New York state Assembly Speaker Carl Heastie told reporters Thursday afternoon that state budget negotiations are “kind of at a standstill” and reiterated his frustration with the amount of policy that gets included in the state’s spending plan every year.

“Things are kind of, kind of at a standstill. We’re going to pass this debt service bill and the members will go home, do work in their districts and we’ll pick it back up next week,” Heastie said.

The budget is due next Tuesday, April 1. Members won’t be in Albany on Monday, as it is Eid al-Fitr, the festival marking the end of Ramadan.

The big policy items discussed this year are Gov. Kathy Hochul’s desired changes to the state’s 2020 discovery laws and involuntary commitment, as well as statewide standards for a cellphone ban in schools, but Heastie said he’s gotten no language from the governor’s staff yet.

“I don’t like doing policy in the budget because governors like to use the leverage of Silver versus Pataki to throw all kind of policy in the budget,” Heastie said, referencing former state Assembly Speaker Sheldon Silver and former Gov. George Pataki’s budget battles. “And like I said, you could probably knock out numbers in just a matter of hours but it’s policy that always bogs down budget negotiations.”

One policy item Heastie said he would like to see part of the budget is paying off New York’s $6 billion in outstanding unemployment insurance debt from the COVID-19 pandemic, especially given the situation, he says, going on in Washington.

“If the federal government is going to continue to do what they’re doing with this Republican administration, I can only assume we’re going to a start to see people applying for unemployment and it’s just another burden on our already exhausted unemployment system,” Heastie said.

That Republican agenda in Congress that could bring various government cuts has made this year’s state budget process more tedious, as state Senate Majority Leader Andrea Stewart-Cousins also alluded to on Wednesday.

Heastie said “we are never going to be able to backfill federal cuts” and when asked how the atmosphere on Capitol Hill affects the state’s spending plan, he said, “before you all say ‘I’m gonna ask Speaker Heastie,’ can you please ask the seven Republican members of Congress what are they doing in light of knowing thee cuts are coming?”

A spokesperson for Hochul released a statement later Wednesday, saying “Gov. Hochul continues to stand firm on her key priorities as she negotiates in good faith with the Senate and Assembly to pass a budget that makes New York safer and more affordable.”