Tomorrow morning at Queens Borough Hall is the first chance for New Yorkers to offer ideas to the Charter Revision Commission set up by Mayor Adams to review the city’s “constitution.” We have some ideas of our own that the panel should adopt and present to the voters this November.
Closed party primaries push candidates to the extremes, to the right and the left of the public. In NYC, with the dominant Democratic Party, it’s to the left. We can help repair that by expanding ranked choice voting to include all voters.
Ranked choice voting was used successfully in 2021, when Eric Adams won. But this system of elections, which maximizes voter strength and rewards candidates who appeal to a broader base (both excellent things), only applies to the party primaries. Ranked choice voting should be extended to let all people participate, including those not registered in a party.
Instead of the party picks being chosen by ranked choice in a primary and then facing each other in November in a traditional election, all candidates for an office, regardless of party, would run against each other in the primary. The top five finishers would then compete in the general election in November, where the electorate would use ranked choice voting.
All voters would be deciding, which is better for everyone. While there are 3,420,848 Democrats registered in the five boroughs, there are also more than half that many voters, 1,732,424, who aren’t Democrats. The breakdown is 529,310 Republican, 136,999 in other parties, and the big one, 1,066,115 New Yorkers who are not registered in any party. Elsewhere in the country that is called independents, here is called a blank or unenrolled.
While some hard core lefties in the Democratic Party may object, moderates like Adams, who reach out to the middle, would be bolstered. Make this change this November and put it into place for next year.
Another fix that should go into the charter would remove from the City Council the power at any time to raise its own pay, now a generous $148,500. That should be changed to make sure that any pay hikes are only effective after an election for the next class of members. That is how it works in both Albany and Washington.
If New York City wants a serious legislature, there can be no such blatant self-dealing to raise your own pay. Model the language after the 27th Amendment: “No law, varying the compensation for the services of the Senators and Representatives, shall take effect, until an election of Representatives shall have intervened.” The charter panel, chaired by Carlo Scissura, should put this common sense measure on the November ballot.
We would also have the charter commission add to the list of functions in the charter that can only be changed by the public. As it stands now, there are only a small number provisions that need a referendum, like abolishing or creating an elective office. Most of the rest of the city’s governing document can be altered by the Council alone. To that list that needs a public vote should be added term limits, ranked choice voting (hopefully to be expanded) and the new pay provision.
It is too tempting for the Council, be this one or a future body, to mess around with such fundamental powers. That should be left up to all New Yorkers.
