#Andrew Cuomo backs off on tax hikes to cover COVID-19 revenue losses

ALBANY — Gov. Andrew Cuomo walked back threats from last week that he would raise taxes on the state’s wealthiest should Washington fail to grant additional federal aid to state and local governments hit hard by COVID-19.

“If Washington does not step up to the plate here and get us financial aid, we are going to be in a whole world of hurt for a long time. This state, between the state and the local governments we need about $50 billion,” the governor said Tuesday during an interview with Long Island Radio.

New York budget officials have estimated a high of $59 billion is needed over the next two years to close the state and local governments’ budget deficits, as well as those of the MTA and the Port Authority.

“People say, ‘Oh well, raise taxes, raise taxes.’ I raise taxes, it puts the state at a competitive disadvantage because people can go to other states and taxes are very high in this state to begin with,” he argued.

“But OK, raise taxes, if we went to the highest income tax in the country, which is now California, we’d raise a couple of billion dollars. Couple of billion dollars? We have a $50 billion hole! What am I going to do with a couple of billion dollars, so Washington has to step up and stop the politics and just get it done.”

Cuomo has previously shied away from hiking taxes, but last Thursday threatened that an increase could be inevitable, given the Empire State’s budget crisis.

New York City already has the highest combined state and local income tax rate, at 12.7 percent, according to the Tax Foundation think tank.

But state Senate Majority Leader Andrea Stewart-Cousins (D-Westchester) and Assembly Speaker Carl Heastie (D-Bronx) have said they would support tax increases to stave off cuts to state education and health budgets.

New York City Mayor Bill de Blasio is actively lobbying state lawmakers to approve a $5 billion loan to cover Gotham’s coronavirus costs, an idea Cuomo has said he’s not keen on.

The city’s top business leaders have also taken matters into their own hands, a sign of waning confidence in the governor and mayor’s attempts, appealing directly to President Trump in a letter Monday.

The third-term Democrat also put the damper on reopening expectations for indoor concert venues and other entertainment zones like comedy clubs — dubbing the industries “high risk” and “least essential.”

“When you look back at what we did, the most essential businesses with the lowest risk we did first,” he explained of New York’s reopening plan.

“My good friend Billy Joel, he was doing Madison Square Garden — when will we get back to Madison Square Garden. Those large arenas pose the greatest risk. Even if you say every two seats, every three seats, yeah, but you’re still channeling people in and out of a corridor.”

He then added: “How essential is a comedy club when you’re talking about a possible infection rate? Not to offend people in a comedy club and Lord knows we need to laugh — but those are the calibrations we’re making.”

Other industries like movie theaters — which have reopened already in New Jersey — and live acting on Broadway also have yet to gain the green light for reopening.