ウィスパリング同時通訳研究会コミュのGovernor Hochul Delivers 2022 State of the State Address

Thank you, Lieutenant Governor. You have been doing an outstanding job in such a short time and I’m proud to have you by my side as we deliver for the people of New York.
I also want to thank my partners in government. State Comptroller Tom DiNapoli, State Attorney General Tish James, Senate Majority Leader Andrea Stewart-Cousins, Assembly Majority Leader Crystal Peoples-Stokes, and I hope Speaker of the Assembly Carl Heastie gets well soon.
And thank you to Pastor Soloman Dees and to Allie Navarette, for representing the Girl Scouts so well.
As I stand before you, I am well aware of the significance of this moment: the first time in New York’s history that a woman has delivered this annual address. But I didn’t come here to make history. I came to make a difference.
To be sure, I have a deep reverence for our State’s remarkable past. And we’re honoring it by coming together in this beautiful Assembly Chamber, its original, and rightful, setting with elected leaders, joined together to serve the public.
I’m fond of quoting a former member of this body, and one-time Governor, Teddy Roosevelt, who said: “It’s not the critic who counts… The credit belongs to the man – or, shall we say, the woman – who is actually in the arena.”
To my colleagues and partners in government, for too long, Albany’s Executive and Legislative branches were fighting each other in that arena. No more. That ends now.
What I am proposing is a whole New Era for New York. The days of Governors disregarding the rightful role of this legislature are over. The days of the Governor of New York and Mayor of New York City wasting time on petty rivalries are over. The days of New Yorkers questioning whether their government is actually working for them are over.
And the days of three men in a room are clearly over – just ask the Majority Leader.
We know that women are always held to a higher standard. So I know that I must not just meet but exceed expectations for this to no longer be an historic achievement… but rather the norm. So we will do things differently. From now on: we will share success. We will find common ground. We will restore trust in this government, because it has been eroded for far too long. And we will fight like hell – not for turf…not for credit – but for New Yorkers.
I’ve been proud to stand with the members of this legislature, signing more than 400 of your bills into law since September. And we’re just getting started.

New Yorkers need the help of everyone in this room to pass an ambitious agenda. One that responds to the Covid-19 pandemic but also rebuilds our healthcare and teacher workforces, provides tax relief to those who need it most, speeds up economic growth and creates good paying, middle-class jobs, strengthens our infrastructure and confronts climate change, secures public safety, makes housing more affordable, ensures every New Yorker has a roof over their heads and enacts bold reforms for our State government.
My fellow New Yorkers: This agenda is for you.
Every single initiative is filtered through the lens of how it will help you and your families. I know you’re exhausted, I know you want this pandemic to be over, I know you’re worried about the economy, inflation, your kids and their education and what the future holds.
We’ve endured so much hardship over these past two years. We’ve buried loved ones, experienced seismic shifts in our daily lives and missed out on so many of life’s precious milestones – holidays, weddings, graduations,the birth of a grandchild.
There has been so much loss – of too many lives, and of too many of our hopes and dreams. And now, just when we thought we were turning a corner, there’s a new variant. Another surge in cases. It feels like déjà vu.

And I know you’re all asking: Will we ever get through this?

Yes. We will.

