Over the last several weeks, Gov. Kathy Hochul has made policy adjustments in the face of criticism. 

She shelved a plan to require local governments to allow for accessory dwelling units. She moved to end mask requirements in schools. In both instances, Hochul said, she did so based on either consultation with people who had raised issues or based on data and guidance from the federal government. 

It was not, in other words, based on politics. 

Still, the moves came before Republicans in New York held their state party convention this week. GOP officials had for weeks blasted the mask mandate in schools and knocked the accessory dwelling unit plan as having the potential of overriding local zoning laws. 

Neither issue was really a central theme of the convention. But Hochul on Wednesday in Brooklyn while promoting a push to allow alcoholic drinks to-go at restaurants said that was not by design. 

"It really has nothing to do with the timing of the convention," she said. "We run on what we're doing here."

Ending the push or the accessory dwelling unit plan was done after speaking with Long Island officials who had raised concerns with the proposal, she said. Taking the provision out of her $216 billion budget plan was a way of showing "a different approach to governing," she added. 

"I still believe in creating more access to affordable housing," Hochul said. "But there are different ways to accomplish that." 

Ending the mask requirement in schools, which took effect on Wednesday, was already in motion, Hochul added. She had previously in February announced she would re-assess the increasingly polarizing issue in early March following the winter break for many school districts. 

But the decision by the Centers for Disease Control to lift indoor mask wearing guidances across the country led her to make the change. 

"When the numbers are 1% in New York City and the vast majority of the state is below the CDC requirements and the CDC came out last Friday, I think that's the logical connection to make rather than anything the other party might be doing," she said. 

Hochul in August announced she would seek a full term, and quickly raised millions of dollars in campaign cash. But she has also sought to keep in public the politics of campaigning at arm's length during the state budget season. 

"We are continuing to govern with strength, getting us beyond this pandemic and focusing on the needs of New Yorkers, and getting through a budget," she said. "We won't be concerned about our messaging going forward."