Rachel Leon

Good government groups are taking advantage of the lull in news on Day 2 to outline the proposals they'd like Eliot Spitzer to include in his state of the state address tomorrow.

The ten proposals, presented at a press conference by Blair Horner of NYPIRG and Rachel Leon of Common Cause, include creating an independent ethics commission, ending "pay to play" and restricting the personal use of campaign contributions.

Unlike the executive orders for state employees Spitzer signed yesterday, these reforms would apply to legislators -- and would require their approval.

How would the new governor get that? Precedent would suggest the precise sort of three men in a room-style of compromise building that has characterized Albany lawmaking for years.

Still, Horner said, if that's what it took to get ethics changes, it wouldn't be so bad.

The list of ten proposals is after the jump.  read more »

-- Azi Paybarah

When Eliot Spitzer meets with good government groups today around 3:30 today in Albany, they'll discuss redistricting, campaign finance reform and ethics reform. And Alan Hevesi.

Spitzer, of course, has expressed a preference for putting off a firm decision on what to do about the Hevesi controversy until January.

But one of the good government group advocates meeting with Spitzer later today, Rachel Leon of Common Cause, said Hevesi will likely be a point of today's discussion.

The report on Hevesi by an independent investigator "pointed out the failing of our current system," Leon told me. "They couldn't enforce what they found." One of the advocates' goals is to have an independent ethics agency which can "not just make decisions and refer to someone else," but enforce what they find.

The impasse over what to do with Hevesi "is the motivation we need to change what we have," she said.

-- Azi Paybarah