Lamenting the rise of taxes, the exodus of residents, and the quality of health care and education, New York’s candidates for governor painted a grim picture of the state last night in their first joint televised forum of the race.

While offering varying solutions, the two Democratic contenders, Attorney General Eliot Spitzer and Nassau County Executive Thomas Suozzi, and the Republican Party’s nominee, a former assemblyman, John Faso, hammered home a singular and depressing message: New York under Governor Pataki is in decline.

Mr. Suozzi spoke of “cities dying throughout our entire state.” Mr. Spitzer described a Medicaid system that is “spiraling out of control,” and said the Metropolitan Transportation Authority was one of the “worst run agencies in the nation.” Mr. Faso warned that some upstate urban areas were in a “fiscal death throe.”

At various points in the town hallstyle forum, candidates pointed to the state’s unfortunate distinctions: that it ranks no. 1 in the nation in losing residents to other states, that it has the highest local taxes in the nation, and that it has America’s most costly Medicaid system.

The questions asked of the candidates reinforced the tone of the night. At one point, a 12-year-old girl who was wearing a Faso pin asked Mr. Spitzer if it would be possible for her to run for president in the future as a New Yorker, or whether she would have to move away to some other state.

“There has been a lot of pessimism tonight,” Mr. Spitzer said.

Although the event wasn’t an actual debate, it was the first time that all three candidates shared screen time in a race that Mr. Spitzer, who leads in fund-raising and in polls, is heavily favored to win.

For 30 minutes each, the candidates answered relatively routine questions from New Yorkers in studio audiences in Lower Manhattan, Rochester, Schenectady County, and Syracuse.

The format invited less confrontation than a debate and was more geared toward allowing the candidates to broadly outline policy plans, which from a viewer’s perspective, did not differ by large extent.

Key differences could be teased out of their answers. Mr. Faso spoke most insistently about cutting taxes, eliminating mandates and liabilities, and cutting spending. He blamed high workers’ compensation costs and the state’s scaffolding law, which holds building owners and contractors liable for almost all cases of worker injuries at job sites, for housing shortages. He criticized Mr. Spitzer for offering a property tax relief plan that he says doesn’t control school spending costs and for supporting a “bigger better bottle bill,” which would add noncarbonated beverages to the state’s deposit law.

Mr. Faso has said the bill is a tax, because it would direct unclaimed deposits to the Environmental Protection Fund, not the general fund.

“We shouldn’t be nickeled and dimed to death by Eliot Spitzer or anyone else,” Mr. Faso said, holding a plastic water bottle.

For Mr. Suozzi, a two-term county executive who regularly refers to himself as a CEO, the largest problem the state faces is incompetent and corrupt management. “I’m running against the leaders of both parties,” he said. “Our legislators are more concerned with how the power brokers think” than the people.

Mr. Spitzer said the most alarming problem was inequality, saying he would try to raise the minimum wage, put all of New York’s children under health insurance, and spend billions of more dollars on New York City schools.

Mr. Spitzer’s participation in last night’s forum was the closest he has come to a debate since he faced off against Mr. Suozzi in a one-hour debate at Pace University on July 26. Mr. Spitzer, who is in the middle of an upstate campaign swing with his running mate, state Senator David Paterson, has refused several invitations from cable companies to take part in televised debates.

After he declined, Cablevision and Clear Channel offered him free airtime to answer questions from a panel of reporters, but the candidate turned them down. Some newspapers in upstate New York have taken notice of his absence. The Rochester Democrat and Chronicle noted in an editorial on Monday: “The most discouraging thing by far about the statewide election campaigns in New York is the degree to which the Democratic frontrunners have been running for cover. For them, silence seems golden.”

Messrs. Suozzi and Faso have tried to make Mr. Spitzer’s refusal to participate in more debates a campaign issue, accusing him of ducking issues and hiding behind his steady lead in the polls. The underdog plea for debates is a tradition in politics. Eight years ago, Mr. Spitzer, who at the time was a relatively unknown former prosecutor trying to unseat attorney general Dennis Vacco, demanded that his Republican challenger debate him six times. Mr. Vacco consented to two, provoking an outcry from the Spitzer campaign.

After the event, a spokesman for Mr. Pataki, David Catalfamo, defended the governor’s legacy, saying, “We are now the safest large state in America. We have one million less New Yorkers on welfare.” Told of Mr. Spitzer’s comment about the MTA, he said, “Does he remember the MTA that Pataki inherited with graffiti-strewn cars, unsafe conditions, and no MetroCards?”