mergers and out of state mergers? We get questions typically on a monthly basis from a lot of colleges saying to us, we're thinking of doing x, y, z. Either you have the regs or you need to amend your regulations or put out guidance to deal with that. And then the second part to that, as commissioner was mentioning, I will say the one kind of good antidote and bulwark that we've built up over the years is the fact that we've had a really good, healthy opportunity program, post secondary opportunity partnership program between our school districts and our colleges that are able to really engage. And we're one of the highest states in the country when it comes to high school graduates deciding that they're going to engage in higher education, around 70%. And we're also one of the highest with FAFSA completion to ensure that they know that they've got the access and affordability. And we happen to be one of the leaders in access and affordability, especially when we look at our public tuition structure and our TAP program and Excelsior and all the proactive ways that we've tried to address access and affordability to see if we can save it. Unfortunately, the numbers historically are going to probably work a little bit against us. So we're going have to be proactive. J. Okay.

[Assemblymember Phil Palmesano]: Thank you. I want to pivot with my forty five seconds left. Supporting individuals with disabilities, especially our students, must be a priority. And I caught in your testimony how your number of students served has increased from 2,600 to 8,800. I guess and I see you're asking, you said restore 2,000,000 and an additional 2,000,000. Are there students on a wait list? And how many more students would you be able to serve with disabilities with this additional funding? And how would that work?

[Saloni Mays-Ruff (Deputy Commissioner, ACCES-VR, NYSED)]: So these are two different initiatives that you're referencing. So the pre employment transition services are services for students between the ages of 14 to 22 to give them early exposure to careers, things like work experience, post secondary counseling, etcetera. The two If

[Assemblymember Phil Palmesano]: you want to follow-up with me after, that'd be great.

[Assemblymember Judy Griffin]: Yes.

[Assemblymember Phil Palmesano]: Thank you very much.

[Senator Liz Krueger (Chair, Senate Finance Committee)]: Thank you.

[Lola W. Brabham (President, Commission on Independent Colleges and Universities)]: Yeah, the college. College.

[Senator Liz Krueger (Chair, Senate Finance Committee)]: Senator Senator Weber is next.

[Senator Dean Murray]: I'll be right back here. Okay.

[Senator Bill Weber]: Hi, Commissioner Rosa. Good afternoon.

[Dr. Betty A. Rosa (Commissioner, NYS Education Department)]: Hi, good afternoon.

[Senator Bill Weber]: Great. I have a couple of questions related to the Higher Education Opportunity Program, a great program that really helps economically and educationally disadvantaged residents who demonstrate a potential, right, to go to but that may not meet the traditional standards for schools but are obviously helped out through this program. Guess a couple of questions I have is, do you know how many students, maybe statewide and maybe district specific to my district, are taking advantage of that program?

[Dr. Betty A. Rosa (Commissioner, NYS Education Department)]: I think we have 4,000 HEAP students in total. We can give you specifically to your district.

[Senator Bill Weber]: Yeah, I'm I'm sorry.

[Dr. Betty A. Rosa (Commissioner, NYS Education Department)]: That's the one that we've asked for, the 4.9?

[Senator Bill Weber]: Yes. Yeah. I'm interested in knowing not only how many students by district, maybe by East Ramapo, North Rockland, broken up by district. But also, if you can, I'd like to see or you may know it now what is the success rate, maybe statewide and maybe district wide as well on

[Assemblymember Jo Anne Simon]: the Sure.

[Dr. Betty A. Rosa (Commissioner, NYS Education Department)]: So the same Exhibit A that we just gave you in your packet, we will add the HEOP because we did not add the HEOP, the 4,000. Yeah. So we will add that and break it down. And anyone else who's interested in terms of your own districts, we'll lay it out so that everybody can get that information.

[Senator Bill Weber]: J. Okay. Thank you, commissioner.

[Dr. Betty A. Rosa (Commissioner, NYS Education Department)]: J. You're welcome.

[Senator Liz Krueger (Chair, Senate Finance Committee)]: J. Okay. Thank you.

[Speaker 0]: J. L. Thank you. Assembly Wooden Clark.

[Assemblymember Sarah Clark]: J. Thank you, and thank you, Commissioner. First, just on the opportunities program briefly. I know you've heard a lot of the challenges that we hear. I did get to meet some of the very wonderful students in it two weeks ago when they were here. And they say, even traditional settings, that they didn't hear about the program from their guidance counselors. When you look at schools that should have a disproportionately high or a higher number of kids applying for those opportunity programs that aren't, are there interventions? Do we do more with guidance counselors to make sure they're really getting the information out for the opportunity programs? J.

[Dr. Betty A. Rosa (Commissioner, NYS Education Department)]: Sure. So usually, we do work, obviously, with the requirement of economically disadvantaged, And we do try to target places and areas where the concentration of those students exists. And we do have opportunities to share our staff, do work with whether it's the principal, the guidance counselor, staff, just to really share the information about it. Plus, I think on our website, right, we have so much information about it. But again, it's who really accesses the information. We tend to every year, I think we testify to this issue because we think it's so important, all of them, whether it's HEAP, I mean, STEP, C STEP, all of them. So it is something that we make part of our conversation, whether it's at the regents meetings, website, and try to really share with our stakeholders as well.

[Assemblymember Sarah Clark]: J. Should have all the guidance counselors meet with the excited students I meet with every year who really sell it probably better than anyone in terms of what the great program does for them. J. L. That idea, so much of what we're seeing in post education, whether it's career or college, is dependent on the K through 12 system, right? Success often we could look at factors in third grade and probably know more about a student's trajectory and the supports they need. As you start to look at this new statewide plan on education and going all the way up beyond high school, it takes a lot. There's a lot of players, a lot of stakeholders, private public colleges, businesses, community partners, our schools. How do you really see state ed, particularly if you look at a district like Rochester that's already struggling to make sure how do you see your role at state ed? How do you see the role at state ed really bringing all those partners to ensure they're all working together?

[Dr. Betty A. Rosa (Commissioner, NYS Education Department)]: J. And this is obviously, in Rochester's case, they even have a monitor, which really actually, two monitors, one for fiscal and one for who focuses on instruction to support the district. Our tendency is obviously to look at our

[Assemblymember Sarah Clark]: We'll have to figure it out. We'll share.

[Senator Liz Krueger (Chair, Senate Finance Committee)]: Hi. I think it's me. So I don't think you were in the room at the time, but when the SUNY chancellor was testifying, several of us asked him questions about the SUNY Institute for Approving Charters versus the Regents process for approving charters. And the several of us who spoke out and I was one of them and a couple of assembly members said, it's our experience that everybody gets told yes through the SUNY system. And we're very concerned about that because we think there are charters being approved that shouldn't be approved. So then I just, while I'm sitting here listening to you testify, have somebody who's involved, not with the chancellor of SUNY, who said pretty much that he doesn't really have anything to do with it. But it is within SUNY. So somebody who's more involved with the actual institute said, no, it's just the opposite. We have the much better reputation. People only end up going to the regions when we've rejected them. And in fact, they haven't accepted a new charter in, I think, what was said was six years. I have no facts on any of that other than, is that your experience? Because that's the opposite of what I get told all the time

[Speaker 14]: at home.

[Senator Liz Krueger (Chair, Senate Finance Committee)]: And apparently, some of my other colleagues from other parts of the state, they're shaking their heads now, don't hear that either. So what's your understanding?

[Dr. Betty A. Rosa (Commissioner, NYS Education Department)]: Sure. We have five ninety four, 95 schools. As a matter of fact, this month, we've got, you know, renewals. And, you know, we're pretty strict in terms of visiting, having, making sure that our schools clearly before we approve. We go through a very rigorous process that we have, which we are more than glad to share with all of you in terms of the process that we go through to approve. We make sure that they have the setting, the selection. We have our team and facilities to make sure that all of those things are in place. And the most important thing is that even some of our regions will visit. One of them visited a school from The Bronx two weeks ago. And so, and we, even as commissioner, I will visit some of these schools with our regions. So we have a really pretty extensive process before we do approve. We go through the same process in terms of when there are deficits, we identify those. We meet as a board and make sure that all of those things are highlighted. The packages are extensive and our process is very intentional, which is why in many cases people find it easier to go elsewhere. Now, in addition to that, we stick to the five years. We don't do an automatic, you know, if somebody has three years after three years and they may be in good standing, we give them another five. We pretty much follow the law in terms of the five. Now, in addition to that, again, when I do meet with Chancellor King, when there is an issue of sending back, which you know in law we send it back, but after, you know, ninety days, it goes into effect. We do have the conversation with SUNY to pretty much share our rationale why we're not supporting and why we're sending it back to SUNY. So there, you know, we do have open lines of communications, but we're pretty strict about the process that we use and the levers that we pull in order to not only approve, do renewals and also in addition to that, closures as well. So those three activities have a very extensive process in our office. Financially, is not as well supported, as you know, as a SUNY charter entity is. J.

[Senator Liz Krueger (Chair, Senate Finance Committee)]: And that was another question that another one of my colleagues brought up. Does SUNY get money or lose money on playing this role? And they said it has nothing to do with money for them. No, I But you just said they do get some money?

[Dr. Betty A. Rosa (Commissioner, NYS Education Department)]: Yeah, they do get funding, which is our funding is a smaller amount than what they do receive, and we can share that with you. That's public knowledge.

[Senator Liz Krueger (Chair, Senate Finance Committee)]: J. Okay. I would appreciate learning more about that because it just seemed that everything I get told about the differences in the systems and how these things get decided was very, very different from what I was hearing today. And what I also hear frequently is that there are school districts where, if there are so many charters approved, they lose so much money to their public school districts because it has to be shifted into the charter money that they feel that their actual public schools really suffer from having so many charters. I've certainly heard that at home in New York City for large numbers of years. I'm looking at my colleagues who are from various places, and they are shaking their heads. So, I mean, we might all be crazy, but we all seem to have the same understanding of these story lines.

[Dr. Betty A. Rosa (Commissioner, NYS Education Department)]: Well, Senator, I think you're talking about saturation in some districts.

[Assemblymember Sarah Clark]: Yes, that's a nice word, yes.

[Dr. Betty A. Rosa (Commissioner, NYS Education Department)]: Saturation. You're also talking about, particularly in some of the places now, this whole movement has moved into Long Island and Westchester. So you have saturation. You also have the issue of the impact on the public schools that, obviously, when the students you know, there's a sense that the formula means that when the student is moved, those dollars move with the student. There are issues of returning students. There are, you know, because unlike public schools, students do return back. The issue is also special needs. Students, you know, how many special needs students are accepted because sometimes we get them back because of the fact that they don't have those services. You know, if a student is, let's say, 75,000 or more that you have to spend on different services speech, OTPT, complex. That's an expense that sometimes they don't have the resources or the staffing. The public school doesn't have the ability to say, sorry, we don't have those. They must provide those services. So there I think there are issues that we do have to address if we are to level the playing field. But we do know that the impact now, New York City goes even into another impact of, you know, the colocation as well as if there is no entity, no site, then, you know, we end up paying for for, obviously, finding a new building or finding a new site for the school to exist. So there are many, many issues that I think it's important for not only the public to understand, but also, to your point, for our legislators to have the duality of this issue is complex, especially when we send back a particular charter where the community has been adamant about realizing the impact it's going to have on the dollars in the public sector. And yet, you and I know that you know, those particular schools are still passed. So I do do believe that we, you know, we have to be a little bit more transparent. I do believe that we have to come together and realize that we really need the clarity around having approvals for these charters and the implications, the unforeseen implications that they have on the public sector. Right.

[Senator Liz Krueger (Chair, Senate Finance Committee)]: And I'm sorry my colleague John Luke wasn't here for now. He was here earlier because he's our chair of the New York City Education Committee. And any of us who know John know that he's very articulate about his concerns about what the impacts have been in various communities in our city. So thank you for sort of verifying some of the things that we think we know and understand. But I think you're absolutely right. We need more detailed transparency on the data.

[Dr. Betty A. Rosa (Commissioner, NYS Education Department)]: J. I agree. And I think, given you the documentation and going through our process but I also think there are other New York City legislators who are and beyond New York City, now you're experiencing in Long Island. And certainly, also, you're experiencing in Westchester, the Lower Hudson. So this is not just specific to one location.

[Senator Liz Krueger (Chair, Senate Finance Committee)]: Right. I agree completely. Thank you very much. And I'm just out of time. So assembly. Thank

[Speaker 0]: you. Assembly member Simon?

[Assemblymember Alicia L. Hyndman (Chair, Assembly Higher Education Committee)]: She just walked out.

[Speaker 0]: That's good. And assembly, I'm in Ichus.

[Dr. Betty A. Rosa (Commissioner, NYS Education Department)]: I just need some water.

[Assemblymember Chris Eachus]: Thank you. Thank you. Thank you for being here and understanding what an important role you play This in higher

[Félix V. Matos Rodríguez (Chancellor, City University of New York)]: is

[Assemblymember Chris Eachus]: higher education hearing. But normally, we speak to

[Senator Peter Oberacker]: you about

[Assemblymember Chris Eachus]: K-twelve. And I really do thank you for being here and taking this concern. Again, just remembering and one of the things we didn't even mention here my education experience, forty years as a high school teacher, many of those years teaching college courses. So there's that intersection also between the two. I think that all of these requests for HEOP, EOP, STEP, C STEP, Liberty Partnership, the foster kids, I think they're all very, very reasonable. And I will work very hard to get those. When people understand how successful those programs are, they will pour that much money, if not more, into them.

[Speaker 0]: Thank you. By

[Assemblymember Chris Eachus]: the way, charter schools are the death knell of the public school system. So teacher morale is pretty poor right now. And I just know that because I still go back into the schools and I speak with friends who are still teachers and so on like that. Can you comment on how tier six because you have 82,000 sign ups. But I know we don't get 82 or we're not going to get 82,000 teachers out of that. I'd love to think so. But many of them will even go as far as finishing their teaching degrees. But then they get into the classroom. They're told about tier six. And it's like, are you kidding me? So how important is us fixing tier six to help you with this teach.org?

[Dr. Betty A. Rosa (Commissioner, NYS Education Department)]: J. Very important.

[Assemblymember Chris Eachus]: J. Okay. Thank you. That's a very concise answer. And I appreciate that because I think it's very important also. The final question I have is you talked about the professions and so on like that. And you talked about what certain authorizations you're going to give for administering. Does that mean that you truly believe that there should be RNs in every one of your school buildings?

[Dr. Betty A. Rosa (Commissioner, NYS Education Department)]: You're talking about nurses. Ideally, in the ideal world, I would want a nurse in every single school. And the reason for that is not just, you know, with our children in terms of medication issues, special needs, as you know. But also, I think there's, you know, a lot of times, children are going through health issues and sometimes the comfort of going to the nurse's office, which many children, especially the younger children, but they're not the only ones. I think young girls and young men who sometimes have key issues, even as they're going through puberty, I think the importance of having a nurse in the building is something that I couldn't agree with you more.

[Assemblymember Phil Palmesano]: Thank you.

[Assemblymember Judy Griffin]: Okay. Good afternoon, Commissioner Rosa. Thank you all for being here. And first, want to thank you, Commissioner Rosa, for having your staff meet with me in early February to discuss the many challenging issues my school districts are facing. The three main ones are escalating costs of charter school tuition and transportation, special ed costs and reimbursement, and transportation costs in general. So I appreciate Senator Kruger for addressing the charter school topic and I wanted to piggyback on this. I really appreciate the thoughtful process that state ed has for the charter school approval process. Unfortunately, the SUNY charter board doesn't seem to follow a thoughtful process. And pretty much most people on Long Island would agree with me. You know, these are they're approving for profit charter schools at a rapid rate despite vast community opposition. So that's the first question. How is that even possible? The prior question is, how did it ever work out that taxpayers have to fund for profit industry when they never got a chance to vote on it? You know, taxpayers on Long Island, we fund the

[Senator Toby Ann Stavisky (Chair, Senate Higher Education Committee)]: school

[Assemblymember Judy Griffin]: districts. But if anyone ever asked, do you want to fund a for profit industry, the answer would have been no. We never had that opportunity. So

[Speaker 27]: what's a

[Assemblymember Judy Griffin]: little odd is I'm hearing that no charter schools have been approved when, just recently, a charter school was approved this is all by the SUNY charter board in West Hempstead, one in Brentwood, and a charter high school in Central Islip. And the charter high school will serve up to 90 miles. So that means anyone in my district, which is eightytwenty one in Southwestern Nassau County, can ride the hour on a bus at a really expensive rate because busing on Long Island is really expensive. So it's odd that anyone would be saying charter schools haven't been approved because that's the

[Speaker 27]: rate. And

[Assemblymember Judy Griffin]: I already have a significant negative impact in many of my schools, but I just met with superintendents. And now that West Hempstead opened other school districts, all of my school districts are losing, you know, twenty, thirty, 40. Starts out small and it keeps growing. So we're beyond like, I don't believe that waiting to be saturated is the answer. And I could go on and on, but I just wanted your viewpoint because now I realize I talk too much.

