Gov. Cuomo visits the Syracuse Media Group

NYS Gov. Andrew Cuomo stopped by the Syracuse Media Group offices to talk to editors and reporters during his visit to Syracuse on Wednesday February 4, 2015. Gov. Cuomo answers a question by SMG President Tim Kennedy.

(Stephen D. Cannerelli)

SYRACUSE, N.Y. - Gov. Andrew Cuomo today said he has no plans to send millions of dollars to Syracuse or other Upstate cities to fix leaky aging water mains. Why not?

"Because you are going bankrupt," Cuomo said of Syracuse, later adding he meant that metaphorically. "You are unsustainable. You need jobs, an economy, business."

Instead, he wants Syracuse and other urban centers to come up with their own plans to fix themselves. Those plans should include job creation, strengthening regional economies and rebuilding local tax revenues.

"The upstate cities have to be stronger economically. They have to do better," Cuomo said today during an editorial board with The Post-Standard and Syracuse.com.

If the plan is good enough, if it involves private sector investment and promises new jobs, Cuomo would invest $500 million into places like Syracuse and Central New York. In turn, those areas should be able to afford mending their own problems, he said.

"Show us how you become economically stronger and create jobs," Cuomo said. "Then you fix your own pipes."

Syracuse Mayor Stephanie Miner tonight called the message inconsistent, especially after the governor promoted other aspects of infrastructure improvement across the state at a budget presentation at SUNY's College of Environmental Science and Forestry.

"He is the governor of New York," Miner said this evening. "The infrastructure of the Tappan Zee Bridge is important. But so are the roads in Syracuse. To come Upstate and say: Find some developers, then fix your own water mains? I find a complete inconsistency in his message."

Late last year, Miner submitted her billion-dollar plan to Cuomo that asked for about $850 million to fix the city's crumbling water mains. It was a response to Cuomo's call last fall for Syracuse to pitch ideas for spending $1 billion in state money, much as Buffalo and Western New York has done.

Her argument is good infrastructure will bring good jobs.

"Delivering clean water is essential to economic development," Miner said. Tax-free zones and other economic incentives for new businesses "will be meaningless if they learn they can't flush their toilets and put water in their coffee makers."

Cuomo, with his proposed $1.5 billion competitive program to help Upstate areas, is looking for the promise of private sector investment first. Cuomo said today he hadn't read Miner's proposal.

Cuomo said today winning proposals should include private-sector investment. Miner's proposal did not. Instead, she proposed spending $851 million in state money to fix the city's aging infrastructure.

Already, Cuomo said today, the state budget subsidizes Upstate cities. The state pays about 25 percent of Syracuse's budget, more than 30 percent of Buffalo's, more than 20 percent of Rochester's, Cuomo said. The state pays about 70 percent of Syracuse's school district budget, according to his budget office.

Miner's office didn't dispute the numbers. Miner said about half the city's properties qualify as tax-free, meaning the owners don't pay property taxes. Many of those buildings are state-owned: SUNY ESF, Upstate Medical University and the State Office Building in downtown.

Last year, the State Office Building had one of the city's water main breaks, Miner said. So far this year, the tally is at 45, or just about one a day, she said.

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