Earlier this month the New York Times criticized the slow growth of wireless Internet access in New York City, which was the centerpiece of Andrew Rasiej's bid for the office of public advocate last year. The Times noted that free or low-cost wireless access is particularly needed in poorer neighborhoods, where the cost of DSL or high-speed service is prohibitive.
New York City's current patchwork approach to wireless access is markedly different from that of other cities and many rural communities. The national trend is toward developing free or low-cost wireless networks that are accessible anywhere within a given region. New York City has focused on wireless access in parks.
Thus far the Department of Parks and Recreation has been trying to provide wireless access in selected parks through partnerships with various non-profit and commercial groups. In addition, several organizations have worked independently to "light up" selected parks. For example, the Bryant Park Restoration Corporation provides wireless access in Bryant Park, and the Alliance for Downtown New York provides the same service in eight public spaces, including three parks, in lower Manhattan. Both groups worked with NYC Wireless, a non-profit organization that advocates universal wireless access in New York City.
The parks department first solicited bids for vendors to provide wireless access in 2003. Despite skepticism from some City Council members and NYC Wireless, the department perceived wireless access as a means of generating new revenue. The bid sought out companies willing to pay a significant license fee to outfit some of the city's largest parks, in exchange for selling subscriptions and/or pay-as-you-go wireless access. Few vendors were interested, and over a year later the contract was finally awarded to Wi-Fi Salon, a small firm in Manhattan. Although Wi-Fi Salon has successfully launched wireless service in part of Battery Park, it is almost one year behind schedule for launching wireless service in nine other parks throughout the city. The parks department has given Wi-Fi Salon a deadline of the end of this summer for completing this contract, and may approach other vendors if this is not met.
Because the original bid did not generate as much interest or revenue as anticipated, the parks department issued a second bid for wireless vendors earlier this year. The new bid has lower licensing fees, allows vendors to bid on one park at a time rather than multiple parks only, and assumes that wireless access will be free to all individuals. In addition, there are shorter deadlines for completing projects once a contract is awarded. There are early signs of success for this approach; NYC Wireless is involved in providing wireless service in Dag Hammarskjold Plaza, and a Long Island company will work on the Brooklyn Heights Promenade and in Brooklyn's Columbus Park.
Even though NYC Wireless successfully competed for the recent parks department bid, Executive Director Dana Spiegel expresses concerns about it. He believes that wireless service should be treated as an amenity that is as important as a park bench. Spiegel also worries that, because of the costs associated with responding to the parks department bid, many qualified groups have ignored it.
Spiegel feels that the city should pay for park access if no other funds are available. With that said, in many instances parks conservancies or "Friends of" groups could pay for installation and maintenance of wireless service. However wireless access is funded, Spiegel argues that it is a modest financial proposition, which pays for itself in the creation of more vibrant parks.
Most NYC Wireless projects have not included the parks department. Union Square, Tompkins Square and Stuyvesant Cove Parks all offer wireless service established by NYC Wireless and interested local groups. A similar installation at Brooklyn Bridge Park is currently in development.
One of the most important goals of universal wireless access is to narrow the digital divide. The South Bronx Overall Economic Development Corporation and Urban Communications Transport Corporation recently launched the first freely available wireless network in the South Bronx. Urban Communications Transport is a minority-owned business that was initially founded to provide wired Internet access in disadvantaged communities, and has now moved into the wireless realm. If the South Bronx network proves successful, it could serve as a model for similar networks in other neighborhoods throughout the city.
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Every two weeks the New York City Council meets for its Stated Meeting to introduce and pass legislation. As a regular feature, Searchlight covers these meetings and posts a summary of the bills passed.
MEETING SUMMARY:
COUNCIL CODE OF CONDUCT
The New York City Council voted to change its own internal policies regarding employment discrimination and harassment.
One amendment bans all forms of workplace harassment - whether it is racial, ethnic, religious or sexual in nature. It requires that anyone who receives a complaint report it to the speaker’s office.
Another amendment establishes a new code of conduct for council members. It defines "disorderly behavior" and gives the council new powers to discipline anyone who violates the rules, ranging from an official reprimand to expulsion from the council.
"This sends a strong message of zero-tolerance of any type of harassment," said Speaker Christine Quinn.
Quinn ordered a review of the body's harassment policies shortly after taking office in January. Last year, Queens Councilmember Allan Jennings (who is no longer in office) was found guilty of improperly firing one employee on his staff and creating a hostile work environment.
The council spent nine months investigating the incidents, and former Speaker Gifford Miller was criticized for how he handled the complaints.
"We saw over the course of that nine-month investigation that we need to make City Hall a very serious place," said Councilmember Joel Rivera, who chaired the committee charged with dealing with the Jennings' case. "I'm sure with these changes that we will not have anyone else who needs to appear before our Standard's and Ethics Committee in the future - knock on wood."
CHILD ABUSE REPORTING
Another council bill will require that the Administration for Children's Services provide new quarterly reports on its efforts to combat child abuse. Under the legislation (Intro 15-A), the agency must report information such as the number of child abuse complaints it receives, how many cases each staff person is working on, and how the agency is responding to individual incidents.
The bill was drafted in response to the death of Nixzmary Brown, a 7-year old girl who was beaten to death by her stepfather while under the supervision of the agency.
Councilmember Bill deBlasio said that if the new regulations had been in place at the time, Brown's death might have been prevented.
"We need public accountability, and we haven't had it up until now," said deBlasio. "We will be able to see what is working, what is not working and make changes accordingly."
HEALTH BENEFIT FUND
As part of this year's budget proposal, Mayor Michael Bloomberg called for the creation of $2 billion trust fund for retiree health benefits. The fund is a plan to pay for future health care costs for city employees.
The council has supported the plan and recently allocated $1 billion toward the plan.
At the meeting, the council voted to officially create the fund that will be monitored by the city comptroller.
"This is a good and bold idea," said Quinn.
(For another view of the health fund, see a Gotham Gazette article)
DEPARTMENT OF CORRECTIONS VEHICLES
In recent years, the council has worked to require that city-owned vehicles meet certain fuel and hybrid technology standards in an effort to reduce pollution. At the same time, lawmakers do not want the regulations to limit the city's ability to purchase the specialized emergency vehicles it needs.
