A coalition comprising nearly every Democratic state lawmaker from New York City urged Gov. Andrew M. Cuomo in a letter, to press for extending and tightening the state’s rent regulation laws as part of the budget deal he is negotiating with the Legislature.

“If the state does not act, millions of working- and middle-class New Yorkers will be at immediate risk of losing their homes,” warned the lawmakers, about 90 of whom signed the letter to Mr. Cuomo. “We ask that you act boldly on tenants’ behalf by requiring these reforms to be a part of any budget agreement.”

Mr. Cuomo this month rebuffed suggestions by tenant advocates that he include a rent law extension in his amended executive budget, released March 3. The state budget is due at the end of March. The regulations, which limit the rent that landlords can charge on over one million apartments in New York City and its immediate suburbs, are set to expire on June 15, raising fears that hundreds of thousands of tenants will face substantial rent increases that they cannot afford.

Landlords, who have invested millions of dollars in lobbying state officials on rent regulation, have argued that the laws have discouraged them from investing in improvements to rental apartments and ultimately depress the supply of affordable apartments.

The letter to Mr. Cuomo reflects growing concerns among Democrats who support rent regulation that they will find their backs against the wall should they be forced to negotiate an extender bill separately from the budget, as they did in 2003, the last time the laws faced expiration.

Then, Gov. George E. Pataki and the Republican-controlled State Senate ultimately agreed to renew the laws, but they forced the Democratic-controlled Assembly to accept changes that tenant advocates believe have allowed landlords to start charging market rates on tens of thousands of formerly regulated apartments in recent years.

“The budget is the last best chance at a new and improved housing law,” said State Senator Daniel L. Squadron, a Democrat who represents parts of Brooklyn and Manhattan. “We’ll keep fighting for this, but it will be a whole lot harder to proceed” if Mr. Cuomo does not push for the changes.

Along with extending a temporary income tax surcharge on high-earning New Yorkers, the rent regulations stand as one of the major priorities of Assembly Democrats this legislative session. But unlike the way the handled the income tax surcharge, Assembly Democrats did not include a package of rent regulations in the one-house budget bill the chamber approved on Wednesday.

In interviews, some Democrats who signed the letter said they expected the budget process to end not in a three-way deal with Mr. Cuomo and the Senate, but rather with Mr. Cuomo using his emergency powers to force the Legislature to vote on his budget proposal or risk shutting down the government.

Their goal, the Democrats said, was to persuade Mr. Cuomo to include the rent regulations in any emergency budget bill, essentially using his leverage to force Senate Republicans to accept extended and strengthened rent laws.

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