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Q&A
Discussion on council member deference, an appeals process, and speaker authority in land use
1:24:26
·
10 min
Commissioner Carl Weisbrod discusses member deference and the balance between individual council member desires and citywide needs with Perris Straughter.
Weisbrod raises the issue of member deference, noting few projects are approved over a council member's objection, and suggests an appeals board (mayor, speaker, borough president) could enhance the speaker's power and address this. Straughter disagrees with the premise that the lack of overrides is a failure, viewing it as a success of negotiation, but states the council does not support the proposed appeal board, questioning its triggers and the potential influence of special interests on its members. He also elaborates on a potential mechanism to enforce the fair housing framework by giving the Speaker more control over which discretionary land use applications come to the council for a vote, a change Kathryn Wylde notes the council could make via its own rules.
Sharon Greenberger
1:24:26
Carl?
Carl Weisbrod
1:24:30
A lot of what you said that
Sharon Greenberger
1:24:32
Lean in.
Carl Weisbrod
1:24:32
I'm sorry.
1:24:33
There's a lot in a lot of what you said that certainly was not important with reality in the last few decades, few decades.
1:24:46
And particularly the issue of of member is that not working?
Howard Slatkin
1:24:51
No.
1:24:51
I don't think so.
Carl Weisbrod
1:24:53
Particularly the issue of member deference and the reality that, I think one housing project in the last two decades or so, has been approved over the council member's objection.
1:25:10
And I think we're struggling with this issue of what is the balance between what a particular council member might want and the needs of the city as a whole.
1:25:25
You talked about, increasing, enhancing the power of the speaker.
1:25:31
And as you know, one of the proposals that we're now considering is having an appeal from a negative council vote to a three party, appeals board, basically, of the mayor, the speaker, and the relevant borough president.
1:25:51
Wouldn't that be a way of enhancing the power of the speaker in two ways?
1:25:56
One, empowering the speaker to have more influence over an individual member on the front end and then in a position to correct miscarriages of policy on the back end?
Perris Straughter
1:26:21
Yeah.
1:26:21
I think I mean, on the on its face, that proposal, you know, has some some logic.
1:26:29
Right?
1:26:29
I think the the where I disagree with you, mister Weisbrot, is that, you know, there's been very limited, times where the the council as a whole has overwritten an individual member.
Carl Weisbrod
1:26:44
I will say it was part of the last time it was done.
Perris Straughter
1:26:47
Yes.
1:26:48
Yeah.
Carl Weisbrod
1:26:48
With some ten years ago.
Perris Straughter
1:26:49
So Yeah.
1:26:50
Well, I was I was not here, but I was on on the administration side as well as here.
1:26:55
But, anyway, I think that's a testament of success rather than failure.
1:27:02
So I see it very differently.
1:27:04
Also, there's what happens in terms of a public vote.
1:27:08
What you don't see is the negotiation that happens behind.
1:27:12
And there are plenty of times where council members have very legitimate concerns about land use proposals.
1:27:20
And at the on the other hand, either the administration or developers are not willing to kinda move on those things and actually figuring out how to get to a good place and get to a yes is extremely hard work that requires, like I was talking about earlier, interventions from other council members, interventions from from folks beyond the individual council member.
1:27:46
So I think that kind of inside process is not something that's, you know, widely seen.
1:27:53
But because of that process, what I've what you characterize as a long period of time without the city council overruling an individual member, I consider a success.
Carl Weisbrod
1:28:06
Well, let me just continue with that for a bit.
1:28:13
First, I I I think I think you more or less accept my proposition that we wanna give the speaker more power.
1:28:22
And one way to do it would be to have the speaker as a part of an appeals process as opposed to a a veto where the mayor vetoes and the entire council simply overrides the veto in a process that we we know is is has a foregone conclusion.
1:28:51
So and the second thing I'd bring to your attention, which I know you know, is that we've had a lot of testimony here from developers, real estate interests, communities, and others, even from council former council members that say that it won't even bring a private application into the EULA process if they know that the local council member at the end of the line is simply going to veto it because the council will back up that council member.