The council passed an exemption from the fuel-efficient requirements (Intro 208-A) for certain buses and emergency response vehicles used by the Department of Corrections. The office of emergency management, the sheriff’s office, police department, and the fire department are already allowed to bypass the regulations when purchasing emergency equipment.
"This bill makes sure that the Department of Corrections has the tools they need to do their job," said Councilmember James Gennaro.
All of these bills passed by a vote of 50 to 0.
The next Stated Meeting is scheduled for June 28, 2006.
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Each New York City Council member makes a base salary of $90,000. However, council members can also earn an additional stipend or "lulu" ranging from $4,000 to $28,500 for serving in various leadership positions or as a chair of a committee. In 2006, the council awarded itself a total of $479,500 in stipends.
One member decided not to take the extra money; Councilmember Tony Avella declined $8,000 for chairing the Zoning and Franchise Committee. Five others members - Letitia James, Andrew Lanza, Melissa Mark Viverito, Darlene Mealy, and Rosie Mendez - do not receive stipends or chair committees.
The following chart is organized by categories "Leadership Positions," "Standing Committees, " "Subcommitees," and "Select Committees" and by the size of the stipend, from the largest to the smallest.
New York City Council members are also the only local elected officials who are allowed to earn outside income from other jobs. See a chart of non-city income earned by council members.
POSITION | MEMBER | STPIEND | TOTAL |
Leadership Positions | |||
Speaker |
Christine C. Quinn | $28,500 | $118,500 |
Majority Leader/Health | Joel Rivera | $23,000 | $113,000 |
Deputy Majority Leader/Consumer Affairs | Leroy G. Comrie, Jr. | $20,000 | $110,000 |
Minority Leader | James S. Oddo | $18,000 | $108,000 |
Assistant Majority Leader/General Welfare | Bill de Blasio | $15,000 | $105,000 |
Assistant Majority Leader/Youth Services | Lewis A. Fidler | $15,000 | $105,000 |
Majority Whip/Standards and Ethics | Inez E. Dickens | $11,000 | $101,000 |
Minority Whip | Dennis P. Gallagher | $5,000 | $95,000 |
Standing Committees | |||
Finance | David I. Weprin | $18,000 | $108,000 |
Land Use | Melinda R. Katz | $18,000 | $108,000 |
Housing and Buildings | Erik Martin Dilan | $10,000 | $100,000 |
Mental Health, Mental Retardation, Alcoholism, Drug Abuse & Disability Services | G. Oliver Koppell | $10,000 | $100,000 |
Women's Issues | Helen Sears | $10,000 | $100,000 |
Aging | Maria del Carmen Arroyo | $10,000 | $100,000 |
Civil Rights | Larry B. Seabrook | $10,000 | $100,000 |
Civil Service and Labor | Joseph P. Addabbo, Jr. | $10,000 | $100,000 |
Contracts | Yvette D. Clarke | $10,000 | $100,000 |
Cultural Affairs, Libraries & International Intergroup Relations | Domenic M. Recchia, Jr. | $10,000 | $100,000 |
Economic Development | Thomas White, Jr. | $10,000 | $100,000 |
Education | Robert Jackson | $10,000 | $100,000 |
Environmental Protection | James F. Gennaro | $10,000 | $100,000 |
Fire and Criminal Justice Services | Miguel Martinez | $10,000 | $100,000 |
Governmental Operations | Simcha Felder | $10,000 | $100,000 |
Higher Education | Charles Barron | $10,000 | $100,000 |
Immigration | Kendall Stewart | $10,000 | $100,000 |
Juvenile Justice | Sara M. Gonzalez | $10,000 | $100,000 |
Lower Manhattan Redevelopment | Alan J. Gerson | $10,000 | $100,000 |
Oversight and Investigations | Eric N. Gioia | $10,000 | $100,000 |
Parks and Recreation | Helen D. Foster | $10,000 | $100,000 |
Public Safety | Peter F. Vallone, Jr. | $10,000 | $100,000 |
Rules, Privileges and Elections | Diana Reyna | $10,000 | $100,000 |
Sanitation and Waste Management | Michael E. McMahon | $10,000 | $100,000 |
Small Business | David Yassky | $10,000 | $100,000 |
State and Federal Legislation | Maria Baez | $10,000 | $100,000 |
Technology in Government | Gale A. Brewer | $10,000 | $100,000 |
Transportation | John C. Liu | $10,000 | $100,000 |
Veterans | Hiram Monserrate | $10,000 | $100,000 |
Waterfronts | Michael C. Nelson | $10,000 | $100,000 |
Subcommittees | |||
Landmarks, Public Siting & Maritime Uses (Land Use) |
Jessica S. Lappin | $4,000 | $94,000 |
Planning Dispositions and Concessions (Land Use) | Daniel R. Garodnick | $4,000 | $94,000 |
Drug Abuse (Mental Health) |
Annabel Palma | $4,000 | $94,000 |
Public Housing (Housing and Buildings) |
Rosie Mendez | $4,000 | $94,000 |
Senior Centers (Aging) |
James Vacca | $4,000 | $94,000 |
Select Committees | |||
Community Development |
Albert Vann | $4,000 | $94,000 |
Libraries | Vincent J. Gentile | $4,000 | $94,000 |
The chart below lists the range of "non-city income" that members of the New York City Council declared in 2004 (the most recent year available). This income is in addition to the $90,000 a year salary each council member earns and any stipends for serving as a chair of the committee or in a leadership position. (Click here for a list of council salaries and stipends).
Each council member is required to fill out a financial disclosure report with the Conflict of Interest Board, listing outside income and its sources. Although council members do not have to disclose the exact amount of outside income earned, they are required to give a range. The categories are $1,000 to under $5,000; $5,000 to under $35,000; $35,000 to under $60,000; $60,000 to under $100,000; $100,000 to under $250,00; $250,000 to under $500,000; $500,000 or more.
Council members who did not declare additional information are not listed. Also there is no information availabe for eight members - Inez E. Dickens, Daniel R. Garodnick, Jessica S. Lappin, Melissa Mark Viverito, Darlene Mealy, Rosie Mendez, James Vacca, and Thomas White, Jr. - who did not take office until January 2006. Some information in the report is illegible and is marked with a "?" in the chart.