[Dr. Betty A. Rosa (Commissioner, NYS Education Department)]: Well, thank you for for the fact that you took such an amazing interest in meeting with our staff and really going through the process. And you know that our board met on these two schools, and we did send them back.

[Speaker 0]: -Misselma M. Kelles?

[Senator Toby Ann Stavisky (Chair, Senate Higher Education Committee)]: -Thank you.

[Assemblymember Anna R. Kelles]: -Hi. Thank you so much for being here. I appreciate it. Good to see you. First question thank you so much for your advocacy for the opportunity programs. And I would love to see the statistics as well for the EOP, HEOP programs you talked about by district, by all of them, STEP as well, CSTEP. What I'm seeing in my district and hearing from my colleagues is that the demand far exceeds our capacity to support them. What tools are you using? How do you measure that differential? We have what you have asked for, but is that matching the actual need?

[Dr. Betty A. Rosa (Commissioner, NYS Education Department)]: No. The reason we ask for additional funding is to keep adding, obviously, opening it up to support additional students with it. Part of what we try to do is also and that's why I share the exhibit A, just to kind of give you a highlight of how successful these programs because usually, as legislators, you want to know what are the outcomes. So if you're obviously investing, you want to know. So we do have a need for additional students.

[Assemblymember Anna R. Kelles]: Do we know how much though? How do you measure that? Like how are we measuring need?

[Dr. Betty A. Rosa (Commissioner, NYS Education Department)]: Well, the need is usually I think even in one of our documents, we talked about that we had x number of students, but if we had x number of dollars, we could add another, you know, even some small numbers like, you know, 25 more students. Right? Or, you know, in some cases, 2,000 students could benefit from those. We can get you that information because we've we did been doing an analysis of each of these in terms of what do we currently you know, we have a chart. What do we currently have? What is the investment current investment? What are we adding this year? And how many more students is that? So we have a chart that we can Fantastic. Share with

[Assemblymember Anna R. Kelles]: No, that's wonderful. And with the little bit of time we have left, I wanted to follow-up on the question about the office of the professions and the modernization that you're talking about, because I have people that are waiting a year. I had one person that was almost two years to get their licensure. So that's way more than a couple weeks. You're talking about modernization. I've been hearing it for many years. But I haven't ever heard, like, what's the timeline for this modernization? What measurements? What structure? What scope? I'd love to see some of that information.

[Stephen (Office of the Professions official, NYSED)]: J. We would be happy to follow-up with you a more detailed report on the modernization, which started in 2018 and is still ongoing. It has many benefits to the customers thus far. It would be best to follow-up with you after this hearing with

[Assemblymember Anna R. Kelles]: a Yeah. I'd 40 love to year see some progress on those. Absolutely. Love the day when we're not hearing them at all. But that's definitely a long time for people to wait.

[Dr. Betty A. Rosa (Commissioner, NYS Education Department)]: L. So thank

[Speaker 0]: you very A. Much. And with that testimony, it concludes our governmental section of the And I was told that I was ready to shut it down. And now you're going to reopen?

[Senator Liz Krueger (Chair, Senate Finance Committee)]: I had two chairs each once they're

[Speaker 0]: three minutes. Okay. I stand corrected. Senator?

[Dr. Betty A. Rosa (Commissioner, NYS Education Department)]: J. Okay,

[Assemblymember Judy Griffin]: less than three minutes.

[Senator Toby Ann Stavisky (Chair, Senate Higher Education Committee)]: There we go, thanks. To follow-up, incidentally, you, Doctor. Rosen and your staff and your staff for your ability to respond. I appreciate that, and I know the panel does, too. Following up on the Article VII, I know you may not know the answer or your staff may not know the answer, in which case you'll get back On the Article VII, you're opposing the transfer of the three professions to the Department of Health. The first, the physicians, the physician assistants, the specialist assistants.

[Senator Liz Krueger (Chair, Senate Finance Committee)]: J.

[Dr. Betty A. Rosa (Commissioner, NYS Education Department)]: A. E.

[Senator Toby Ann Stavisky (Chair, Senate Higher Education Committee)]: I miss one? No. Is the scope of practice for the PAs?

[Stephen (Office of the Professions official, NYSED)]: J. STEPHEN STEPHEN STEPHEN

[Speaker 0]: STEPHEN ROSE B.

[Senator Toby Ann Stavisky (Chair, Senate Higher Education Committee)]: B. Thank you. And the specialist assistant, can you tell me what they do and how many there are and if there's a program in New York State that provides

[Speaker 0]: I can

[Stephen (Office of the Professions official, NYSED)]: follow-up licensure? With you on programs and whether they provide licensure. There are 134 special assistants right now.

[Assemblymember Anna R. Kelles]: J. A. S.

[Stephen (Office of the Professions official, NYSED)]: There are, by comparison, there are 25,000 physician assistants. So special assistant is a really unique category of licensure that we'll follow-up with you in greater detail later. But they're relatively small in scope.

[Senator Toby Ann Stavisky (Chair, Senate Higher Education Committee)]: Are there any programs for them in higher education in New York State?

[Stephen (Office of the Professions official, NYSED)]: Honestly, would have to follow-up with you on that specific question, yeah.

[Senator Toby Ann Stavisky (Chair, Senate Higher Education Committee)]: Okay, thank you.

[Assemblymember Alicia L. Hyndman (Chair, Assembly Higher Education Committee)]: Assembly member Hyndman. Thank you, Chair Prentlow. Just really quickly on the Article VII. Medical assistance administering immunizations, you are in favor of that. But in New York State, there's no standard uniformity of how MAs are taught. It's proprietary schools, proprietary colleges, continuing education programs, and there's no standard test like LPN or or CNA. Why are you agreeing with that Article seven language?

[Stephen (Office of the Professions official, NYSED)]: I can start the conversation, we can lead over to Salon, too. There's a connection here with BPSS schools as well. But from our perspective, this was brought to us as a public health priority from the Department of Health. And through our collaboration, longtime collaboration with the Department of we worked over several years to assess the question of whether the conditions were in place for the existing medical assisting workforce to successfully implement this procedure in office settings with supervision and a dedicated training module. So while there is no standardized curriculum for all of the things that a medical assistant might do, there's very standardized modules that are developed and can be provided for existing medical assistants to successfully perform these services. So our commissioner of health and our collaboration has identified this as an immediate need with an existing workforce. That said, Salon and I have had many conversations about a broader need to have a standardized curriculum in medical assisting. And those two things are not mutually exclusive, but we think could be worked on.

[Assemblymember Alicia L. Hyndman (Chair, Assembly Higher Education Committee)]: J. Right. Because you could be a medical assistant in an office, never gone to a training, but a doctor's office decides that that's what they're going to call you. Right. No one's going to say no to that paycheck, by the way.

[Saloni Mays-Ruff (Deputy Commissioner, ACCES-VR, NYSED)]: J. But I think we're concerned about

[Dr. William P. Murphy (Deputy Commissioner for Higher Education, NYSED)]: if we include because sometimes supervisors also do a little bit of evaluation. So I would say maybe 15 of the staff have some role in evaluation. And a lot of it's dedicated, like half of the evaluators or a little less than half are for our teacher education programs, which is the highest volume. Similar to like in OP, a lot of the nursing volume. And then the others are related to new colleges and SARA, the distance at SARA regulations and permission to operate

[Assemblymember Phil Palmesano]: ancillary roles, yeah.

[Assemblymember Alicia L. Hyndman (Chair, Assembly Higher Education Committee)]: J. Okay. Thank you. Thank you, Chair.

[Speaker 0]: J. Thank you, everyone. Has everyone asked their questions? Do you want to wait for some of the assignment to come back? No. J. Sure, ma'am. Okay. Commissioner, thank you. This ends our governmental portion of the hearing. And we're now going to move into our panel section. Everyone, please know the panel section, we're all equal. Panelists have each three minutes to testify. And members have three minutes to ask questions of the panel. Chairs do not have ten minutes. They have three minutes. Rankers do not have five minutes. They have three minutes. Our first panel is going to be panel A. Mr. James Davis, Professional Staff Congress of CUNY, Frederick Knowle, United University professors, George Cushman, New York Community College trustees, Andrew Sacco, faculty Federation of Erie Community Colleges and James McCarthy, New York State University Police.

[John B. King, Jr. (Chancellor, State University of New York)]: Good.

[Speaker 23]: Excellent. Good.

[Speaker 0]: I guess we can start from my left, your right, or however you want to start.

[James Davis (President, Professional Staff Congress-CUNY)]: Thank you, Senate Chairpersons Kruger and Sebiski, Assembly Chairs Owen Hyndman, and committee members. I'm JAMES James Davis. I'm the president of the Professional Staff Congress at CUNY, proudly representing 30,000 faculty and professional staff. And we appreciate very much the opportunity to testify today. And we really appreciate your critical support for public higher education. Much has changed since we testified last year as a result of the Trump administration's attacks on higher education, on our immigrant communities, and on students' freedom to learn. PSC remains committed to fighting for immigrant students and their families and part the legislature to protect them and the future of CUNY. Governor Hochul's executive budget recognizes, as her past budgets have, the great strengths of CUNY and its contributions to the state economy. With the support of the legislature, many of our colleges have begun to dig out of years of austerity. Enrollment is up at CUNY for the third straight year. The new Reconnect program is bringing thousands of students to our campuses. Without question, this will bolster their workforce in essential high demand fields where CUNY excels. However, adding more students to a system that is still not fully funded means additional resources are urgently needed so our members can continue to offer the students the best education possible. PSC's budget request for fiscal 'twenty seven includes $92,000,000 towards the goal of having 70% of our classes taught by full time faculty. Student contact with full time faculty is an essential element in improving retention and graduation rates, as the research shows. Equally important are vital services of advisors and mental health counselors. Dollars 16,000,000 would hire 55 culturally competent advisors and 40 new mental health counselors. Last year, PSC members ratified a contract that runs through 2027. And we've appreciated that the cost of the state's portion of our contract has been covered in the budget in recent years. However, we join the CUNY administration in requesting that this year, the negotiated salary increments and fringe benefits are fully covered. We also echo the administration's capital request. As you know, many of our buildings are still not in a state of good repair. Finally, none of these necessary investments in capital and operating funds will happen unless New York State can right the ship of unfair tax policies. While the federal government delivers tax breaks to the richest New Yorkers, Our members, your constituents, are committed to making the ultra wealthy pay their fair share. Thank you. We look forward to working with you towards a strong and active budget.

[Frederick E. Kowal (President, United University Professions)]: J. Kwanger, Chairperson Pretlow, Chairperson Staviski, Chairperson Hyndman, I am Doctor. Fredrik Kohl, President of United University Professions. And I appreciate the opportunity to testify regarding the 'twenty six-'twenty seven executive budget. You have my written testimony. I will simply hit several of the major points that I wish to make, highlighting areas that I believe are most important. I am honored to speak on behalf of the 42,000 members of United University Professions, our students, and our patients. Most notably, I have the honor of speaking on behalf of Alex Gonzalez, a UUP member who was seized by ICE several months ago, was released on bond just a couple of weeks ago, hopefully to win his appeal and not be deported to Ecuador. We certainly welcome the support that you have been leaders in getting for public higher education. It has been the state legislature that has been the strongest ally of the work that our members do in UUP and in SUNY. And we certainly welcome the 49.3 net million dollar increase in operating aid that the governor has proposed. However, it's not nearly enough. We propose that there needs to be an increase in operating aid to SUNY's state operated campuses of one hundred and forty one point eight million dollars one hundred million dollars for the system, dollars 41.8 specifically targeted to the four campuses with the largest structural deficits. Those four campuses, ESF, Buffalo State, Fredonia, and Potsdam, continue to suffer under the long period of underfunding during the Cuomo years. In my written testimony, starting on page four, you will see a detailed accounting of the incredibly impressive, important work being done at those institutions despite the years of underfunding. If you add up where we would be if the funding was controlled for inflation going back to 2011, it would be $653,000,000 more to just those four campuses. The fact that direct state allocations have not been increased to individual campuses since 2011 is the root cause of the financial difficulties, as well as the falloff in enrollment that is often spoken about. Specifically, in terms of these campuses, the funding support we are asking for will get them out of their deficits, and then they can plan for a better future. In terms of the public teaching hospitals in SUNY, we welcome what the governor is proposing. But they need to have their debt service and their fringe benefit costs covered, especially given what's coming with the Medicaid cuts. With that, I will close and anticipate questions. Thank you very much.

[Speaker 14]: J. Good afternoon, all right? It could be it's good evening. Chair Stavitsky, Chair Hyndman, Chair Kruger, Chair Pretlow, distinguished members of the Senate and Assembly Higher Education Finance Committees. My name is George Cushman, trustee at Finger Lakes Community College, and the chair of NYCCT, the New York Community College Trustees. We represent the 300 plus trustees across the 37 SUNY and CUNY community colleges. We stand at a critical juncture where increased investment will determine whether we can meet the rapidly evolving educational workforce needs of our state. We're deeply appreciative of Governor Hochul's Reconnect initiative, which has created access for working poor adults to pursue critical careers. Reconnect has accelerated positive enrollment trends. Programs like Yelp and ASAP are making measurable differences in retention and completion. We are aligned with CUNY and SUNY in support of the governor's budget, including the operating expense floor. However, we respectfully urge three critical investments. First, continue the $8,000,000 in targeted operating funds. The chancellor mentioned this several times. This investment has been effective and essential, and we're thankful for your leadership on that. Second, increased unrestricted operating funds via this Funding Stability Act. Thank you, Assemblyman, for sponsoring that. State funding has been flat while expenses continue escalating. New York Community College students pay 40 percent to 50% of the cost of their education. By contrast, the rest of the country averages about 20% or double. Community College Funding Stability Act will help to offset increasing salaries and benefits and limit those tuition increases that we're having to do now. Third, support high cost nursing programs. Students are shifting to high need, high cost majors like nursing and advanced manufacturing. These programs create significant losses due to higher faculty ratios and specialized equipment. Onondaga Community College's nursing program alone faces a loss of almost $1,000,000 a year. Nursing Education Support Act will expand capacity, improve quality, and ensure a robust pipeline of skilled nurses. Thank you, Senator Stavitsky. Peter Drucker wrote that community colleges were designed to educate technologists who have both theoretical knowledge and manual skill, the foundation of America's productivity advantage and our ability to create new industries almost overnight. With your partnership, we can ensure sustainability for our community colleges and position New York to thrive in the twenty first century. Thank you. Welcome questions.

