With the start of the 2026 legislative session, Consumer Reports (CR) writes to offer policy recommendations to help New Yorkers in the year ahead. We thank you for your many initiatives for consumers in 2025, including passage of the NY Fair Business Practices Act to enhance the New York Attorney’s general’s enforcement of consumer protection laws, expanded oversight of Buy Now Pay Later lenders, and regulations to limit high overdraft fees. We also applaud the many good proposals in Gov. Hochul’s 2026 State of the State proposal to advance consumer protections and address the affordability crisis.
We urge you to please continue your efforts to enact pro-consumer legislation that promotes health, safety, digital privacy, financial fairness, and sustainability.
CR shares top priority bills and policy proposals that the organization is supporting in 2026 to create a fair, safe, and just marketplace for all consumers.
- Enacting the Beauty Justice Act (A.2054A and S.2057A): Testing by Consumer Reports found toxic chemicals in 100% of synthetic braiding hair samples tested, disproportionately affecting Black women and women of color. This bill would ban the sale of personal care and beauty products containing intentionally added toxic substances like lead and PFAS.
- Ensuring Safer School Meals (A.8707 and S.3214): This legislation would ban seven synthetic dyes—including Red 40, Yellow 5, and Blue 1—from foods served in New York public schools. These dyes have been linked to behavioral issues like hyperactivity and inattention, particularly in children with ADHD. CR supports this science-based protection to ensure schools provide healthy learning environments.
- Tackling Energy Affordability (Governor’s Program Proposal): CR supports the Governor’s “Ratepayer Protection Plan” to keep bills under control by modernizing utility regulations and eliminating “gold-plated” rate cases. CR is urging the Legislature to adopt these provisions in the state budget to require utilities to prioritize cost-effective grid flexibility technologies and restrict rate increases to the rate of inflation.
- Stabilizing Homeowners Insurance (S.8583A): Many New Yorkers are seeing rising home insurance costs and deserve transparency about how their premiums are determined. CR supports legislation requiring insurers to disclose the risk models they use to set rates and to offer guaranteed discounts for homeowners who mitigate risks.
- Passing Comprehensive Privacy Legislation: New Yorkers still lack fundamental control over the personal data companies collect and sell about them. CR is calling for a strong, comprehensive privacy law that minimizes data collection, requires universal opt-outs, and reins in the data brokers who profit from our private lives.
- Securing “Zombie” Devices (S.8507): As “Internet of Things” devices age, they often lose software support, becoming open doors for hackers. The Connected Consumer Product End of Life Disclosure Act (S.8507) would require manufacturers to disclose exactly how long a device will be supported with security updates.
- Strengthening New York’s Consumer Law (A.5287 and S.105): CR strongly supports efforts to strengthen New York General Business Law §349 by 1) broadly prohibiting unfair and abusive practices that harm individual consumers; 2) eliminating the judicial requirement of demonstrating that a business engages in “consumer-oriented conduct,” in order to bring a claim; 3) increasing the amount of damages available for recovery, and 4) making attorney’s fees mandatory instead of discretionary.
In addition to these top priorities, CR is advocating for a suite of bills designed to foster a fairer marketplace, including a ban on surveillance pricing and the Clean Deliveries Act to reduce pollution from e-commerce warehouses. The full letter sent to New York State leadership is available here.