We’re New Yorkers. We’ve been knocked down before. We’ve been counted out. And in response, we never fail to defy the odds and rise to new heights.
New York always rises from the ashes. That is why I believe that this is not a moment of despair….but a moment of great possibility. Because while we are in the midst of an all-consuming crisis we must also remember that if we make the right choices, right now it will end.
But first, we must weather the storm around us. That means controlling this virus and not letting it control us.
When I took office, we immediately enacted a comprehensive pandemic plan and we’ve continued to adapt as new variants like Omicron have emerged. We’re doing everything we can to keep New Yorkers healthy: setting policies that have made our vaccination rate one of the highest in the country, activating a military-style operation with vax and test sites, deploying the National Guard to our hospitals and nursing homes and sending out 37 million tests across the state.
During this winter surge, our laser focus is on keeping our kids in school, businesses open and New Yorkers’ lives as normal as possible.
We are attacking this virus head-on, armed with a tactical, science-based approach and we are ready for whatever comes next.
But as we all know too well, this is more than a public health crisis. We now need to support the people, places and industries hit hardest starting with the New Yorkers who have been on the frontlines since day one.
During those terrifying early months, while many hunkered down at home our healthcare workers and first responders showed up, day after day, night after night, double shift after double shift, putting their lives on the line to save others.
They’re not only physically exhausted – they’re emotionally exhausted too. I’ve seen it in their eyes, in hospitals from Buffalo to Potsdam just last week.
That exhaustion combined with pre-existing staffing shortages, has resulted in a crisis. We simply do not have enough healthcare workers in our hospitals or in our long-term care facilities in our ambulances or in the homes of our loved ones.

The health of every New Yorker depends on a strong, stable, and equitable healthcare system and healthcare workers are its very foundation. Bold action is required – before any more time passes.

First, we must stop the current hemorrhaging of healthcare workers and we’re going to do it not just by SAYING we owe them a debt of gratitude but actually PAYING them the debt we owe, starting with a retention bonus of up to $3,000 to our health and direct care workers and we will drive higher salaries throughout the healthcare workforce, so those doing God’s work here on earth are no longer doing it for minimum wage.

Beyond salary, we will make it easier for doctors and nurses from other States to practice with their existing licenses here in New York. We’ll expand the capacity of our medical institutions so more students can train for high-demand healthcare jobs, and we’ll make it possible for them to get that training with free tuition and stipends if they remain here after they graduate.

A once-in-a-lifetime pandemic demands a once-in-a-lifetime response:

That’s why I’m setting an ambitious goal to grow our healthcare workforce by 20% over the next five years. And we will make the largest investment in healthcare in State history, $10 billion dollars. As we bolster our bone-tired healthcare workforce, we know they aren’t the only heroes of the pandemic.

I am so grateful to the county leaders, school superintendents, administrators, parents and teachers for working so closely with us … to get kids back to school this week.

The role of a teacher is irreplaceable in a child’s life and as the past two years have hammered home, they’re irreplaceable in a parent’s life, too.

As a mother, I know this first hand. This workforce is also stressed and overworked. So we will ramp up efforts to recruit and retain teachers – with more effective training and support, faster and easier certification, and stronger career pipelines and ladders.

And we will add more mental health professionals in schools to heal the wounds inflicted during the isolation of remote learning. Others are hurting as well. Families, small business owners, farmers – they all need our help. They need it now and they’re going to get it.

We will accelerate a $1.2 billion-dollar tax cut originally scheduled to take effect between now and 2025, so that it all occurs earlier. That means more than 6 million middle-class taxpayers get more money in their pockets sooner at a time when inflation is robbing them of any gains in income.
To help with property taxes, we will provide a $1 billion middle-class property tax rebate to more than 2 million homeowners. And to help parents get back to work, we’re going to expand access to affordable childcare to 100,000 more working families and invest $75 million in childcare worker wages.
We will also deliver $100 million in much-needed relief to nearly 200,000 small businesses, to keep their doors open and weather what the next few months bring. These businesses are the economic engines of small towns and big cities alike, they’re what make our communities unique and give them personality.
I should know, I’ve shopped and eaten in diners in most of them.
I also helped my mother open a flower shop and my sister start a small tech company, so I know firsthand how hard it is. I know the risks taken by owners and entrepreneurs, and the barriers faced by women. So many small businesses were pushed to the brink. Thousands of bars and restaurants – the souls of our neighborhoods – have had to close.
For others, hanging on by a thread, survival depends on whether they can create more space outdoors, a tough task during our New York winters. To help offset these costs, we will provide a tax credit for COVID-related purchases, like outdoor heaters and seating. And we’re also going to do something bars and restaurants have been asking for….to once again allow the sale of to-go drinks – a critical revenue stream during the lean times last year.

Cheers, New York.
The farmers who supply restaurant kitchens – and our own – need a lifeline as well. I’ve visited farms from Genesee County to the North Fork of Long Island, and life is tough, even in good years. So we’re going to support them through a tax credit for the overtime hours they are paying, an increase in the Investment Tax Credit and an extension and doubling of the Farm Workforce Retention Credit.
This will also begin to address the workforce shortage so many farms struggle with.
This is how we will begin to help healthcare workers, educators, small businesses, farms and families deal with the devastating economic impacts of COVID.
But beyond the pandemic, my agenda reflects my belief that we cannot allow the virus to grip us so tightly that it constrains us from looking to the future. Longing for a simple return to our pre-pandemic world and way of life would not only be timid and unimaginative. It would ignore our history and go against everything that makes New York, New York.
If we can’t embrace the possibilities that come out of times like these, then we fail to honor the legacy of the daring, visionary New Yorkers who came before us.
The portrait of Franklin Roosevelt that hangs above the mantle in the Governor’s residence is my daily reminder of what leadership during a crisis is all about. First as Governor, and then as President, FDR literally rebuilt the economy from the ground up after the crash of ‘29. More than giving people jobs, he gave people hope.
The policies of his New Deal didn’t just help families who lost everything, they spurred decades of economic growth and the birth of the middle class. Again and again, he focused on the storm swirling around him, but kept one eye on the horizon, always planning for the day when the clouds would part.
That is exactly what we are doing now. This pandemic did not create all the problems we’re facing today. It simply forced us to hold up a mirror and see the cracks in our society that had been too easy to ignore before. This crisis has created an opportunity to redefine ourselves – and we must embrace it.
But as we embark on this New Era for our State, we need to take a hard look in that mirror and deal with harsh realities. Like the fact that 300,000 New Yorkers left our State last year. That’s the steepest population drop of ANY State in the nation, an alarm bell that cannot be ignored. To those who left temporarily because of the pandemic or are trying to decide their next steps during these uncertain times, I have one message: you do not want to miss what’s going to happen next.
Right now, in real time, we are building a new New York worthy of your talents and ambitions. We’re going to jumpstart our economic recovery by being the most business-friendly and worker-friendly State in the nation.
To entice people and businesses, we’re investing millions of dollars to transform the downtowns of our cities into magnets for new jobs and new opportunities and position both legacy and emerging industries for success.
New York is already home to some of the most consequential industries in the world. Finance, retail, healthcare, technology, fashion, entertainment, just to name a few.
But there is plenty of room for growth. More shovel-ready sites for new manufacturers and warehouses, improvements in our freight infrastructure and investments in the technology that will power the jobs of the future. And we’re going to make sure we have a workforce trained to step into these jobs.
That’s why we will invest smartly and strategically in workforce development programs which simply means matching people to training, to jobs.
I know the demand is strong. At every one of the thousands of workplaces I’ve visited, the universal complaint is not having enough trained workers. Every single place, it’s the same.
That’s why we will reboot our Workforce Development Office, house it in Empire State Development so we can build stronger partnerships with employers and move funding through our Regional Economic Development Councils so we grow programs that train for jobs that are actually in demand in different parts of the State.
And the smart way to do it is to have school districts, community colleges, SUNY and CUNY all focused on the same objectives.
We are going to incentivize success, by tying a portion of workforce funding to high job placement rates. We’re also going to make it easier to qualify as an MWBE, so everyone can have access to opportunities. It’s a commonsense approach, backed by an uncommon level of funding. And it’s going to help supercharge our economy.
Our goal is for New York to be known nationally as the place that grows and attracts the talent – and the businesses will follow. And for businesses to succeed, they need a well-trained and educated workforce.