[Andrew Sako (President, Faculty Federation of Erie Community College)]: Good evening, Chair Kruger, Chair Pretlow. Thank you for the opportunity to provide testimony today. I'm Andrew Sacco. I'm president of the Faculty Federation of Erie Community College. And I'm also a member of the NYSET Board of Directors that represents community colleges. I'm pleased to speak on behalf of SUNY Erie and the NYSET community colleges. As we all know, community colleges play a critical role in developing our regional workforce, social mobility, as well as offering affordable pathways to degrees, transfer opportunities, and job aligned training in partnership with employers. SUNY community colleges are seeing rising enrollment, but state support has not kept pace with these funding needs. While we are grateful for the introduction of the funding floor in 2019, for our 2019 budget, That budget, that has been a valuable tool during the pre and post pandemic. However, the funding for our community colleges has not kept up with inflation at the cost of doing business as costs continue to rise at our community colleges. Community colleges have no choice but to reduce programming, which will limit enrollment. We all don't want that. While we appreciate the modest increase in operating aid proposed in the executive budget, base aid funding remains essentially flat to last year and well below what is needed to meet our growing demand. We urge the state to engage NYSET in developing a new funding model that does not rely on enrollment trends and allows colleges to plan for long term stability. To strengthen community colleges, we should create a predictable funding floor by investing $15,400,000 to the index based inflation rate using the higher education price index and guarantee funding at no less than the highest three previous fiscal years. That will help us meet closer to the statutory requirement of 40% of the operating costs. Struggling community college campuses, we'd like to have you increase the aid from $940,000,000 to $3,700,000 Expand the SUNY Reconnect program. That's been a great program for our college as well. Offering degrees in areas of shortages cover students eighteen to fifty five and remove the restrictions on those that have prior degrees. Many returning adults need to retool and may need to take other programs to become employable. Our community colleges are the engine of opportunity in each of our respective regions. And New York must invest in them accordingly. Thank you for your time.

[James McCartney (Director, NYS University Police Lieutenants/PBA of NYS)]: Good evening. My name is James McCartney. I serve as director of the New York State University Police Lieutenants, president of the PBF New York State representing state university police officers, environmental conservation officers, forest rangers, and park police officers. I have proudly served as a New York State University police officer for twenty six years. I am proud of that service, but I'm here today because our members still not receive the same twenty year retirement benefit provided to 97% of police officers and firefighters across New York State. For six consecutive years, the legislature has overwhelmingly supported pension parity for our members. We are deeply grateful for that support. Today, I respectfully ask you to continue leading on this issue and work with governor Hochul to include the twenty year pension parity into the state budget. Our members and their families deserve the same fairness afforded to nearly every other police officer in New York State. I also wanna address public safety across the state university system. SUNY includes 64 campuses, yet only 28 are protected by state university police officers. The remaining campuses rely on a patchwork of local agencies and noncertified personnel. This creates unequal safety standards. A student at a four year SUNY institutions receives full protection, full police protection, a student at a community college may not. This disparity is not consistent with SUNY's commitment to equity. It is time to modernize and centralize state university policing. A unified structure would reduce duplication of cost, create consistent policies and accountability standards, improve emergency coordination, strengthen specialized training, and allow for true data driven decision making statewide. Central centralization does not eliminate local input. It strengthens it by giving officers the structure, resources, and leadership needed to meet modern public safety challenges effectively and consistently across New York State. Our members put their lives on the line every day to keep student campuses safe. They are asking for fairness in retirement and a professional structure that reflects the size and complexity of today's system. Thank you for your time, your continued support, and your leadership.

[Speaker 0]: J. Thank you. Assembly Member Hyndman?

[Assemblymember Alicia L. Hyndman (Chair, Assembly Higher Education Committee)]: J. Thank you. So this is going to be like a lightning round. I'm trying to get it's not three minutes for each person, right?

[Speaker 0]: J. Nope. J. L.

[Assemblymember Alicia L. Hyndman (Chair, Assembly Higher Education Committee)]: President Davis, my question for you is, is Allison Friedman a member of your union? And if so, has she sought out any protections from your union?

[James Davis (President, Professional Staff Congress-CUNY)]: J. Appreciate the question. Doctor. Friedman is at Hunter College, so she is a member of the Professional Staff Congress. And she was referenced earlier as having made comments at the Community Education Council III. Yes, she is entitled to the protections under our contract.

[Senator Lea Webb]: J. Okay.

[Assemblymember Alicia L. Hyndman (Chair, Assembly Higher Education Committee)]: Thank you. President Powell, it's always good to see you. A couple of questions for you. As soon as I find my page. If the legislation if, sorry, you propose a $5,000,000 expansion for the Pre Medical Opportunity Program and a new mental health EOP, with another $5,000,000 What are the targeted student populations and expected enrollments for that program?

[Frederick E. Kowal (President, United University Professions)]: Thank you for asking, Assembly member. This is vitally important that we address a longstanding, as I'm sure you're aware, a longstanding deficit in mental health providers and health care providers. We have heard a lot about the nursing shortage that is real and is going to get worse, but there's also primary care physician shortages. There are other shortages that are coming throughout health care. And so what we have proposed, actually years ago, first was the medical EOP program, and then now the mental health EOP program. It is intended to bring students in and give them the kind of support necessary to bring success, just like with EOP, which is so amazingly successful. And so that is the goal. Now, in terms of numbers, it's really a function of what institution they would be attending. So this is really an attempt to get some base funding, get a pilot program or two, and then let's see where we can go forward from there. The target constituents for the program would be underrepresented, specifically communities of color that are underrepresented in health care, especially in mental health care.

[Assemblymember Alicia L. Hyndman (Chair, Assembly Higher Education Committee)]: J. Okay, thank you. George, it's good to see you again. And if you could just tell me which campuses don't have early childhood care on And the the last question I have is for James McCarthy. You said only the four year campuses have protection, not the community colleges?

[James McCartney (Director, NYS University Police Lieutenants/PBA of NYS)]: We have full police protection.

[Assemblymember Alicia L. Hyndman (Chair, Assembly Higher Education Committee)]: Okay. George, if you may have to get back to

[Speaker 23]: me I will the number

[Speaker 0]: get back to you on that.

[Assemblymember Alicia L. Hyndman (Chair, Assembly Higher Education Committee)]: Campuses that don't have child care. Thank you.

[Senator Liz Krueger (Chair, Senate Finance Committee)]: L. STEPHEN STEPHEN

[Senator Toby Ann Stavisky (Chair, Senate Higher Education Committee)]: There we go. J. Technical trouble. J. Technical. STEPHEN That's what happens when you have a degree in history. Thank you for coming. My question is very similar for both Doctor. Kwani and Doctor. Davis. You both spoke about operating aid. But I'd like to zero in not just on how we can improve the operating aid, but also the fact that the state pays the debt service for every agency in the state except CUNY and SUNY. The same is true for the fringe benefits. Now, I know the pay bill is different. The state does the one for SUNY, but not CUNY. But of the fringe benefits, which are critical, would you address that issue, each one of you, from SUNY and CUNY? And also, how the operating budget can help those hospitals that are in financial difficulty?

[Frederick E. Kowal (President, United University Professions)]: J. Thank you, Senator. And thanks to you and all of the members of the state legislature for your outstanding support and advocacy over the last two years as we saved downstate from the planned closure of that important facility. The SUNY hospitals are unique in that, you're correct, that the fringe benefit costs and the debt servicing are not paid. There is also the Jacobs Medical School at the University of Buffalo faces the same barrier. But specific to the hospitals, because of what is coming with the Medicaid cuts, we all know how desperate hospitals are going to be financially. These institutions that are the state's hospitals, public teaching hospitals, they're training the next generation of health care professionals. Picking up these costs now so that they have a financial cushion, given what could be coming, becomes more crucial this year than ever. So specifically, I think that's vitally important.

[Senator Toby Ann Stavisky (Chair, Senate Higher Education Committee)]: J. Doctor. D. Davis?

[Félix V. Matos Rodríguez (Chancellor, City University of New York)]: J.

[James Davis (President, Professional Staff Congress-CUNY)]: A. You. In the CUNY system and I think the chancellor referenced this. J. D. In recent years, the full cost of the collective bargaining agreement, including fringe increases, has been covered. We look forward to making that the case again through the legislative and budget process this year. There's almost $29,000,000 in gap right now that still needs to be covered. And you all know what happened previously, which is individual college budgets ended up being sort of cannibalized in order to fund the shortfalls in the collective bargaining agreement. So we look forward to working with you to prevent that from happening this time. Thanks.

[Senator Toby Ann Stavisky (Chair, Senate Higher Education Committee)]: J. Thank you.

[Senator Liz Krueger (Chair, Senate Finance Committee)]: You have seven seconds.

[Senator Toby Ann Stavisky (Chair, Senate Higher Education Committee)]: I don't think you've got Thank

[Senator Liz Krueger (Chair, Senate Finance Committee)]: you. Sorry. J.

[Speaker 0]: So little time. Assembly Member Gray.

[Assemblymember Phil Palmesano]: Thank you very much.

[Assemblymember Chris Eachus]: Chair Cushman, excuse me. Reconnect is enhancing enrollment in the community colleges. Is that correct?

[Speaker 14]: It is, yes.

[Assemblymember Chris Eachus]: Okay. And what's the effect? Staffing levels? I know workforce shortages are across all sectors. Is that creating stresses on the staffing levels? Are you experiencing any type of burnout?

[Speaker 14]: J. Well, there's quite a bit of faculty burnout right now in community colleges, for one thing. The majors that these are going toward have a much higher ratio of faculty to student. So there's fewer students per faculty. So they've got we're losing money on every one of them. So that's a factor. But also with regard to we have got less full time faculty. We've got roughly half per FTE that a four year college has. With that, we have to do more adjuncts. So this is putting a lot more pressure on the full time faculty. And the reporting issues are off the rails right now. But there is also University Faculty Senate Ethics and Institutional Integrity Community has just released a white paper on faculty burnout. And it's very comprehensive. I'd recommend it. And I can forward it to you if you like. J.

[Assemblymember Chris Eachus]: Sure. I appreciate that. Thanks very much. And President Kowal, just on ESF. So ESF is a critical institution. It is a doctoral granting institution. It is a research institution. There are many outposts within ESF facilities, whether it's the Thousand Islands biological system up there or Waunakina. There's just a lot of outposts. Is it worthy that that should be considered for a university center funding type model?

[Frederick E. Kowal (President, United University Professions)]: J. Yeah, I would argue very much so. And also in terms of some tuition flexibility for them as well. I think that would be very important. This is an institution that now more than ever can serve an incredibly important role. And it really does, as you pointed out. Additional to that, it is in a very unique position where they have limited, literally growing space. And with that, they're turning students away. When the chancellor says, well, funding has been our strategic plans are put in place for institutions because their enrollment is down, that's not ESF. ESF turns students away from across the country. So the support of the legislature is crucial in ensuring that we can grow that institution.

[Senator Liz Krueger (Chair, Senate Finance Committee)]: Thank Thank you. Senator

[Senator Toby Ann Stavisky (Chair, Senate Higher Education Committee)]: Murray? No? Senator Omar?

[Senator Liz Krueger (Chair, Senate Finance Committee)]: Okay. Then I will just take my very brief time also. I want to thank you all for being here. This could maybe sound like it's inconsistent with the questions or the testimony of four of

[John B. King, Jr. (Chancellor, State University of New York)]: the five of you.

[Senator Liz Krueger (Chair, Senate Finance Committee)]: I don't think it addresses the police issues. So there are states that are doing away with tenure. Can you tell me what that would mean for us here in New York and what we ought to do preemptively to not allow that to happen. Because I'm past the point of believing certain things could never happen here. I think the last fourteen months of our lives have, I think, taught us all to not assume anything. So I don't even know if some of my colleagues know that they're undoing tenure in various states in this country.

[Senator Tom O'Mara (Ranking Member, Senate Finance Committee)]: I wasn't aware of

[Speaker 0]: it.

[Senator Liz Krueger (Chair, Senate Finance Committee)]: J. See? And I think you know everything.

[Senator Tom O'Mara (Ranking Member, Senate Finance Committee)]: J. D.

[Senator Liz Krueger (Chair, Senate Finance Committee)]: Do. And maybe you don't have an answer for me today, but I hope you'll all put your hats on to give yourself another assignment as representatives of the faculty of our great institutions because I don't even know what that can look like here.

[James Davis (President, Professional Staff Congress-CUNY)]: J. It's what starts in Oklahoma or Florida may find its way here. And I think it's really critical that we find a way to translate what tenure actually means and what its value is to the general public. Because the general public may see tenure as like a synagogue, a job for life. The fact is that tenure was devised in order to protect the academic freedom of the researcher and the instructor. That doesn't mean carte blanche to do anything and everything. It means that they can conduct their research towards truth and teach towards their training free from political interference. And that's really important. Doesn't mean you can never be fired or you can never be subject to due process. It means you get to pursue your scholarship and your teaching. So that feels very important. And I think we know that the Trump administration's agenda for diminishing or removing tenure protection rights are largely cynical and part of

[Assemblymember Chris Eachus]: a broader cultural war. So I

[James Davis (President, Professional Staff Congress-CUNY)]: appreciate you raising that, Senator Krueger.

[Senator Liz Krueger (Chair, Senate Finance Committee)]: Thank you.

[Frederick E. Kowal (President, United University Professions)]: JAMES Yeah. And I would simply add James put it very, very well I think that tenure is also under assault with the expansion of contingent labor. And fewer and fewer positions in higher education are tenure track lines. And that undermines our ability to be the independent research institutions, but also to bring the best new ideas to this nation and to this world. We desperately need to make sure that the protections of academic freedom, which are directly linked to tenure and the independence of a free thinking individual and a free thinking society, is absolutely vital. We appreciate your support and for raising this question.

[Senator Toby Ann Stavisky (Chair, Senate Higher Education Committee)]: J. Thank you very much.

[Senator Liz Krueger (Chair, Senate Finance Committee)]: My time is up. Thank you so much.

[Speaker 0]: Thank you. Wasemamemma Inkus.

[Assemblymember Chris Eachus]: J. Thank you for being here. George, most of these questions are going to go to you. Can you determine by the freezing of in state tuition how much money that's going to cost? Because I'm assuming the cost of your community colleges continue to go up with inflation, whether it's personnel, supplies, and so on like that.

[Speaker 14]: R. We haven't frozen tuition. I think that's a SUNY operated campus.

[Speaker 0]: So

[Speaker 14]: because the funding model has not kept up with us at all, we've resulted, as a result, had to increase tuition, which is why the students are bearing such a high proportion of that right now. And so it's either that or retention of services and faculty. J.

[Assemblymember Chris Eachus]: SUNY Reconnect. Thank you, governor, for putting this in. Can we find out you talked about Onondaga and just one program, nursing, costing that community college $1,000,000 Can we find out across the community college system how much money this Reconnect is costing? We

[Speaker 14]: are doing some analysis on that now. I know the colleges are. And in response, we're coordinating with them. I think that, actually, the governor is looking forward to getting that information so that she can better inform how the reconnect goes forward in the future.

[Assemblymember Chris Eachus]: Good. Because it's a great program, but I don't want to see it make community colleges go broke. J.

[Speaker 14]: L. J. You

[Assemblymember Chris Eachus]: have $15,000,000 in funds for AI, but that's for all SUNY. Has any of that been committed? Or do you know if any of that is going to be committed to community colleges?

[Speaker 14]: J. No. We've asked independently for 15,000,000 But our ask for AI is fundamentally different than what SUNY is doing. It's all CTE programs. This is really designed to teach the human skills that people need to be able to manage AI in the future. This is really designed to go be spread. We're the only institution that can hit every single resident of the state of New York and the small businesses that reside in our community. This CTE credit would go toward them so that they can develop the agency to be able to use the system properly.

[Assemblymember Chris Eachus]: I totally agree. I mean, it would be nice to get a degree in AI. But I think everybody needs, especially those within your institutions, need to learn about its abilities, capabilities, and the damages that it can do. And then finally, we know that the comptroller put out a tuition assistance program is not keeping up with inflation. How far are we behind?

[Speaker 14]: J. Well, are behind, as are we. We appreciate that. I guess one of the issues is that because we have to keep raising tuition, they're going to have to keep raising TAP.

[Speaker 0]: Thank you. Senate member Griffin.

[Assemblymember Judy Griffin]: Okay. Thank you all for being here. Limited time, but my first question is for Mr. Cushman. I appreciate our incredible community colleges across the state. And now with the Reconnect initiative, they've become even more important to our communities. I represent 8021 in Nassau County. I know we have many students, and many people have availed themselves of the great programs there. So of course, I support the continued $8,000,000 in targeted operating funds as well as the funding for the unrestricted operating funds. I wondered if oh, can we get the numbers of how many students enrolled in Reconnect initiative for our districts? L.

