Former New York state senator Seymour P. Lachman, director of Wagner College's Hugh L. Carey Institute for Government Reform, talks with Staten Island Advance political editor Tom Wrobleski about the Carey Institute and its purpose. (Recorded March 14, 2008)
"The Man Who Saved New York: Hugh Carey and the Great Fiscal Crisis of 1975," by Seymour P. Lachman and Robert Polner, is the latest product of Wagner College's Carey Institute for Government Reform. It was published in July 2010 by the SUNY Press, Albany.
It was principally Carey’s leadership, Lachman and Polner argue in "The Man Who Saved New York," that helped rescue the city and state from the brink of financial and civic catastrophe in 1975.
“This is the definitive account of New York’s fiscal crisis, of its hero Governor Hugh Carey, and of one of the most significant and absorbing episodes in the history of local and state government in this country," says Peter Goldmark, former New York State Budget Director, "plus, it is timely because New York and a handful of other states stand once more on the brink of bankruptcy.”
“Intellectually, academically, and politically, 'The Man Who Saved New York' couldn’t be more timely and vital for New York as the state slides toward its own rendezvous with insolvency,” says Giuliani biographer Fred Siegel.
“We would do well to learn from this account of New York’s fiscal crisis in the 1970s," says New York Lt. Gov. Richard Ravitch.
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On July 23, 2010, Seymour Lachman was interviewed by New York Post state government editor Fred Dicker on Albany, N.Y. talk radio station WGDJ-AM. The topic: "The Man Who Saved New York." Listen to the interview by clicking on the radio icon to the left.
Later on July 23, Time-Warner Cable's YNN news channel broadcast an interview by political reporter Liz Benjamin with Seymour Lachman and Robert Polner, authors of a new political biography of former Gov. Hugh L. Carey, entitled "The Man Who Saved New York." The interview was aired on the program, "Capital Tonight." Watch it below:
On Saturday, Aug. 28, 2010, New York 1's "New York Times Close-Up" with Times urban affairs correspondent Sam Roberts featured an interview with Wagner College Professor Seymour Lachman and NYU public affairs officer Robert Polner, co-authors of "The Man Who Saved New York: Hugh Carey and the Great Fiscal Crisis of 1975." Watch it here:
Former New York Governor Hugh L. Carey was an honored guest at Wagner College's 2007 Commencement exercise, where he was awarded the degree of Doctor of Humane Letters, honoris causa, and delivered an address to the assembled graduates, their family and friends, and other honored guests of the college. Follow the link above to hear Governor Carey's doctoral citation and watch him deliver the commencement address to the Class of 2007.
Former New York state Senator Seymour Lachman, director of Wagner College's Hugh L. Carey Institute for Government Reform, is much in demand for his insights into the way government works (and, sometimes, does NOT work!) in Albany and around the country. Follow the link above to view two examples.
"Three Men in a Room: The Inside Story of Power and Betrayal in an American Statehouse," by Seymour P. Lachman and Robert Polner, was the book that launched Wagner College's Hugh L. Carey Institute for Government Reform. Published in September 2006, "Three Men in a Room" is an insider's exposé of how one of the country's largest and most powerful state governments -- with the fourth-largest budget, behind only the federal government, California and Texas -- has become a model of corrupt, inefficient and undemocratic governance. Lachman ran the New York City Board of Education and taught political science before being elected to the New York state senate. What he found when he arrived in Albany was a Potemkin village of government where legislators voted on bills they hadn't read during legislative sessions they hadn't attended. After four terms, Lachman left his safe senate seat in disgust and, with journalist Robert Polner, wrote this sharp, mordant and impassioned call for reform. CLICK HERE for more about "Three Men in a Room" on the book's Amazon.com web page.
The HUGH L. CAREY INSTITUTE FOR GOVERNMENT REFORM at Wagner College is named for New York’s 51st governor, whose two terms as its chief executive embodied the state’s history as a laboratory and incubator of ideas for reform that have often been adopted by other states as well as the nation.
In the late 19th century, Theodore Roosevelt entered political life as a member of the New York State Assembly, declaring that if the people desired the best government possible, the best people must be willing to devote themselves to public service. During the course of his career in public life, T.R. championed and enacted measures that improved urban policing and civil service — reforms that had significant impacts on curtailing political corruption and improving local, state and national governments’ delivery of services to their citizens.
During the first quarter of the 20th century, Alfred E. Smith became New York’s governor after many years of service in its state assembly. His tenure in Albany laid foundations for social welfare initiatives that subsequently served as models for national programs enshrined in President (and former New York governor) Franklin D. Roosevelt’s New Deal.
At the start of a new century, however, New York is mired in stagnation. While there are pockets of economic growth and social vibrancy, particularly in its downstate region, the state is steadily losing population. Industrial manufacturing, both large and small, continues to move out of state and overseas. Agriculture remains depressed and ever shrinking. Many of the service jobs available to replace these lost employment opportunities offer lower wages and reduced health and retirement benefits. New York’s ability to address these threats to its future is stymied by what is widely regarded as the most dysfunctional state government in the nation.
Here are just a few of the dysfunctions that must be corrected:
Reform, in order to be implemented, requires that those who understand the need for changes have a sustaining institutional base that serves to generate, nurture and develop analyses and proposals. This is the central lesson of reform movements throughout American social and political history, from the Age of Jackson and the Progressive Era to the New Deal.
At this particular moment in our state and nation’s history, colleges and universities are the institutions best suited for conducting the studies necessary to shape and disseminate an agenda for reform: