Metro

Andy: it’s ab$urd!

HALL OF SHAME: Gov.-elect Andrew Cuomo tours the empty Tryon Boys Residential Center (above) in upstate Johnstown yesterday.

JOHNSTOWN, NY — Gov.-elect Andrew Cuomo visited an empty — but fully staffed — boys detention center upstate yesterday to demand an end to a “ridiculous” law that requires a year’s notice to shut down such facilities.

Cuomo condemned the $15 million spent to keep 30 employees working at the Tryon Boys Residential Center in Johnstown this year even though it has been empty for months.

He vowed to change the policy after he takes office in January.

“It is ridiculous,” Cuomo told reporters after touring the facility, about 40 miles west of Albany. “It is bizarre. It is something that has to be stopped immediately.”

The absurd situation stems from a state law that lawmakers tucked into a budget bill in 1994, when Cuomo’s father, Mario Cuomo, was governor. At the time, Albany had to give nine months’ notice before closing a facility.

In 2006, the law was revised, requiring government agencies to give 12 months’ notice.

The policy leaves public workers to perform do-nothing work or no work at all.

The 44-year-old Tryon facility, which famously once housed a young Mike Tyson, is slated to be officially mothballed on Jan. 19.

Cuomo said the law needs to be changed, despite opposition from unions and others.

“For me, it is symbolic,” Cuomo said. “This state government needs radical reform. The politicians in Albany really have to take a look at what they’re doing, and they have to respect the taxpayers.”

The state said it was recently forced to renovate the facility’s air-conditioning system because a $2 million contract couldn’t be canceled.

New York overhauled its juvenile-justice system to emphasize rehabilitation rather than punishment and to avoid a federal takeover after reports of mistreatment by guards and insufficient services.

Cuomo said a projected $9 billion budget gap means the state won’t be able to afford to pay workers not to work next year.

With no federal bailout expected, the 2011-12 fiscal year is going to be “very, very difficult . . . All the choices will be hard choices,” he said.

But Cuomo has shared few specifics on how he would address the state’s current and future deficits.

Since being elected this month, Cuomo has toured a number of state facilities to determine how government can operate more efficiently. The stops included the Manhattan Psychiatric Center, Sing Sing prison and the Tappan Zee Bridge. Brendan Scott