[Speaker 14]: Believe we can. J.

[Dr. Betty A. Rosa (Commissioner, NYS Education Department)]: Okay. I'd that, too.

[Assemblymember Judy Griffin]: L. I'd love to get that. And I'm going to move on to James McCarthy. I just wanted to say you certainly should. The New York State Park Police should Park University Environment and Forest should have pension parity. And I know it's a a big issue and has been a big issue. How big a problem is retention in the organization? Because do many people get trained and then go to another police force to get that pension that they deserve?

[James McCartney (Director, NYS University Police Lieutenants/PBA of NYS)]: Yes, at the cost of the state of about $100,000 per person. And I believe from 2020 to 2025, SUNY's lost over 200 people.

[Assemblymember Judy Griffin]: Yes, And then

[James McCartney (Director, NYS University Police Lieutenants/PBA of NYS)]: you have local agencies that are putting out flyers targeting us to transfer.

[Assemblymember Judy Griffin]: Yes. So that is significant. How many years do you need on the force before people transfer? Is it, like, five years?

[James McCartney (Director, NYS University Police Lieutenants/PBA of NYS)]: Between one to five they transfer.

[Assemblymember Judy Griffin]: One and five. Okay. And then I believe the centralizing police, as you described, is a great idea. I've heard of it for many years, and it makes sense, can save money. You know, there's just a lot of benefits to it. I was wondering if you if the police were centralized, do you think that would improve retention because officers could have more ability to maybe transfer to different parts of the state if it was centralized?

[James McCartney (Director, NYS University Police Lieutenants/PBA of NYS)]: J. It's like a three tier thing. The centralization would help. Pension parity would help. And then for us, keeping up the salaries with local police agencies would help.

[Assemblymember Judy Griffin]: Okay. Okay, very good. And about the community colleges, was it you that said our community you're not at community colleges?

[James McCartney (Director, NYS University Police Lieutenants/PBA of NYS)]: No, we're not.

[Assemblymember Judy Griffin]: Not. And so our community colleges are just I mean, we have the Nassau County Police Department. They're overseeing Nassau. But that probably presents a problem in many community colleges across the state who may be in rural areas may not have a police force to protect those students.

[James McCartney (Director, NYS University Police Lieutenants/PBA of NYS)]: J. Correct. A major issue is they have peace officers that are around. SUNY tried that model, and they changed in 1999 to full police services. And the problem is at a community college, they can't serve turbos or repos, emergency exigent.

[Assemblymember Judy Griffin]: J. Okay. Well, thank you. Thank you all for being here.

[Speaker 0]: J. Thank you, Assembly Member Simon.

[Assemblymember Jo Anne Simon]: J. Thank you. Sorry.

[Speaker 0]: Come on, Is

[Assemblymember Jo Anne Simon]: that going against my time? Thank you.

[Dr. Betty A. Rosa (Commissioner, NYS Education Department)]: You'll get that.

[Assemblymember Jo Anne Simon]: Okay. So I have a question. Actually, it could be for all of you. So one thing I understand is that and this goes to this issue about training nurses and doctors and the tech needs, etcetera, etcetera, at greater cost. And that is that SUNY has a STEM allocation, a separate STEM allocation. And I was just talking to one of the CUNY presidents the other day who believes that CUNY needs a STEM allocation. And that would translate to a lot of the community colleges, the associate's degree programs as well. And I would assume that would affect also the community colleges generally around New York State. What are your thoughts on that? Do you think that would make a difference? It would help? How would it help? How might it be used?

[Frederick E. Kowal (President, United University Professions)]: J. Well, certainly, I think that the stem allocation has been helpful, without a doubt. At the same time, I do have a related concern that actually goes back to Senator Krueger's question earlier. And that is that what we're seeing, where programs are being eliminated at places like Buffalo State, which despite the rosy picture being painted earlier this afternoon, I've gotten notices of retrenchments and programs eliminated. And they are overwhelmingly into liberal arts. And that's happening across SUNY and across the country. We have to be very careful as we invest in STEM. Perhaps we make it STEAM so that the arts are included in that and the humanities, social sciences additionally.

[Speaker 14]: I'm not sure I can speak on the STEM. I will just agree that because of the cost of nursing programs, we have to cut somewhere. And we're going to cut the programs that are the least subscribed, unfortunately. And in many cases, are some of the liberal arts programs.

[James Davis (President, Professional Staff Congress-CUNY)]: Sam Pirozzolo, the only thing I would add is that we, at CUNY and I'm not sure which president you're referring to but nursing programs are full, and they're full to overflowing. And the flip side of this from the labor side is that we struggle to be able to hire and retain faculty because we can't pay them at competitive rates compared to what

[Speaker 14]: they could get in the

[James Davis (President, Professional Staff Congress-CUNY)]: health sector outside of school. Thank you.

[Assemblymember Jo Anne Simon]: We know the nurse educators is a big issue. Okay, thank you. I appreciate your thoughts on that.

[Speaker 0]: Sam Pellesano.

[Assemblymember Phil Palmesano]: Hi. Good evening, everyone. My question is for Mr. Cushman. Mr. Cushman, I'm a big proponent in support, as we all are, of our community colleges. I have Corning Community College and Finger Lakes Community College in my district.

[Speaker 14]: Exactly.

[Assemblymember Phil Palmesano]: J. And obviously, the work they do on workforce development, being able to turn around programs quickly to help support the business community, which is critically important to businesses in our community.

[Senator Tom O'Mara (Ranking Member, Senate Finance Committee)]: I do want to

[Assemblymember Phil Palmesano]: ask some questions, though, from your perspective. We know how hard you got hit during COVID. Is, like, the current base aid for FTEs adequately cover the instructional costs at community colleges? And if not, what is the actual per student cost versus state support, if you have any information on that?

[Speaker 14]: Well, the aid support from the state has been pretty steady for some time. If you look back in 1972, the rate, if you convert it to today's dollars, was about $5,000 per FTE. With the floor, we're at 3,600. So it just, with the expansion programs and so forth. As far as the split right now, the students are picking up 42.5% of the cost of their education. The state's picking up 23.5%. And the counties are coming in at right around 34%, right about the one third rate.

[Assemblymember Phil Palmesano]: And it's supposed to be a third, a third, a third generally, isn't it?

[Speaker 14]: Was the way it was originally written in education law. J.

[Assemblymember Phil Palmesano]: And outside of maybe the state living up to that, what it was supposed to be, making that third, third, third, is there anything else that we should, from your perspective, we could be looking at to help community colleges thrive and continue to support the business community and support students? Do you recommend we need to look at reassessing how we fund community colleges in any way? Or what would be some things we should look at?

[Speaker 14]: I do think that the model's broken. And in particular, I'll go back to these high cost programs. I mean, are students changing? Our average student is probably a 28 year old single mom who's working and going to school, needs completely different supports. And then they're taking courses that are pretty much all practical courses. So they require a ratio of about eight students to one faculty. And gone are those liberal arts courses where we could put 30 to one faculty. So the sales mix, if you will, business has shifted dramatically. So I do think that the model has to be relooked because the students are changing. It's not the institutions. I think we've done magic with what we've got.

[Speaker 0]: J.

[Assemblymember Phil Palmesano]: Thank you very much for what you guys do. Thank you.

[Speaker 14]: Thank

[Speaker 0]: you. Assemblyman Michaelis.

[Assemblymember Anna R. Kelles]: Thank you, everyone, so much. The interest of time, I'm only going to have one set of questions for Mr. Cowell. Thank you so much. I want to talk specifically about ESF. And one of the things that I learned it's essentially a research institution. It's an R2. But because it's grounded in basic sciences, by design, it has to have smaller classes, which means that the cost per student is higher. It also, being a research institution, it has to graduate a certain number of graduates per year in order to maintain its RT status, things that make it uniquely more like a research institution than not. And I know you have been fighting for ESF because it has a deficit instead of simply doing cuts because that will lead to the loss of, I think, 44 staff and faculty, with a significant number of those being faculty, which will cut a lot of the courses for the program. So can you tell me a little bit more about how that's going to impact students, faculty?

[Frederick E. Kowal (President, United University Professions)]: J. Yeah. And I think that thank you, assembly member, for asking that. It is extremely disturbing. Again, this morning, we've heard the glowing report that everything is good, that there's stability in the campuses that are facing deficits, like ESF. However, 33 faculty members and professional staff have taken the separation incentive. Those positions, we have been told by administration there and by indirect command from SUNY, those positions are not all going to be filled. Eliminated. And with that, the institution shrinks. It's not able to maintain those standards that you outlined. But furthermore, it sends a message to those students, as I said earlier, that desperately want to get into this institution, especially when you're talking about a generation that does accept the reality of the climate crisis and the biodiversity crisis. And they want to find out the ways to address those crises and be a part of that. To me, it seems patently obvious that the 10,000,000 to $12,000,000 whatever it might be, to get them out of the deficit is a tiny amount of money in terms of an investment, in terms of the return.

[Assemblymember Anna R. Kelles]: Right. A third of our DEC staff come from ESF, right? They're graduates.

[Speaker 0]: That's correct.

[Assemblymember Anna R. Kelles]: I had heard that also Robin Wall Kimmer was one of the faculty. I mean, she's one of the most world famous faculty in her field. It's heartbreaking. So hopefully, we can do something to get the $8,300,000 Definitely.

[Speaker 0]: Yeah. Thank you very much. I just have two quick questions. Mr. Davis, can you tell me what the current percentage of full time faculty is in a school?

[James Davis (President, Professional Staff Congress-CUNY)]: I appreciate the question. We have approximately 11,000 part time faculty and just under 7,000 full time faculty.

[Speaker 0]: So it's a little less than two to one. Any idea what the cost would be to increase that by 2%?

[James Davis (President, Professional Staff Congress-CUNY)]: I don't have the 2% calculation in front of me, but I'll just reiterate what's, I think, in the written testimony, which is we think that moving towards a goal of 70% of classes taught by full timers an investment in 1,000 full time lines big system, 24 campuses. 1,000 sounds like a lot, but would require a $92,000,000 investment.

[Speaker 0]: $92,000,000 Okay. Thank you. And Mr. McCarthy, has there been much interaction between enforcement agents on our on our SUNY campuses? I know that there was one instructor that was was taken away, but I'm talking about students, student body.

[James McCartney (Director, NYS University Police Lieutenants/PBA of NYS)]: With what enforcement agency?

[Speaker 0]: In for ICE.

[James McCartney (Director, NYS University Police Lieutenants/PBA of NYS)]: Not not to my knowledge.

[Speaker 0]: Not at all. Okay. No. Thank you very much, gentlemen. This ends this section. Thank you. We'll now convene panel B. University Student Senate of CUNY, Akim Pollack State University of New York Student Assembly, Luca Rallis and the Graduate Students Employees Union of the Communications Workers Union, Bradley Hirschon and Shirley Jin. Ladies first.

[Senator Liz Krueger (Chair, Senate Finance Committee)]: Thank you.

[Shirley Jin (Organizer, Graduate Student Employees Union, CWA Local 1104)]: Hate to say evening. Good afternoon, chairs and members of the committee. My name is Shirley Jin. I'm an organizer for Graduate Student Employees Union, CWA Local eleven oh four. I represent nearly 5,000 graduate student workers across SUNY. I'm here with one ask to codify Senate Bill S9034A and Assembly Bill A10334 to permanently end mandatory broad based fees for graduate workers. As a union, we long fought to eliminate those mandatory fees, as a lot of you have probably known. At this point, some of our graduate workers joke that ending fees has lasted longer than their entire PhD program. But we are here to make sure that the progress that you helped achieve becomes permanent. In 2022, this legislature committed to phasing out fees over four years. And that commitment, that founding, has made a real difference in graduate workers' life. And we're so grateful for that commitment. What we ask today is straightforward: make it permanent. Codifying this legislation does not expand the promise, it secures it. It ensures that graduate workers will never again have to pay fees back to the institute that they hired them. Graduate workers, they teach courses, grade papers, run labs, power research across SUNY. At some campuses like ours at UAlbany, 40% of undergraduate courses are taught by graduate workers. Stability for graduate workers means stability for SUNY. So we here respectfully urge you to include s ninety thirty four a and a ten three three four in the budget and help us close this chapter with certainty. Thank you for your attention.

[Speaker 0]: Thank you.

[Bradley Hershenson (Business Agent, Graduate Student Employees Union)]: Good afternoon, assembly members and senators. My name is Brad Hershenson. I'm a business agent for the Graduate Student Employees Union. Today, I'm here to share that we must truly freeze the cost of tuition for all students, not just in state undergraduate students. Two populations are left out of this so called tuition freeze. And I call it a tuition freeze like this because in this budget cycle, the first population left out is graduate students. And the second population left out are international students who already pay a tremendous amount for tuition at SUNY. So permit me to suggest this is not the time to make it harder for the immigrant community in New York or on the families of the hardworking graduate students. So the A word this year is affordability. And the easiest thing that we can do now to achieve that is to include language in the budget to eliminate the fees for graduate workers and truly freeze tuition for all students, not just some students. Thank you.

[Speaker 17]: Oh, good good evening, chair Kruger, Stavinski, Hyndman, and and other members of the Assembly and Senate. My name is Akim Polak. I'm the chairperson of the CUNY University Student Senate and CUNY trustee, representing more than 240,000 students across 26 campuses. CUNY has long been a pathway to opportunity for most working class and immigrant families. Today, that promise is strained, and one of the most immediate barriers students face is transportation. For many students, commuting is a hidden tuition. Transportation can consume 7% or more of their total expenses. Many spend over $100 each month simply to just reach class, and for more than 60% of students from low income households, that cost can determine whether they attend at all. We appreciate the 1,400,000.0 transportation pilot included in CUNY's budget request, and it's equally shared between the state. We're requesting $700,000 and the city, 700,000, which is a five day OmniCard providing 75 trips per student which will be meaningful progress and reflects sustained student advocacy. But the need far exceeds a pilot. Free Omnicards for all CUNY students remain our top priority. Reliable transportation is essential for equitable access, retention, and timely graduation, especially when more than $70,000,000 already supports fare free transit for high school students with no comparable investment for CUNY. Further targeted investments matter as well. Disability services at $5,200,000 would ensure that students with disabilities have modern tools for learning mobility and digital access. CUNY CARES at $4,600,000 will expand mental health and wellness resources across five worlds. Modernizing campus infrastructure and technology will ensure that our classrooms and labs and libraries and digital systems remain reliable and accessible for twenty first century learning. These are not isolated requests. They are investments in the success of CUNY students and in New York's future workforce. Thank you for your time and your commitment to public higher education.

[Speaker 0]: Thank you. Assembly Member Hyndman.

[Assemblymember Alicia L. Hyndman (Chair, Assembly Higher Education Committee)]: Thank you, Chair Pretlow. Mr. Hershenson, it's been great to see you grow up right before our eyes, and here you are testifying again. Since you meant in your testimony, you made references to federal grant cuts that have impacted graduate workers' ability to continue education, can you specify which cuts the federal government which cuts were

[Assemblymember Phil Palmesano]: J.

[John B. King, Jr. (Chancellor, State University of New York)]: Sure.

[Assemblymember Alicia L. Hyndman (Chair, Assembly Higher Education Committee)]: Yep. And I'll come to Akeem when I get this answer.

[Bradley Hershenson (Business Agent, Graduate Student Employees Union)]: J. Sure. There are several graduate workers, for example, folks who are doing their PhDs in public health that are funded through NSF or other federal agencies where funding for existing and ongoing projects that people who have been doing research for the last several years, unfortunately, funding has been cut. And those are our colleagues. They're graduate workers who teach undergraduate courses, conduct research. And their projects, dissertations have been upended. So it's a really challenging time right now. And that's of why we're asking for the funding to fully phase out the fees is to make it so our graduate workers and colleagues have what they need to succeed and graduate.

