To Improve Albany, Try Starting With Salaries

When the Assembly early on the morning of April 1 created a commission to study raising legislators’ pay after a 16-year freeze, the most-intriguing comment came from Andy Goodell, a Republican from upstate Jamestown. He told Capital New York that he hoped the panel would wait until after the November 2016 elections and that “they don’t raise it so high as to get competent opponents to run against us.”

Joking or not, he was crystallizing one of Albany’s dirty little secrets: that one reason most state legislators are virtually assured perpetual re-election if they aren’t indicted is that the salary of $79,500 is paltry enough to discourage from seeking the job many people who are both capable and honest enough to resist the temptation to improperly pad their pay.