1:29:24
And that's a that's a concern that, well, I agree that area wide rezonings are desirable, and important.
1:29:34
We do need individual rezonings as well.
1:29:38
We do need small developers, particularly, who have to invest a lot of money upfront being prepared to come, through the legislative process and not simply be stared down at the beginning of it or even before the beginning of it by a council member who says I won't have anything to do with this.
1:29:59
I I mean, I get I it's a it's a problem that we're really wrestling with, and I think we've come up with at least one way of dealing with it.
1:30:08
And I think I'm hearing you saying that that's at least something you're receptive to.
Perris Straughter
1:30:16
Well, no.
1:30:16
The appeal board has currently proposed is not something the council supports, But I I acknowledge that it seems like, you know, a solution's balance.
1:30:29
I I I didn't say there was another thing I wanted to say about it, so just quickly if you acknowledge me.
1:30:35
I think the complexity of that structure and questions that it engenders for me is, well, what triggers the appeal?
1:30:45
Is it every project?
1:30:46
Is it certain projects?
1:30:48
And, also, what I said in my testimony around, you know, board presidents and the mayor not being you not being they are also able to be influenced by NIMBY interests, developer interests, special interests.
1:31:06
So having that appeal body really kinda complicates the negotiation.
1:31:11
City council's made a lot of success in terms of making projects more deeply affordable, bringing affordability to projects that weren't there to begin with, like, if there was an MIH on the table, for instance.
1:31:25
So the the complexity of the negotiation process that is supposed to advantage local communities and local neighborhood residents through the city council member leading that process, I question how that how that appeal board having two thirds of its members from either borough wide or city wide, how does that how does that influence those negotiations?
Carl Weisbrod
1:31:58
Well, it influences the negotiations by having the council members as a whole and particularly a local council member being much more flexible than he or she might otherwise be.
1:32:11
But let let me just go back to your answer to miss Greenberger's question, which I didn't entirely follow.
1:32:19
I followed it on the in terms of the informal process.
1:32:25
Although I I will say, at least my experience, is that generally on area wide rezonings and receiving proposals from communities, communities are, shall we say, much less aggressive in in supporting housing than than the city as a whole is, irrespective of administration.
1:32:48
But on the legal answer to how the fair housing framework could be enforced, I didn't really understand what you were proposing in terms of how the housing framework could be enforced legally other than more or less the arrangement that we're considering where the council speaker has a lot of power.
Perris Straughter
1:33:14
Yeah.
1:33:15
No.
1:33:15
Thanks for that.
1:33:16
So one idea that I I alluded to in my testimony is around how applications come to the city council for vote or not.
1:33:26
Some applications are mandatory, which means that the city council must vote on them.
1:33:32
Other applications are discretionary, and there's different types of discretionary actions.
1:33:37
But, essentially, either the individual council member or the chair of the land use committee can call them up or not.
1:33:48
And one potential tool could be a speaker call up where instead of actions being necessarily automatically taken to the council as a whole for vote so with basically, the council votes on whether to vote on those applications.
1:34:08
It seems a little strange, but that's it's what we do.
1:34:13
Instead of the council as a whole taking that vote, it could be something that is in the hands of the speaker.
1:34:19
And that does change the kind of politics around what gets decided to be brought to the floor.
1:34:28
And then there's other precedents for this.
1:34:30
It's not unlike the way certain committees are intended to work, particularly at the the national level.
1:34:40
You don't see that as much on the city level because the council makes their own rules on on on legislation.
1:34:46
But that that's the that's, like, one alternative idea isn't is looking at the ability for the speaker to say what comes to the council for a vote as opposed to the council as a whole.
Kathryn Wylde
1:35:02
But they used to have that ability, and the council itself could restore that ability to the speaker just like they took it away.
Sharon Greenberger
1:35:10
Mhmm.
1:35:11
Yes.
Perris Straughter
1:35:11
So through council rules.
Kathryn Wylde
1:35:12
Yeah.
1:35:12
They don't need a charter change for that.
Cleo Acevedo
1:35:14
Correct.