Mayor de Blasio’s hand-picked City Council speaker, Melissa Mark-Viverito, rushed to his defense Tuesday in a battle that sets him up against Gov. Cuomo on expanding pre-kindergarten programming.
Mark-Viverito, who vaulted to the head of the legislature with the mayor’s strong backing after
some bitter Democratic Party infighting
, took a “let’s all work together” tone in a statement on Cuomo’s $142 billion spending plan.
But she made clear that she sides with de Blasio, who said Tuesday he still believes a tax hike on the rich — which Cuomo didn’t include in his executive budget —
.
“Our goal, and Mayor de Blasio’s, is to ensure that every four-year-old in New York City has access to pre-k as soon as possible, with a funding stream in place to ensure that promise is fulfilled in the future,” Mark-Viverito said on behalf of the Council.
She said de Blasio’s plan for what she called a “modest” tax hike on high earners “has the support of a wide spectrum of New Yorkers – including many in [the] business community who would pay the increase.
“We will analyze the governor’s funding proposal, but we believe the best way to fulfill the promise to our children is to enact the mayor’s plan.”
Cuomo’s budget,
as first reported by the Daily News
, includes $1.5 billion to support statewide, full-day pre-k over a five-year stretch.
State Assembly Speaker Sheldon Silver, like Mark-Viverito a Manhattan Democrat, on Tuesday
to go along with Cuomo’s program if his conference feels confident it provides ample funding to sustain pre-kindergarten in the long term without boosting taxes.
IMAGE: BEBETO MATTHEWS/AP
Update:
Via John Kenny of
, here’s de Blasio’s press conference from earlier in which he addresses questions regarding Cuomo’s budget, and explains why he thinks the public would still like to see him press for the tax increase. The mayor takes the question about the News story at about 9:54 in the clip.
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