First, I have to express my concern about the manner in which this charter commission was appointed. While all the members of this commission have distinguished themselves professionally and will all contribute their perspectives and experience to the charter revision process, I believe that future commissions must have an even broader range of perspectives to better represent the city’s diversity, and that includes racial, ethnic, geographic and political diversity.
Furthermore, the five boroughs, as distinct and unique parts of the city, are not adequately represented. I believe that, going forward, state law should be amended to give each Borough President an appointment to future charter revision commissions.
I am also concerned about the hurried manner in which this commission was convened, and its apparent rush to conduct public meetings and hearings. Advance notice was inadequate, and some of these early hearings have been poorly attended. This is unfortunate because this is supposed to be the “grassroots” part of the charter revision process allowing the people to come forward with charter proposals on subjects they deem important.
The charter provides the framework for all of city government. Therefore, the charter revision process should be a long, deliberative process during which the commission should hear as many points of view as possible, from a broad cross-section of the population. I commend the commission for planning to conduct at least two more rounds of hearings in all five boroughs. I urge you to give as much notice as possible and to make these hearings accessible to anyone who wishes to attend. In the end, the goal should be to make local government better and to ensure that it can effectively serve all the people of the city, in all five boroughs.
Any changes should have as their ultimate goal: a charter that better serves the people. To do this, revisions should protect and even enhance the powers of those who represent our individual boroughs and communities. That is why Borough Presidents and community boards, whose members are appointed by the Borough Presidents and are critical to our offices in addressing our communities’ concerns, are so important.
Borough Presidents are essentially the county executives of each borough. As you know, their charter-mandated responsibilities include, among other things: working with the mayor to prepare the annual executive budget; proposing borough budget priorities; reviewing and commenting on major land use decisions; monitoring the delivery of city services within their respective boroughs; and developing a strategic plan for their boroughs. While the charter imposes these significant duties on the borough president, the powers it actually bestows on them are inadequate to enable them to fully and effectively perform those duties.
For these reasons, I hope the commission will endorse a series of modest proposals that will help ensure that borough presidents can protect the interests of their respective constituents.
1) Our offices and the community boards should be given a guaranteed minimum, baseline budget allocation similar to that of the city’s independent budget office.
2) Borough presidents should have the power to make binding recommendations within the uniform land use review procedure (ULURP). For example, the process should be changed so that a negative recommendation by a Borough President could only be overridden by a supermajority of nine members of the city planning commission. If Borough Presidents had the power to make binding recommendations, then they would be in a better position to ensure that developers are sensitive to communities’ concerns
3) The charter should provide for a borough infrastructure committee to be chaired by the Borough President. Such a committee would consist of the commissioners or borough commissioners of all the relevant city agencies, and these agencies would be required to meet with the Borough President on a regular basis to review, discuss, schedule and coordinate infrastructure and building projects within each borough.
I urge the commission to slow down the charter revision process and not rush to put something on the ballot this fall; rather, it is much more important to wait until the November 2011 election, which will give the commission time to implement an open, transparent process to identify and study a number of solid proposals, with the help of extensive public input, which will truly benefit the public.
Helen Marshall is the Queens Borough President