COUNCIL MEMBER
|
SOURCE
|
TYPE OF INCOME
|
RANGE OF OUTSIDE INCOME
|
TOTAL INCLUDING COUNCIL SALARY AND STIPEND
|
|
MINIMUM
|
MAXIMUM
|
||||
Avella, Tony | Park Ave. Securities | Dividends (Jointly Owned) | $1,000 | $5,000 | At least $91,000 |
Brewer, Gale | B and B? | Income | $5,000 | $35,000 | At least $105,000 |
DeBlasio, Bill | John Edwards for President, Inc. | Consulting | $5,000 | $35,000 | At least $105,000 |
Fidler Lewis | A. Roberts & Fidler PC | Salary and Distribution |
$35,000 | $60,000 | At least $179,000 |
Roberts, Fidler and Mirasol | Draw | $5,000 | $35,000 | ||
Plaintiff Funding Corp | Salary | $35,000 | $60,000 | ||
Emigrant Savings Bank Bank | Interest | $1,000 | $5,000 | ||
Roslyn Savings Bank | Bank Interest | $1,000 | $5,000 | ||
Janney Montgomery Scott | Bond Dividends | $1,000 | $5,000 | ||
Munder Funds | Dividends | $1,000 | $5,000 | ||
Gerson, Alan J. |
Inheritance from Uncle | Pension and Annuities | $5,000 | $35,000 | At least $105,000 |
Jackson, Robert | Cornell University Extension Program | Salary for Instructor | $1,000 | $5,000 | At least $101,000 |
Koppell, G. Oliver | Koppell, Leavitt, Kerson and Duane LLP |
Law Firm Income | $5,000 | $35,000 | At least $241,000 |
Law Offices of G. Oliver Koppell & Associates | Law Firm Income | $100,000 | $250,000 | ||
Coyle & Assoc. LLP | Law Firm Income | $1,000 | $5,000 | ||
State of NY | Pension | $35,000 | $60,000 | ||
Lanza, Andrew J. | TD Waterhouse |
Dividend Inc. | $1,000 | $5,000 | At least $92,000 |
US Treasury | Interest Inc. | $1,000 | $5,000 | ||
McMahon, Michael E. | O'Leary, McMahon and Spero | Salary | $100,000 | $250,000 | At least $200,000 |
Apple Bank |
Interest | $1,000 | $5,000 | ||
CitiBank |
Interest | $1,000 | $5,000 | ||
City + Suburban |
Interest | $1,000 | $5,000 | ||
North Fork |
Interest | $1,000 | $5,000 | ||
Recchia, Domenic M. | Self-Employed |
Law Practice Income | $100,000 | $250,000 | At least $310,000 |
Stratton, VT |
Rental Income | $5,000 | $35,000 | ||
Stratton, VT |
Rental Income | $5,000 | $35,000 | ||
Stratton, VT |
Sale of Property | $100,000 | $250,000 | ||
Seabrook, Larry B. | John Jay College |
Adjunct Prof. | $5,000 | $35,000 | At least $105,000 |
Sears, Helen | U.S. Treasury |
Social Security | $5,000 | $35,000 | At least $123,000 |
IRA |
? | $5,000 | $35,000 | ||
Chase Bank |
Interest | $1,000 | $5,000 | ||
Independence Bk |
Interest | $1,000 | $5,000 | ||
UBS |
Dividends | $5,000 | $35,000 | ||
? |
Annuity | $1,000 | $5,000 | ||
? |
? | $5,000 | $35,000 | ||
Stewart, Kendall | Kendall Stewart - Podiastrist |
Medical Practice | $60,000 | $100,000 | At least $160,000 |
Vallone, Jr., Peter | Vallone & Vallone |
Law | $5,000 | $35,000 | At least $106,000 |
Valley Rock Realty |
Real Estate | $1,000 | $5,000 | ||
Vann Albert | Rent |
$5,000 | $35,000 | At least $104,000 | |
Social Security |
$5,000 | $35,000 | |||
Weprin, David I. | Sieratzki Ceccarelli & Weprin LLP Law Firm |
Draw | $5,000 | $35,000 | At least $218,000 |
Sterne, Agree & Leach Inc. |
Investment Banker Salary | $100,000 | $250,000 | ||
Misc. Law Firms of Counsel Work |
$5,000 | $35,000 | |||
Yassky, David | Aim Aggressive Growth |
Sale of Mutual Fund Shares | $1,000 | $5,000 | At least $102,000 |
Yassky Wyndham Partnership Limited Partner; | Real Estate | $1,000 | $5,000 |
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What job pays at least $90,000 a year and still leaves enough free time to earn hundreds of thousands of dollars in additional income?
It is the job of a New York City Council member - or at least it is for one. Brooklyn Councilmember Dominic Recchia, who makes $90,000 a year in council salary and an additional $10,000 for chairing the council's cultural affairs committee also earns about a quarter million dollars or more in outside income, according to city documents.
What city government job pays $150,000 a year and provides a car and driver, but has no real power over city policy?
There are at least six such jobs: public advocate and the five borough presidents, who were stripped of most of their authority years ago, but whose positions remain nonetheless.
This summer, there is a debate over whether or not these elected officials deserve a pay raise.
Click here for more information about councilmembers' outside income. |
Michael Bloomberg recently appointed a commission to consider the compensation for the office of mayor, comptroller, public advocate, borough president, district attorneys, and members of the City Council.
The commision will consider factors like:
. The cost of living in New York
. What similar positions in the private sector pay
. Additional stipends for council members
. If it is a full-time or part-time job
. The amount of time since the last raise
And then they will make a recommendation to the mayor in July.
Proponents of a salary increase argue it has been seven years since local officials got their last increase.
"I think its time for the council to get a raise, yes," City Council Speaker Christine Quinn recently told the New York Post editorial board.
But critics question the rationale and the process.
For one thing, the City Council gets to vote for its own salary increases. It is also the only elected position that is allowed to be part time. About a quarter of the members also earn outside income - as lawyers, investment bankers, and political consultants, and one is a foot doctor.
The debate raises a difficult question: How much should public service pay?
New York City is one of the most expensive cities in the world. Money Magazine calculates that the cost of living in the city is 138 percent more than the national average. In turn, New York City elected officials are among the highest paid in the nation.
