Ed Koch says he’ll send out robocalls today and will reach 100,000 voters in the 42 legislative districts represented by lawmakers who are reneging on their pledge to support independent redistricting.
The lawmakers are mostly Senate Republicans (who are backing a plan to change redistricting rules through a constitutional amendment, which won’t go into Read More
College students who held a mock session in the state Senate chambers this weekend proved they have the whole routine down pretty well.
The CUNY and SUNY students debated the redistricting bill that narrowly passed the Republican-controlled State Senate. Mirroring the real-life debate, students representing Republican districts controlled the chamber, and pushed for a constitutional Read More
Democratic Rep. Anthony Weiner is getting attacked by the former finance chairman of the New York State Senate Democratic Campaign Committee, Bill Samuels, who has taken up the cause of non-partisan redistricting, which, the congressman opposes.
Samuels, in a public statement, described Weiner’s opposition to non-partisan redistricting as “disappointing” and “self-serving.” To be fair, Read More
The reform movement paints a target on Dean Skelos’ back, with Ed Koch firing the opening salvo.
“The constitutional objections that he is making today were not made when he made the commitment and we believe it is simply an effort to derail the whole operation,” Koch said after meeting with Skelos.
When it comes to redistricting, Ed Koch doesn’t agree with Chuck Schumer.
“Chuck Schumer’s view is it should be partisan and redrawn to protect parties. He’s dead wrong,” Koch told me an interview this afternoon. “He says they would lose three [congressional] seats. I say redistricting is not intended to ensure the outcome of Read More
At long last, those little census forms that arrived in our mailboxes last year, the ones we were endlessly hectored to fill out and send back, will come to mean something: They’ll be used to redraw district lines for the 2012 state and federal elections. Already, legislators and their aides are poring over maps and Read More
Bronx Assemblyman Michael Benjamin, who declined to run for re-election this year, took great interest in our earlier post about the pushback among D.C. Democrats for the the Koch/Cuomo independent redistricting panel idea commission.
He sent over a long email with some thoughtful analysis and historical perspective, parts of which we reprint below. His opinion Read More
One of the key plans of Ed Koch’s reform effort, NY Uprising, is taking redistricting power out of the hands of legislators by creating a non-partisan redistricting commission.
The way redistricting works now is that legislators, usually in the majority party, take out a map and a pen and decide who they will represent. Read More
Affordable Housing or Lack Thereof
