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ALBANY, NY State Senator Greg Ball spent his four years as a state Assembly member railing against the establishment, but in his first year in the Senate the Republican from Patterson found to his surprise both major parties are actually working together.
Its been a phenomenal year said Ball. After four years of blasting Albany for being dysfunctional its nice to see thing get done working with a Democratic Governor and a Republican Senate.
The District 40 State Senator said that many of the issues he had been talking about in recent years were addressed in some manner. Weve been able to cap property taxes, deliver some unfunded mandate relief, bring the middle class tax rate to the lowest rate its been in over 50 years and bring the repeal of the MTA payroll tax for 80 percent of the folks that were paying it," Ball said.
He said he was surprised the MTA payroll tax was repealed as quickly as it was, and pleased to have passed a balanced budget on time while cutting spending by two percent.
Its a really stark contrast to Washington, D.C. where they seem organically incapable of working together and seem completely focused on the next election instead of moving the country forward, Ball said.
Ball said as 2012 unfolds his main focus will be to concentrate on jobs, both by working with lawmakers in Albany to make the state laws less hostile to businesses and at the local level.
"My office has over 10,000 [potential] jobs from local businesses that either need help staying in this area, want to expand or businesses outside the region and the state that want to move in, Ball said. If we just work together as a community in Westchester, Putnam and Dutchess we can pull ourselves out of this continued economic devastation quicker than surrounding regions. Ball said.
And if he wasnt busy enough coming this year, Ball said his New Years resolution was to get in shape in order to do a triathlon.
Right now Im up to 10 miles, and my focus is to take the time every day to train and run a triathlon by the summer, Ball said.
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