Currently, the salaries for local officials are:
- Mayor $195,000
- Comptroller $160,000
- Public Advocate $150,000
- District Attorney $150,000
- Borough President $150,000
- Council Member $90,000
However, the median income of all workers in New York City is only $41,509 - which means that the mayor earns five times more and a City Council member earns more than two times more than the average New Yorker.
Some believe this is plenty.
"I'm fine with $90,000," said Queens Councilmember Tony Avella. "I think that is enough."
But others argue that most elected officials work long hours and make decisions that affect millions of people - and that higher salaries help attract the highest caliber of people, especially in a city where many expect to - and need to - earn high wages.
"The salaries do not compensate for the time and effort and energy needed to serve," said John Zaccone, who works for the Staten Island Borough President and was one of only three people to testify at a June 1 hearing on the issue. "The salaries must not act as a deterrent to qualified people seeking public office."
Michael Bloomberg accepts just $1 a year as the mayor of New York City. Because of his personal wealth, he has the luxury of refusing a city paycheck.
But most politicians need to pay the bills while they engage in public service, which invariably sparks a debate when the issue of compensation arises: How much is an elected official worth?
One way to think about the issue is to consider what similar jobs in the private sector pay. By this measure, many elected officials are underpaid.
At $195,000 a year, New York City has the highest paid mayor in the nation, but he is the boss of more than 300,000 city employees. CEOs of smaller corporations make many times more; the chairmen of Lehman Brothers, Merrill Lynch, and Goldman Sachs, for example, each earn more than $30 million a year.
District Attorneys, who currently make $150,000, only earn about the same as a first year associate at a private law firm. Some good government groups and newspaper editorial boards have urged a pay increase for prosecutors.
"The compensation for the district attorneys should be increased by a greater amount than for other offices given how low the pay is for those who are members of the legal profession in service to the city," Dick Dadey of Citizens Union (the sister organization of Citizens Union Foundation which publishes Gotham Gazette) recently testified.
However, it is difficult to compare jobs like the public advocate or borough president, which have little powers over city policy or the budget. They spend much of their time advocating for certain causes, serving as government liaisons, or acting as cheerleaders for their communities.
Critics who have argued that these government jobs should be eliminated are particularly opposed to giving them raises.
"The $150,000 salary is a gross overpayment for the worthless post of public advocate," the Daily News editorial board wrote.
Still others argue that public service is fundamentally different than working in private industry. People should be motivated by a desire to help others, they say, not by money.
"Public service has never been about becoming rich unless you are corrupt," Blair Horner of the New York Public Interest Research Group argues. "It's supposed to be about serving the public, by definition, and the gratification is not monetary."
The City Council Speaker has power to give members stipends - also known as "lulus" - in addition to the base salary of $90,000 a year.
Currently, 46 of the 51 City Council members receive stipends. They range from $4,000 to $18,000 for serving as chairs of various committees. Some earn additional stipends for leadership positions ranging from $5,000 up to $28,500 for Council Speaker Christine Quinn. (Click here for a full list of salaries and stipends.)
Bronx Councilmember Joel Rivera earns an additional $23,000 a year for chairing the health committee and for serving as majority leader, a title that carries no real responsibilities other than, as the rules state, "appointing party officers as he deems appropriate." The lulus bring his total annual salary to $113,000 a year.
There is also Deputy Majority Leader Leroy Comrie (who earns an additional $20,000), and Assistant Majority Leaders Bill deBlasio and Lewis Fidler (who each earn an extra $15,000) and Majority Whip Inez Dickens (who earns an additional $11,000). And it is not just the Democrats who enjoy the lulus. Two of the three Republicans in the council also have leadership roles. James Oddo earns an additional $18,000 as the minority leader and Dennis Gallagher earns $5,000 for being the minority whip.
All told, the council members approved a total of $479,500 in stipends for themselves this year.
Some critics have called for an end to the practice because it gives the speaker power to dole out money or take it away from those who grow too independent - and it is a way for council members to boost their own salaries without going thorough the proper process.
"Why not have any salary increases tied to the elimination of stipends, which can be used to punish or reward members?" said Gene Russianoff of the New York Public Interest Research Group.
All elected officials are required to work full-time and are not allowed to earn outside income from other jobs, with one exception: members of the New York City Council.
At least 17 of the 51 current City Council members earn outside income from law firms, political consulting jobs, apartment rentals, or pensions, according to records from the Conflict of Interest Board.
Although the financial disclosure forms that the council members are required to fill out only list a range of earned income and not the exact amount, the records show that a half a dozen council members make close to a quarter million dollars a year in income. (Click here for a complete chart of information on the additional income earned by the current members of the City Council.)
In 2004, Brooklyn Councilmember Bill deBlasio made somewhere between $5,000 and $35,000 as a consultant for John Edwards' failed president campaign.
The same year, Brooklyn Councilmember Kendall Stewart made at least $60,000 working as a podiatrist.
Queens Councilmember David Weprin, who chairs the finance committee, made at least $110,000 in additional income from his work as a lawyer and investment banker. And Bronx Councilmember Oliver Koppell earned at least $141,000 in outside income from his law firm and pension payments from his time in the State Assembly.
Brooklyn Councilmember Dominic Recchia is the biggest earner in the council. In 2004, Recchia made somewhere between $210,000 and $570,000 in addition to his council salary from his law practice as well as rental and sales income from properties in Stratton, Vermont.
The exception that allows council members to earn outside income dates back to a time when there were fewer members and they had little power. Today, however, each council member represents approximately 157,000 people and votes on legislation, the city's $50 billion budget, and land use items.
Some believe it should be a full-time position.
"Just ask my wife, this is not a part time job," said Councilmember Joseph Addabbo, who estimates he works 12 to 15 hour days, six or seven days a week and recently introduced a resolution that would designate the council position as a full-time job.
Still, while many council members want to do away with the stigma of it only being part-time, most are reluctant to limit their colleagues' ability to earn outside income.
"I didn't want to jam this law down anybody's throat," said Addabbo.
This year, good government groups support a modest pay increase for council members, but also called for making the job full-time and eliminating council stipends.
In New York City, the salaries for local elected officials are supposed to be reevaluated every four years through an official process. The mayor appoints a three-member commission with a name as obscure as its task: the Advisory Commission for the Review of Compensation Levels of Elected Officials.
