Yesterday, the Senate and Assembly conducted its first virtual hearings to examine the federal response to the economic impact of the Covid-19 pandemic in New York state. Representatives from many industries testified regarding their experiences seeking aid through federal programs created by recent stimulus packages.

“While I welcome any opportunity to connect with small business owners, colleagues and other community stakeholders I do take some issue with the way the Assembly Majority framed yesterday’s online hearing. While we all agree that the Paycheck Protection Program and other elements of the federal stimulus package were executed imperfectly, state government has plenty of problems to tackle, plenty of our own approaches to evaluate and plenty of things we know we should’ve done differently.

“That’s why I was so pleased that my colleagues on the Minority side highlighted concrete proposals our Conference has released that were all ignored by state Majority. Our Small Business Emergency Relief Act would’ve provided millions of dollars in emergency grants, loans, and regulatory relief for small businesses. We petitioned the federal government for aid for our farmers. We released a comprehensive plan to safely reopen our economy weeks ago that complied with CDC guidelines and demanded collaboration between the private sector and public health officials.

“We haven’t been blaming Washington. We’ve been working hard. I’m hopeful that the Majority will heed our calls to hold similar hearings on the Department of Labor’s inefficient handling of unemployment claims and on the alarming number of fatalities in our nursing homes,” said Ra.