District 11 City Council candidate, Dan Padernacht, and a number of other City Council candidates held a press conference on Tuesday, Dec. 29, where they discussed different proposals to mitigate against the health risks associated with campaigning in the Northwest Bronx in the era of COVID-19, as reported by Norwood News. 

 

The candidates called on Gov. Andrew Cuomo and Mayor Bill de Blasio to waive the minimum 450-signature requirement to qualify to place their names on the ballots in the District 11 and District 15 special elections, which are expected to be announced on or about Jan. 1, 2021 and which should take place within 80 days of the announcement by the mayor. They say this would avoid unnecessary person-to-person contact between candidates, their staff and the public.

 

Most candidates seek many more than the minimum 450 signatures needed to ensure their name is guaranteed on the ballot and with, roughly, a dozen candidates running in these two special elections, concurrent campaigning efforts by these candidates have the potential to create an estimated 14,000 person-to-person encounters at a time when COVID-19 infection rates are rising.

 

“The health and well being of New York City residents must not be placed at risk when there’s an alternative,” Padernacht said during a hastily organized, virtual press conference on Dec. 29. “We need to protect, not endanger the electorate we seek to serve. The alternatives include a waiver of the signature requirement, or a substantial reduction in the [minimum] signature requirement.”

Padernacht cited the June 2020 primary as a precedent, when the minimum signature requirement was reduced to 30 precent in light of the pandemic. Another alternative discussed was a draft bill proposed by Manhattan Council Member, Ben Kallos, representing District 5, which, if passed, would allow ballot qualification to be based on the minimum campaign contribution threshold set by the New York City Campaign Finance Board (CFB)’s matching funds program.

This voluntary, small-dollar, public matching funds program incentivizes candidates to rely on regular New Yorkers, rather than special interest groups and corporates, for contributions to their political campaigns. As a reward, for each dollar (up to a maximum of $250) contributed by a resident to a candidate’s campaign, the CFB program allots up to $8 in public funds to that campaign. Additional rules stipulate maximum allotment thresholds per contributor.

To qualify, City Council candidates must raise a minimum of 75 contributions of $10 or more from residents of the district they seek to represent, and a minimum contribution threshold of $5,000 from New York City residents. They must also agree and demonstrate compliance with the program requirements, follow through to eventually be on the ballot, have an opponent on the ballot, and submit a personal financial disclosure filing with the Conflicts of Interest Board.

Among the other candidates at the press conference who agreed with Padernacht’s proposal to come up with an alternative to person-to-person petitioning contact were Carlton Berkley, Abigail Martin, and Marcos Sierra who are running in the 11th District race, Latchmi Gopal who is running in the 15th City Council race, and Corey Ortega, who is running in Manhattan’s 7th District City Council race.

Martin referred to an op ed she wrote in the Gotham Gazette on Dec. 23 in which she suggested the ballot signature requirement be suspended. “We could also reduce the [number of required] signatures,” she said. In terms of the election itself, Martin also proposed postponing in-person voting until more people were vaccinated, and suggested sending postage-paid absentee ballots, ahead of time, to all eligible voters, as was done for the June primaries, last year.

As reported by Norwood News, some voters said they experienced delays or non-receipt of their absentee ballots at that time, prompting Assemblyman Jeffrey Dinowitz, who represents the 81st Assembly District, to call for the future use of ballot tracking technology to track receipt of ballot applications and, separately, to abolish the cost of having to mail back completed absentee ballots.

“We know that with some of these vaccines, it takes time in order for all people to be fully vaccinated and safe, and I think that if we considered moving the election to later, we would allow for more people to be safe,” Martin said, adding that mid-January was predicted by Dr. Anthony Fauci to be the worst cycle of the coronavirus pandemic. “Hospitalizations in New York State are at the highest they’ve been since May 8,” she added. “For these reasons, I hope we can come up with some solutions so that these two special elections can be held safely.”

Sierra concurred with Martin and Padernacht’s suggestion to eliminate or reduce the minimum 450 signature requirement. “This will allow some candidates who have not yet met the CFB thresholds to still maintain access, and not disenfranchise any candidates,” he said.

Regarding the proposal to use the CFB contribution thresholds as an alternative to petitioning signatures, Sierra said while he was not opposed to it, his only caveat would be that there are some smaller, grassroots campaigns which have not had the ability to yet meet the CFB contribution thresholds, and by choosing that alternative, it could potentially disenfranchise some candidates.

Meanwhile, speaking to the health risks to voters, Berkley said he was grateful to Padernacht for calling the press conference and agreed with Martin’s call to postpone the election. “I do agree with waiting because of what’s going on with this pandemic.” He added, “Everyone is afraid. We do have the vaccine out now, and I wouldn’t mind waiting and giving it a little bit longer. However, no, I don’t think it’s going to be held up. You know what? I’ll go with the majority.”

For her part, Gopal said she also supported finding an alternative way forward, and emphasized that COVID-19 has had much more of an impact on Black and brown, immigrant, working-class communities, and that this had to be considered when making any decisions about the issue. “These communities are the ones who are holding a lot of the weight of essential workers out there every day, and to require signatures in this manner will put them, and other individuals, in our City Council neighborhoods at risk,” she said.

