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By: Rusty Brooks
An exclusive report by The New York Times shows that very few New York State employees have completed the mandatory sexual harassment awareness training that Governor Kathy Hochul has mandated. Sadly, only 0.4% of the 130,000 state employees have completed the required class.
Hochul made it her personal platform to make sure all employees working for the State of New York are safe from harassment and abuse. At an event in 2021 Hochul said, “I have always stood with and continue to believe not only the women in this situation, but all women who come forward to bring allegations of sexual harassment or abuse”.
“No one will ever question what we’re doing in our administration,” Hochul said, noting that since taking office, she has implemented in-person sexual harassment trainings, directing that the executive chamber, her office that is comprised of top aides, hire an outside law firm to handle all harassment and discrimination cases.
“We are working very hard to erase this culture so all women, all people, feel free from discrimination, harassment and abuse in the New York state workplace.”
The governor said employees could not “click their way through a class” under her watch, according to the paper, which showed Hochul didn’t provide resources to realize her promise.
After almost two years as Governor, she has yet to establish a universal class for all the employees to take on the subject.
“What we’re requiring is not scalable,” Assemblywoman Pat Fahy, a Democrat representing Albany, told
The New York Times. “We went overboard with the requirements without giving any of the tools to implement it.”
Before she took office, about 35,000 employees were subject to mandatory ethics training, a number almost quadrupled with her mandate, according to the Times.
“This was a well intentioned but not long-thought-out process that needs further attention,” Assemblymember John McDonald, also a Democrat from the Capital Region, said.
Ben Kessler, of The New York Post writes that the governor has come under fire herself for ethical shortcomings, including her backroom deal to build a new stadium for her hometown Buffalo Bills. New York taxpayers will pay an unprecedented $850 million in public money for the stadium’s $1.4 billion construction.
It proved especially controversial after it was revealed her husband Bill Hochul is senior vice president and general counsel for Delaware North, a major food concessionaire at the Buffalo Bills’ current stadium.
Meanwhile, New York City is making government employees take a “radical critical race theory-inspired training,” Fox News Digital reported Monday.
Fox News Digital obtained a copy of the “mandatory” training, which was allegedly sent to all city employees with a March 6 deadline. A city email said the training would show employees “the importance of racial equity…in the workplace.”
“Where they were discussing equity, how we have to look at people through a particular lens, that contradicted… [the idea that] we should treat everybody equally,” a source familiar with the “racial equity” training told the outlet.
“I do not agree with what they want us to do as city employees. The [racial equity training] leads me to believe that they want the contracts with the city and the hiring from the city being looked at through this lens,” the source continued. “And that’s what I think is really unfair. It goes against their [stated claims] … that everybody should be treated equally.