Over the next month, the commission will consider factors like cost of living, trends across the country, and the responsibilities of the officials, and make a recommendation on salary changes to Mayor Bloomberg by July. The mayor can accept, reject, or modify the recommendation. It then goes to the City Council for a vote.
In the past, some politicians, who recognize that the subject of pay raises is touchy, have ignored the commission's suggestions.
In 1995, elected officials were given across the board increases, but Public Advocate Mark Green refused to accept the $20,000 increase because he was being forced to lay off members of his staff because of cutbacks.
In 1999, five City Council members voted against a 28 percent pay increase for themselves, some calling it "unconscionable" and a "windfall" for politicians (although the measure passed and they still accepted the extra money).
And in 2003, billionaire Mayor Michael Bloomberg decided that the city's budget woes were so bad that he refused to even appoint a commission as required by city law, and instead postponed it.
But now that the city's fiscal situation has improved - and the next local election isn't until 2009 so voters who are angered by any pay increases are likely to forget by the next election day - most observers believe there will be some kind of pay increase this year.
Under the rules, current council members will vote to increase their own salaries. Congress as well as representatives to the State Legislature are only allowed to vote for increases for those people elected in the next term to prevent such a conflict.
Critics also scoff at the notion that elected officials haven't had a raise in seven years. Because of term limits, most haven't even been in office that long.
Manhattan Borough President Scott Stringer took office in January. Of the 51 council members, 34 members have been in office for only four years, and eight have held office for just six months.
"It's a safe bet none of them campaigned in November on a pledge to raise his or her own salary," argued the Daily News editorial board.
Additional reporting by John Pham, Daniel Rivoli, and Shoshana Schwartz
Related Links:
2006 City Council Member Salaries and Stipends
Non-City Income for NYC Council Members - 2004
Advisory Commission for the Review of Compensation Levels of Elected Officials
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At its most recent meeting on May 24, 2006, the New York City Council passed several bills that made taxis more accessible to the disabled and more environmentally friendly.
Members of the council also introduced more taxi-related bills, as well as bills on smoking, cell phones, and POW/MIA flags.
According to the Council, many people in the taxi industry lack sufficient knowledge of the benefits of clean air vehicles. Several council members sponsored a bill (Intro 352) that would require that the Taxi and Limousine Commission to conduct an education campaign explaining the virtues of hybrid vehicles to taxicab owners. The bill also would require the commission to approve at least one more hybrid-electric car model that could be used as a taxi.
The Council introduced a related bill (Intro 353) to require clear identification marking clear air taxis, as well as increased public information concerning the vehicles.
Finally, a bill was introducing calling for the creation of a Central Accessibility Dispatch System (Intro 356), which would to allow the public to find taxis with access for disabled passengers by calling 311.
Tobacco use costs the City almost $300 million per year in direct costs, in addition to the foregone income of workers who miss work due to smoking-related illnesses, according to a study by the Columbia University Center on Addiction and Substance Abuse. According to New York City’s Bureau of Tobacco Control, 25 New Yorkers per day (over 9,000 per year) die of smoking-related diseases.
Ninety percent of these smokers began the habit before twenty-one years of age, according to the American Lung Association. Now Councilmember Joel Rivera wants (Intro 360) to raise the legal age of buying tobacco in New York City to twenty-one. According to Rivera, this bill would “help prevent the initiation of smoking by teenagers and improve the general health of all New Yorkers.”
The legal age for purchasing tobacco in New York is set at both the city and state level. The state sets a minimum age at which tobacco can be purchased. All cities must enforce this standard, but they are permitted to set their own, more stringent laws as well.
Most electronic devices – including cell phones – have been banned in city schools since 1988. But these laws were rarely enforced until this spring, when Mayor Bloomberg and Schools Chancellor Joel Klein announced that mobile metal detectors would be randomly set up in schools. This move angered many students and parents, who said that, for many students, carrying a cell phone is a safety issue.
Councilmember Lewis Fidler and the City Council recently entered the fray, introducing a bill (Intro 351) to allow schoolchildren to carry cell phones to and from school.
[See “Hanging Up on Parents?” and “Cell Phone Ban Angers Students” for more on the cell phone controversy.]
In an attempt to make sure that children respect the sacrifice of combat soldiers, Councilmembers James Oddo and Dennis Gallagher have proposed a bill (Intro 358) requiring the display of the Missing In Action/Prisoner Of War flag on all Department of Education properties where the American flag is flown.
“You learn the main subjects [in school], but you also learn main values, and one of those values is that we honor our soldiers past and present, and honor their sacrifices,” said Christopher Decicco, a spokesperson for Councilmember Oddo.
The Department of Education would be required to pay the costs of the flags, whose exact price is uncertain. In 2003 the Council passed a similar bill requiring that the Parks Department display the POW/MIA flag in about 800 public locations. Spokesperson Decicco feels that the new bill is similarly uncontroversial.
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In January, Judge John Gleeson ruled on the case Lopez Torres vs. the New York State Board of Elections, which held that highly qualified candidates for Supreme Court deemed to be not sufficiently loyal to the party are unable to secure the nomination in New York.
Margarita Lopez Torres ran for civil court with the support of the party in 1992 and later decided that she wanted to run for Supreme Court. After she got her seat on the civil court bench, she was given instructions from the county leader to hire a particular court attorney. Lopez Torres determined that the particular court attorney was not qualified for the position and refused to hire him. When time came for the Supreme Court nomination, she was told that the party needed loyalty – that those who stand by the county party can move on to the Supreme Court, those who do not stand by the party, cannot.
In the brief to the court, the defendants do not argue that the convention system serves judicial integrity or judicial independence. They do argue that the system serves the party associational interests and an interest in racial, ethnic and geographic diversity.
The first interest – the party’s rights to freedom of association – does not, in our view, include its right to exclude its own members from the nomination process. And geographic diversity can be addressed without burdening voters’ rights simply by imposing residency requirements on the judicial candidates, which do not now exist, or by reducing the size of the judicial districts, so that there would be smaller districts from which each judge would run. Racial diversity is a serious interest and whether or not the system in place or other alternatives created will be a great concern.
Related Articles: Selecting the Most Qualified Candidates Creating A Diverse Judiciary |
We begin with the premise that sham elections are not consistent with democracy. And sham elections are what we have under the current convention system. Our state constitution requires that our Supreme Courts judges must be elected. But the convention system allows the county leaders to usurp from the voters the power to select the justices.
