Laundry List of New Laws for the New Year

Good morning. Tuesday is the first working day of the new year. Besides the calendar, we’ll be looking at a few things that changed over the weekend.

This morning, or maybe tomorrow, George Kaloudis will be typing four numbers on a keypad in his office at the gas station.

The big green number on the front will change from 3,059 to 3,199, making the new price of a gallon less than $3.20, which is one-tenth of a regular cent. And the so-called gas tax holiday will end at the gas station in the Long Island hamlet of Albertson, New York.

Officially, the gas tax holiday was swept along with the old one at the end of 2022 amid warnings from gas station owners like Kaloudis that pump prices would rise again.

As for the ones that come with the new year – because the “old out” line in the last paragraph requires a “re” line here, right? — Governor Kathy Hochul’s office sent out a list of legal provisions that went into effect on January 1. The list was 12 pages long.

The new year also brought higher tolls on the New Jersey Turnpike and Garden State Parkway. They’ve increased 3 percent, bringing it from one end of the toll road to the other – from the George Washington Bridge in North Jersey to the Delaware Memorial Bridge in South Jersey – for $20.01 during rush hours or weekends.

And then there’s the time next week when tolls will rise on the four bridges and two tunnels operated by the New York and New Jersey Port Authority.

But now back to the new one. The minimum wage in New York State rose from $13.20 to $14.20 statewide on January 1, but did not increase in New York City, where it has been at $15 an hour for four years. New Jersey also has a new minimum wage that has increased from $13 to $14.13.

New York voters can now vote in person at a polling place other than the polling station assigned to them, but only if the polling place they go to is in the correct borough and correct parliamentary district. The idea was to accommodate registered voters who went to the wrong polling place and were given a temporary ballot to fill out instead of being sent to the correct polling place. Jarret Berg, co-founder and voting rights adviser at Vote Early New York, said so far these ballots will be invalid.

State Senator Zellnor Myrie, a Brooklyn Democrat who sponsored the bill that made false ballots acceptable, said the change would mean “more reasons to count valid votes and less reason to disqualify them.”

Another change for 2023 in New York is back to the future. If you want an absentee vote, it will still look like 2019. Or maybe earlier.

When the pandemic upset the rituals of life in 2020, then-governor Andrew Cuomo issued an executive order adding Covid-19 to the list of temporary illnesses that make a voter eligible to vote absentee. “It didn’t matter if you were sick or not – if you’re worried about getting sick from Covid, you can easily get ballots,” said Blair Horner, executive director of the New York Public Interest Study, for the 2020 and 2022 elections. Group.

That provision expired on December 31, and New York reverted to the rules applied in 2019, despite Horner saying voters “get used to it, like it, and should continue to have it.”

“The epidemic is not over,” he said. “It’s safer for voters and poll workers if people don’t go to the polls.”

Berg of Vote Early New York said he hopes the legislature will reinstate Covid-19 as a reason to issue absentee ballots. “It’s a better policy for the future,” he said.

The gas tax holiday was billed to give drivers a break of 16.75 cents per gallon as fuel prices exceeded $5 per gallon. The average price for a regular gallon in New York State on Monday was $3,395, which is 17.9 cents a gallon above the national average, the AAA said. In Nassau County, where Kaloudis’s station is located, the average price per gallon was $3,182, 43.7 cents less than six months ago.

“This tax break was a waste of time,” said Wayne Bombardiere of the Gas and Automotive Service Dealers Association, which represents independent service stations and auto repair shops in the New York area. “Depending on where your station is located and what needs to be collected, it has created more accounting procedures for more people in different parts of the state. Oil companies have also increased their prices in the first week,” he said, and then the tax was dropped.

Long Island’s Kaloudis said it decided not to change the price once the tax suspension officially ended because the holiday weekend was a relatively slow time. He said he could tell the difference and wanted to take a break from customers for a day or two.

Looking back, he said, lawmakers approved the so-called tax holiday “to appease the people.”

“In the beginning people were happy,” he said, “but prices continued to rise.” And not just for gasoline: “I can’t believe how much we paid for food,” he said.

Several other laws that Hochul signed last month will also go into effect later in the year. Starting in March, telemarketers will have to ask a question like, “Would you like to be on our no call list?” Until then, the question can be asked at any time during a telemarketing call. Hochul said the change will help “protect New Yorkers from receiving annoying, unsolicited calls.”

Also in March, New Yorkers can apply to hold official positions in a marriage on a given day. When Hochul signed the bill last month, he said he removed “barriers” that prevented a friend or relative from performing the ceremony. Only ordained members of the clergy and some government officials were allowed to do so. One-day officers do not need to be a New York State resident, but must be at least 18 years old and apply to the State Department’s office in advance.

And in June, a law will go into effect mandating every employer in the state to provide mothers with a suitable, private space to breastfeed at work. The law requires the area to have access to running water and electricity. The aim is to expand the basic regulations that public servants already have.

Weather forecast

Expect rain, fog and gusts of wind with temperatures near the 50s highest. Rain and wind will continue into the evening and temperatures will remain stable in the mid-50s.

PARKING ON THE ALTERNATIVE SIDE

It is in effect until Friday (Three Kings’ Day).

Latest New York news

• Times Square attack: Authorities say the man accused of attacking three police officers with a knife near Times Square on New Year’s Eve went to New York from his home in Maine and injured police in an Islamist extremist act.

• Art gallery dies: Ronald Feldman, who ran one of New York’s most consistently politically forward-looking art galleries for nearly 50 years, has died at the age of 84.

• Grammy-nominated album by young musicians: The New York Youth Symphony’s debut album featuring some of the middle school players competes with recordings from some of the world’s best orchestras.

METROPOLITAN diary

M15 bus

Dear Diary:

I was on the M15 city center bus home at around 9:00 pm on a Tuesday when it suddenly stopped near the Midtown Tunnel entrance. Roadwork.

“They didn’t tell me about it,” the driver said. Oh my God.

“I don’t know how you do this,” I said.

He laughed.

He explained that he couldn’t drop me off while we were waiting because we had just left a stop and that would be very dangerous.

Suddenly, the bus looked as if it could move again.

Thank you! said the driver.

“Harry Louis,” I said.

“What did you say?” he asked.

I repeated myself.

He laughed.

“You can’t come to my church on Sunday and say that,” she said.

“I would love to go to your church,” I said. When you were at church on Sunday, I added, you’ll remember the girl who said “Harry Louis” instead of “Thank God” and you’ll smile, maybe even say “Harry Louis” yourself.

After getting off at my stop, he passed me and honked the horn and we waved at each other.

It felt good to make her laugh.

— Nancy Kahn-Rosenthal

Drawn by Agnes Lee. Submit applications here and Read the rest of the Metropolitan Diary here .

I’m glad we could get together here. See you tomorrow. — J.B.

PS Here is today’s Short Puzzle and Spelling Contest . You can find all our puzzles here. .

Melissa Guerrero, Ed Shanahan, and Tracey Tully contributed to New York Today. You can reach the team at [email protected].

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