I was unable to attend this meeting but was able to watch the Internet streamed meeting. This open meeting was for the Commission members to hear the report by Citizen Union's which included their approval of putting Non Partisan Municipal Elections (Top Two) on the ballot for the voters to decide if they want all voters to be able to participate in the first round of voting in the September primaries with all the candidates on one ballot.
Use the above link to view the entire meeting. Here is a link for the Citizen Union's testimony. Here is a link for all the Citizen Union's recommendations.
Whenever this issue comes up people talk about the 2003 defeat,70% against, but further review shows that only 12% of eligible voters showed up. So only 8% of the eligible votes defeated it. I feel that the climate has changed in 2010 and has a much better change of passing. If the Commission would make the decision to put it on the 2010 ballot early, it would give its supports enough time to get the voting public aware of the issues and what it would mean to the 1.5 million New York City votes who are locked out of primary voting.
After their testimony, the Commission opened the meeting to the public. It was interesting that the public officials who spoke used their talking point notes and seemed to not listen to the testimony which answered how it would work and would not remove the parties' ability to endorse candidates and show the parties' logos on the ballot. This also happened with some of the voters' comments.
To make this work all candidates who want to get on the ballot should have the same requirements and have to get the same number of signatures. Since we are a fusion state, the ballot should show all the parties who endorsed a candidate.
Finally, the Commission Chairman, Matthew Goldstein, made a comment that one of his criteria was the issue had a strong chance of passing before he would put it on the ballot was disappointing. It is up to the voters not the Commission to make that decision.
Michael H. Drucker
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