[Assemblymember Alicia L. Hyndman (Chair, Assembly Higher Education Committee)]: Okay. Mr. Pollock, we have talked about the Omni Card and the program that's funded Fair Fairs so much. So I even spoke with the higher ed chair from the city council. And this amount, dollars 700,000 for Omni. Now, we already fund the program for Fair Fairs. Wouldn't it be more feasible for us to make sure that students are aware of this program and to apply for it?

[Speaker 17]: J. So thank you, Assembly Member. Fair Fairs surrounds anti poverty. So that's the program, and it targets low income residents. What we're proposing, the free Omnicod pilot, it surrounds academic outcomes and trying to close the gaps with existing programs. So we are looking at higher education higher graduation rates, retention when it comes on to schooling, ensuring students actually go to classes.

[Assemblymember Alicia L. Hyndman (Chair, Assembly Higher Education Committee)]: But isn't access to the transportation is the issue? So you have access to Fair Fairs and apply for that, wouldn't that cover the same objectives that you just said?

[Speaker 17]: J. Well, so Fair Fairs even just removes half of that barrier. We're really advocating for the full removal of the transportation barrier.

[Assemblymember Alicia L. Hyndman (Chair, Assembly Higher Education Committee)]: So you're saying that any CUNY student would be eligible for Omni?

[Speaker 17]: So we would start a pilot program, and we'd have around 3,000 students that we'll target. We would surround students with disabilities, student parents, and we'll ask student affairs. They'll be managing the program, and then they'll see the outcomes of it, if it includes if it improves retention, if it improves the graduation rate, and then possibly this is something that could happen for all CUNY students.

[Assemblymember Alicia L. Hyndman (Chair, Assembly Higher Education Committee)]: Okay. Thank you all for your testimony today. Thank you, Chair.

[Senator Toby Ann Stavisky (Chair, Senate Higher Education Committee)]: Thank you.

[Senator Liz Krueger (Chair, Senate Finance Committee)]: Thank you. Senator Murray?

[Senator Dean Murray]: Thank you, Chairwoman. Just Mr. Hershenson, quick question. So if I'm understanding you correctly, you would like to freeze tuition for everyone. And you would also like to eliminate fees, phase out fees. First off, do you have a number as to how much that would reduce revenue?

[Bradley Hershenson (Business Agent, Graduate Student Employees Union)]: Reduce revenue in what regard?

[Senator Dean Murray]: R. For the schools.

[Bradley Hershenson (Business Agent, Graduate Student Employees Union)]: R. That well, now, to eliminate the fees entirely is $12,000,000 So the legislature has provided $3,000,000 four years ago, dollars 6,000,000 three years ago, dollars 9,000,000. And then this year is the final year of the phase out. So what we need is $12,000,000 in perpetuity. We actually passed both of these bills in front of you last year in the Senate Assembly. And unfortunately, they were vetoed by the governor. So what we'd like to do is, again, pass these. And it's just $12,000,000 in entirety to eliminate the fees. J.

[Senator Dean Murray]: So $12,000,000 for the fees. And then if we freeze tuition, what would that cost

[Félix V. Matos Rodríguez (Chancellor, City University of New York)]: down the

[Senator Dean Murray]: road as far as future revenue?

[Bradley Hershenson (Business Agent, Graduate Student Employees Union)]: J. That is probably a question for the chancellor and his team. But what I will say is that any public funding is certainly an investment in the families and the graduate workers and students of our state. I think that the folks who are attending SUNY want to live in New York, buy houses in New York, support the economy and the environment. So that money will certainly come back into the state economy, whatever is provided by the legislature. J. Okay.

[Senator Dean Murray]: So then the rate of inflation being just under 2.5% right now, that would obviously mean each year where the costs are rising as well. Again, without these revenue streams, do you have an idea of how much that would be? And how would you pay for it?

[Bradley Hershenson (Business Agent, Graduate Student Employees Union)]: I don't have the figures off the top of my head. But what I know is that our members will take other jobs. And unfortunately, there's lots of graduate workers who end up skipping meals or looking for food pantries and different ways to make rent and support themselves and their families. That's, unfortunately, the harsh reality is that we have a pay to work system where folks who are employed by the university have to pay fees in order to have the job that they have to teach and work at the university. So I'm sure our colleagues will find the ways they do it. But unfortunately, it's tough. We'd rather the fees be eliminated and that commitment be seen this year.

[Senator Dean Murray]: Okay. Thank you all for coming today. Thank you. Thank you.

[Senator Toby Ann Stavisky (Chair, Senate Higher Education Committee)]: I got on the first try. I met maybe a couple of weeks ago with some of the students from SUNY. And one of their asks was a $10,000,000 appropriation for food pantries. I asked both Chancellor Matos Rodriguez and King earlier this afternoon about food insecurity because I find that very troubling. Chancellor King, I believe, said that there was a food pantry on every campus. That I don't know about CUNY. But either CUNY or SUNY would like to address the issue of students who are hungry. We have a school breakfast program for elementary school and high school students. And we have a lunch program. And it seems to me that we need some kind of program for college students as well. But if one of you would like to address that issue or more the question of food insecurity on our public college campuses.

[Shirley Jin (Organizer, Graduate Student Employees Union, CWA Local 1104)]: Well, that's definitely good question. Appreciate it. That's definitely something graduate workers are suffering with. I can bring in two testimonies that recently received. One of our members said that back to the fees. The fees are equivalent of three months of rent. That's a lot of money for this just one member. Another member mentioned that he's a parent. He said when the fees were gone the first time, that's the first time he didn't have to choose in between paying university fees and covering childcare for his son. So food is definitely one of issues that our graduate workers are experiencing, but that's not all. We also experience different type of financial difficulties. And not to mention, we're a group of people who are pushing and performing cutting edge resource. And we are future educators. And I want you to invest in us so that it's not only food, but all other aspects child care support for our members so WIC members can purchase those devices for teaching better, doing better teaching jobs. So this investment will really help this group of people. We ask you to invest in this group of people so that stability of graduate workers today will long last till tomorrow.

[Senator Toby Ann Stavisky (Chair, Senate Higher Education Committee)]: Thank you. Thank you.

[Speaker 0]: Thank you. Yes,

[Assemblymember Phil Palmesano]: good evening. Appreciate your patience. I know it's getting late. I really don't have a question. I really just want to say thank you. Thank you for taking the time to be involved, coming here to address this legislature, to talk to us about what's important to you, what the priorities for yourselves, your fellow students should be, and to communicate that to us. I mean, personally, I love it when younger people like yourselves, students get involved and advocate for themselves. I think far too often, people don't get involved because they feel like the system doesn't work for them. And I think seeing you three here tonight really kind of helps that case and just encourages you to keep speaking out on those issues that matter to you. And if you're not liking what we do, challenge us. Do it respectfully. You've been respectful. I just I just really just wanted to commend you all for coming out and speaking out, because I love to see young people get involved and advocate for themselves. And not enough do that. So thank you for being here. I really appreciate it, and have a great evening.

[Félix V. Matos Rodríguez (Chancellor, City University of New York)]: I

[Speaker 0]: do have a question for Ms. Jin. I did I thought I heard you correctly. You said 40% of the, classes are being taught by graduate students?

[Shirley Jin (Organizer, Graduate Student Employees Union, CWA Local 1104)]: Yeah. Just to clarify, a lot of undergraduate courses, especially on our campus at u Albany, are taught by graduate workers. Yes.

[Speaker 0]: So these are graduate students that are currently obtaining their graduate degree and teaching part time?

[Shirley Jin (Organizer, Graduate Student Employees Union, CWA Local 1104)]: Exactly.

[Stephen (Office of the Professions official, NYSED)]: Yeah. And you

[Speaker 0]: have a union?

[Shirley Jin (Organizer, Graduate Student Employees Union, CWA Local 1104)]: Yes.

[Speaker 0]: Interesting. Okay. And about how many number wise do you think that is?

[Shirley Jin (Organizer, Graduate Student Employees Union, CWA Local 1104)]: Yeah. For for that's about 5,000 to 6,000 graduate workers.

[Speaker 0]: 5,000?

[Shirley Jin (Organizer, Graduate Student Employees Union, CWA Local 1104)]: Yeah. A lot of them are PhD students. Some of them are master's students. So a lot of them are taking four credits, meaning 12 credits a semester. Meanwhile, they have to fulfill their part time teaching, researching duty. That's a lot on our plate. We're not complaining. This is really exciting because we are excited for being doing you know, involving those cutting edge research and being prepared for being future researchers. But we would love to have some support at this moment of our life when life is a little bit hard financially. And, know, codifying bills would really offer stability to us and we would really So appreciate

[Speaker 0]: the panel before you, Mr. Davis, said that there are 11,000 part time teachers, 5,000 of those are students.

[Speaker 14]: That's us.

[Speaker 0]: That's you. Yeah. Very interesting. And what school what school are you teaching at, just if I could ask?

[Dr. Betty A. Rosa (Commissioner, NYS Education Department)]: Oh, I'm

[Shirley Jin (Organizer, Graduate Student Employees Union, CWA Local 1104)]: teaching at U Albany.

[Speaker 0]: At U Albany? U Yeah. U of E?

[Bradley Hershenson (Business Agent, Graduate Student Employees Union)]: University at Albany.

[Speaker 0]: And I came with what's I came with school are at?

[Speaker 17]: Oh, I'm at York, but I'm not a teacher.

[Speaker 0]: I know. You're a you're student.

[Speaker 23]: There was

[Speaker 0]: a free bus pass. I know. Oh, O'Pharrow: yeah, your college. Like my colleague, want to thank you all for being involved in this and sitting, waiting out today, and testifying for us. Thank you very much.

[Senator Toby Ann Stavisky (Chair, Senate Higher Education Committee)]: Thank you. Thank you.

[Speaker 0]: Thank you.

[Senator Peter Oberacker]: Yeah.

[Speaker 0]: Now I'm going to call panel C, the Association of Private Colleges, Donna Grunt, the Commission on Independent Colleges and Universities is Lola Brebham Higher Education Opportunity Program Professionals Organization, Aaron Ray Cornell University, Charlie Krasinski and the Association for Program Administrators for STEP and STEP, Doctor. Ronaldo D. Alba. Taking charge, Laura. I I see that. I never know.

[Lola W. Brabham (President, Commission on Independent Colleges and Universities)]: Okay.

[Speaker 0]: How do you want to start, left or right? Center?

[Lola W. Brabham (President, Commission on Independent Colleges and Universities)]: Good evening, Chairpersons Kruger and Pretlow and member of the Finance Committee. My name is Lola Bratham, President of the Commission on Independent Colleges and Universities. CICU represents more than 100 nonprofit colleges and universities that educate nearly half of all college students in New York. We're at a defining moment in higher education, from declining enrollments and rising operational costs to cuts and eliminations in federal funding to misguided policy changes complicating the higher education landscape, the urgent and immediate threat to educational access and economic stability is real. Federal changes to student loan programs combined with rising costs and reductions in federal research funding, are creating instability for students, institutions, and communities. The impact is not isolated to one sector. When access is limited anywhere in New York's higher education system, the consequences are felt everywhere in our workforce, our local economies, and in our tax base. As home to the second largest higher education ecosystem in the country, New York is particularly valuable I'm sorry, vulnerable to these changes. Recent policy shifts like the elimination of Grad PLUS and new caps on Parent PLUS threaten affordability, enrollment stability, and workforce development across our state. New York's independent colleges are essential partners in meeting workforce demand. Private nonprofit institutions educate the majority of the state's nurses, STEM graduates, and future teachers. Our campuses are economic anchors in urban, suburban, and rural communities alike, yet pressures on the independent sector are intensifying. Declining state support, demographic shifts, reductions in federal funding, and student loan changes are compounding challenges for students and families. CICU urges the legislature to take several critical steps in this year's budget. First, we call on the legislature to establish the New York State College Access Program, a state backed loan program designed to be a safety net for New York students pursuing graduate degrees in critical fields like teaching, nursing, architecture, engineering, and others that will experience a reduction in financial support due to the financing gaps created by the One Big Beautiful Bill. We're grateful that the executive budget proposes a borrower education program in response to these changes, but counseling alone is not enough. A responsible state supported loan option with strong borrower protections and competitive rates will protect pathways into essential work fields and is the best alternative for high cost private loans. At a time of growing federal constraint, New York's response matters more than ever. Legislative leadership is critical. Secondly, last year's historic expansion of TAP helped ensure that students are supported in a meaningful way. Now, New York must build on that progress by restoring and increasing Grad TAP and providing, independent students with full TAC benefits.

[Donna Stelling Gurnett (President, Association of Private Colleges)]: Alright. Good evening, everyone. Thank you for giving the Association of Private Colleges the opportunity to present this testimony. My name is Donna Stelling Gurnett, and I am president of APC. The association supports 12 privately owned family founded and family led institutions educating over 22,000 students across New York State. I'd like to begin by thanking the legislature for their continued support of the tuition assistance program. Improvements made to TAP over the past few years are greatly appreciated. But with recent changes to the federal student loan program, further steps are needed to ensure that TAP continues to make higher education acceptable accessible. In July 2025, Congress enacted the One Big Beautiful Bill Act, representing the most significant restructuring of federal student lending in more than a decade. The law eliminates the federal Grad PLUS loan program, imposes new annual and lifetime borrowing caps on graduate and professional students, restricts parent plus borrowing, and narrows eligibility for certain professional programs. The elimination of Grad PLUS loans and the imposition of lifetime caps will disproportionately impact middle and low income students. It will also push more students into the private loan market, where lending is based on creditworthiness. Students without established credit or those from low income households may be denied loans or face substantially higher interest rates. At a time when the federal policy is narrowing access, New York has the opportunity to lead. First, we strongly urge the restoration of Graduate TAP. Graduate TAP was eliminated in 2010, leaving graduate students almost entirely dependent on federal loans. With federal options now restricted, restoring graduate TAP would provide direct state support for advanced degrees that are critical to workforce development and economic competitiveness. Second, New York should consider creating a state sponsored graduate student loan program to address the financing gaps created at the federal level. Other states are already acting. Earlier this month, Connecticut announced an expansion of the Connecticut Higher Education Supplemental Loan Authority to include a new supplemental graduate student loan program. And other surrounding states, including New Jersey, Pennsylvania, Massachusetts, Vermont, and Maine, already operate state backed loan programs serving graduate students. The federal landscape has changed dramatically. Graduate students now face borrowing caps, elimination of key loan programs, and regulatory definitions that do not align with New York's licensure requirements. Without state action, fewer students will enroll in advanced degree programs, and workforce shortages will intensify. These student centered investments will strengthen our workforce, protect economic mobility, and secure the state's long term competitiveness. Finally, I'd be remiss if I didn't mention the APC Student Leadership Council members who will be in Albany tomorrow. So look for the blue and white scars. Thank you.

[Speaker 23]: Good evening now. From twenty five thousand STEP and C STEP students across New York State so Chair Pretlow, chair Kruger, chair Hyndman, and chair Stavitsky, thank you for allowing us to testify today, allowing Apex to testify today. I will note for the record, written testimony was submitted, so I will be brief in my comments. So, again, I agree to you from 25,000 students across New York State, 16,000 of which are seventh through twelfth graders, 9,000 are C STEP students at the college level. 59% of those students are first generation students. First, I'd like to say thank you for the allocation last year in the restoration and the modest increase to STEP and C STEP funding. I'm happy to report that STEP has spent 96.960.6% of those funds, and STEP has spent 95.5% of those funds in a year when we experienced a lot of transition. I'm pretty sure if we had a couple months, it would have been a 100%. So here, we are asking for a restoration of the governor's cuts, which are about 5%. And what that translates into a 1,900,000.0 cut means 952 less students in the STEP and C STEP pipeline. I am here respectfully requesting a restoration, a full restoration of those cuts and an increase of 20% and allowed me to qualify what that would look like. $7,800,000 qualifies as an additional 3,989 students. This is per the funding guidelines of the RFP. And what that means, we would have 3,989 students plus the restoration, bringing us to 4,900 students of of students pursuing fields in STEM health and licensed fields, high need professions for our state, professions that drive economic, statistics and that signify the investment that New York stands to gain. We're looking for an expanded enrollment because the excitement of having a Step and C Step program is felt throughout the state of New York. So we're in a contract cycle. 19 new projects have joined our network. 19 new projects. That's exciting, especially during the financial during the federal changes that are going on in the elimination of opportunity programs at the federal level. A lot of New York State institutions with C STEP programs have welcomed those students and provided them ancillary support. So know that it play we play a catalyst role on our campuses. Also, you should know that we're looking because we have an expanded network of projects, they haven't been funded adequately, which means enrollment numbers will drop in the coming year, and you will see that play out in the statistics that are gonna be provided to you next year. So we're looking to fill out the apparatus, the infrastructure that we have, so that we can do the most that we can for New York State, but more importantly for our students that we'll then do for New York State. Allow me to temporarily drift from my testimony. There's a key issue that's going on with funding contracts that have been delayed. So reimbursement has been delayed, and the initial 25 dis percent disbursement to institutions across New York State have been delayed. And that has proven to be a challenge for institutions that we know now are 28 colleges that close, for colleges and universities, institutional partners that are overwhelmed with the financial complications that they're facing, having delayed processes of reimbursement disbursement are creating some real you challenges very for much, chair for outlook.

