Can Albany Be Reformed? Also, New Yorkers Don't Care for Spitzer as Mayor in 2013

NEW YORK

• New York awaits more reform (by Jim McGrath, Albany Times Union/The Observation Deck) The portion of the budget that funds legislative operations specifically includes $1.5 million for LATFOR. Yet this would have been the ideal time to instead put that money toward the independent redistricting commission that so many legislators profess to support.
• Andrew Cuomo, the press and the war on partisan redistricting (BY JOSH BENSON, Capital) The danger, for anyone interested in putting an end to a process that protects unresponsive officials, is not that Cuomo will fail to get the legislature to go along with him; it is that he will cut a deal, in exchange for something else he wants, that would allow the legislature to keep a firmer hand in the process of drawing electoral lines than the reform proposal currently calls for.
• New Yorkers prefer Spitzer not run for mayor: poll (Reuters) Almost two-thirds of New Yorkers do not want disgraced former New York state governor Eliot Spitzer to run for mayor of their city in 2013, a new poll found on Friday.

New York Independent Redistricting Close to Being Put on the Shelf

The fight for independent redistricting rages on in New York, however both the State Senate and Assembly approved funding for partisan redistricting committees under LATFOR. Reform advocates continue to press Gov. Cuomo to veto this budget to keep independent redistricting at the forefront.

NEW YORK REDISTRICTING

• Independent Commission Still Uncertain, Assembly And Senate Approve Funding For Partisan Redistricting (By Andrew J. Hawkins, City Hall News) While the battle for the creation of an independent redistricting commission rages on, the Legislature is on track to approve funding for the same partisan, lawmaker-driven redistricting taskforce it has been using for years.