Video, Audio, Photos & Rush Transcript: Fighting for Your Family: Governor Hochul Celebrates Affordability Wins in Budget Deal for Western New Yorkers

Earlier today, Governor Kathy Hochul highlighted the affordability proposals she secured in the FY 2026 New York State Budget deal for Western New Yorkers and how she delivered on her commitment to put thousands of dollars back in the pockets of working class families. These affordability proposals include a historic tax cut for the middle class — cutting taxes for more than 75 percent of all filers statewide, and providing tax relief for 507,000 Western New Yorkers; inflation refund checks of up to $400 for 585,000 households starting in October; tripling the size of the child tax credit, which provides 118,000 Western New York families with children four and under $1,000 and $500 per child ages four to 16; and making investments to expand access to child care, including $400 million investment to safeguard child care subsidies and allocating $110 million in capital grants to support child care providers.

VIDEO: The event is available to stream on YouTube here and TV quality video is available here (h.264, mp4).

AUDIO: The Governor's remarks are available in audio form here.

PHOTOS: The Governor's Flickr page has photos of the event here.

A rush transcript of the Governor's remarks is available below:

Thank you. Thank you. So good to be home again. I am always delighted to be here. Please take your seats. And I want to thank a lot of incredible individuals in this room. One is that I have very good taste in picking out my Commissioners, Buffalo’s own Tim Hogues, our Commissioner of Civil Services here. Our mayor, Chris Scanlon is here. Please take a bow. Deputy County Executive Lisa Chimera, our Comptroller Kevin Hardwick. All my partners in government — Trina Burruss, the President of United Way, my gosh, she, challenges, which I want to thank her for being a great leader.

Larry Pernick, the Executive Director of the Northwest Buffalo Community Center, where we are right now. Thank you, Larry. Former Mayor, Tony Macello has joined us as well. Mayor, great to see you. All of my friends here. We talk a lot about public service, but people across the state aren't quite sure why I got this gene or this inclination, this passion for public service, and it started right here in Western New York.

And I was that 16-year-old from Hamburg High School would take an hour bus ride zigzagging through Lackawanna. I stopped at all the great locations, met a lot of friends on the bus, happy to get outta school for half a day. And then I became an intern for politics, but also the New York State Assembly Office. And by the time I was 18, I had a real fancy business card — Kathy Hochul Special Assistant to the Speaker of the New York State Assembly. It is fun in a bar like, yeah, look at my job. I'm a big shot. Just kidding. But this is where I cut my teeth. This is where I ran for local office 31 years ago.

This is where I ran for County Office. This is where I ran for Congress, Lieutenant Governor, and this is the community that taught me the value of serving others. Because Buffalo isn't just a city of good neighbors. It's a city of great neighbors. People lift each other up and take care of each other, and that's why I am the way I am.

I learned about grit and generosity and community and pride right here, and I made a promise that I would fight for this city with every fiber of my being because I know what it's like when you're knocked down. I know what it's like and people count you out. And I know what it's like to not get the brass ring of the Super Bowl yet. Okay. It's all right. We can talk about it kinda like a group therapy session, right? 'cause there's always next year and next year is right around the corner. But I wanna lift this community up and encourage it, to believe in themselves again because we have so much going for us and I'm so excited to be here.

Because we're doing a lot, just a few days ago. How is it now? I'm gonna ask a question. East Buffalo or east side? Because I heard both. Okay. Alright. I'm very democratic. All those in favor of saying East Side, raise your hand and shout. Okay. Okay. All those in favor of East Buffalo. Raise your hand. Shout. Okay, staff, take it out of my remarks. East Side is back.

So $10 million for the East Side Building Fund, we wanna assist in renovating the buildings, the great architecture that sometimes gets covered over with the out of business signs or the plywood. And that's not a welcoming experience for the community that lives there, or people wanna visit there. We get to revitalize our neighborhoods. That's on top of $260 million already invested there to protect our iconic sites that we have, MLK Park and Broadway Market, and so many others because I believe in those assets. I've been there, I know what they're all about. They're part of our identity.