Asked if he knew what the other absent candidates’ views were on the issue, Padernacht said, “So, this [press release] was all pretty much put out this morning, so we did invite the other candidates in the two districts,” he said. “I’m not sure if all campaigns had an opportunity to process everything that we’re putting out,” he said, adding that the other candidates would have an opportunity to read about it in media reports, and decide for themselves what they believe should be the appropriate course of action.

Though Martin said she was in favor of postponing the election for a brief duration, she was also concerned about lack of representation in District 11 until a replacement was elected. “I’m absolutely concerned. I don’t think three months is acceptable but this is where we are,” she said. “We have to weigh the safety of our senior population. They’re the ones that should be able to start receiving the vaccines maybe as early as the beginning of March as well, in the second round of vaccines, so I think we need to weigh another four to six weeks of not having representation against the safety of the public.”

Now, former City Councilman for District 11, Andrew Cohen, stepped down from his role on Dec. 31 to take up his new position on the bench of the Bronx Supreme Court. Though he informed constituents they can still send inquiries to his office until such time as his replacement is elected, concerns had already been raised on social media by District 11 residents about lack of representation until the special election is held, a point raised with the mayor’s office by Norwood News last August.

During a CB7 General Board Meeting on Dec. 22, as he bid his constituents farewell, Cohen said, “Councilman Cabrera is going to have to carry the whole load for a little while, but I know he’s up to it too. My office is going to be run by the [City Council] Speaker [Corey Johnson]’s office, so if people need us, you can still email District 11, and you’ll get a response from the City Council.”

Norwood News reached out to Cohen’s office to clarify his comments as they appeared to suggest that perhaps Councilman Fernando Cabrera (D-14) might be temporarily assisting with constituent inquiries in District 11. A representative from Cohen’s office responded, saying, “I believe he was referring to participation at the CB7 community board meetings and generally in the community, as there is some overlap between the council districts and the community board area.”

Cohen won his seat on the Bronx Supreme Court in the November general election. With this in mind, Padernacht said, “Everyone has been able to forecast the special elections since November, and since that time, we haven’t received any word or direction from the Board of Elections, the governor’s office, the mayor’s office, on this topic, on how to best keep the public safe, that there are alternatives available to reduce the person-to-person contact, and that’s what we’re asking our government officials to do.”

He continued, “We are aware that in District 37, there was a Board of Elections ruling that determined that the governor’s executive order from last year did not apply to that special election, and some of the candidates in that race were led to believe that it was a smaller signature requirement, and when they got those signatures, the Board of Elections later determined, in its own unit, that the governor’s order did not apply.”

Padernacht said what he and the other candidates were looking for was for the Board of Elections, leaders and elected officials to come up with a straightforward, honest process to keep people safe while getting candidates the ability to get on the ballot.

For his part, Ortega said he didn’t envisage any response from the Board of Elections on the matter. “The Board of Elections will follow laws and procedures,” he said. “They don’t have the wiggle room, necessarily, to say, ‘Hey, this would be a better practice,’ if it’s not written in law, so I think we just have to rely on the [elected] leadership and legislature to make those changes to the petition process and whatnot.”

Padernacht clarified that the reason for including the Board of Elections in the discussion was so that its legal counsel could start reviewing and anticipating any problems with the proposed solution sooner rather than later, since this would hopefully avoid a situation where candidates might incorrectly believe they had a lower signature requirement, only to find out later they did not.

Meanwhile, in terms of signatures, Ortega said his preference was all or nothing. “Reducing the number of petitions is still putting you at risk,” he said. “That’s like saying, ‘I just want a little bit of cancer.’ You either get COVID or you don’t, so there’s no distinction in volume on that.” Padernacht said he understood and acknowledged the point being made, though he added that fewer required petitions would, hopefully, mean less person-to-person contacts overall.

 

Asked why it would not be more logical to postpone the special elections until the June primaries, Padernacht said, “If we don’t have a special election now, the district will go for about nine months without representation at a critical point. That critical point is, quite frankly, the budget, and with everything happening in New York City right now, that’s an extremely important aspect to have a city council member for.” He added, ‘In addition to the budget, we need constituent services for the next nine months, especially with a pandemic.”

admin

Welcome to the Norwood News, a bi-weekly community newspaper that primarily serves the northwest Bronx communities of Norwood, Bedford Park, Fordham and University Heights. Through our Breaking Bronx blog, we focus on news and information for those neighborhoods, but aim to cover as much Bronx-related news as possible. Founded in 1988 by Mosholu Preservation Corporation, a not-for-profit affiliate of Montefiore Medical Center, the Norwood News began as a monthly and grew to a bi-weekly in 1994. In September 2003 the paper expanded to cover University Heights and now covers all the neighborhoods of Community District 7. The Norwood News exists to foster communication among citizens and organizations and to be a tool for neighborhood development efforts. The Norwood News runs the Bronx Youth Journalism Heard, a journalism training program for Bronx high school students. As you navigate this website, please let us know if you discover any glitches or if you have any suggestions. We’d love to hear from you. You can send e-mails to norwoodnews@norwoodnews.org or call us anytime (718) 324-4998.