[Speaker 12]: Good evening. My name is Aaron Ray, and I am representing the Higher Education Opportunity Program Professional Organization, which represents H E O P directors and practitioners across New York's independent colleges and universities. Our members serve thousands of economically disadvantaged, first generation, historically underrepresented students who rely on HEOP to access persistent and complete higher education. We are deeply concerned about the executive budget proposal that includes a 6% reduction in HEOP funding. This cut would have immediate and measurable consequences for student success across New York State. HEOP is not discretionary. It is essential higher education infrastructure. It is one of New York's most effective tools for advancing

[Speaker 0]: economic mobility and workforce development. As federal education supports become less stable and responsibility increasingly shifts to states, New York faces a defining moment. History shows that when public investment recedes, low income and first generation students bear the greatest risk. Strengthening HEOP now is

[Speaker 12]: essential both a protective measure and a strategic investment in our state's long term economic stability. HEOP's success is rooted in its comprehensive model. Programs provide intensive advising, tutoring, summer bridge programming, emergency financial support, career development, and holistic student services. This is not cheap. These supports significantly improve retention, graduation, and postgraduate outcomes. HEOP does not exist because its students lack ability. It exact it exists because educational opportunity has never been evenly distributed. A student's zip code too often shapes the quality of their k through 12 education and their access to resources. HEOP ensures that the talent and determination, not circumstance, determines a student's trajectory. It affirms belonging, counters imposter syndrome, and equips students to thrive academically and professionally. A 6% funding reduction would mean fewer services, reduced summer program capacity, increased staff caseloads, and ultimately higher student attrition. At a time of rising living costs and growing mental health needs, reducing H E O P funding moves New York in the wrong direction. Instead, we urge the legislature to support a 20% increase in HEOP funding. This investment would address years of underfunding, help us keep pace with inflation, stabilize staffing, expand access to eligible students currently turned away, and better align H E O P with workforce priorities in health care, education, STEM, and public service. Since 1964, New York has recognized that a thriving economy depends on an educated citizenry. HOP operationalizes that belief. It produces graduates who remain in New York, contribute to the workforce, support their families, and reinvest in their communities. We respectfully urge legislature to reject the proposed reduction, restore, and increase HEOP funding by at least 20%, and affirm HEOP as essential infrastructure for New York's educational and economic future. Thank you.

[Speaker 0]: Thank you. J.

[Charlie Kruzansky (Cornell University, State Relations)]: Hello, chairs Hyndman and Pretlow and Kruger and Stavitsky. Thanks. I get to wrap up. And I'll start with HEOP and EOP. Cornell University, Land Grant University, we have both programs. I mentioned that also because of Fred Cowell leaving. He said, I forgot to mention EOP. Why do we talk about it? Because it works. We invest at Cornell $10 for every dollar we get from the state for these programs. And this was created by the legislature and funded and expanded by the legislature. So a huge thank you. It works. And why are we here today, higher ed? New York State needs higher ed more than it's ever needed it before. It's economic development. It's workforce development. It's the future. When you're funding these budgets in higher ed, you're actually making the future better. We used to do it because the students were benefiting. Now we're doing it because we're benefiting. We in New York need young talent. We need population. We need economic development. We need these jobs for the future. So that's why we're here to talk about all these programs and how they fit together. We at Cornell again, we've been around a long time. We're in Upstate. Upstate New York, parts of Upstate are struggling, except for higher ed. That's what's bringing New Yorkers here. That age category is where we do best in New York. We don't lose young people. We bring them in at the same rate they leave. Every other age category in New York, we're losing people. So doubling down on higher ed and young people is the way to keep our talent here and bring in talent from outside. And we need that right now, not only for the census count in 2030 as well. We need them for our future. I'll mention in the SUNY again, we see it all. The SUNY budget, yeah, he needs funding, but the privates do, too. We're in the we've seen privates close. He's struggling to keep his campuses open. I appreciate that. But we should keep all these campuses open. We at Cornell are in his budget. He left us out of his allocation because he was talking this morning about SUNY campuses. Cornell's not struggling but we've lost more than SUNY has because the USAID funding, that went away. And then we lost a lot of money for diversity, not just our diversity programs for people, but for plants and animals, too. They cut that from the federal government and other funding, climate change funding, got cut. So we're looking for an allocation of $10,000,000 in our land grant line in the SUNY budget along with Cornell Cooperative Extension, which we run statewide. The legislature has been adding to it every year. We're looking for more of an add to get New York City more on equal footing. So really, I'm here to wrap up this panel, love questions, talking about all of higher ed, this ecosystem. We appreciate you being here and listening.

[Speaker 0]: J. You. Assemblyman behind me?

[Senator Liz Krueger (Chair, Senate Finance Committee)]: D. Toby.

[Assemblymember Alicia L. Hyndman (Chair, Assembly Higher Education Committee)]: Thank you, Chair Pretlow. Donna, you had mentioned that other states were doing the grad Student Loan Program. And, Lola, I know we talked about this. I know we talked about Pennsylvania, but you said Connecticut. And how much did the states put into the program? Because in the conversations I've had with HESC, they and the governor's office, they are very adamant that $500,000,000 is too much to put aside for students in New York State. So please tell me what those other states, how much are they putting in.

[Donna Stelling Gurnett (President, Association of Private Colleges)]: That is a good question. I know in Connecticut, I believe they had set aside an additional $10,000,000 to support the graduate student loan program that they are doing. The other states, I'm not sure exactly what the dollar amount is, but we could look into that and get back to you. It was more a matter of just pointing out that there are other options out there that other states currently are doing similar programs that maybe we could either mirror or reach out to them and see if there's some way to create a coalition with them. There's just a lot of options.

[Unidentified timekeeper/clerk]: Can I add to that?

[Assemblymember Alicia L. Hyndman (Chair, Assembly Higher Education Committee)]: Yeah.

[Lola W. Brabham (President, Commission on Independent Colleges and Universities)]: So just to put some clarity around the statement that was made earlier about the state of Pennsylvania, they have FIIA, which is Pennsylvania's equivalent of HESC. And they run a state run student loan program that covers undergraduate, graduate, and also parent plus. And the unique thing about Pennsylvania and what I believe Hess was mentioning earlier is that they have what's called a white label program. And so they are loan servicers for other states, some of the states that you mentioned. So the potential partnership there is that the state of Pennsylvania, under a program called PA Forward, would work and does work with other states to service loans for students that were originated in the home state. And they do all of that under, say, for example, New York, New York State's branding and whatever New York State would call the program.

[Assemblymember Alicia L. Hyndman (Chair, Assembly Higher Education Committee)]: Okay. We have to talk more about it. We don't have a Doctor. Lot of Alba, you said 19 new projects came online for C STEP, STEP? Yes. Why? And now we can't fund those programs?

[Speaker 23]: Those are questions that I I fortunately can't answer on the why. I I would imagine increasing the footprint of successful opportunity programs throughout the state of New York was a priority. The funding calculus, I think, was resting on how successful we would have been last go around with the increase. And I know there was great disparity on where we were with the Huntsman House bills. But, you know, respectfully, Chair Hyndman, that wasn't my call.

[Assemblymember Alicia L. Hyndman (Chair, Assembly Higher Education Committee)]: Okay. Doctor. Molina did bring that up to me. So I wasn't sure why we added 19 new programs and can't afford 19 new programs.

[Speaker 23]: But the the expansion of the footprint shows that colleges and universities are really thirsting for services for students that are interested in STEM health and licensed fields which clearly is important to the state.

[Assemblymember Alicia L. Hyndman (Chair, Assembly Higher Education Committee)]: You all. Thank you, Charles.

[Senator Liz Krueger (Chair, Senate Finance Committee)]: S. Senator Murray? Oh, Senator That's right. Savitsky. No, no, didn't think you were saying yes.

[Hector Batista (COO, CUNY)]: J. I

[Senator Toby Ann Stavisky (Chair, Senate Higher Education Committee)]: was very, very interested in what was said by everybody, particularly President Bramham. You mentioned Pennsylvania. And there are some other states that have similar programs. And I thank you for your comments about the student loan program and the three points that you made. There's another area involved that I don't think was mentioned in terms of the governor's executive budget, and that's the HE CAP funding. How important is HE CAP? And what are some of the things that the colleges do with HECAP funding, the three to one match where the college puts in $3 for every dollar the state does.

[Lola W. Brabham (President, Commission on Independent Colleges and Universities)]: J. Yes. Thank you for your question. The HECAP program is essential. It helps our campuses keep up with campus infrastructure, make repairs, update science labs. It's very important. And as you mentioned, for every dollar that the state provides, our campuses puts in $3 And aside from the immediate benefit to college campuses, it also creates jobs in local areas and supports local economies. So it's very important.

[Senator Toby Ann Stavisky (Chair, Senate Higher Education Committee)]: And for Donna, who represents the APC, the proprietary colleges. There's one that I'm particularly familiar with. I don't want to catch you unaware. But you know that I have known the folks at Plaza when it was a little business college in Jackson Heights. And now they have I was there for the ribbon cutting a number of years ago, a nursing program. And we obviously have a nursing shortage. And I can't tell you how happy I was when I was there. And they were using mannequins and three d dimensional instruction, which was done at some remembered Lupardo and my bill that the governor signed. How effective has Plaza's nursing home and this is a family owned business. And I've known them going back. I call them Charles the first and Charles the second.

[Assemblymember Brian D. Miller]: That's right. And Chad the fourth. Yes.

[Senator Toby Ann Stavisky (Chair, Senate Higher Education Committee)]: How effective has the nursing program

[Dr. Betty A. Rosa (Commissioner, NYS Education Department)]: been?

[Donna Stelling Gurnett (President, Association of Private Colleges)]: It's been incredibly effective. You know, the institution has really made quite an investment in their nursing simulation lab. As you know, they also just created an entire surgical suite inside their classrooms as well for their med surg tech program. But I will say, I was talking with Chuck earlier this week, and he was telling me that on their latest NCLEX tests, they had a 100 pass rate. So clearly, their investments are paying off.

[Senator Toby Ann Stavisky (Chair, Senate Higher Education Committee)]: 100%.

[Donna Stelling Gurnett (President, Association of Private Colleges)]: 100%, yes.

[Senator Toby Ann Stavisky (Chair, Senate Higher Education Committee)]: J. That's the National Nursing exam.

[Assemblymember Alicia L. Hyndman (Chair, Assembly Higher Education Committee)]: J.

[Senator Toby Ann Stavisky (Chair, Senate Higher Education Committee)]: Yes. That's correct.

[Speaker 0]: J. L. You. Sam Pimposano. J. Good evening.

[Assemblymember Phil Palmesano]: My question is for President Brabham. In your 2026 priorities, many of you mentioned the restoration of Grad Tab. I was just curious, do you know how many students would benefit from this restoration? And how much do you think that would cost to do so?

[Lola W. Brabham (President, Commission on Independent Colleges and Universities)]: J. Well, I think any student receiving TAP is going to benefit from the restoration. If you're asking how many students belong to the independent sector, we don't have insight into that due to the way Hess

[Speaker 23]: -Sure.

[Lola W. Brabham (President, Commission on Independent Colleges and Universities)]: -kind of processes that information. So I wouldn't be able to tell you an exact number. But what I will tell you is that last expansion happened that there were approximately 25,000 students who benefited from that O'Hare, expansion.

[Assemblymember Phil Palmesano]: Too, when I was questioning the president of Higher Education Service Corp in her testimony, mentioned that 28 colleges, proprietary independent colleges have closed since 2016 and that they envisioned this wasn't going to stop anytime soon. We know it's disruptive to students. We know it's disruptive to those communities that have those schools because it's a major employer for jobs and just a signature part of that community. What are you seeing as what are you seeing as a reason for these closures? Is it enrollment? Is it funding? Is it programs like a faculty? What is it?

[Dr. Betty A. Rosa (Commissioner, NYS Education Department)]: All of the above.

[Speaker 23]: All of the above.

[Dr. Betty A. Rosa (Commissioner, NYS Education Department)]: All of the above.

[Lola W. Brabham (President, Commission on Independent Colleges and Universities)]: And I mentioned some of in my testimony. Unfortunately, we're seeing a decline in financial support for independent colleges, and it's really wreaking havoc across the state. And And our schools are struggling. And that's why we're here trying to ring the alarm bell, because now, with some of these actions that the federal government has taken in the big, beautiful bill, it's only overlaying the problems that already exist and exacerbating them.

[Assemblymember Phil Palmesano]: I guess I got another question for you. This might be something that might need more detail. You could follow-up with us. But I heard you mention in your testimony that the state should create its own student loan program. How do you envision that working? How much money would do you have a proposal and how much that would cost to fund and how many students would benefit, how the determination for that would be? J.

[Lola W. Brabham (President, Commission on Independent Colleges and Universities)]: Yeah. I'm going to try to get through it really quick. So this problem for New York is really a 75,000 student problem, right? Because that's how many students it's going to affect by 2030. But the immediate answer to your question is that some of those students are going to be able to get private loans, some have family wealth and all of that. What it's going to come down to is a group of students anywhere from 11,000 to 14,000 students that won't be able to go to a private bank and get a loan because of creditworthiness. And so we're trying to create that safety net for those future teachers, nurses, architects, engineers, and even people in the creative arts who are going to need that funding. I'd like to continue to say how we could kind of the structure. So it would be great if somebody else could ask me.

[Speaker 0]: Thank you. That's good.

[Speaker 14]: You get

[Speaker 0]: the board going.

[Senator Dean Murray]: Thank you, chairwoman. If I have time left, I'll let you finish that. But Doctor. Alba, I have a question. You had mentioned the delays. Can you go into a little more detail about that regarding the reimbursements and operational expenses? Can you go So into

[Speaker 23]: if I can walk you through just what last year looked like because you the legislature restored and gave us an additional increase that generates a contract amendment process. Now this is a multiagency sort of review and fingerprints on all the paperwork that's going on. We don't know exactly where the delays are, and that's why we're asking for help in sort of troubleshooting and providing a solution on where these delays may be occurring. So with that contract amendment, then we would have to wait, for that to process and go through the channels of everyone that has to approve the contract amendment. Then institutions can submit their FS 10 f's, which are the final expenditures, so that it it appropriately charges the account the budgeted account that took through probably December, to be honest with you, to get through all of that. Where we are then on top of that, STEP and C STEP went through a five year grant, application. The process of executing those, those grants still is ongoing. And I can give you an example. So 37% of C STEP grants that have gone through the FS 10 F, the previous year expenditures, 37 have received payment. 30% of C STEP institutions received payment. For STEP, 67% have received payment. That's for last year.

[Félix V. Matos Rodríguez (Chancellor, City University of New York)]: The in the initial have or haven't?

[Speaker 23]: Have. 30% of C STEP institution that have C STEP programs have received payment. 67 of institutions with STEP programs have received payment. That's for last year. The contracts come into play with an initial 25% disbursement. Programs that I supervised just received the additional 25%. We're in February. Programs have been operating since July 1. So that really hampers the institution's ability to address, to have to support the staff with forward funding while they wait for that money to come in. It's really becoming an untenable situation for IHEs.

