ASTORIA – Senate Deputy Leader Michael Gianaris issued the following statement on March 3 about Amazon’s decision to halt construction at their Virginia office complex, coinciding with massive layoffs from the company:

“Amazon’s announcement shows once again that paying off a historically wealthy corporation with massive subsidies to make a single office siting decision is bad policy. It also demands we take a different approach to the use of public dollars that does not rely on providing scarce resources to those who need them least while continuing to shortchange the services that would actually help people’s lives improve.”