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TESTIMONY
Testimony by Public Advocate Jumaane Williams on the commission's charter reform proposals
0:41:32
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4 min
Public Advocate Jumaane Williams presents his nuanced perspective on the commission's proposals, supporting many in theory while raising concerns about their implementation and potential impacts.
He suggests modifications to the housing and land use proposals, such as expanding the appeals board, and calls for more research into the effects of open primaries and even-year elections before they are adopted.
He begins his testimony by stating he has lost all faith and confidence in the Adams administration.
- On land use, Williams supports shortening the review process but suggests maintaining consecutive review times for community boards and borough presidents.
- He questions the income bands for the affordable housing fast-track proposal and the constitutionality of the proposed three-member appeals board, suggesting it be expanded to five.
- He expresses concern that the city map proposal would improperly vest too much power in a mayoral agency.
- While theoretically supportive of open primaries and even-year elections, he believes more research is needed to understand potential negative impacts like voter burnout.
Jumaane Williams
0:41:32
Alright.
0:41:32
Peace and blessing.
0:41:33
Love and light to everyone.
0:41:33
Thank you so much.
0:41:34
I I will start just from the framework.
0:41:36
I wanna be clear.
0:41:38
When it comes to the Adams administration, I've lost all full faith and confidence, so I'm concerned about that.
0:41:44
But I have a lot of faith and trust in a lot of folks who are on this board, so I'm gonna try and have a conversation as if the the Adams administration had nothing to do with it.
0:41:54
Public advocate for the City Of New York, and I wanna thank chair Burry as well as the members of the commission and my fellow New Yorkers for allowing me to testify before you today.
0:42:02
Wanna start off by saying many of the proposals that this commission has put forth, agree with in theory, but I have a lot of questions concerning the implementation of some, the legality of others, and the impact of all.
0:42:12
On the housing and land use questions, while I do support shortening the length of the overall review process, I have some concerns about consolidating the review time for the community boards and the ball presidents.
0:42:22
I believe a consecutive process with a thirty day allotment for ball presidents, community boards, and the department of city planning.
0:42:28
Each will fulfill the goal of shortening the process while providing these groups with their own dedicated time to deliberate and come to their own conclusions.
0:42:35
I also have questions concerning the use of mandatory inclusionary housing under the proposed affordable housing fast track.
0:42:42
During my time in New York City council, I found the highest income bands allowed under MIH to be unaffordable for many, and as such, I voted against the introduction of MIH.
0:42:51
I have questions on this particular point, and chief among them is what specific income bands will be covered on this proposal?
0:42:57
The interim report mentions a range of incomes generally, quote, unquote, between 4080% of area of mid income AMI.
0:43:05
We should have some specifics, would be changing the process and timing for land use matters that have been in place since 1989, and that was necessary since this US Supreme Court ruled the board of estimates process for land use matters unconstitutional since the mayor, the control, and the council president had two votes each as opposed to the bar president that each had one violating the one person, one vote rule.
0:43:27
In regards to ballot measures number three, that proposed the creation of an appeals board and would eliminate both the mayor's veto power in the uniform land review process and the New York City council's power to override vetoes.
0:43:39
I'm I'm unclear as the constitutionality of this proposal and wonder whether this violates New York City charter that would eliminate a crucial part of our system of checks and balances in the legislative process.
0:43:49
It is important to note that land use matters are legislative matters.
0:43:52
But if it is actually constitutional, then I might support this.
0:43:55
But only if the appeals board has expanded to five members, requiring three out of the five to vote in affirmative, I'd recommend expanding the board to including, the two citywide elected officials, comptroller and the public advocate.
0:44:07
On question four, I have a lot of concerns and don't look favorably on this proposal, as we remove the powers that the ball president commonly have to vest all responsibilities and power on a city agency whose agency head is appointed by the mayor, and we often have problems with agencies getting the proper funding that they need.
0:44:25
Finally, on the questions of even year elections and deliberation of open primaries, I actually tend to support these proposals in theory.
0:44:34
But as the commission laid out in the interim report, open primaries would have a number of positive effects from allowing unaffiliated voters to participate in the primary process to increasing local turnout and reinforcing ranked choice voting.
0:44:45
However, given the relative success of ranked choice voting in New York City, I do believe more research needs to be done into the potential impacts these would have on the process as well as other potential impacts such as election burnout and down ballot burnout.
0:44:58
In conjunction with evening elections, I think this will potentially lead to a drop off in voting down ballot in addition to less informed electorate on local race candidates.
0:45:06
So while in theory, I support these, I'm concerned that we won't have time to answer some of the questions I have before the general election.
0:45:14
And I know my time is up, but I I when I had the city council, charter commission, we did talk about, making sure that the board of corrections and CCRB had one percent of expense budgets, of the NYPD and the department of corrections.
0:45:28
And we ask for my office to have subpoena power and, the standing to sue.
0:45:33
Thank you so much, and happy to answer any questions.
Richard R. Buery Jr.
0:45:35
Thank you so much.