But six weeks later, after lawmakers approved the state budget this week, the governor acknowledged that his highly promoted proposal, which his advisers talked up as a major advancement in criminal justice policy, was so politically controversial that he would no longer pursue using public money to finance it.
The abrupt decision was a rare political retreat by Mr. Cuomo, a careful student of public opinion polls and legislative sentiment who has generally avoided the kinds of miscalculations about hot-button issues that can easily trip up a chief executive.
At a news conference on Tuesday to celebrate passage of the budget, Mr. Cuomo said he had decided against seeking public money for the prison classes because of opposition from lawmakers, particularly in the State Senate, who pointed out that many law-abiding families are struggling to pay for college.
“I understand the sentiment,” the governor said. “I don’t agree with it, but I understand it, and I understand the appearance of it.”
Mr. Cuomo, a Democrat, had proposed creating publicly-funded college programs at 10 state prisons. His office estimated the program would cost $1 million in the first year, a minuscule sum in a state whose corrections agency has an operating budget of $2.8 billion.
College programs in prisons dwindled two decades ago after President Bill Clinton signed legislation denying Pell grants for inmates. Gov. George E. Pataki, a Republican, later made prisoners ineligible for New York’s Tuition Assistance Program, cutting off another source of public funding.
New York currently offers college programs in more than a dozen state prisons, funded mostly with private money, though a small amount of public money has been used. Mr. Cuomo wants to create a state program to build upon those offerings so more inmates can participate and earn degrees. A study by the RAND Corporation last year found that inmates who participated in education programs while incarcerated had much lower odds of returning to prison.
