Organizer's Report:
An Incredible Grassroots Effort- But We Haven’t Won Yet
-Jon Greenbaum
I’m not a macho guy. In fact I’m pretty far along the nerdy end of the spectrum (I identify more with Barney Fife than Andy Griffith). But this last legislative session in Albany has revved up my inner Billy Jack (the B-movie black belt avenger from the 1970’s. You could always count on Billy Jack to kick the greedy corporate racists’ a**).
Three of our campaigns, Clean Elections, Industrial Development Agency reform and Equal Marriage, are all currently stalled due to Joe Bruno’s intransigence. The Republican Majority leader said that “nobody gives two hoots” about campaign finance reform, and that, “We’re not doing gay marriage by [the end of the legislative session] that's for sure, or this year." Bruno’s staff also balked at including wage standards and clawback in the IDA reform negotiations (clawback is the mechanism in which corporations are required to give back subsidies if they don’t create the jobs promise).
And with Republicans holding on to their four vote majority in the NYS Senate, Joe Bruno is going to continue his role as the conservative third man in the room, blocking our efforts for a more equitable future. (One can assume that the Bush White House will want the current FBI investigation of Bruno’s consultant business to go as slow as possible).
Now, I’m not advocating that somebody should deliver a karate kick to Joe Bruno’s head…
But if the Republicans lose two seats in the Senate in the 2008 elections, Bruno is out of the picture and the whole landscape of political opportunity changes. And with a new landscape, Metro Justice and our statewide coalition partners will be that much closer to pushing through reforms that help change power dynamics in our state- real reforms that transform the nature of the system.
This will make the races for Senator Robach and Senator Alesi’s seats more interesting, especially with an expected infusion of cash from statewide Democrats. Democratic Assemblyman David Koon is expected to take on Alesi.
But let’s take a moment to revel in the progress we made this year in laying the foundation for future victories.
Same-Sex Marriage Bill Passes Assembly!
At our Marriage Ambassador training last year, Nora Yates, the Empire State Pride Field Director, explained that regardless of the ruling of the NYS Court of Appeals, the same-sex marriage fight would continue in the NYS Legislature. The Appeals Court then handed down a bizarre ruling characterized by logic straight out of a Monty Python skit (“it is important for children to have married parents, therefore all heterosexual couples should have children, and marriage should not be extended to same sex couples”).
Yates also explained that the struggle for marriage equality would take several years and that, with Spitzer solidly behind it, the next step would be pushing a bill through the Assembly.
In order to get the bill through the Assembly New Yorkers around the state needed to mobilize to show their support for marriage equality. Here in Rochester Metro Justice helped the Empire State Pride Agenda (staffed by the indefatigable Todd Plank) move the issue into the public discourse by holding rallies and events like the Have a Heart Valentines Day event. We produced cable television programming and contributed our personal stories for a statewide book of testimony. Hundreds of Metro Justice members signed postcards, wrote letters, sent emails and lobbied.
Similar actions were happening around the state at the same time.
Going into the Rules Committee vote it wasn’t clear how Speaker Silver stood on same-sex marriage. During the rules Committee debate Assemblyman Dov Hikind, (D. Kings County), an Orthodox Jew, said he planned to vote "no" unless "God sends a message to me during the next two hours of debate."
Not long after Hikind sat down a clap of thunder was heard outside the Capitol, and the chamber broke out in laughter.
With the clock ticking on the legislative session, the bill then moved to the Assembly floor for debate.
One sign that our grassroots movement had developed momentum was when openly gay Democrat Matthew Titone took the floor, held his cellphone high and said, “I have my partner here on the phone and he just asked me to marry him.”
The Assembly cheered.
Assemblymembers were also moved by a speech by fellow Assemblymember Teresa R. Sayward (R., Willsboro). Sayward is from the conservative northern part of the state and is known as an observant Catholic. She told the story about how her son struggled to come to terms with his gay identity as a younger man, “We would spend long nights crying together and talking. And one night I said to him, ‘You have to be what you are; you can’t be what people think you should be.’ ”
The bill passed, 85-61.
"My colleagues stood up and did the right thing," emotional Assembly-bill sponsor Daniel O'Donnell (D-Manhattan), the brother of Rosie O'Donnell and one of three openly gay Assembly members, told The New York Post as he hugged his partner of 26 years.
The struggle to pass the equal marriage bill in New York will continue but opposition is inevitable. The NY Daily News printed a columnist’s piece following the vote, “Gay marriage victory in Albany stirs valid fears that incest and polygamy could come next”
Equal Marriage advocates around the state have heard back from both Republican and Democratic Assemblymembers that their grassroots lobbying made the difference. Assemblymembers said that without the discussions they had with us, they would have voted against the bill. One legislator said that he was thinking of the discussions he had with Equal Marriage advocates when he voted.
Assemblymembers Morelle, Koon, and John voted for the bill. Gantt voted with Republicans Errigo and Reilich against the bill.
The battle now moves to the Senate.
