(photo via NYC Board of Elections)
The following essay is a slightly edited version of J.H. Snider’s introduction to a Fall 2016 symposium, “The Politics of State Constitutional Reform,” published by the Law & Courts Section of the American Political Science Association. The symposium provides a summary of notable presentations at a short course, A Political Primer on the Periodic State Constitutional Convention Referendum, presented at the 2016 Annual Meeting of the American Political Science Association, whose theme for 2016 was “Great Transformations: Political Science and the Big Questions of our Time.” The short course and symposium provide an inter- rather than intra-state perspective on New York’s November 7, 2017 referendum on whether to call a state constitutional convention. Gotham Gazette has previously published four op-eds by J.H. Snider providing an intra-state perspective on the upcoming referendum.
********************
At the 2016 Annual Meeting of the American Political Science Association, I produced a short course, “A Political Primer on the Periodic State Constitutional Convention Referendum.” The short course consisted of two parts.
Part I included a two-hour compilation of TV documentaries and political ads. The TV documentaries included excerpts from past constitutional conventions, mostly U.S. state constitutional conventions held during the latter half of the 20th Century, plus a smattering of recent path-breaking constitutional conventions held in other countries. The unedited TV ads, mostly 30 seconds in length, were either for or against calling a state constitutional convention at an upcoming referendum. The TV documentaries generally described the past constitutional conventions in hagiographic terms. Most of the professionally produced TV ads were negative and characterized a future constitutional convention as a grave threat to the people’s rights.
Part II consisted of four panels of experts, each panel approximately 30 minutes long. The first panel focused on New York, which on November 7, 2017 has the next referendum on whether to call a state constitutional convention. The panel included a history of New York’s 11 state constitutional conventions since 1777 (by me) and an argument why New York’s upcoming referendum was of national interest (by Sandy Levinson).
The second panel reviewed the history of U.S. state constitutional conventions (John Dinan) and changing public opinion towards them (William Blake). The third panel examined the merits of alternative legislative bypass mechanisms, including Ireland’s 2012 constitutional convention with randomly selected members (David Farrell), Florida’s periodic constitutional revision commission (Carol Weissert), and the constitutional initiative (Craig Holman and John Dinan). The fourth panel focused on the politics and policy of New York’s upcoming constitutional convention referendum, including an identification of the political actors (me) and arguments generally for (Richard Briffault) and against (Craig Holman).
The short course, which was recorded and posted online at The State Constitutional Constitution Clearinghouse and The New York State Constitutional Convention Clearinghouse, is intended as a resource for local opinion leaders in states with upcoming state constitutional convention referendums.
Between 2016 and 2034 at least one U.S. state every two years will have a referendum on whether to call a state constitutional convention: New York (2017), Hawaii (2018), Iowa (2020), Alaska (2022), Missouri (2022), New Hampshire (2022), Rhode Island (2024), Michigan (2026), Connecticut (2028), Hawaii (2028), Illinois (2028), Iowa (2030), Maryland (2030), Montana (2030), Alaska (2032), New Hampshire (2032), Ohio (2032), and Rhode Island (2034).
No periodic state constitutional convention referendum has passed since 1984—contributing to the longest drought in convening a state constitutional convention in U.S. history. After reviewing many debates leading to constitutional convention defeats, I concluded that the debate discourse was often ill-informed, partly because of a lack of local experts on whom the press could rely for historical and comparative information about state constitutional conventions.
To rectify this problem, I have sought to provide easily accessible background information in a variety of different formats, including newspaper op-eds, online information clearinghouses, scholarly articles, public history events, and this short course.
My information clearinghouse on Rhode Island’s November 4, 2014 state constitutional convention referendum, the most recent such referendum, is the most comprehensive online documentation of the politics of such a referendum ever compiled online. The results of my research will be published in Snider, J.H., “Does the World Really Belong to the Living? The Decline of the Constitutional Convention in New York and Other U.S. States 1776-2015,” The Journal of American Political Thought.
Since only a tiny fraction of Americans has lived through a state constitutional convention in their adult lifetimes, and since Americans are not taught about state constitutional conventions (as opposed to the federal constitutional convention of 1787) during their formal schooling (even those such as myself who received a Ph.D. in American government), Americans approach these referendums starting with a huge knowledge deficit, making local opinion leaders that much more influential in public debates.
Too often local opinion elites and the public don’t focus on the referendum until only weeks or days before the vote, when the debate is dominated by lowest common denominator sound bites, including poorly informed opinion elites distracted by higher profile candidate races.
Such a lack of attention and expertise should not be confused with lack of importance. As every young student learns, the preamble to the U.S. Declaration of Independence states that the American people have an “unalienable” right “to alter” their government. Thirty-seven of 50 U.S. states would eventually include similar rights language in their state constitutions; and all 50 state constitutions include some type of mechanism to implement that right. Clearly, the right to alter one’s constitution is one of the most fundamental, perhaps even the most fundamental, political rights Americans have. Implicit in that right is the right of the people to peaceably alter their constitution in the face of legislative opposition.
