WATERTOWN, New York (WWNY) – There are changes coming to New York state laws in 2022 which will affect many of us – and issues in the new year Governor Hochul and the state legislature will have to face.
Maybe the most useful way to think of the new year – it’s a year of vice.
Mobile sports betting – using your phone to place bets – becomes legal, and billions of dollars are at stake. New York will instantly become the largest market for online mobile gambling. Ads are already filling the airwaves of local TV and radio stations.
Expect to be able to place your bets no later than Super Bowl Sunday, and maybe sooner.
Less clear is whether you’ll be able to stroll down to your neighborhood pot shop and buy legal marijuana. Pot is already legal in New York, but it’s taking time to set up the regulatory mechanism for the state’s pot shops. Some reports have linked the resignation of Governor Cuomo to the slow rollout.
Good news for dog owners. Insurance companies will no longer be able to charge higher rates on your homeowner’s policy if you have a certain breed of dog.
“It’s a great thing for people who own Pit Bulls or German Shepherds or Rottweillers. The breed isn’t bad. It’s how they’re raised,” said Libby Post, of the New York State Animal Protection Federation.
Minimum wage for many workers goes up from $12.50 an hour to $13.20 – though with employers scrambling to hire, wages tend to be higher than minimum anyway. Employees who get tips are also in line for a raise.
It’s been a long time coming, but the limousine crash near Albany in 2018 which killed 20 people, including a couple from Watertown, yields new laws with the new year. One requires new limousines to have seat belts in the rear for each passenger.
Governor Hochul and the state legislature face a number of issues, while trying to manage the pandemic and deal with a big election year. Look for Hochul and the Democratic majority in the legislature to again face pressure to change the state’s bail reform laws – bail reform has led to some people charged with serious crimes being released from jail, and Republicans blame the reforms for an increase in crime. (Though as Spectrum News’s Nick Reisman points out, statistics have yet to show a correlation between the two.)
And as noted, it’s a big political year, made bigger because the state legislature is likely to end up redrawing the state’s political maps – those maps determine who represents you in the state legislature and in congress, and will likely prompt lawsuits and counter-suits and much talk of unfairness.
Copyright 2021 WWNY. All rights reserved.
