Paul Szmal: Is State Senator Rachel May, who represents Points East in our listening area, the 48th Senate District. Senator, good morning and welcome back.
Rachel May: Good morning, Ted. It's always good to talk with you. Yeah, happy start of the school year.
Paul Szmal: So I made it to the great New York State Fair for the first time in a while this year, and you went as well. What's your favorite part?
Rachel May: Oh, it's hard to say. We had a really great Women's Day breakfast and then the governor was there and highlighted a lot of different things that was exciting for me because she came to the maple booth and signed a bill that I had put together. Last year, I met some maple producers from the southern part of my district, and they told me that if they wanted to expand state forest land was the best way for maple syrup producers to grow their businesses, but the state didn't offer the kinds of leases that they needed. And so I passed a law to do that, and the governor signed it into law while we were at the State Fair, which was great. It was the first time I ever saw one of my bills actually being signed into law.
Paul Szmal: Wow, that's pretty neat.
Rachel May: Yeah, it was pretty neat, and the maple producers are really excited. And then she went from there just to a couple booths away in the horticulture building is where a lot of the distilleries are, and some craft cider people were there, and she also celebrated a bill that she signed into law. It wasn't my bill, but I had carried a bill to help craft cider producers to sell their product online, and she actually ended up signing a bill that allowed distilleries as well to do that, which puts them on a level playing field with other states, and I think is really going to help their businesses. So yeah, it was an exciting day for sweet things.
Paul Szmal: Yeah, I remember for years, the wine industry had the debate going over what they called reciprocal shipping. You could, some states could ship to New York, but you couldn't ship there, or vice versa, and it just made it difficult for them to do business. So as a craft cider brewery and also distillery aficionado, thank you.
Rachel May: Yeah, thanks. You're welcome. It was a hard fight. It took a really long time, but they were facing, you could order whiskey from another state and have it delivered to your door, but you couldn't order New York State whiskey, which was just ridiculous. So yeah, we're really happy that changed over.
Paul Szmal: So when you go to the fair, do you just, do you cut loose and have all the fried stuff, or are you a good girl?
Rachel May: Really, the maple ice cream is the only thing that I indulge in typically at the fair, but, you know, and the chocolate milk. But there were some solemn things. There was a beautiful ceremony for law enforcement officers who died in the line of combat, I mean, in the line of duty. So that was very moving, especially this year with the two officers who died in the Syracuse area. And then the Labor Day parade was huge yesterday. This is, labor is really resurgent. We're seeing a lot of new unions forming, and a lot of people kind of recognizing that we need a bigger workforce. And the workforce needs to, part of the way to do that is you get better wages and benefits for workers. So that was exciting too.
Paul Szmal: Which reminds me of Micron coming to the area. Have they begun hiring yet?
Rachel May: I understand that they have done some. It's not anywhere near what they're going to be doing, but yeah, they've done some hiring. And definitely, you know, the construction contracts are getting out there too. Today, I think a few schools started before Labor Day, but today is probably the biggest opening day for most schools.
Paul Szmal: Give us some thoughts on back to school day.
Rachel May: Yeah, well, here in Syracuse, I think it's tomorrow because I've been invited several schools to give kids a high five as they come in the building. We worked really hard in the legislature last spring to make sure the budget included a bump in the child tax credit for this year. And those checks went out just in time for back to school. So I'm hoping that families will be feeling ready for the beginning of the school year. I'm hoping this cooler weather will make it great for the kids to, you know, concentrate and not be wishing they were outside playing as much. So yeah, it should be a good start to the school year.
Paul Szmal: And it sounds to me like the schools feel like they did pretty well in terms of state aid in the budget this year.
Rachel May: Yes, the governor's initial budget had cuts to a lot of rural schools and some of the urban schools as well. And so that was another thing we fought really hard to make sure didn't happen. So I haven't heard complaints from any superintendents. So yeah, there's been a lot of discussion of the state mandate to replace diesel buses with electric by 2035. There's concern whether that's a realistic goal and because of the cost and a lot of things, do you believe that that is a realistic goal or that this was going to need some help? What are your thoughts on that, the electric bus bill?
Paul Szmal: Yeah, I'm pretty sure we'll have to revisit that bill just because it was aspirational. You know, we were trying to send a message to the industry that they need to ramp up the production and bring down the cost. I don't know if that's going to happen. And if it doesn't, obviously we can't put that burden on school districts. So I'm sure we'll be talking about it this year because I hear about it a lot when I'm out in the district.
Rachel May: So I'm told the governor is going to be coming to Syracuse soon to hold an energy summit. Tell us a little bit about the event and what's on the agenda.
Paul Szmal: Yeah, it's going to be just, you know, people who work in the industry and people from from NYSERDA and the Public Service Commission and that kind of thing. But it was so oversubscribed. They said they got a space for 400 and they had 700 sign up. So it's something that's on a lot of people's minds. I hope they're going to be talking about the energy grid. I passed a bill to make the grid more efficient. We know as we electrify buildings and transportation more, we're just going to need a more efficient grid. So I think that'll be on the table. I think talking about the future of nuclear power is going to be on the table. There's going to be a lot.
Rachel May: I'm taking... I wanted to ask you about that. Do you believe, because I mean nuclear power, I don't know that there have been any new plants in the U.S. in a long time. Do you think that people are going to begin to think maybe we have to take a look at that?
Paul Szmal: So there's been a real change in the nuclear, in research on nuclear and development on nuclear power. And there are these micro nuclear opportunities that I think we should definitely be considering. I was at a tour in Denmark last year and we learned about a way you can take, this is wild, you can take salt and melt it and it has a long enough time before it cools back into salt that it acts as a battery. So if you use nuclear power to melt the salt, then you can take that battery, put it on a container vessel and use it to power the vessel to go across the ocean. And if there's a meltdown, all that happens is the salt turns back into salt. It's like, yeah, so there are really interesting things you can do with nuclear. I imagine they'll be talking about some of those.
Rachel May: The state senate's summer reading program just wrapped up for the year. Have you any idea of numbers of how many kids have submitted their books to get their certificates?
Paul Szmal: Oh, I don't. I didn't look that up, but we do have a literacy fair going on in Syracuse on Saturday. I'm really looking forward to the children's parade for the literacy fair at Beecham Library. So I know everybody's focused on literacy right now.
Rachel May: All right, State Senator Rachel May, our guest this morning, representing the 48th Senate District, that is points east in our listening area. We always appreciate the update and thank you for your time.
Paul Szmal: Absolutely. Good to talk to you, Ted.
