It would be better off voluntarily giving up a percentage of the unclaimed deposits now rather than risk even a bigger cut in the future.

Year after year he has proposed legislation that would end the practice, forcing soda and beer companies to repay the state for unclaimed deposits.

The law does not say who should receive unclaimed deposits, leading the Cuomo Administration to propose that they be returned to the state.

Since 1983, distributors have kept almost $800 million in unclaimed deposits, the agency says.

Currently, distributors pay retailers 2 cents for each bottle they collect, money that comes out of the unclaimed deposits the new law would take away.

And it's not exactly accurate to say that those unclaimed deposits would be returned to "the people," unless the people you mean are public employees.

Even so, unclaimed deposits total about $60 million a year, $230 million since the bill went into effect in 1983.

At a Congressional hearing in September, an agency official testified that unclaimed deposits totaled only $30 million.

The industry groups said that if the state received the money on unclaimed deposits, the result would be higher prices for consumers.

Some state treasurers have indicated that less than 20 percent of unclaimed deposits are recovered by residents under these programs.