Changing the Campaign Finance Reform Discussion
Metro Justice started gearing up for this year’s legislative session at the end of 2005. Citizen Action has been working for full public financing of elections for about 15 years and, with chapters and affiliates all over the state (Metro Justice is now a Citizen Action affiliate), we have the capacity to push for Clean Elections from every corner of the state.
How do we transform a political culture in Albany characterized by heavy reliance on big campaign cash (which is overwhelmingly provided by corporations and the wealthy) to one in which the Capitol is filled with politicians who are not beholden to any campaign contributors?
Our first strategic step was to get the gubernatorial candidates on board. Going into the election it became obvious that Spitzer would likely be the next Governor. Yet Spitzer was not talking about campaign finance reform in any of his stump speeches. However, we did know that Spitzer had supported CMCE as Attorney General. Our response was to create a statewide rapid response team to greet Spitzer at as many campaign stops as possible with signs thanking him for his “support of CMCE.”
With a blizzard of postcards encouraging Spitzer to take a public stand in favor of clean elections and behind the scenes discussions with the candidate and his staff, it wasn’t long before Spitzer was being quoted in the news for his support for full public financing of elections.
In fact, after being elected, in his State of the State Address, Governor Sptizer said that Clean Money Clean Elections is one of his main objectives.
"To neutralize the army of special interests, we must disarm it. In the coming weeks, we will submit a reform package to replace the weakest campaign finance laws in the nation with the strongest.
Our package will lower contribution limits dramatically, close the loopholes that allow special interests to circumvent these limits, and sharply reduce contributions from lobbyists and companies that do business with the state.
But reform will not be complete if we simply address the supply of contributions. We must also address the demand. Full public financing must be the ultimate goal of our reform effort. By cutting off the demand for private money, we will cut off the special-interest influence that comes with it."
Meanwhile, Metro Justice members were fanning out around the county, talking to community groups about campaign finance reform and generating support for clean elections. We generated emails, phone calls, postcards and handwritten letters from all over the state and lobbied our elected representatives in Albany and in their home offices.
Clean Election activists from Brooklyn to Buffalo educated their elected representatives and pushed for letters of support from Assemblymembers, eventually bringing on board 40 members to sign the letter. Assemblyman David Koon signed the letter and Assemblywoman Susan John cosponsored the Ortiz Clean Elections bill. We also helped pack a public hearing on campaign finance reform in the Brighton Town Library. Around the state our Citizen Action partners were also holding Town Hall meetings on Clean Elections.
One way we knew that we were making progress was that for the last 15 years Speaker Silver has sponsored a partial public financed bill based on the New York City matching funds bill (which gives candidates public money to candidates in relation to how much money they raise from private sources). The partial public financing bill is passed by the Assembly every year in the beginning of the session. Although Silver’s bill might have been politically expedient when Pataki was the Governor, the partial financing bill is worse than the current system because taxpayer are stuck subsidizing candidates who continue to have to shake the bushes for private campaign contributions. The big winners are the corporations and the wealthy that don’t have to contribute as much but still retain privileged access to elected representatives.
But this year Silver did not submit his bill.
Toward the end of the session, when it became apparent that Bruno’s resistance to campaign finance reform was stopping movement in the Assembly we realized that we needed to guard against the possibility that, even though we weren’t going to get any part of Spitzer’s reform package passed, no weak matching funds bills were slipped in for a vote.
So we got in our cars and traveled to Albany where teams from all over the state hung out in the Assembly lobby and “lobbied” our representatives who had signed the letter of support to make sure that they resisted any efforts to pass a weak matching funds bill.
And sure enough, no matching funds bill was put up for a vote.
Campaign finance reform is now seen as a major issue. Citizen Action has been working with the Governor’s staff in drafting a Clean Money Clean Elections bill. Governor Spitzer has made campaign finance reform priority number one and is urging the legislature to return to finish its business. In fact we understand that we will have another opportunity to move our campaign forward in a special legislative session this month.
COMIDA Isn’t Spanish for Free Lunch
Metro Justice has been shining a light on COMIDA for over ten years. We’ve uncovered their violations of open meetings laws and exposed boondoggles and tax giveaways to corporations that don’t help our local economy. We injected the term “corporate welfare” into the local public discourse.
Back in 2005 Metro Justice found out that certain provisions of the state law governing Industrial Development Agencies (IDA’s) were sunsetting and that Jobs with Justice was organizing a coalition to reform the system. We were able to get the legislature to avoid reauthorizing the provisions (for non-profit bonding) permanently and got them to just do a one year extension. This allowed us some time to launch a more effective campaign.
Last year’s campaign moved the ball forward significantly. The Assembly passed our reforms and the same bill was also sponsored by Senator George Maziarz, the Republican Chair of the Labor Committee. The Senate leadership seemed interested in the issue, but ultimately the bill stalled under Bruno.
