BUFFALO, N.Y. — Standing outside Buffalo's RiverBend facility, the most expensive piece of Governor Andrew Cuomo's signature Buffalo Billion economic development initiative, Democratic gubernatorial candidate Cynthia Nixon sought to draw a contrast between her own plan and his.

"Cuomo has doled out millions, hundreds of millions, even billions of dollars to his corporate donors that not only created a cesspool of corruption that is Albany, but has also created far too few good paying jobs for New Yorkers," she said.

Nixon criticized Cuomo's Regional Economic Development Councils, which helped target investments for the Buffalo Billion and other areas around the state.

"Ninety percent of Cuomo's handpicked development council leaders are white and many of them are also major political donors to his political campaigns," she said.

She said those councils have, not surprisingly, short-changed regions with the highest concentration of people of color. Nixon promised more balanced disbursement of state funds and more diverse councils if elected.

"Far many more women, far many more people of color and I would make sure, as Governor Cuomo has not, that they filed a complete conflict of interest form and that that form was made public," she said.

 

 

The actress-turned-politician said her economic development plan would turn the focus to a bottom-up model. Nixon said she plans to ensure infrastructure funding and put Upstate workers on the same schedule for a mandated $15 per hour minimum wage as Long Island and Westchester County.

"We are one state and our entire state deserves a statewide minimum wage," she said.

Nixon also said she'll put an end to the sub-minimum wage for tipped workers and form a board to make sure workers in the rapidly growing health care industry are paid a good living wage.

"Yes we need factory jobs but we also need human service jobs which cannot be exported to another state, cannot be exported to another country," she said.

State Democratic Party Chair and Buffalo Mayor Byron Brown issued a statement in response to the visit Tuesday praising the governor for turning around the city's economy. He said Nixon is making election-year promises and doesn't understand the region or its challenges.