Inadequate Hearing
On Term Limits Bill;
Section 38 of Charter
May Bar City Council
From Self-Perpetuation
By Henry J. Stern
October 20, 2008
We last wrote Tuesday (Oct. 14) about term limits, and then paused for the required public hearings which were held Thursday and Friday. Although the hearings were poorly managed and many members of the public were excluded from testifying, while others were rushed through two-minute bites, what did come through were the large numbers of ordinary people (not just candidates and 'community organizers' who came on their own time and dime to speak against the Bloomberg-Quinn plan for mutual term extension.
Although the public was told that witnesses would be heard in order of their registration to speak, that turned out not to be the case. For example, this blogger registered with the sergeant-at-arms as directed at about 11 a.m., two hours before the hearing was scheduled to start (1 p.m.).
He was not called until 5 p.m., four hours after the hearing began. Actually, that was not bad, because he had the opportunity to listen to a great deal of testimony, delivered with varying degrees of eloquence, conviction and motivation.
The witnesses supporting the Council’s attempt to over-ride the City Charter were generally but not universally those encouraged to attend by the Mayor, the Speaker and their aides. Some were beneficiaries of city appropriations, both Mayoral and Council, or anonymous gifts over the years.
Many were unfamiliar with the precise issue, but issued statements of support for the Mayor and praise for the accomplishments of his administration. The opposing witnesses were primarily concerned with the principle of a legislative body reversing the twice expressed judgment of the people - particularly on an issue involving substantial personal, political and financial benefits for the legislators themselves, most of whom had not earned anything near their Council salaries ($122,500, including lulus) in their previous private or 'non-profit' activity.
Some witnesses were hostile to the Mayor and a few were rude, but most were not. A number, including this blogger, spoke favorably about the Bloomberg administration, which has been generally a very good one, with the Mayor often using his private resources in the public interest. The city has been governed relatively well in recent years, certainly in comparison with the state and federal governments.
Among the numerous deficiencies of the "public" hearing was the fact that the Council chamber was far too small to hold the people who wanted to speak or to listen. Even worse, the second day hearing was held in a much smaller room, the committee chamber, so that hardly anyone was able to gain admittance. (A hearing on Willets' Point occupied the Council chamber, but Friday's hearing could have been held on a day when the chamber was free, or elsewhere). What ensued over two days was scarcely a "public hearing," in the sense of a dialogue or an exchange of views.
The proper location for the proceedings would have been the auditorium at One Police Plaza, particularly for the second day. Although people were told that all who appeared would be allowed to speak, registration was arbitrarily cut off at a particular hour for each hearing. The time limit for the public was set at two minutes, which is totally inadequate for a persuasive oral presentation on a serious issue.
The presiding officer was Councilman Simcha Felder, who could most charitably be described as choleric. He forbade applause, and continually threatened spectators with eviction, although, in this area at least, his bark was far worse than his bite.
Our First You-Tube
The campaign to defend the City Charter from legislative emasculation has produced a You Tube video, which shows Mayor Bloomberg, in living color, forcefully expressing his prior position on precisely this issue. Elizabeth Benjamin, a talented reporter, placed it in her Politics blog, which is published by the Daily News. Although the publisher supports the administration's proposal, the paper has allowed its columnists freedom in writing on this issue, and they have generally denounced the scheme.
You can link to it here. This is our first citation of YouTube, which is rapidly becoming an important political medium. See what it did both for and to the Governor of Alaska.
A great deal is happening with regard to this particular question, and we could write more extensively, but that could be a burden to our readers. We believe that this is one of the most important issues to come before the City Council because it deals with city governance, and what we and many others see as an attempt to use legal technicalities to over-ride the will of over a million people, twice expressed.
Some people discredit the term limits referenda because Ronald Lauder spent millions of dollars to pursue that goal. But Mayor Bloomberg spent millions in support of a referendum question for non-partisan local government (which we strongly supported), and the proposal lost, 70 to 30. It is true that Lauder’s fortune brought the issue to the people, but the majority voted for it because they wanted to. Certainly Lauder was in no position to promise jobs, budget appropriations or any other benefits to those who supported his views.
A Parallel Question - Section 38
It may also be argued that Section 38 of the City Charter prevents the Council from extending eligibility for re-election without a public referendum.
You can link to the entire section here. It includes seventeen categories of Charter provisions which can only be amended by the people in referendum, not by the Council. Several of these categories deal with the election and qualification of public officials.
We cite subsection 4. A referendum is required if a law “abolishes an elective office, or changes the method of nominating, electing or removing and elective officer, or changes the term of an elective office.” It seems to us that this language applies with regard to a law changing the eligibility of a candidate for public office, especially if a previous referendum had been held on precisely that point.
The entire thrust of Section 38 is to prevent the Council from tampering with the system of elections for its own benefit. Although no one can predict the action of the Court of Appeals if this case arrives there, it is clear that the intention of the section was to prevent monkeying with an election to suit the personal ambitions of candidates, including those who would otherwise be ineligible to seek office.
There are many sections of the City Charter which the Council is free to amend, because the Charter is longer and more detailed than it should be (as is the State Constitution, which is almost 100,000 words.
The City Charter does go out of its way to protect the sanctity of the electoral process and the final authority of the public to make decisions on governance. For a lame-duck City Council to tamper with that process, after they failed despite ample opportunity to place the matter on referendum, is likely to be illegal if the Court considers the intent of Section 38, but it is certainly unconscionable.
Whether one likes the Mayor or not, whether one likes term limits or not, people of reasonable judgment should reject this last minute effort to thwart the democratic process. Those who participate in this scheme will, sooner or later, pay a price at the polls, because they are acting in their own interest, not on behalf of the men and women who elected them.
The councilmembers first elected in 2001 are the trust fund kids of politics. They only got their seats when their predecessors (in some cases their own parents) had to give up theirs. For these members to attempt to subvert the very Charter provision that made their own election possible is the height of both greed and gall.
#506 10.20.2008 1285wds |