[Senator Dean Murray]: Because that's operational funding. So you're trying to operate while waiting for the funding that was promised for operating.

[Speaker 23]: That's correct.

[Senator Dean Murray]: Right. I got it. Okay. So we need to look into where those delays are and what we can do to either eliminate or speed them up.

[Speaker 23]: Greatly appreciated. And that's not only for STEP and C STEP. This is for HEOP and LPP as well. So these are the department's opportunity programs.

[Senator Dean Murray]: Right. I have twenty three seconds. Go.

[Lola W. Brabham (President, Commission on Independent Colleges and Universities)]: The loan program would be for New York State residents, pursuing a graduate degree at an accredited college or university in New York. With regard to the funding mechanism, our proposal contemplates the dormitory authority being the originator of those loans, and they would acquire the funds through bond sales.

[Senator Dean Murray]: J. We got a little bit. Thank you.

[Speaker 0]: J. That thought.

[Dr. Betty A. Rosa (Commissioner, NYS Education Department)]: J. L. Okay.

[Speaker 0]: L. Assembly member Simon.

[Assemblymember Jo Anne Simon]: So tell me about this.

[Lola W. Brabham (President, Commission on Independent Colleges and Universities)]: And then the other side of this is that you need a loan servicer, which could be a third party loan servicer, which is why people keep bringing up PA Forward because that's what they do. And as I say, they currently do it for multiple states. And with regard to the cost, that depends on the parameters of the program. I'll give a quick example. If the loans were kept at $10,000 a year for 11,000 students, it's $110,000,000 That's just a simple example. But of course, the parameters would be determined by all of you.

[Assemblymember Jo Anne Simon]: And with the experience of the federal government used to do loan servicing, and then they decided to go to outside loan servicers. And everything got messed up. And there was a lot of corruption and a lot of delays. How would your proposal not fall down that path of

[Lola W. Brabham (President, Commission on Independent Colleges and Universities)]: Well, an alternate I think part of the problem there is that when you're working with private banks, and it's more likely that those things are going to happen. And we're suggesting just the opposite, that we work with a third party loan servicer that is not a bank to avoid higher cost loans, predatory interest rates, and things like that. So we're suggesting the exact opposite.

[Assemblymember Jo Anne Simon]: And would this affect and help students who are going to be affected by these caps, number one, and by the sort of, all of a sudden, the deprofessionalization of a great number of fields, which just happen to be female dominated.

[Lola W. Brabham (President, Commission on Independent Colleges and Universities)]: Right. That's exactly who is going to help, and it's going to help the graduate students who that program has been completely eliminated, not And so, you know, the cap is really for the Parent PLUS loans, which is for undergrads. So that's kind of an aside. But yes, that's exactly the population that this is targeting.

[Assemblymember Jo Anne Simon]: Thank you very much. You're welcome.

[Senator Liz Krueger (Chair, Senate Finance Committee)]: Thank you. Hi. So I think for the two representatives of the private schools, my understanding has always been that New York puts more of our money for colleges and now graduate schools into the TAP program and SEEK and HEAP and all these other wonderful programs, and therefore doesn't put as much into the privates. So I wanted to ask you, are you using 60% graduate students to teach your classes also?

[Donna Stelling Gurnett (President, Association of Private Colleges)]: I can tell you we're not.

[Senator Liz Krueger (Chair, Senate Finance Committee)]: No. You're not. And your independent schools are Yeah.

[Lola W. Brabham (President, Commission on Independent Colleges and Universities)]: I cannot give you a percentage on the number of PhDs teaching classes, but I certainly can get back to you on

[Senator Liz Krueger (Chair, Senate Finance Committee)]: that. And Cornell?

[Charlie Kruzansky (Cornell University, State Relations)]: I think about 98% of our classes are taught by PhDs. Some of the foreign language classes, people don't have PhDs. Other than that, it's sort of any person that you study. It's a big school. We teach from vet med to human ecology. And we are famously very heavily PhD tenure track. That's the Cornell model. Sure, we have grad students, but we're actually much bigger on the undergrad than grad. So we have TAs, but nothing like those numbers.

[Senator Liz Krueger (Chair, Senate Finance Committee)]: What's the average student loan owed?

[Charlie Kruzansky (Cornell University, State Relations)]: Dollars 20,000 is the average, but about half our students graduate debt free.

[Senator Liz Krueger (Chair, Senate Finance Committee)]: J. Okay.

[Charlie Kruzansky (Cornell University, State Relations)]: L. And our opportunity program students, we limit it to $2,000 in loans if they have any loans. Okay.

[Senator Liz Krueger (Chair, Senate Finance Committee)]: And how about the independents overall?

[Donna Stelling Gurnett (President, Association of Private Colleges)]: J. P. C. Members, it's about $22,000 in student loan debt when they're done with their programs.

[Lola W. Brabham (President, Commission on Independent Colleges and Universities)]: Similar, under $25,000

[Senator Liz Krueger (Chair, Senate Finance Committee)]: And do you happen to know CUNY or SUNY? Fair enough. That's Okay. I know. I thought CUNY was very low, but I wasn't sure.

[Speaker 0]: It was be low, yeah.

[Senator Liz Krueger (Chair, Senate Finance Committee)]: Okay. And when you talk about these other states that are doing these programs, I think it's important for us to actually understand how small some of those are. You're talking about $10,000,000 in a program in Pennsylvania. That's not really any kind of parallel to even the programs we have here now in New York. Right? So I think it's actually important to right? I think you said $10,000,000 for No.

[Lola W. Brabham (President, Commission on Independent Colleges and Universities)]: I didn't. I said 110,000,000. If you were to give 11,000 students

[Senator Liz Krueger (Chair, Senate Finance Committee)]: Right, 10 that was for thousand New York, but you used the $10,000,000 Well, we

[Donna Stelling Gurnett (President, Association of Private Colleges)]: were talking about the Connecticut program.

[Senator Liz Krueger (Chair, Senate Finance Committee)]: Oh, the

[Donna Stelling Gurnett (President, Association of Private Colleges)]: Connecticut And that's just for their

[Lola W. Brabham (President, Commission on Independent Colleges and Universities)]: That was an add on, a supplemental that they added to their larger Just for their graduate program. Okay.

[Senator Liz Krueger (Chair, Senate Finance Committee)]: Because I know every state runs things very differently. But you have to be careful, I think, to see apples and oranges as apples versus oranges.

[Lola W. Brabham (President, Commission on Independent Colleges and Universities)]: J. And so the clarification there is that if, for example, keeping with the Pennsylvania example, they wouldn't run the program under their parameters. They would run it under numerous I have admit you.

[Senator Liz Krueger (Chair, Senate Finance Committee)]: I'm cutting myself off, but I'm still happy to do that.

[Assemblymember Alicia L. Hyndman (Chair, Assembly Higher Education Committee)]: Thank Member Michaelis.

[Assemblymember Anna R. Kelles]: So three minutes is never enough. Thank you all so much for being here. The first question I had, I have been working trying to create a pass a piece of legislation. I worked on it actually with you a while ago about a mental health EOP program specifically to try and track people into mental health careers, but also to make sure that those who are in mental health tracks are representative of the diverse population that needs mental health services. I know SUNY has created an EOP small program, but it only has about enough funding for like 10 students, I think. It closed within hours. I think he said seven hours they had a full application. So can you just tell me a little bit about what that would do? What is the need for it? Are you hearing about it? What would it look like if we were going to have that kind of track?

[Speaker 12]: I mean, the need is significant. I think for HEOP, there would be a lot of interest in having a specialized pathway towards careers in mental health. Speaking from my institution, I have a lot of students who are interested in pre health. But specifically, I'm seeing more students interested in going into psychiatry and mental health counseling. Even more students are interested in going into social work. HOP students disproportionately want to go back into their communities and make a difference, and that would be a pathway.

[Unidentified timekeeper/clerk]: J. Can I add to that? Yeah, please.

[Lola W. Brabham (President, Commission on Independent Colleges and Universities)]: So with your bill and what you contemplated, this would fill the gap, right? Because HEOP students who are undergrad, many times the stumbling block is that there's no money for graduate school. And you can't enter any of these professions without a graduate degree and without certification. So that's the J. M. Bill.

[Speaker 27]: J. L.

[Assemblymember Anna R. Kelles]: The first is for the undergrad. The second is to create the scholarships for the grad because this is one field that actually would need graduate training and And we don't have

[Lola W. Brabham (President, Commission on Independent Colleges and Universities)]: that much. These EOP students are the pipeline, right?

[Assemblymember Anna R. Kelles]: Exactly.

[Speaker 23]: Yeah. If I may. I'm a trained mental health counselor. Step to C STEP cover mental health under licensed professions. So we do have some projects with graduate institutions on their campus that may be able to create a track for mental health professionals as well. So Fordham University, for example, has a program in mental health that some C STEP students may be interested in, knowing that there would be funding So behind you should know it's not only EOP, but expanding as well.

[Dr. Betty A. Rosa (Commissioner, NYS Education Department)]: S. That's fantastic.

[Félix V. Matos Rodríguez (Chancellor, City University of New York)]: And then

[Assemblymember Anna R. Kelles]: my one last can you talk a little bit about the SUNY contract colleges, how they're different? You guys have had flat funding for how many years when SUNY has gotten increased operating funds?

[Charlie Kruzansky (Cornell University, State Relations)]: In fifteen seconds, yeah. So again, for New York State colleges, they predate SUNY hematology, veterinary medicine, agricultural markets, and labor. And so in the last two years, yeah, the chancellor has really just GREGORY GREGORY LEVINE: provided

[Speaker 0]: the money to his campuses and left us out. Do you want to add more? Do you Do you want to add

[Charlie Kruzansky (Cornell University, State Relations)]: they left us out of the allocations the last two years. And said, again

[Speaker 0]: It's about the clock.

[Charlie Kruzansky (Cornell University, State Relations)]: He said, go ahead. You guys go again, our costs go up just like his. So, yep. That's right. Yep.

[Speaker 0]: All right. Well, I want to thank you all for what you do. It's really a good thing in taking care of our young people. And I'm really surprised to hear that the average debt at graduation is $25,000 and less. It really should be nothing, but $25,000 is a lot better than $60,000 or $100,000 or 200,000 I know there was a request for putting the Opportunity Program money back in. If you've been around for a while, know that there's an annual budget dance. And everything that has a legislative ad is generally removed from the budget by every governor, not just this governor or her predecessor or his predecessor, but every governor since all three has started these programs. And then the legislature has to find revenue. Magically, we always find the revenue, and then we replace it. Sometimes we don't get enough back, but this is just so don't really worry too much about HEAP and all of C STEP and STEP and all of those programs going away. We're not to let that happen. That's a line in the sand that's not going to be crossed.

[Senator Liz Krueger (Chair, Senate Finance Committee)]: But we have to spend the money once we put it in the budget, which apparently is another part of the

[Speaker 0]: Well, yeah. That's another thing. But they have to get it. We don't write the check. That's another problem. We don't write the check, though. So that's our problem, though. Anyway, I want to thank you all. And that concludes panel C. Thank you all. And panel D?

[Senator Liz Krueger (Chair, Senate Finance Committee)]: Come on down. J.

[Speaker 0]: D. York Public Interest Group, Blair Horner, Friends of the New York State Liberty Partnerships, Elizabeth Altman, New York State Academic Dental Centers, Jennifer Tesler the Institute for College Access and Success, Kristen Keef and Fostering Youth Success, Deirdre Nesbitt.

[Senator Liz Krueger (Chair, Senate Finance Committee)]: Almost panicked. We didn't think we saw you here, Blair. We almost panicked because we didn't see you in the background. Wouldn't be a hearing.

[Speaker 0]: Wouldn't be a hearing without Blair? But it would be quicker.

[Senator Liz Krueger (Chair, Senate Finance Committee)]: Oh come on, he only gets three minutes.

[Speaker 0]: Sorry. Well we won't start with him, will we?

[Senator John C. Liu]: No. Good, okay.

[Senator Liz Krueger (Chair, Senate Finance Committee)]: Okay. Who do you want to start with?

[Speaker 0]: Left or right? Who wants to start? Raise your hand. We don't care.

[Senator Liz Krueger (Chair, Senate Finance Committee)]: There's a sweet spot to get to the green ring. There you go.

[Kirsten Keefe (Senior Director, Policy & Advocacy, TICAS)]: Thank you. Thank you very much for the opportunity to testify. Thank you to the committee chairs and to the other members who are still in the room. And I also just want to give a shout out thanks to legislative staff both here and behind the scenes who are working late tonight for us to testify. My name is Kirsten Keefe, and I am the senior director of policy and advocacy for New York for the Institute for College Access and Success, also known as TCAS. TCAS is a resource and advocacy organization focused on student centered public policies that promote affordability, accountability, and equity in higher education. Our written testimony includes proposals for updating TAP, including many of the proposals that were discussed today, eliminating disparities between independent and independent students, increasing the income threshold to receive maximum TAP, and extending eligibility from four to six years, as well as recommendations around institutional debt, data privacy, and data transparency. Tonight, my testimony will focus on proposals in the executive budget addressing basic needs, college access and completion, and student consumer protections. First, we strongly support the creation of the higher education emergency aid program that Governor Hochul included in her executive budget, and we urge the Assembly and Senate to include up to $5,000,000 in funding for that program. Currently, aid programs are largely, if not entirely, funded by philanthropic donations, and the need greatly outpaces the availability of assistance. College success depends upon a student's basic needs being met. Many students who are attending New York College are doing so without adequate financial support, and unexpected expenses can undermine their ability to persist and complete college. Second, Tika strongly supports inclusion, and I believe the number currently is 6,375,000.000 in funding for the Education Debt Consumer Assistance Program, EDCAP, run by Community Service Society of New York. We do not receive EDCAP funds, but we are strong supporters of this program as the only statewide network of services helping students to understand private education loans and navigate federal repayment and loan forgiveness programs. EDCAP also plays a critical role in identifying issues statewide for policymakers. Also, Tika strongly supports increasing New York support for the opportunity programs that were discussed tonight, including primarily EOP, ACE, and ASAP, and we urge the legislature to consider extending these programs to part time students. New York's public institutions have significant part time enrollment numbers. 54% of SUNY two year and 12% of SUNY four year students are part time. 42% of CUNY two year and 27% of CUNY four year students are part time.

[Speaker 27]: Evening, chairs and members of the legislature. My name is Elizabeth Altman, president of Friends of the New York State Liberty Partnerships, representing 51 Liberty Partnership programs across the state. I just wanted to take a moment to thank you for your support of the opportunity programs. As an alumni of one of those programs, I'm not sure what my professional trajectory would have looked like without that support, advocacy, and mentorship. I want to begin by acknowledging the coalition partners who testified in the prior panel, STEP, SISTEP, and HEAP. They're essential opportunity programs, and Liberty Partnerships works alongside many of them. Together, we form a continuum of support for students across the state. Liberty Partnerships, however, operates earlier in the continuum. We are embedded in schools and communities. Last year, we worked directly with over 18,000 middle and high school students and their families to prevent dropout, strengthen academic readiness, and create sustained pathways to postsecondary success. We are respectfully requesting restoration of prior reductions and a 20% increase to reestablish the Liberty Partnership's base award. This is not an expansion request. It is a stabilization request. Base awards have not kept pace with inflation or rising staffing costs. And at the same time, programs experience operational gaps due to that previously mentioned FS 10 approval and reimbursement process. Programs often begin serving students months before funding flows. They hire, they mentor, counsel, tutor, and engage families all while waiting for reimbursement, And yet they prevailed last year with an 87.4 graduation rate. They prevailed because Liberty is not just a funding stream. It is a partnership model embedded in communities. It works because institutions of higher education, school districts, and families are invested together in student success. One of our Liberty alumni recently shared that Liberty matters because it is far more than a college access program. It is a community of people who genuinely believe that students who are often overlooked deserve not only a seat at the table but the guidance, advocacy, and sustained support to claim it. That is what you are funding. Restoration and a 20% increase would allow Liberty partnerships to maintain staffing stability, absorb rising operational costs, and reduce fiscal uncertainty that disrupts student services. Liberty is an upstream investment in educational attainment and economic mobility. Stabilizing it now protects the long term strength of this statewide network. We appreciate your continued support. Thank you.

