Lottery revenue keeps going up, topping out at $8.44 billion in the past year according to New York Lottery figures released today. Nearly $2.9 billion went to state education spending. The figure represents roughly 15 percent of total state aid to local school districts. (The lottery’s fiscal year ends March 31.) That’s a lot of losing QuickDraw… ⧸ Full Story
To mark May Day, Occupy Wall Street has declared today a general strike, and protests are planned for many locations in midtown and lower Manhattan. Already, we’ve seen and filed numerous reports of public parks and plazas, as well as privately owned public spaces, barricaded against public entry. Whether you’re a pedestrian, protester or both, this map will… ⧸ Full Story
State ends money-making off 'tenant blacklist,' but private vendors continue to sell litigants' information ⧸ Full Story
City Department of Information Technology and Telecommunications opens guidelines and tech specifications to revision and scrutiny ⧸ Full Story
Last week, Governor Cuomo issued an executive order creating a state health insurance exchange, after State Senate Republicans repeatedly blocked legislative efforts to create an exchange as mandated in the federal Affordable Care Ac. New York is now among 16 states that have created exchanges through executive order, according to the National Conference on State… ⧸ Full Story
Last week, the New York City Taxi and Limousine Corporation unveiled the Taxi of Tomorrow. It features biker-friendly sliding doors, anti-microbial seats and, to much acclaim, a power outlet and two USB ports to charge electronics. But how safe is it to connect your phone via USB to any old port in a cab? After all, smartphone USB cables… ⧸ Full Story
Using details on recent real estate sales, we calculate the value to developers of the public plazas on their property ⧸ Full Story
Bronx Defenders survey of hundreds arrested for possession finds most were improperly forced to show drugs to police ⧸ Full Story
The Metropolitan Transportation Authority, the behemoth that runs not only the city’s subways and buses but also commuter rail and many of the region’s bridges and tunnels, sure looks like a winner this week. Under a state budget deal it will receive $13.1 billion to fully fund its capital plan, which pays for projects like… ⧸ Full Story
Between midnight and dawn last Thursday, Governor Andrew Cuomo used emergency measures to push a major package of laws through the state legislature. So-called “messages of necessity” were designed to be used only during emergencies and bypass the normal three-day waiting period that allows the public and press to review bills before the legislature takes… ⧸ Full Story
Proposed congressional districts from a federal judge show significant differences from those drawn by state legislators ⧸ Full Story
A deadline has come and gone for a promised peek at Andrew Cuomo's attorney general records ⧸ Full Story
A timeline of the redistricting process so far ⧸ Full Story
It’s Sunshine Week – a time to ask how well government is living up to its obligations to make information available to the public. This year New York’s standards took a major leap forward thanks to a new enhancement to the state’s Open Meetings Law: public agencies are now required to release documents under discussion at… ⧸ Full Story
Redistricting splits Brooklyn's Russian-speaking immigrants, some of whom see an attack on democracy and their own political advancement ⧸ Full Story
Next time you use a mobile subway or bus schedule app, thank Sarah Kaufman, who brought the MTA into the era of public technology ⧸ Full Story
A federal court is likely to draw district lines for Congress — including those for Rep. Charles Rangel, who until now has represented Upper Manhattan ⧸ Full Story
Yesterday, the New York City Council passed the most comprehensive municipal open data bill in the country. Intro 29A will require all city agencies to publish public datasets online in machine-readable formats and provide APIs. The first datasets will be released a year from now and the process will continue through 2018. But this isn’t the first open data… ⧸ Full Story
Intro 29A requires city agencies to make information available for use in websites and apps — but not until 2018 ⧸ Full Story
Which cities supply financial data to tech developers? The office of New York City Comptroller John Liu recently revealed that it is developing Checkbook NYC 2.0, which would greatly expand on the information already publicly available via the Comptroller’s website on the city’s payments to contractors and other recipients of funds. As first reported in… ⧸ Full Story
