The New York State Executive Budget for Fiscal Year 2016-2017 included proposals to invest $25 million in an upstate antipoverty initiative, turn every failing school into a community school, increase the minimum wage to $15 an hour, create a 12‐week Paid Family Leave program in New York, and invest in children’s mental health services. The Governor also made several important proposals aimed at reducing homelessness, including the creation of 20,000 new supportive housing beds over the next 15 years and increasing the number of emergency shelter beds.

In addition, Governor Cuomo’s budget proposal once again advances raising the age of criminal responsibility in New York, so that New York will stop prosecuting all 16 and 17 year olds as adults regardless of the alleged crime. “We are quicker to find a sixteen‐year old a jail cell than a job interview, and that is just wrong,” the Governor said. CCC will be working with the Governor’s office and the Legislature so that this can be the year we finally improve public safety and raise the age!

CCC provides a detailed summary of the proposals related to children and categorizes them as positive, negative or requiring further assessment by CCC.

For more information about the New York State Budget process, you may also read our one-page guide, New York State Budget 101