This year we came out swinging, generating buzz all over the state on the various outrageous deals getting green lights from local IDA’s. Several newspapers around the state printed editorials calling for reform. The Wall Street Journal even printed an article about the efficacy of one of our reform demands, “clawback” (requiring businesses to pay back the subsidies if they don’t deliver the promised jobs). Locally we generated over a dozen print articles, television and radio pieces about the Wellesley Inn deal, which we had targeted as the perfect poster corporation for bad IDA deals.
We packed the Brighton Town Hall where local residents wondered why the entire COMIDA board was missing at the public hearing (a staff member and the COMIDA attorney were the only representatives present). Speaker after speaker spoke out against the proposed tax giveaway to a hotel located across the street from the county jail. Only the hotel’s owner spoke in favor of the deal. Members of the Brighton Town Board explained why the board had passed a resolution against the deal.
We then followed that with a press conference outside of COMIDA headquarters in which we unveiled a Jobs With Justice statewide study of IDA’s around the state showing that the overwhelming majority of businesses receiving tax breaks failed to deliver the promised jobs. The head of the Area Labor Federation, Jim Bertolone, and Brighton Town Supervisor Sandy Frankel spoke out against the Wellesley deal and called for statewide reform. Supervisor Frankel would then travel to Buffalo to testify in favor of IDA reform at an Assembly hearing.
Throughout the campaign we worked with members of the local building trades, lobbying our representatives and attending press conferences in Albany. Our IDA reform coalition partners were also active in other areas of the state. Critical districts were subjected to massive mailings and radio advertisements calling for IDA reform.
We knew from the beginning that the wage standards would be an issue. We were fighting for the common sense notion that if we give a business a tax break to encourage job creation, the jobs should pay decent wages- the free market creates plenty of Wal Mart jobs.
Getting the bill through the Assembly was difficult this year because, in contrast to last year, Assemblymembers knew that if the bill passed Spitzer would sign it and it would become law. This wasn’t a one house bill they were dealing with.
Assemblymember Sam Hoyt of Buffalo was the sponsor of the bill and Assemblywoman Susan John, the chair of the Assembly Labor Committee, played a crucial role in leading her fellow Assemblymembers. The Campaign for Economic Justice and Buffalo Labor Council did a tremendous job in organizing the people in Buffalo, and Hoyt responded by sticking with the wage standards in the bill. He even went so far as to threaten to drive the IDA provisions off the cliff if the Senate didn’t negotiate in good faith on a comprehensive reform package.
Last year our coalition partners’ lobbyists were scrambling to get the bill recognized in the Senate. This year they started engaging the leadership staff early on and we moved the debate in our direction. The Chair of the Senate Local Government Committee, Betty Little, proved to be difficult to work with. Apparently she didn’t understand how the wage provisions worked, so Senator George Maziarz’ IDA reform bill was pulled over to the staff of the Senate leadership so that it could be negotiated directly.
But in the last few days of the legislative session the Senate walked away from the negotiating table, unwilling to come to an agreement on wage standards.
Meanwhile the Assembly, understanding that the Senate was going nowhere on the bill, passed a short-term extension in order to make sure the issue would be revisited in the next legislative session. But the Senate turned around and passed a 2-year extender late at night and then gaveled to a close their legislative session.
The Assembly met the next day, the last day of their session, and realized that they had been left holding the bag. Would they accept the Senate’s long-term reauthorization of the bill and unwillingness to discuss comprehensive reform?
Despite heavy pressure from IDA’s and Mayors, the Assembly forced the issue and made good on their threat to let the provisions sunset. So, as we go to press, IDA’s no longer have the ability to provide low-interest bonds to certain types of non-profit organizations creating civic facilities. This will mean that local governments will grow increasingly upset this summer. It is important for us to make sure that the media understands that the Senate, due to their intransigence on comprehensive IDA reform (specifically wage standards and clawback), have a major responsibility in the scuttling of these IDA provisions.
Although local Republican Senators like Joe Robach and Jim Alesi said they supported IDA reform, the Senate failed to deliver a bill that reigned in out-of-control IDA’s like COMIDA. And as local IDA’ realize that they are unable to move forward on civic facility bonding, the pressure will increase.
If New Yorkers want to build a strong economic future for our state we need to make smart public investments that pay off in the long run. We aren’t investing in a healthy future if we are handing out tax breaks to businesses that pay so little their employees have to apply for foodstamps and Medicaid. And we aren’t maximizing our efforts if we are making IDA deals on a case by case basis- the equivalent of economic development Attention Deficit Disorder.
However, powerful conservative business interests, under the Unshackle Upstate moniker, have been working to capitalize on upstate New York’s economic woes by pushing an agenda that weakens the power of workers to organize and protect themselves from injury and increases the power of large general contractors and other businesses. They are currently working to create separate rules for workers upstate. This is the same tactic that powerful corporations used to get developing countries to enact free trade zones and maquiladoras.
The IDA reform fight is part of a broader struggle to provide a counterweight to the conservative corporate agenda and is where the current living wage battle is being played out.