Cuomo: Show me the performance

Cuomo marks 100 days in office on Sunday. In a 25-minute radio interview with WCNY's Capitol Pressroom, the governor talked to Susan Arbetter about his packed schedule -- "I think if you count the hours, rather than the days, it's been years of service" -- and how he defied expectations by getting a "good," "honest," "clean" budget passed on time.

He also broke out new talking points that sidestep ideological questions of spending versus taxes (including Silver's drumbeat to re-up the higher income tax rate on millionaires).

Governor Cuomo doesn't want to talk about money in or money out - he wants to talk about efficiency and performance in government.

The answer can’t always be, ‘they should pay more taxes.’ That can’t always be the answer. At one point the question has to change to, what are we getting for the dollar? And how do we do this with more efficiency and more effectiveness?

He first brought it up when he was asked about the property tax cap:

We are talking about the tax cap. And you’re going to hear me talking about something else which I have been talking about but I’m going to emphasize it even more, which is performance in government. Output.  Results.

He applied the same frame to schools:

The school district gets a check by some formula amount. Well, where is performance in that equation? Where is funding for teachers who do a better job than other teachers, or schools that do a better job than other schools? Or school districts? Where do we reward performance? Where are the bonuses?...I think once you start to say, look, funding of education is not funding the business interests of education. We should start talking about funding performance in education. And let’s start to look at this situation from the student’s point of view. You know, you say Susan, ‘the superintendents, the mayors’, yeah how about from the students? And what schools are performing for the students, and let’s start to evaluate performance.

To taxes generally...:

You know, New York – government writ large,  we’ve been very generous in our funding for many many years.  We’re now at a point where the people of the state are saying I can’t pay anymore taxes, businesses are saying we’re leaving at this tax rate, and we have to shift the question to efficiency, effectiveness, and results.

...And to property taxes specifically:

That’s what this period of time is all about. Property tax, by the way, which you brought up, is part of that. Property tax cap is, let’s impose fiscal discipline. And let’s put a cap on the growth. Nobody’s saying reduction.  Some people did say we should talk about cutting property taxes below zero.  That was rejected. My proposal is cap the growth. Now school districts, local governments, say well we don’t want to cap the growth. I understand you don’t want to cap the growth. But the people of this state are saying  need a cap on my property tax because you’re taxing me out of my home!