Infra
Voter Guide: Ballot Question 5 Mandates More Detail for Budgeting on City Maintenance
This ballot question guide is part of our full explainer article on all of the six proposals on the ballot in New York City this November.
What is Ballot Question 5?
Ballot Question 5 would expand the Citywide Statement of Needs and make other changes to capital planning creation and deadlines.
Here’s how Ballot Question 5 will look on your ballot: “This proposal would amend the City Charter to require more detail in the annual assessment of City facilities, mandate that facility needs inform capital planning, and update capital planning deadlines.”
The city releases a number of reports that take stock of its infrastructure: what needs fixing, what needs to be expanded, what’s going to be built. If this proposition passes, one major annual report — the Citywide Statement of Needs — would be expanded to include more information on maintenance needs, and another report — the Ten-Year Capital Strategy — would need to explicitly take the findings in the Statement of Needs into account for its plan.
According to the Charter Revision Commission, these recommendations were developed after testimony from Comptroller Brad Lander, who wanted to take advantage of the ballot measures to implement budget reforms.
However, Lander said that Proposition 5 does not actually draw on his office’s recommendations.
“[The proposal] is meaningless, does not advance transparency, and fails to improve the City’s capital planning process in any way,” Lander said in a statement. “Like the Commission’s rushed process and other recommendations, it is simply a cynical effort to distract New Yorkers.”
Unlike Lander’s proposal, which would involve a far larger infrastructure inventory, the Statement of Needs covers less than 1% of the city’s infrastructure. “Requiring the Citywide Statement of Needs to include additional detail on facility condition is meaningless for capital budget planning purposes – since these are in fact the projects that the City has already decided need to be improved and to invest funds to do so,” the statement read.
Where did this proposal come from?
Ballot questions 2 through 6 on New York City voters’ ballots this year went through a rocky process to make it your voting booth.
In the spring, the City Council put forth a ballot measure to expand the “advice and consent” process that gives the Council the power to approve some mayoral appointees.
Around the same time, Mayor Eric Adams created his own Charter Review Commission, assembling some of his closest allies to lead the process, as THE CITY has reported. His commission met for two months this summer, a timeline that has been criticized by City Council and advocacy groups as rushed.
The dueling ballot proposals caused a legal clash. According to city law, the City Council’s ballot proposals and the mayor’s can’t coexist on the same ballot, and the mayor’s takes precedence. That means only Mayor Adams’ proposed Charter revisions will appear this November.
The executive director of the mayor’s commission, Diane Savino, says that its five ballot measures were the result of listening to New Yorkers’ needs, taking input from thousands of people and that they reflect “the desires they heard from New Yorkers for clean streets, fiscal responsibility, public safety, transparency in the city’s capital planning process and support for Minority- and Women-Owned Business Enterprises,” she said in a statement.
Opponents to the mayor’s charter revisions disagree and say that though these ballot questions seem innocuous, they are actually an attempt to interfere in the city’s legislative process.
“[Propositions] two through six weaken checks and balances and weaken local democracy and increase power for the mayor at a time when people all over the country should be voting for democracy up and down the ballot,” said Joo-Hyun Kang, a representative for No Power Grab NYC, a campaign that was formed in response to the proposed Charter revisions.
“It’s a sophisticated and sneaky move by the mayor,” Kang said.
Have a question about the ballot proposals, or about voting in New York this year? Reach out to our newsroom at ask@thecity.nyc.
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