But I also had a broader message back in January when I announced my State of the State Address. I said, “Your family is my fight.” And I learned that fighting spirit right here and I meant it because right now there are so many people across this state and in this community who are struggling. Life's been hard, sometimes it feels unfair, and raising a family here in Western New York — I know what it's like.

I was that mom clenching coupons, walking into BJ's, that giant shopping cart — sometimes I had two — diapers, and formula, and paper towels and toilet paper, and dishwashing detergent, all that stuff you need, and I was making a whopping $12,000 take home pay as a town board member, so we weren't feeling real rich.

My husband was in government. We are blessed, but you know what? Still had to pay the bills, still had to pay the mortgage, and my life was a lot better than a lot of other people and I know that. I know that because I was raised by a family — social justice Catholics, my parents would bring us into the city when we were kids; we went to over on Sycamore, my mother was involved in starting the Neighborhood Information Center with Sister Desponsada — you're all too young to know that name, but she was legendary in the east side of Buffalo — and I would work with my mom there.

We'd go visit people who are lonely, seniors by themselves, people we need to bring food and clothes to. That's what I did as a kid so this is embedded in me. So I know there's people who needed more than I did. We knew that, but sometimes our friends — even today, no matter how hard you work — it just seems like you're not getting ahead. That's why I outlined a vision based on my life's experiences here and what I saw my neighbors going through.

I want a place where middle class parents don't have to dread checking that bank account — if they’re going to be able to cover their monthly expenses or that choice of having to pay for medical bills and utilities; are you ever going to have that luxury of setting your kids to a week long camp in the summertime?

Can you pay for your child care? My god, child care is so expensive. It's cheaper to go to one of our community colleges, even our state universities. It's cheaper to do that than pay for child care. It'd be cheaper, we could just put them into college right away. Hadn't thought of that —- baby college.

But those are real expenses for real people. And there was a time when everybody believed they'd be able to buy a home — that was success, right? That's how you were judged. My parents started in a trailer park off Electric Avenue. I was just there about a week and a half ago. I stopped at the Apollo Diner — they have great fish fries on Friday, hadn't had one in a while — but there's still people there. My parents got out. They got that little apartment in Woodlawn where I was born; they got that little Cape Cod where six kids came along and then they were able to progress as my family's success grew.

So many people today, young people aren't even sure they can afford an apartment and get out of their parents' house, much less be able to set aside all the money they need for that down payment, for that American dream of home ownership. And we have not built generational wealth in our Black and Brown communities as a result of this, and they just are never going to get ahead and be able to pass something down to their kids.

I don't want that to be their existence any longer — that's unfair — and we have to keep fighting for them, and that's what my Budget was all about. I talked about what it's like to struggle, but can you imagine if we can tell people with the Budget we just enacted and I just signed, “You could have upward of $5,000 more in your pocket,” that is something that people get excited about.

Let's start with bringing the middle class tax rate to the lowest it's been in 70 years for over 8 million New Yorkers. That sounds good. That's how you put money back in people’s pockets — $55 million in relief right here; $55 million for over half a million Western New Yorkers, we got that done.

The state's first ever inflation refund — everybody's like, “What's the inflation refund? We never heard of it.” That's because you never had it before. We thought of it ourselves. Because inflation drove up the cost of everything — your kids' sneakers, and backpacks and everything you have to buy — we collected more in sales tax revenue than we expected; our Comptroller knows how this works. So we collected $3 billion more than we even anticipated in our projections because New Yorkers paid more than they expected as well. And I said, “This doesn't belong to us. This is their money. They paid more. Let's give it back to them.” That's the inflation refund I'm talking about — putting up to $400 in the pockets of people, $153 million right back here in Western New York; $153 million back in the pockets for more than a million people here in Western New York.