During the course of the litigation, for example, evidence was entered that the New York County Democratic leader said that he had the votes to “kill someone.” In other words, “I can’t guarantee that I can always make you, but I can surely block you.”
That means that nobody becomes a Supreme Court justice unless the county leader agrees. In fact, after 13 days of hearings, 24 witnesses, and 10,000 pages of evidence, there was no evidence of a single person ever becoming a Supreme Court justice over the objection of a county leader. Between 1994 and 2002, 96 percent of all Supreme Court nominations statewide were completely uncontested.
In our view, if there are going to be elections in New York, then voters should have some real choice in selecting who is going to be on the bench. Now, whether there should be elections at all in New York is a different question, but in this case, the defendants argued that there is no right to meaningful participation in judicial nominations. To me, that is tantamount to the claim that meaningless participation is enough.
Having political parties control who is nominated to the Supreme Court is not consistent with judicial independence, impartiality or integrity.
The district court preliminarily enjoined the operation of the convention system. That means that until trial or until the legislature changes the system, the convention system is not in force. The original injunction would have defaulted to the fallback process in the statute, which are primary elections.
There were primary elections many decades ago, the convention system was put in the place, and so when the judge knocked down the convention system, he simply did what he deemed to be the least intrusive thing he could do, which was to reinstate the process that existed before.
This is the first real opportunity in decades to revisit the issue of how judges should be selected. If this decision is upheld on appeal, it will probably be the last opportunity we will have for decades. The party leaders have controlled this process for many years and unless we have an opportunity now, it is unlikely that will ever be able to persuade them to change.
The Brennan Center has not taken a position that open primaries are the best decision. We have not taken a position as to what we think the best system is. We believe there is more work to be done before we can make that decision.
The problem with the current system is that the party leaders control the selection. I am concerned that just tinkering with the system is going to replicate the problem.
More formal screening panels, for example, would not eliminate loyalty tests. Candidates will still know that at the end of the day, that the party leader will have the power to block the nomination. As long as that is the case then we have not addressed the constitutional problem.
As long as there is a system that allows the party leader to exercise that veto, we are still going to have highly qualified candidates who are going to self-select themselves out of the process.
So the candidates who come before the commission will not necessarily be the most honest, most competent, the people with the highest ethical standards. They will be the people who know that they can make a case to the party leader.
The alternative – primary elections – should not be evaluated as a fallback system alone, but in terms of what they could be if there were appropriate amendments.
1. Money
The first concern about primary elections for Supreme Court is the cost. Some worry that quality candidates who either cannot or do not want to raise large sums of money will not run for office, or that they will be outspent by self-financed candidates. Public funding would address most of this issue.
We have done studies of judicial races and the cost of campaigns across the country, and we have found that the most expensive races are for the high court seats. People are spending millions of dollars on judicial races where there is no higher body in the state to overrule the judge, so it is a very important policymaking position. But we are not seeing, for the most part, very expensive trial court races.
2. Geographic Diversity
Another concern is geographic diversity, and reducing the size of judicial districts would address this issue. If a candidate can run in a single county, then candidates are not in the position to beg for scraps from the leader from the most powerful county.
For example, people in Staten Island have to convince the Brooklyn party leader that they deserve a seat on the bench. If Staten Island had its own district, they would have a much better opportunity to have geographic diversity.
3. Women on the Bench
On gender diversity, the Women’s Bar of the State of New York has submitted an amicus brief in support of the defendants in the case. They do not address the underlying issue of constitutionality, but some members are concerned that the move from a convention system to primarily elections will depress gender diversity in New York State courts. They argue “women will not be able to compete on equal footing with historically more politically entrenched candidates for Supreme Court justice.”
I find this ironic because right now women are at the mercy of politically entrenched, male party leaders.
I don’t think that they are likely to be facing greater entrenchment in an open primary. In 2002, the New York State Judicial Committee on Women in the Courts found that only 17 percent of Supreme Court justices were women. Even in New York City, 26 percent of Supreme Court justices were women, where as 47 percent of Civil Court judges were women. Civil Court judges run in primaries countywide, just as Supreme Court judges would have to do.
4. Racial Diversity
I also want to talk about racial diversity. In 2001, 92 percent of the Supreme Court justices of color in the state were from New York City. Even in New York City, from 1992 to 2002, people of color held 39 percent of civil court seats, but only 27 percent of Supreme Court seats. So in New York City, where we have majority populations of color, there is reason to believe, especially if there is public funding, that communities of color will be able to elect judges.
The one thing that public financing and smaller districts would not address is the fundamental question of whether the election of judges is appropriate in the first place.
Many people believe that institutionally the judiciary is not designed to answer to the tyranny of the majority and that the election process is fundamentally flawed. I’m not sure I agree with that. But even if you do believe that, now is an amazing opportunity for people of the state of New York to engage in a discussion about what is the best system.
Deborah Goldberg is the director of the Democracy Program at the Brennan Center for Justice
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I was first elected as a judicial delegate in Brooklyn in 1982. At that time, the conventions were very quick, they only lasted one day. The county leaders picked the judges. And most of the judges who came out of the convention in the early 1980s were white, and no one cared about how the convention worked and who got elected. That was just how it was.
I want to explain how the judicial convention works today.
Every assembly district is allotted a certain number of delegates – anywhere from five to eight people – based on the party turnout from the previous gubernatorial election. Delegates run on the slate with the district leaders, who are party officials, and they go to the convention. The judicial delegates, either by voice vote or hand vote, determine who wins the nomination for Supreme Court justice.
In the early 1980s, white judges were elected and qualified African-Americans and Hispanics could not get elected. But over the last thirty years, the population of white residents in Brooklyn went down and the African-American and Hispanic populations have risen.
Today, African-American and Hispanic populations control the two most populous districts in Brooklyn and as a result elect judicial delegates who are black and Hispanic. They have, in turn, elected African-American and Hispanic judges to the bench. We have a larger percentage of African American judges in Brooklyn than in some states. And that is a direct result of population changes, the judicial conventions, and how they work.
Because of judicial delegates, we have African-Americans and Latinos on the bench.
Related Articles Giving Voters Real Choices Selecting the Most Qualified Candidates |
From my experience, the best way can power sharing for minorities is through some kind of elective process. I have huge concerns about the merit process. I’ve looked at them; I’ve been on screening panels. The merit process does not work for me.
