Earlier this month, Governor Kathy Hochul delivered her State of the State address. Several policies in her 2026 agenda are directly inspired by CUF’s research.

Preserving Performing Arts Spaces

In our December 2025 report Creative New York, we found that “nearly 50 theaters, music clubs, museums, and galleries have shuttered since 2020,” and identified rising costs as one of the main challenges faced by arts organizations fighting to keep their venues open.

The State of the State cites our 50-venues figure in its proposal to preserve performing arts spaces through the new program Saving Performing Arts and Cultural Experiences (NY SPACE). The program will provide funding to help smaller nonprofit arts organizations purchase the spaces they currently use but are at risk of losing, ensuring the long-term stability of these venues.

The establishment of NY SPACE directly echoes our sixth recommendation from Creative New York, which calls for ensuring the existence of current cultural spaces and backing organizations that are ready to buy space and urges the state to "launch a Cultural Ownership Fund focused on helping mission-driven cultural organizations retain space already in the sector."

Expanding SUNY and CUNY Reconnect

In a November 2024 report, CUF urged Governor Hochul and the State Legislature to replicate the successful CUNY Reconnect program—an initiative that helps re-enroll working age adults who earned some college credits but left school before completing a degree—across the state and invest in both CUNY and SUNY Reconnect. In July 2025, the governor officially launched SUNY Reconnect—along with new state funding for CUNY Reconnect—to cover all costs for working-age community college students pursuing associate’s degrees in high-demand fields. SUNY Reconnect has since enrolled 5,600 students.

State support for this CUF idea remains strong. In the State of the State agenda, Governor Hochul announced an expansion of the list of eligible degrees under SUNY and CUNY Reconnect—opening more pathways to well-paying jobs and strengthening the city and state’s workforce in vital industries.

CUNY Reconnect, which launched in 2022 after advocacy from City Council Speaker Adrienne Adams, was first proposed in a CUF report and has since re-enrolled over 47,000 New Yorkers in college. 

Expanding a Critical Rent Freeze Program for Seniors

In New York City, the Senior Citizen Rent Increase Exemption (SCRIE) freezes the rent for eligible older adults, offsetting rent increases by providing landlords with an equivalent property tax credit. Since 2014, the income eligibility limit for SCRIE had been $50,000—which did not account for the dramatic rise in the city’s cost of living since then. In a series of 2025 reports, CUF charted a growing affordability crisis for older adults in the state, the city, and Long Island, culminating in a December 2025 forum and a proposal in our "15 Policy Ideas for NYC to Start 2026" which urged the state “to raise the program’s income eligibility threshold, currently capped at $50,000, and peg it to inflation.”

The State of the State agenda proposes exactly that. Governor Hochul put forward raising the income limit for SCRIE to $75,000, up from $50,000, in New York City, with an equal increase in the income limit for the similar Disability Rent Increase Exemption (DRIE). This increase will ensure that housing remains affordable for vulnerable New Yorkers and is an important step toward addressing the mounting financial insecurity faced by older adults.