2011: The year in review

January 2011 began with all eyes on Gov. Andrew Cuomo’s first legislative session and the lofty goals he had promised to achieve before session ended in June.

While campaigning, Cuomo had vowed to place the first-ever cap on local property taxes, legalize same-sex marriage in the state and oversee on-time state budgets (he had criticized former Gov. David Paterson for his habit of passing budget extensions). To much praise, Cuomo delivered on all those promises before session ended that year.

After Cuomo’s successes, many political observers hailed him as a governor that had long been needed to restore credibility to Albany and reign in the state’s spending. Cuomo additionally closed a $9 billion deficit with caps on education and health care spending.

In 2011, Cuomo would have to have his first round of negotiations on the future of rent regulation laws with state Senate Majority Leader Dean Skelos and Assembly Speaker Sheldon Silver. Skelos had also begun his first year as majority leader after Republicans regained control of the chamber.

Both Skelos and Silver would be arrested and convicted of corruption charges four years later – and Silver’s bribery case prosecutors would allege that a luxury developer implicated in his bribery scheme requested changes to the law. However, at the time, the changes to the rent control laws were heralded by some as a victory for tenants.

Arguably Cuomo’s biggest fight that year was the effort to legalize same-sex marriage in New York. Cuomo and other Democratic lawmakers needed to sway some Republican members to vote in favor of the bill for it to pass in the state Senate. Ultimately Democrats were successful in luring four Republicans to vote in favor while one Democrat, state Sen. Ruben Diaz Sr., an evangelical preacher, voted against it and the bill ultimately passed.

Starting in late May, U.S. Rep. Anthony Weiner became embroiled in a three-week-long sexting scandal. The Democratic congressman ultimately resigned in disgrace after it became public that he had sent explicit pictures of himself to women online.

New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg faced political pressure to deal with the new Occupy Wall Street protesters, who spent two months living in tents and tarps in the financial district in Lower Manhattan in an effort to bring attention to income inequality. Citing public health and safety, he ultimately ordered New York City police to raid and evict the protesters from Zuccotti Park in November, a move he was both praised and criticized for.

OUR COVERAGE: Nearing the end of Cuomo’s first successful legislative session, Adam Lisberg in The Capitol’s June 13 issue profiled the “three men in the room” and their end-of-session negotiations.

Later that year, Laura Nahmias exposed Assemblyman William Boyland’s abuse of the Legislature’s per diem system by tracking his online game-playing on Facebook, while Chris Bragg dug into Public Advocate Bill de Blasio’s efforts to curb corporate influence in politics even as he accepted the support of billionaire benefactor George Soros.

In City & State’s first issue in December, Andrew Hawkins publishes “After Zuccotti,” analyzing the Occupy Wall Street movement’s would impact on New York City politics.