Fourteen states implement that right in part by granting the people the right at periodic intervals (ranging from 10 to 20 years) to call a state constitutional convention via a statewide referendum. This institution, like the constitutional initiative, dramatically reduces the legislature’s gatekeeping power over constitutional amendment. Since legislatures have an institutional conflict of interest in proposing reforms that might weaken their own power, this institution serves a vital democratic function--albeit one that is rarely politically salient to the average voter.
Motivating voters to care about the direct provision of collective goods, such as education or transportation, has proven hard. Harder still has been motivating people to care about indirect collective goods such as redistricting, campaign finance, or other “good government” reforms that serve as the platform for providing direct collective goods. Hardest of all may be motivating average voters to care about infrequent and unfamiliar mechanisms for creating good government—arguably, the ultimate collective action problem.
The price of serving as a check on legislatures is that legislatures are this institution’s intrinsic enemy. Powerful special interest groups with a track record of successfully influencing legislatures are also intrinsic enemies, as their ability to control a constitutional convention is a wildcard. Partly as a consequence of this intrinsic opposition and the collective goods nature of this institution for average voters, campaigns that oppose calling a state constitutional convention have tended to be much more sophisticated and better funded than campaigns that support calling a constitutional convention.
A state constitutional convention referendum has the ingredients of a collective action problem: concentrated benefits for opposing one and diffuse benefits for favoring one.
Better educating the public about this institution via local opinion elites cannot eliminate this classic political problem, but it can mitigate it.
********************
On the short course page at NewYorkConCon.info, links can be found to the essays of the other symposium contributors as well as a two-hour documentary researched and compiled by J.H. Snider that consists of excerpts from TV documentaries and political ads on state constitutional conventions.
***
J.H. Snider, the president of iSolon.org, is the editor of The New York State Constitutional Convention Clearinghouse and author of Does the World Really Belong to the Living? The Decline of the Constitutional Convention in New York and Other US States, 1776–2015.
***
Have an op-ed idea or submission for Gotham Gazette? Email This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it.
Brooklyn Bridge Park (photo via Henrik Krogius)
Recently, there has been considerable focus on the idea that public parks are important to the health and wellbeing of New Yorkers. Mayor Michael Bloomberg invested $5 billion in parks during his 12 years in office after decades in which even caring for existing parks was a low city priority. Mayor Bill de Blasio has made his Community Parks Initiative a centerpiece of his agenda to reduce inequality in all aspects of city life. Since announced, the number of community parks targeted has increased from 35 to 67, at a total cost of $285 million in capital. In August, the Mayor announced an additional $150 million to upgrade five New York City parks – one in each borough.
With more than 1,000 parks in New York City, these investments are welcome, but only a drop in the bucket. And capital is in many ways a smaller issue than maintenance, which is provided for in the city’s expense budget, and which competes for scarce tax revenue. Sadly, the budget for maintaining parks has never recovered from the fiscal crisis of the 1970s and is woefully inadequate to the task.
If public funds are short, is private money the answer? A number of privately-funded park conservancies have grown, starting with the Central Park Conservancy, to fill the gap for missing public funds. But that only works when there are well-to-do people in close proximity to a park who care enough about its upkeep to contribute their own money.
Another approach, exemplified by Hudson River Park and Brooklyn Bridge Park, are large parks built with public money but required to be financially self-sustaining. In other words, parks that must generate revenue within the park to cover ongoing operations and maintenance. These are thought of as a way to leverage public money to produce private investment: so-called public-private partnerships. They have a mixed record.
Hudson River Park was created first but it has struggled for years despite the fact that visitors flocked to the site even when the park was only a strip of concrete on which to run, bike, and walk next to the Hudson River. The park has not received as much capital as it needs, but also does not have enough revenue to cover its expenses. Yet its efforts to remedy that situation by bringing in new private sources have been fought by the neighboring communities, local elected officials, and civic groups. After many battles, the Hudson River Park Trust has obtained legislation permitting it to sell its air rights to developers who wish to build across the street from the park, but many are still unhappy with this result.
The latest installment in the Trust’s attempts to build the park is the lawsuit being waged to prevent the development of Pier 55 as a landscaped venue for non-profit cultural and musical event. This, despite, or perhaps because, wealthy donors have agreed to provide the bulk of the funds and ongoing maintenance.
In the case of Brooklyn Bridge Park, generating revenue within the site to cover the cost of operating and maintaining the park was from the beginning a condition of the state and city providing the necessary capital to build the park. That revenue had the added benefit that it would be captured directly by the park and not be subject to the vagaries of the city budget process.
When it turned out that maintaining the pier structures upon which much of the park sits was considerably more expensive than thought, housing along the edge of the park was chosen as the revenue generator because it would provide the most revenue in the smallest footprint. Although that plan was endorsed by all of the major neighborhood and civic organizations, and survived a legal challenge on the grounds that the park would not exist but for the housing plan, there has been a constant and growing effort to prevent the last housing project from going forward, thereby depriving the park of needed revenue.
