During a Zoom press conference today, organized by the New York State Association of Counties (NYSAC), Erie County Executive Mark Poloncarz made a grim comparison.

Poloncarz said that Erie County has more cases and deaths than Pennsylvania’s Alleghany County, home to the city of Pittsburgh, or Ohio’s Cuyahoga County, home to the city of Cleveland. And both of those counties are home to 300,000 more people than Erie County.

“So, it’s not just on a per capita basis that we’re worse,” he said. “It’s also on a general gross basis.”

Both Poloncarz and Duchess County’s Marc Molinaro made it clear that if aid doesn’t arrive soon from the federal government, they will have to furlough workers.

“When it comes to the finances, we must have a stimulus package 4.0,” said Poloncarz. “If we don’t have a stimulus package 4.0, we’re going to have to do drastic cuts across all county departments.”

When asked earlier today via Skype if the next stimulus package would include aid to both state and local governments, Albany area Democrat Congressman Paul Tonko (D – Albany) said he is optimistic.

“The House is currently working on what is dubbed a ‘Heroes Act,’ which speaks to investing through local, state and school district municipalities the kind of investments we need in order to pay for those workers,” he said.

While the governor has repeatedly called for this kind of aid, some Republicans in Washington have dubbed it a “blue state bailout.” It's not surprising that House Democrats have decided to call the package a “Heroes Act” instead, which smacks less of big government. According to Tonko, the package, which is still being developed, would help police, firefighters, sheriffs' departments and educators.

In what will surely be welcome news to county leaders, Tonko said at least some of the aid would go directly to counties, bypassing the state.

“Absolutely,” Tonko said. “I think there will be direct aid to local governments and direct aid to the states.”

Unfortunately, there is still no clear picture of what the next phase of economic relief will look like.  

One issue that could unite both Congressional Democrats and Republicans is the release on Friday of what is expected to be an historically bad jobs report.

“I think it should encourage us to do something. The message from the U.S. Senate leadership that states should just file for bankruptcy is so off-target and so hard-hearted,” said Tonko, referencing Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell’s suggestion that states and cities go bankrupt amid the coronavirus-induced economic pandemic.

“We can do better than that. We need the tools to respond,” he said.