By Howard Koplowitz
State Sen. Tony Avella (D-Bayside) may be one of 62 senators, but the lawmaker said he has a stronger voice among his colleagues than when he was on the City Council, where he was one of 51 legislators — 48 of them Democrats.
“I have more influence in Albany than I’ve had in the City Council,” Avella said last Thursday during an interview at the Bayside offices of TimesLedger Newspapers, explaining that Council Speaker Christine Quinn (D-Manhattan) wields more power than Senate leaders because the state body is more evenly divided among the two parties.
Avella said he and other freshman senators from both sides of the aisle as well as Gov. Andrew Cuomo ran on reforming Albany — dubbed the most dysfunctional legislature in the country — and their progress is starting to be felt.
“We’re all sort of new and we want to change things,” he said. “The beginning of the fresh blood is starting to make a change.”
Avella said there is more discussion among his Democratic colleagues in the Senate and that he stopped going to Democratic conference meetings in the Council because Quinn “would just do what she wanted.”
Avella, who defeated 38-year incumbent Republican Frank Padavan in November 2010, also said Albany has more of an impact on how Mayor Michael Bloomberg governs than the other way around, with just the threat of a state law passing putting enough pressure on Bloomberg to act in the city.
“Up in Albany, the mayor does not have the influence whatsoever that he has down here,” Avella said.
While Avella ran on a reform platform and the state has taken steps to be more transparent in the areas of ethics reform, he said more should be done, including limiting legislators’ outside income.
“There still needs to be more openness,” he said.
Avella also said there should be campaign finance reform, pointing out that state legislators can receive higher contributions to their campaigns than mayoral candidates and lobbyists are not required to disclose that they are bundling contributions from many donors.
With the state in financial trouble, Avella is advocating for a one-time “true millionaire’s tax,” which he said would raise $4 billion and affect 79,000 tax filers with incomes exceeding $1 million. Previous versions of the charge were known as a “millionaire’s tax,” but those making $200,000 a year or more were included .
Avella said the argument that millionaires would leave the state if the tax were put into effect does not carry water because of the 79,000 affected, 39,000 of them do not live in the state.
The senator said he is also in favor of legalizing sports betting to raise revenue, claiming organized crime takes in $300 billion a year through sports betting, which Avella said is used to fund their illegal activities.
Avella said being a state senator has given him more visibility when it comes to the media — he said more television crews cover his news conferences since he made the switch from councilman to senator — but calls from constituents are mostly the same, except from a few who now contact him more about state legislation.
“Most of the calls are still ‘fix my pothole,’” he said.
Reach reporter Howard Koplowitz by e-mail at hkoplowitz@cnglocal.com or by phone at 718-260-4573.
