Chris Keeley
Reform NY Day 2008
1. New York State’s 2008 budget, prepared behind schedule and in shadowy circumstances has been described as a “throwback to Albany’s worst old days.”
2. The defeat of the City’s congestion pricing plan, endorsed and supported by DMI, was killed at the hands of one man operating behind closed doors. A man that has since been described to be, “unworthy of his office.”
We don’t have to look earlier than last week for these sad examples of dysfunction in Albany.
With a budget larded with money for pet projects – but no raises for judges - even a Jack Abramoff hard-liner would be impressed by Albany’s status as a “sanctuary city” for back-scratching favor-seekers. The sorry spectacle of secret budget negotiations and legislators voting on partial budget bills without any idea of the totality of the budget make it clear that the New York State legislature’s “reforms” in recent years have done little to change business-as-usual.
NYPIRG’s “Fat Cats” ranking of Albany lobbyists has come to reinforce what is well known and rarely denied that voices of everyday citizens have been drowned out by a handful of well-to-do special interests and their deluge of campaign cash.
It's become fortune cookie wisdom: Behind closed doors, democracy withers.
Yet, there are still New Yorkers who believe that it does not have to be this way. On April 29, though, citizen-activists from across the state will gather in Albany to tell our state’s many deeply-entrenched legislators that staying the current course of back-room deals and undemocratic operating procedures is not an option.
Ordinary New Yorkers want to tell the members of Albany’s status quo, “Enough is Enough!”
Enough of rules that concentrate Albany's power in the hands of only three men.
Enough of sham ethics investigations conducted by partisan boards.
Enough of campaign finance rules that allow incumbents to scare off high-quality, first-time candidates.
Enough of district lines drawn by the parties in power, with nothing in mind but the preservation of the power of incumbency.
Enough of campaign funds subsidizing the lives of elected officials.
On Reform Day 2008, ordinary New Yorkers will raise our voices to demand accountability from our elected representatives, transparency in the legislature’s processes, and a return to representative democracy in the State of New York.
Organizations currently supporting Reform Day 2008 include:
Brennan Center for Justice
Center for Governmental Research
Citizen Action of New York
Citizens for Better Government in New York
Citizens Union of the City of New York
Common Cause New York
Democracy for Hudson Mohawk Region
Democracy for New York City (DFNYC)
Democracy Matters
Fifth Avenue Committee
FreeNYS.org
Hunger Action Network of New York State
League of Women Voters of New York City
League of Women Voters of New York State
League of Women Voters of Westchester
Long Island Progressive Coalition
New York Civic
New York Public Interest Research Group (NYPIRG)
Plainville’s Nature’s Fare
Professional Staff Congress
Schuyler Center for Analysis and Advocacy
The Interfaith Alliance of Rochester
Women's City Club of New York (WCC)
Participation is expected to be broad: buses will depart from Binghamton, Ithaca, Long Island, New York City, Oneonta, Rochester, and Westchester.
Reform Day 2008, at its core, is about demanding and defending democracy in New York State. We hope, in bringing these concerns directly to the doorstep of the individuals responsible to act on the people’s behalf,
to engender real change in Albany.
For more information, please contact Common Cause/New York at 1-800-300-8707 or ckeeley (at) commoncause.org.
Posted at 7:00 AM, Apr 14, 2008 in Governmental Reform | Permalink | Comments (3)
Comments
I have two troubles with this post:
1) I think it wrong-headed to attribute to Speaker Silver the defeat of Mayor Bloomberg's congestion pricing proposal. There's a lot of reason to think that a majority of Democratic Assembly members did not support the proposal. The "three-men-in-room-metaphor" blurs, in my view, a somewhat more textured give and take among electeds.
2) The reforms proposed are not described in the post above. I did not find them on the Common Cause web site either. Unless you are calling for us to just say "Dayenu," wouldn't it help the rest of us to understand what you are proposing?
Posted by: Daniel Millstone | April 14, 2008 11:43 AM
Daniel,
Thank you for your comments. While it may be the case that the majority of the Democratic Assembly members did not support the congestion pricing plan, we do not know this for certain. The proposal did not come to the Floor for a vote, so there is no way to tell for sure.
As a matter of transparency and public accountability, a proposal of this magnitude should be brought to the Floor so the people of New York State can understand where their member of the Assembly, be they Democratic or Republican, stand on critical issues. Currently, the only New Yorkers that know the position of the Democratic members of the Assembly are the very members of that Caucus. The constituents of these members, unfortunately, do not know with any level of certainty.
The key issues that will be discussed at Reform Day are 1) An ethics commission with greater independence from the legislature and executive, 2) Campaign finance reform, 3) A non-partisan redistricting commission that ensures racial and language minorities have fair and effective representation, and 4) Opening the political process within the legislature through reform of its operating rules.
The final position statements for Reform Day 2008 are expected to be posted on the Common Cause website later this week. I encourage you, and anyone else interested in the specifics of Reform Day and its issues, to contact us at (212) 691-6421 or ckeeley (at) commoncause.org. Thanks.
Posted by: Chris Keeley | April 14, 2008 12:18 PM
I think Silver deserves the benefit of the doubt because of his record on Second Avenue Subway. Early this decade, when it was still uncertain if there was enough funding for it, Silver told Pataki that if he didn't get his SAS funds, he'd choke off funding for Pataki's East Side Access. What's more, Silver made it clear that as long as there was a guarantee the entire line would be build, it was okay with him if the first stages included only the Upper East Side; Silver's district is on the Lower East Side, and will only benefit from the final stage.
Posted by: Alon Levy | April 14, 2008 05:59 PM