Look at the current situation in the merit screening process of the governor. The governor has been in office for ten years, and he has a merit process for the appellate division. The first division of the appellate division has a huge African-American and Latino population in Brooklyn and Queens. But of the 16 appellate judges in the division, there is only one African American and one Hispanic.
Of the 60 Courts of Claim judges, which are appointed by the governor, we have one African-American and three Hispanics. And the one African-American judge was a candidate for Congress and basically he was appointed at the request of the Democratic Party in Queens. It had nothing to do with merit.
The Brooklyn family court –whose judges are appointed by the mayor - services the largest minority population in the state. We have no African-American family court judges. Not one.
Merit selection boards appoint people who look like them. The judicial conduct commission has 11 members, all appointed, and has no minority representative. Under merit selection, the majority of the people in the room are not people of color. When it comes down to the question of “who is the best?” or limiting it to the best three out of ten, there is a strong likelihood that people of color will be eliminated.
There are problems with the judicial conventions, but there are things that can be done to make judicial conventions better.
First of all, we have to let the delegates determine who the judicial candidate is.
In my experience, whenever a candidate gets enough momentum to become a threat at the judicial convention, the party leader always adopts that candidate. Some would say, a person didn’t get elected because the county leader opposed them, but nine times out of ten, consensus means that they did not have enough support. Consensus means that the party is holding things together, and that is how you are chosen.
The Gleeson decision talks about a “super majority” that is needed to challenge a judicial convention, but I dispute that. In the 1980s, we ran delegates in assembly districts against delegates from the country organization.
We found that you don’t need a super majority to challenge the judicial convention. All you have to do is have enough delegates to support you – about one-third – so that you can go to the convention with enough votes to negotiate.
Here are other four ways to improve the judicial convention:
1. Make the judicial delegates public.
2. Open the convention.
3. Allow candidates to speak at these events.
4. Allow time for electioneering.
And if you are going to keep the judicial conventions, give them the right to choose. To now say, you are smart enough to be elected by the direct vote of the people, but you are not smart enough to determine who is best qualified, and we have to put a panel up here to filter who you can choose from, strikes against my sense of what electoral politics are.
When you run for State Senate or Assembly or Congress, there is not a panel to determine if you are a good candidate. The public has the ability with input from bar associations, to determine who the best judges are.
Paul Wooten heads up Paul Wooten and Associates
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I have long been a strong believer in merit selection. I personally believe it should be our ultimate goal. Unfortunately, I also think it’s not a realistic goal to be achieved in the near future.
I do not want to have open primaries. I have real questions about whether or not voters really can meaningfully cast their vote in primaries. I don’t know what issues judges are going to campaign on, or how voters can intelligently exercise their franchise.
In Texas, there is a story (that I believe is only half apocryphal). Two people try a case before a judge. The judge says, “I want the record to reflect that a lawyer for the plaintiff gave me $10,000 for my campaign and the lawyer for the defendant only gave me $5,000 for my campaign.” And the lawyer for the defense says, “Judge, can we adjourn so I can write you a check?”
If we have open primaries, the issue of money is something that everyone should be very concerned about. Public financing would partially address the issue, but it would not address how voters make their decisions.
Giving Voters Real Choices Creating A Diverse Judiciary |
I do not think that you are going to be able to generate a consensus for merit selection anytime in the foreseeable future. I do not think that you are going to be able to generate consensus on public financing for judicial candidates. If we believe that, I think we are kidding ourselves.
So if we are not going to get merit selection and if the open primary approach is not particularly desirable, then let’s look at the judicial conventions system and ask what is wrong with it and see if it can be corrected.
I think there are two fundamental problems with the convention system. As Judge Gleeson pointed out, it is virtually impossible for anyone who wants to buck the county leader to get elected. So, we have to look at how you can correct that.
The second issue is the “Clarence Norman” problem. Testimony in the case demonstrated that the county leader has had virtual dictatorial power of the quality of the people coming out of the system. There are a lot of judges who should be on the bench. But there are also a lot of people who were able to make deals and they should not be on the bench, but they are.
So how do you correct these flaws?
1. Easier Ballot Access
The first flaw, which I’ll call the constitutional flaw, has two basic issues. One is the number of signatures required for a delegate to get elected. Both the Feerick Commission and Mayor Bloomberg have suggested that you change that 500-signature requirement to 250 to make it easier for people to get on the ballot.
2. Fewer Delegates
The second issue is that under the current statute each party can determine how many delegates there should be at a judicial convention. So if you have a large convention, and you want to run as a maverick candidate, you not only have to get a lot of signatures, but you have to have support from a lot of people at the convention.
Mayor Michael Bloomberg has proposed that the smallest assembly district within the particular judicial district has one delegate, and that the number increase based on population in each district. The Feerick Commission suggested that you have weighted voting to achieve the same balance. Either way, you have to cut down the number of delegates.
3. Screening Panels
So how are we going to ensure that the most qualified people come out of the convention system and not just people who pass some minimal professional criteria?
Unfortunately, the New York State Constitution gets in the way of this. The constitution says that the only qualifications for judges is that you have to be a certain age and you have to have practiced law for a certain period of time. You cannot say that you have to be found “highly qualified” to run for judge.
But what you can do – and this is what the Feerick Commission, Judge Judith Kaye, and the mayor have all proposed – is set up a judicial qualification commission. The commission finds the people at the convention who are qualified to be a judge.
The mayor has pushed this one step further; he has suggested that the qualification commission find the three most highly qualified candidates for each slot.
You cannot mandate that the convention only select from those three people, but if you have a statute and you create this commission I would hope that this would force the parties to adhere to the recommendations of the qualifications commission.
There can be lengthy debate – if we get that far – as to who should pick the members of the judicial qualification commission.
However that is done, you must establish an independent judicial commission and then you ask those people to find the most qualified people. Those are the names are presented to the convention. I think this would change the entire dynamic. We have an opportunity. I hope we can get the State Legislature to wake up and take on this debate.
Michael Cardozo is the corporation counsel for New York City
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It all seemed a little creepy -- a cross between "American Idol" and one of those sadistic social science experiments from the 1960s -- when, on the first night, the foreign artist-contestants arrived in the Chelsea gallery, handed over their passports to the stern-looking young man in a uniform, and sat on their assigned mattresses in a row along a barren wall. They had become detainees.