A different set of local elected officials than were earlier in place now repudiate the bargain that was made, while many in the community either don’t know or don’t care what commitments were made. Litigation over how to proceed is pending while piers deteriorate.
Why are these park arrangements controversial? The public at times seems uncomfortable with the concept of public-private ventures. Some do not trust wealthy people offering funds to provide a public good, regardless of how good it may be. They don’t like developers whose investment is needed to help pay for a park, especially when it means market-rate housing for more wealthy people (though when Mayor de Blasio proposed some affordable housing for Brooklyn Bridge Park, the neighbors didn’t like that, either).
Some people are philosophically opposed to private funding, but, for many, opposition to public-private ventures may be a cover to protect their own private interests – like inexpensive parking on Pier 40 or a private grudge in Hudson River Park, or an impaired view on Pier 6 in Brooklyn Bridge Park (even though disclosed in their prospectus).
Legitimate issues arise when private funds support public purposes, and each project must stand on its own merits. Still, public resources are often inadequate to needs. In the case of major new parks like Hudson River and Brooklyn Bridge, the choice was not between public funding and private funding, but between park and no park. Both are democratic parks, available to all, wildly popular, and reflective of the diversity of New York. When the litigation and controversy end, as they will, two great parks will remain.
***
Joanne Witty, a lawyer and environmentalist who has served in both City and State government, was president of the community-based Local Development Corporation that created Brooklyn Bridge Park's master plan. She currently serves as Vice Chair of the Brooklyn Bridge Park Corporation, the city-sponsored not-for-profit organization that is building and operating the park.
***
Have an op-ed idea or submission for Gotham Gazette? Email This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it.
Kelsie Louie, the author, last World AIDS Day (photo: Donna Aceto)
For over 35 years, HIV has plagued communities around the world. In the initial years that followed its discovery, our elected officials and social institutions failed to address the epidemic as it unfolded. Those who were falling ill faced tremendous danger and anxiety with no recourse in sight. Organizations like GMHC, ACT UP, Housing Works, and so many others were founded to not only provide a support system and educate the public, but to fortify a voice that would compel our leaders to take the AIDS crisis, and its victims, seriously.
This World AIDS Day -- Thursday, December 1 -- marks not only a day of remembrance and mourning for those we have lost, but also a turning point in our efforts to defeat the epidemic. After decades of deficient and half-hearted policies to address HIV, the United States has a National HIV/AIDS strategy, and, with aggressive pledges to end the epidemic in their respective jurisdictions, communities such as New York, Washington D.C., San Francisco, and Fulton County, Georgia are leading the charge to end AIDS.
Aside from pledges and press conferences, we have actually seen elected and government officials affirm their commitment to these efforts.
This past summer, officials in Fulton County, Georgia, unveiled an ambitious plan to eradicate HIV in the Atlanta metro area. According to the federal Center for Disease Control (CDC), an astonishing 1 in 51 Georgians will be diagnosed with HIV in their lifetime. County officials have set out to provide free, routine opt-out HIV testing in all healthcare settings and jails to decrease the number of new HIV diagnoses by 25 percent, increase the number of free condoms distributed from 2.3 million to 3.5 million, and link 85 percent of people who test positive for HIV to care within three days.
Here in New York State, Governor Andrew Cuomo’s Ending the Epidemic Blueprint has served as a catalyst to expand funding and services across the state. For instance, in New York City, we have been successful in expanding rental assistance benefits to almost all low-income individuals living with HIV.
The blueprint has produced tangible results. On Tuesday, the New York City Department of Health released data showing that the number of new infections has dropped to 2,493 in 2015, the first time that annual infection figures have dropped below 2,500 since the HIV crisis began. The Department also made a monumental announcement – for the first time, in 2015, there were no mother-to-child HIV transmissions.
Until we see similar progress in all places, not just Fulton County and New York, our work is not complete. The South now experiences the greatest burden of HIV infection, illness, and deaths of any U.S. region, and lags far behind in providing quality HIV prevention and care. At-risk groups nationwide, particularly communities of color, transgender women, and men who have sex with men, continue to face institutional barriers that prevent easy and affordable access to testing, treatment and prevention.
I have great concern about the current national climate, which includes significant uncertainty over the future of federal health care policy. Depending on the course taken by Congress and the next President, we may be forced to confront new challenges in reducing HIV transmission rates and ending the epidemic. Local, regional, and state governments may be forced to pick up the torch in order to avoid moving backwards. Right now, we need more local elected leaders to act on ending HIV and AIDS in their communities. When they do, I am confident that we will collectively end this epidemic.
Thirty-five years ago, the feat of ending AIDS appeared impossible, but today, I believe our darkest days are behind us. We have overcome past inaction and complacency, and we must proactively continue to fight because we cannot afford to waste any opportunity to create an AIDS-free generation.
***
Kelsey Louie is the CEO of Gay Men’s Health Crisis. On Twitter: @GMHC.
***
Have an op-ed idea or submission for Gotham Gazette? Email This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it.