[Speaker 0]: J. Thank you.

[Unidentified timekeeper/clerk]: Good evening. Good evening, chairs and distinguished members of the legislature. Thank you for this opportunity to testify in the executive budget proposal for the state fiscal year 'twenty seven. My name is Jennifer Tassler. I'm vice president of government relations and strategic affairs for the New York State Academic Dental Centers, also known as NYSADS. NYSADS is the consortium of the six dental schools in New York State. We have more dental schools than any other state. Dental schools serve a dual role in both educating the oral health workforce and serving as a safety net provider for Medicaid populations and others in the state of New York. NISEDS is requesting that the legislature fund the Fellowship to Address Oral Health Disparities at $750,000 to advance training in special needs dentistry and help one of our most vulnerable populations. NISAID is also hoping to support additional workforce programs. And I'd also like to note our support for a lot of the testimony here today regarding finding a solution to the elimination of the Grad PLUS loans and caps that were imposed by the federal government this year. NYSEDS would also like to ask the state to continue to invest in oral health workforce through loan repayment, practice support programs, and outreach to ensure equitable geographic distribution. NYSEDS works in partnership with its members to advance dental education and to address disparities in oral health care, particularly for individuals with special needs, including intellectual and developmental disabilities. There is a persistent shortage of dental providers who treat patients with moderate to severe IDD. Only 10 of general practice dentists regularly report that they treat individuals with these conditions. NYSEDS has developed the Fellowship to Address Oral Health Disparities, which has been funded by the state legislature for several years now. The fellowship provides advanced training for dentists in this area. And the dentists commit to work in underserved areas treating patient populations with a significant portion of these patients having intellectual and developmental disabilities once they finish the training. We are currently wrapping up our application cycle, and we are pleased to announce that we are fully funded fully subscribed. And we'll have four fellows going into this program who will go on and treat patients in this area going forward. We are very grateful that the legislature has consistently provided this funding for this program. And again, we are requesting that they fund it in the state budget this year. Again, we are also pleased that the governor started applications for the Healer program, which is funded through the eleven fifteen waiver. This is for dentists, includes dentists who treat a significant percentage of Medicaid patients. We'd also like to ask that we expand certain loan repayment programs, including doctors across New York, to include dentists with a commensurate addition of funds for that program to address the needs. Thank you. And

[Blair Horner (Executive Director, NYPIRG)]: Nyberg is based at the state university, the city university, and on independent colleges. We have a dual mission. One is to offer young people an experience in civic engagement, and another is to advance policy advocacy. So that second goal, in the context of that second goal, we've submitted six written testimonies on the budget to you regarding the governor's executive budget. I'm just going to briefly hit some highlights and then talk about higher ed. In our N. Con testimony, we recommended you protect the climate law, that you modernize the bottle bill that would generate as much as a $100,000,000 for the state and save local taxpayers as much as a $100,000,000 annually. Our education testimony focused on the importance of adding state support to public broadcasting to help ensure access to local news. Our health testimony urged that you include the Fair Pricing Act in the budget, which could save $1,000,000,000 in health care costs. We also recommended that you support the establishment of tax equity between cigarettes and other nicotine products and adding non cigarette tobacco products to the mix. Our general government testimony urged that you earmark increases in lobbying fees for improvements in the program as well as pairing it with a measure to increase the lobbying disclosure floor from the current $5,000 a year to $10,000 for nonprofits. We also highlighted the fact that while it's true that insurance premiums and utility rates have risen noticeably, that's true everywhere in the country. We urge that you examine insurance outside of the budget to focus on the root causes of insurance hikes, while urging you to add a utility consumer advocate to better protect utility rate payers. Our higher education testimony urges that you support the governor's proposed tuition freeze for public colleges, that you restore the governor's indefensible cuts to opportunity programs no matter what the dance is, and that you support the capital funding asks of SUNY and CUNY, and that you begin to restore Bundy aid to the independent private colleges. Those institutions, as well as their public counterparts, are key economic anchors and development drivers. The cuts to support Bundy aid have had impact on private colleges. In academic year 'eighty, 'eighty one, the state spent roughly a $115,000,000 on Bundy aid. Today, it spends less than 20. How can that not have an impact on independent colleges and universities? Couple of mentions of TAP. We support expanding the TAP program to cover the full tuition of public college and apply that to graduate students as well. It makes no sense to underinvest in the state's most productive economic development. Thank you.

[Senator Liz Krueger (Chair, Senate Finance Committee)]: Okay.

[Speaker 0]: Thank you. Assembly Member Hyndman? Thank

[Assemblymember Alicia L. Hyndman (Chair, Assembly Higher Education Committee)]: you for waiting. Blair, I think I saw you back the entire time. I'm going to try and get all my questions in. In one of your reports, you recommend expanding the opportunity promise to include all associate degree programs, regardless of major or age. Were there any costs, annual costs associated with that expansion?

[Blair Horner (Executive Director, NYPIRG)]: We did not do an estimate on that expansion. The policy is the policy, which is that we believe it should be as easy as possible for people to afford to go to college and that they have the services to succeed no matter where they are.

[Assemblymember Alicia L. Hyndman (Chair, Assembly Higher Education Committee)]: Okay, thank you. I'm sorry, I just want make sure I get your name right. Jennifer, regarding the New York State Academic Dental Centers, I visited University of Rochester and they said they have a two year wait for Medicaid patients to receive dental care. And I just found that utterly horrible because I'm thinking about all of the individuals that are not getting care in two years and what could happen detrimental to their health. If we appropriate $750,000 how many fellows do you think that could fund annually?

[Jennifer Tesler (VP, Government Relations & Strategic Affairs, NYS Academic Dental Centers)]: Currently, we have that pegged to about four fellows. Again, we're placing one fellow in each school. It is a lot, but it's really about training a fellow. They're working for a full year. They're providing care and they're learning. Plus, there is a service commitment on the back end. So they will work for a year in New York State, and they'll have to care for a significant portion of patients with IDD.

[Assemblymember Phara Souffrant Forrest]: J. Okay.

[Assemblymember Alicia L. Hyndman (Chair, Assembly Higher Education Committee)]: For the dentist loan repayment program, what do you think the cost will be for the state to fund that?

[Jennifer Tesler (VP, Government Relations & Strategic Affairs, NYS Academic Dental Centers)]: J. I'm not sure of a cap. I know Doctors Across New York is a very widely popular program. I don't imagine it would be quite as large. But I can look into it and get back to you and see what the need would be.

[Assemblymember Alicia L. Hyndman (Chair, Assembly Higher Education Committee)]: Okay. Thank you very much. Thank you all for your testimony today.

[Senator Dean Murray]: Thank you.

[Senator Liz Krueger (Chair, Senate Finance Committee)]: Senator Murray.

[Senator Dean Murray]: Thank you, chairwoman. Thank you all for toughing it out and waiting this long. And Ms. Altman, great to see you again. Thank you for all your great work. A couple of questions. So you mentioned the restoration of prior reductions. How much was that?

[Speaker 27]: So the restoration and increase or restoration J.

[Senator Dean Murray]: Just the restoration. Well, how much was that?

[Speaker 27]: How J. Much was J. That?

[Senator Dean Murray]: 3%?

[Speaker 27]: J. L. So right now, it's proposed at a 3% in the governor's.

[Félix V. Matos Rodríguez (Chancellor, City University of New York)]: J. L.

[Senator Dean Murray]: Okay. The 20% increase to stabilize the base awards, first off, what amount would that be? And would that make you whole?

[Speaker 27]: J. Yeah. So a restoration and 20% increase would be about $5,000,000 J.

[Félix V. Matos Rodríguez (Chancellor, City University of New York)]: $5,000,000

[Senator Dean Murray]: Okay. And then, again, we were talking about the gaps and the problems in there. I'm understanding or trying to understand, I believe it's through the FS10 approval process is where the delays lie. But have you specifically identified where? I mean, a place we should be targeting here to help speed this up?

[Speaker 27]: I mean, I think there's a few ways to tackle it, in my opinion. So we're typically awarded like a five year grant. And each year of that five year, we have to submit an FS-ten, which is our proposed budget how we're going to spend the monies allocated for that year of the five years. And then we have to submit amendments to that, whether it's an increase or decrease. And also, if we want to move monies from, let's say, supplies to purchase services to provide direct services to students, right? So now imagine it's our 51 programs from all the other opportunity programs. And now you have hundreds of FS-10s. And they tend to bottleneck, right? They have to go through state ed. They also have to go to the contract admin and grants finance. And as I understand it, I think we're just short staffed sometimes and turnovers and, yeah, just.

[Senator Dean Murray]: J. If it's just amending something, would it make sense to maybe put a limit on, for example, that it would automatically be approved if it's under a certain amount or a certain adjustment? Would that make sense? Would that speed up the process? Just trying to see how we could speed it. Because I understand exactly where you're coming from here. We have similar problems to our public schools in Suffolk County, where their tax collection with the county doesn't match up with when they get their money. And they end up having to borrow, which costs hundreds of thousands of dollars. We don't want to put you in that position. So where can we O'Hare: focus?

[Speaker 0]: Or could we maybe you guys make suggestions and submit that to us?

[Speaker 27]: I think so. And I appreciate that. Sure.

[Speaker 23]: J. M.

[Senator Dean Murray]: Okay. All right. Well, you very much. Thank you.

[Speaker 0]: J. Yes, Assemblyman M. Pallasamo.

[Assemblymember Phil Palmesano]: J. Hi. Good evening. Thanks for sticking it out. It's been a long day, so appreciate you. Actually, question I wasn't going to ask a question, but it was for Jennifer when you started talking about on the dental side of things. I've recently met with University of Rochester, and we've talked about Eastman and really the need for dental services for lower income, people without insurance, people on Medicaid, and how Eastman is really the only provider in Upstate New York and most of Upstate, and you have downstate. What, from your perspective I don't know if this is the right hearing for this, but just since you're here in the last panel, I appreciate the input. What can we do to help provide get more access to dental services? Whether do we need more providers to accept Medicaid? Is it the Medicaid reimbursement rate? Is it a combination thereof to be able to provide critical dental and oral health care to individuals? Because as you know, dental, if you have dental problems, that creates other health problems. So I'd just really like to get your take on it. What can we do better to help you be a better partner so we can try to expand access to dental services for all New Yorkers, especially the less fortunate.

[Jennifer Tesler (VP, Government Relations & Strategic Affairs, NYS Academic Dental Centers)]: J. Sure, absolutely. And this is something we've worked very closely with Eastman on. The main thing that we've been looking for just to sort of stabilize the academic dental centers, because they serve as such a critical safety net for this population, is a targeted Medicaid rate increase. We've typically been asking health for that, but happy to talk about it here. We've been asking to increase the Medicaid rate by about $300 We've done a retrospective survey and seen that cost for the dental schools has really risen sort of astronomically in the past five years, while Medicaid rates have remained stable, if not declined. So that's really been it's put the schools in a very uncomfortable position where they are losing funds. And that contributes to some of the waits. They are fully committed to seeing these patients and taking care of them. They are in the best position to care for the most complex patients, the sickest patients. But that does lead to tremendous wait times. The dental schools see about seventy percent to ninety percent of patients on Medicaid. So their payer mix is tough. So that's something we're looking for. We've also worked with Schuyler Center on a lot of their recommendations to increase access around the oral health workforce. We're committed to producing dentists and trying to get them to work in areas where they are needed and to accept Medicaid. But that is difficult, I will say.

[Senator Toby Ann Stavisky (Chair, Senate Higher Education Committee)]: All right.

[Senator Tom O'Mara (Ranking Member, Senate Finance Committee)]: Thank you

[Speaker 23]: very much.

[Assemblymember Phil Palmesano]: Appreciate it.

[Speaker 0]: Thank you.

[Assemblymember Alicia L. Hyndman (Chair, Assembly Higher Education Committee)]: Toby? No?

[Senator Liz Krueger (Chair, Senate Finance Committee)]: Okay. I want to follow-up on dental. So I think you said it before, but I didn't hear it. What is the amount that each student gets, and how long is their obligation?

[Jennifer Tesler (VP, Government Relations & Strategic Affairs, NYS Academic Dental Centers)]: J. So they have it's a two year obligation. So the first year is the advanced training, and the second year is a service obligation. So they'll work somewhere in a setting where they're caring for patients with IDD. The fellow receives a salary during the training year, which is what the funding goes to. We actually have had several years where we had difficulty recruiting. And one of the big things we've seen is the differential between what a fellow receives in their PGY-two year and what dentist can make out in practice. So we raised the salary to $150,000 including benefits for that training year. And that really increased our application rate. We actually were oversubscribed on our applications, and we'll have a full cohort of

[Senator Liz Krueger (Chair, Senate Finance Committee)]: So if I analysis this. I understand this right. So you basically need that year of training if you're just going to be a dentist?

[Jennifer Tesler (VP, Government Relations & Strategic Affairs, NYS Academic Dental Centers)]: No. This is advanced training. This is dealing with patients with special needs, particularly intellectual and developmental disabilities. Okay. Is something that is extremely specialized and really something that not

[Senator Liz Krueger (Chair, Senate Finance Committee)]: a J. It lot doesn't of require people that you continue to serve those patients beyond that two year time frame?

[Jennifer Tesler (VP, Government Relations & Strategic Affairs, NYS Academic Dental Centers)]: J. It doesn't require that. But these are practitioners who are interested in doing this. That's part of our application process. We're really looking for practitioners who want to do this. And it's not likely that a dentist would undergo this type of advanced training without the promise of higher salary on the back end, which is not really what they're looking for. And the fellows we have had go through the program all multiple years after their service year have continued to work in settings with high numbers of patients in Medicaid and patients with special needs.

[Senator Liz Krueger (Chair, Senate Finance Committee)]: So I've got to tell you, I'm torn on this because I do know that there's real difficulty finding dentists who will serve lower income people, people with developmental disabilities. I know it took me forever to find a dentist who would take care of AIDS patients because of just sheer like, I don't think I want to put my hands in those mouths, right? And bias. But I also know that dentists are, I think, the highest paid professionals in this country. And again, you know, that's a significant amount of money per year.

[Jennifer Tesler (VP, Government Relations & Strategic Affairs, NYS Academic Dental Centers)]: It is.

[Senator Liz Krueger (Chair, Senate Finance Committee)]: And so if it's just really, you know, slightly increasing how many people will do this kind of work over the long term for getting two years of 100 is it $150,000 per No, no.

[Jennifer Tesler (VP, Government Relations & Strategic Affairs, NYS Academic Dental Centers)]: It's single. It's a single year. The second year is a service obligation. So they're working. They'll receive a salary from wherever they're working. It's not state funding.

[Senator Liz Krueger (Chair, Senate Finance Committee)]: Okay. Thank you.

[Unidentified timekeeper/clerk]: But I will say that can I continue?

[Senator Liz Krueger (Chair, Senate Finance Committee)]: Finish. Finish sentence.

[Unidentified timekeeper/clerk]: A practitioner who undergoes this kind of training, the impact that they provide is much larger than just the patients that they're seeing. It's really also that they're teaching. What we are hoping is that practitioners will feel more comfortable taking care of these patients in the community. And that's part of this cyclical effect. More practitioners who are highly competent can help train those who are maybe less comfortable and refer patients to a center like Eastman, which contributes to the large waiting list.

[Senator Liz Krueger (Chair, Senate Finance Committee)]: Thank you. Sorry I didn't have questions. I missed time to ask other people questions.

[Speaker 0]: Want to thank you all for your testimony today. This concludes this

[Senator John C. Liu]: section of

[Speaker 0]: the hearing, which is the final panel. So I want tell everyone that's out there, if you're watching us, stay tuned tomorrow, 09:30. We'll be here doing labor and workforce development. Other than that, I want to close this hearing. Thank you all very much. Thank you.

[Senator Liz Krueger (Chair, Senate Finance Committee)]: Drive carefully if you're going anywhere.