"Before I got here, I was really nervous," Maria Sanjines, an artist from Colombia, South America, told me. "And now I see why."
"I didn't know this would be so extreme," said Dusanka Komnenic, an abstract painter from Serbia and Montenegro.
The two women were among the ten foreign artists from four continents who had been selected to participate in AsylumNYC, a week-long art competition and exhibition held last month at the White Box gallery.
Only two things were clear at the outset. First, the winner of the competition would get the free services of an immigration lawyer, who would help them apply for a particular type of visa for "extraordinary ability in the field of arts" that, if granted, would enable them to stay in the United States for three years.
Second, little else was clear -- not how the 10 finalists were chosen out of the 235 artists from 43 countries who applied; not how the winner would be chosen; not why the finalists were being asked to eat and sleep for five days and nights in the gallery under a set of draconian and arbitrary rules. They were not allowed to leave their assigned space without permission, could not talk to each other, could only speak to visitors and only in English, and were required to create a work of art using only materials that they could wrangle from visitors to the gallery. They were given a prison-drab green t-shirt to wear.
“We're creating an impossible situation, and we're making an impossible choice," said Martin Rosengaard, the man wearing the uniform (which, with pink piping and epaulettes, looked like an outfit that Michael Jackson might wear.) He is a member of the Berlin-based art collective, Wooloo Productions, that came up with AsylumNYC, the latest of their art projects.
”The first day I was depressed,” Valeria Cordero, an artist from Venezuela, said on the third day. “I understand what they’re doing now. They’re replicating the conditions that immigrants face. This is not really about art, it’s about immigration.”
Taylor and Kat and Ace and Mandisa and Bucky knew what it took to become an American Idol. But for Dusanka and Maria and Marlina and Nao and other foreign artists, the rules for becoming an American -- or even just performing in America -- can be excruciating.
Artists who wish to come to the United States face many of the same barriers that confront any immigrants, along with some additional obstacles.
"It's always been completely different to get immigration services for artists than anybody else," says Leon Wildes, a practicing immigration lawyer in New York for 45 years who is best known for having successful represented John Lennon and Yoko Ono in the government's efforts to deport them. "The law has always been based on having an applicant for immigration be sponsored by an employer, who guarantees a salary and so forth. But most artists are self-employed; nobody wants to hire a fine artist or a composer. The government has never amended the law to accommodate artists."
Nao Matsumoto, a furniture maker from Japan who now lives in Brooklyn (and one of the ten AsylumNYC finalists), certainly does not feel accommodated. “I don’t understand why we need a sponsor to apply for any visa. I have seen enough examples of employers completely manipulating immigrant workers using the green card or the work visa as leverage to make them work in bad conditions.” Nevertheless, artists and craftsmen must seek out a sponsor, and so, he says, “it is not what we as individuals want to do in this country, but what the sponsor wants to do using us.”
While Matsumoto expresses some sympathy with the foreigners who are in the United States illegally, he also is frustrated that so much attention has been on them lately, while those in the country legally can also face difficulties; his own legal visa is running out in a few weeks. “I am a professional craftsman and I have had all my higher education, undergrad and graduate, in the U.S. I have been living in this country for 12 years abiding by all the rules as a legal immigrant, paying taxes every single year. At this point, my feelings are, why not let me stay?”
Shahzia Sikander is one of the lucky artists from abroad. Born in Pakistan, where she attended the National College of Arts, Sikander came to the United States to study at the Rhode Island School of Design. On one of her first visits to New York City, she recalls, she went to the Drawing Center, and told them “I have my work with me. Can I show you?” They said they had only ten minutes to look at it. But that, as it turns out, was all it took: “They accepted me into a show.” Her modern take on traditional miniature painting soon was exhibited at museums such as the Whitney and the Museum of Modern Art. Now living in New York City, Sikander has an EB-1 visa, a category that accepts her as an artist of exceptional ability and allows her to stay in the United States as long as she wants. But even she does not sound please at the way things are set up. ”It took eight years,” she says. “I couldn't leave the country. It was kind of an imprisonment.”
Not all foreign artists would like to live here. Some merely want to visit – musicians, dancers and artists to perform, visual artists to accompany exhibitions of their work. That has become increasingly difficult as well.
”There are only 10,000 O-1 temporary visas for solo performers granted in the entire United States each year,” says immigration attorney Daniel Aharoni.
And in the past five years, it has been more inconvenient to get hold of those visas. "Since 9/11, the government must eyeball every applicant," Aharoni says. In those countries where there are no American embassies or consulates, the applicant must make a trip to the closest one, which can be quite far away.
This is an inconvenience felt not just by the artists, but by their (would-be) American audiences.
The cellist Yo-Yo Ma told Congress last month the story of two Iranian musicians who have performed in the United States some 10 times over the past decade, yet were forced to fly from Iran to Dubai three times in order to obtain a visa from the American embassy there in order to perform for an 11th time in the United States. “The process cost $5,000 and lasted three months,” Ma said. Other musicians, “Zola, one of the prodigies of the long-song tradition in Mongolia, and Wu Tong, the virtuosic Chinese Sheng player and singer,” were shut out completely. "It is on behalf of these culture guides that I am here today to urge you to simplify the visa process," the cellist testified in front of members of the House Government Reform Committee, so that there will no longer be such "extraordinarily high" barriers to have foreign artists visit the United States.
The visa application process for artists is so complex that a number of non-profit agencies have put together a Web site, Artists From Abroad, as a guide to the "principal nonimmigrant work-related visa categories used by the performing arts world." (Among the questions it tries to answer – what tangible proofs one needs to persuade the authorities that one is an artist of extraordinary ability.)
Dusanka Komnenic will get some help navigating the process. At the end of the week, Rosengaard and the other members of Wooloo announced that Komnenic had won the right to consult with the immigration attorney, Daniel Aharoni, who was waiving his usual fee of up to $10,000. They did not really explain why they had selected her. Perhaps it is because she had rebelled against the “border” in black tape that had been put up around her mattress, by putting more black tape on the ground and up the wall, “to cover the border, so that nobody could find it” – a metaphor for all those artists and immigrants, and immigrant artists who, she says, "do not want to be excluded."
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