Memo

To: Candidates Seeking the WFP Line

From: WFP Executive Committee

Re: Key Topics for Interviews

There are 65 separate issue questions in the 2010 WFP questionnaire. We apologize for the length, but of
course the state tackles many important issues. Of these, our candidate interviews may focus on the
following areas:

1. Property Tax Relief & Progressive Taxation

2. Campaign Finance Reform
3. Strengthening Protections for Renters
4. IDA Reform
5. Farm Workers Bill of Rights
6. NYC Charter Revision
7. How your record of service demonstrates a commitment to the values of the WFP.

Please note that in the course of the interviews, we will be asking candidates to take a number of actions.
Specifically, you should be prepared for the following:

• We will ask you to sign the attached letter to Governor Paterson in support of property tax relief
and progressive taxation. Please also see the attached memos and charts on the same topic.

• We will ask you to support legislation closing the so-called “LLC loophole” that allows owners of
multiple Limited Liability Corporations (LLC’s) to “max out” multiple times to the same candidate.

• We will ask you to support legislation extending rent laws that affect over a million NY households
this year rather than waiting to extend them in 2011 when they expire.

Please note that some of these issues may appeal primarily to constituents outside of your district. The WFP
takes the view that all of us – upstate, suburbs and NYC -- are truly “in this together” so we see no
contradiction to, for example, asking NYC elected officials to weigh in on property tax relief, and upstate
officials to support strengthening protections for renters.

We look forward to seeing you at the interviews.

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 AN OPEN LETTER TO GOVERNOR DAVID A. PATERSON

Dear Governor Paterson:

No one can deny it: New York State is faced with the worst budget crisis in a generation. You have
argued that the best way out of the current crisis is by reducing public expenditures on education,
health care, and nearly every other service New York State provides to its citizens. Most New
Yorkers understand that painful cuts to our public budget are inevitable.

But this narrative, and this approach, are inadequate. What’s missing from this narrative is the story
of what has happened to the tax burden in New York. Over the last 30 years, the basic story is this:
the tax burden on the wealthiest New Yorkers has been vastly reduced, and the middle class has
been forced to pick up the slack via tremendous increases in property taxes. Here is a startling fact:
if New York were simply to revert to the income tax code of the early 1970s (with tax brackets
adjusted for inflation), 95% of New Yorkers would see a tax cut, but the state would see billions in
new revenue.

What’s needed is a comprehensive approach that does three things at once: (1) closes the budget
gap; (2) provides property tax relief to hard-pressed working and middle-class homeowners; and (3)
restores progressivity to the tax system as a whole.

We cannot merely cut our way out of this crisis. Nor can we tax our way or borrow our way out. We
need a sensible combination of all three tools. Your current proposal focuses merely on cuts, so we
respectfully wish to inject some proposals for raising revenue that would mitigate the cuts and
provide some amount of funding for property tax relief.

There are many ideas for raising revenue. Here are two that we believe deserve a closer look:

A) A “Wall Street to Main Street” payroll tax on Wall Street bonuses of more than $50,000 that
were given in 2010 to persons who earned at least $250,000. Even a modest tax on such
bonuses could produce several billion dollars in new revenue.

B) Two new Personal Income Tax (PIT) brackets: a 1% increase for households with annual
income over $1 million, and a 2% increase for households with annual income over $5 million.
The weekly numbers make the reasonableness of such a proposal evident: If you make
$20,000 per week (or $1 million annually), your taxes would increase by $200 per week. If you
make $100,000 per week ($5m per year), then the new rate would require an additional $2000
per week. This would generate $1.7 billion in new revenue.

We respect your view that painful cuts must be made. But we also believe that the middle- and
working-class should not be asked to sacrifice alone. We urge you to embrace "shared sacrifice" --
a fair budget resolution that includes cuts progressive new revenues as well as spending cuts.

Some of us support the “bonus tax.” Others of us prefer the new PIT brackets approach. The details
can be resolved. What we all agree on is that additional progressive revenues must be part of a fair
budget resolution.

Simply put: We are in this together. Employers and employees, upstate and downstate, rich and
poor and middle-class. Everyone is ready to share the burden, but common sense and common
decency requires that all segments of society carry a fair share of the load.

Sincerely,