Governor Cuomo announced Thursday that he’s rescinding a state regulation that requires food stamp recipients be fingerprinted, saying the poor and hungry are not criminals.

Governor Cuomo, speaking by phone to a gathering of advocates for the poor, says he’s rescinded a 14 year old state regulation that required food stamp recipients be subject to fingerprinting before receiving benefits.  

“Poverty and hunger are not crimes,” said Cuomo. “So we shouldn’t treat the poor or the hungry as criminals.”

The governor says he doesn’t think the finger printing deters fraud.

“It’s not necessary,” Cuomo said.

Governor Cuomo is calling on the state Legislature to act on a proposal to create a justice center in the state for people with special needs.

Cuomo says the bill addresses an ongoing problem of abuse by employees in state mental health and special needs facilities.

The Governor says the new center will set up two justice mechanisms, "One, for really serious offenses, a special prosecutor who can bring criminal charges, specializing in justice area dealing with justice population and becoming expert in the challenges that are presented here."

Cuomo says the Justice Center will also have an effective administrative mechanism that sanctions or terminates employees who abuse trust.

The debate over the legalization of medical marijuana is still a "smoking" issue. In a recent poll by Siena College, voters weighed in and 57 % support the proposal.

According to the poll, 2/3 of New York voters say they're paying close attention to the debate.

Dr. Don Levy is the Director of the Research Institute. He says more than 700 voters were polled.

"There was no single group that stood out saying 'Hey, wait a minute.' We know the arguments against it and the concerns about it being effectively regulated. But when presented with just the issues, a simple thumbs up or a thumbs down, New Yorkers feel there's a way to do it," says Levy.

Governor Cuomo is pleased with the outcome of Tuesday’s state wide school budget vote,  but teachers and school board leaders see some disturbing trends.

This year’s school budget vote was the first to take place after Governor Andrew Cuomo convinced the legislature to adopt the property tax cap. The governor says the tax cap imposed “fiscal discipline” . He says he’s  pleased  that few schools attempted to override the cap, and  that most schools kept tax increases to a minimum, and were approved by voters. He says tax payers, as well as state government, are tapped out.

“At one point, there is no more money, and that’s where we are now,” said Cuomo. “The answer is not ‘put your hand in the pocket of the taxpayer’ anymore.”

Rochester-based Intervol just returned from Haiti where the group is helping victims of the devastating earthquake in 2010.

Intervol is a nonprofit organization that sends teams of health care volunteers to countries with significant medical needs.

Click on the audio player above to listen to WXXI’s Alex Crichton interview co-founder Dr. Timothy O'Connor during Wednesday’s Morning Edition on WXXI-AM 1370.

Voters in area suburban school districts went to the polls to vote on school budgets Tuesday and all in Monroe County were approved.

This was the first school budget vote since a property tax cap was enacted last year.

The only district in the region to see its budget rejected was in the Wyoming Central School District.

Its proposed budget exceeded the cap limit and thus required a 60 percent super majority of voters in order to pass.

The state’s September primary is going to be delayed by two days, now that the legislature has agreed to move the date from Tuesday September 11th to Thursday September 13th.

Legislative leaders say firefighter groups and others who plan annual memorials for September 11th requested that the scheduled primary be delayed two days, until Thursday September 13th, and they have agreed.

Assembly Speaker Sheldon Silver, whose district includes the World Trade Center site where the planes hit the towers on September 11th 2001, says it was the right thing to do.

“We think September 11th should remain as a day of memorial,” said Silver.

Democrats in the State Assembly were debating a  bill to increase the state’s minimum wage. The Republican leader of the State Senate offered a spirited defense of his position opposing the measure, but did not rule the issue out altogether.

Democrats in the Assembly were set to approve a bill to increase the state’s minimum wage from $7.25 to $8.50 an hour.  Assembly Speaker Sheldon Silver, who has championed the measure, calls it a “moral imperative”.

“It is, I keep saying it, a moral issue,” said Silver.

A new program aims to train people to become early detectors of signs of the emerald ash borer infestation in ash trees in Western & Central New York.

The insect has killed millions of ash trees, and is spreading in western New York.

Cornell University's Mark Whitmore, a forest entomologist, is training people to be first detectors of the bug, so they accurately report it, and educate others.

Whitmore says communities need to be engaged in the battle against the beetle.

The training sessions will cover the biology of the insect and the signs and symptoms of ash tree infestation.

Whitmore says there were false reports last summer in the area, and people need to be able to accurately identify signs and symptoms on the trees themselves.

Research into multiple sclerosis has accelerated rapidly in the last few years - and doctors in Buffalo are at the forefront.

Information about how MS progresses in patients has long been out there, but it wasn’t being synthesized or analyzed effectively.

Now, SUNY Buffalo is using a new supercomputer from IBM that can help researchers make connections between environmental and hereditary factors and how MS affects its victims.