Gov. Andrew Cuomo’s counsel had written to the BOE seeking its advice and recommendations on whether or not the governor should sign the bill, already precleared, but BOE counsel Steve Richman said that implementing it would be enormously expensive.
Implementing it would cost the city “$600,000 to $700,000 per election,” Richman said, for the more than 2,700 interpreters that would be needed to staff polling sites, and an additional $6 million per election for printing ballots.
The cost projections seemed to alarm the commissioners, who said they would like Richman to write back to Governor Cuomo with their cost findings, without a recommendation on what the governor should do.
A bill requiring translation of voting materials into Russian was passed in 2009, and a stronger bill was passed in 2012 because the earlier bill was never implemented.
All of which has displeased Assemblyman Steven Cymbrowitz, who co-sponsored this year’s bill with State Sen. David Storobin. Cymbrowitz drafted a release calling for Richman to resign.
“The Board of Elections has refused to abide by a 2009 law, which I fought for, requiring that voting materials be translated into Russian. As the Board’s top legal official, he is responsible for his agency’s failure to abide by the law,” Cymbrowitz said.
“Now, with the Legislature’s passage of stronger legislation I introduced, the Board of Elections would prefer to continue discouraging thousands of Russian-speaking New Yorkers from voting rather than developing procedures to comply with the 2009 law,” Cymbrowitz explained.“Your non-compliance with the original law and your apparent distaste for the current bill, combined with the headline-making problems that occurred in recent elections, gives me serious doubt regarding your agency’s commitment to properly and expeditiously meet its mandates.”
Assemblyman Steven Cymbrowitz (D-Brooklyn), outraged that the New York City Board of Elections is continuing to flout the law by not translating voting materials into Russian, today called for the immediate resignation or termination of the board’s general counsel, Steven H. Richman.
Yesterday, Cymbrowitz learned that Richman asked the Board of Elections to recommend that Governor Cuomo veto legislation (A10609) requiring New York and other large cities to print ballots and other voting materials in Russian. Cymbrowitz was the bill’s sponsor.
Cymbrowitz demanded the counsel’s removal in a strongly-worded letter to Board of Elections president Maria Guastella.
“Mr. Richman’s action comes after years of inaction. The Board of Elections has refused to abide by a 2009 law, which I fought for, requiring that voting materials be translated into Russian. As the Board’s top legal official, he is responsible for his agency’s failure to abide by the law,” Cymbrowitz said.
“Now, with the Legislature’s passage of stronger legislation I introduced, the Board of Elections would prefer to continue discouraging thousands of Russian-speaking New Yorkers from voting rather than developing procedures to comply with the 2009 law,” Cymbrowitz explained.
In his letter to Guastella, Cymbrowitz said recent events make it even more doubtful that the Board of Elections will comply with the law.
“Your non-compliance with the original law and your apparent distaste for the current bill, combined with the headline-making problems that occurred in recent elections, gives me serious doubt regarding your agency’s commitment to properly and expeditiously meet its mandates,” he wrote.
“As General Counsel, Mr. Richman must have clearly understood the 2009 law and its intent, yet he, the Board of Elections’ chief legal authority, chose to ignore it. This is both illegal and inexcusable and cause for requesting his immediate resignation, or if this does not occur, his termination,” Cymbrowitz continued in his letter.
Cymbrowitz reminded Guastella that, “Our nation’s strength and stability emanates from its body of laws. Government officials cannot have the option of choosing which ones to abide by.”
In addition to calling for Richman’s removal, Cymbrowitz urged the board “in the strongest terms not to stand in the way of legislation that seeks only to bring more residents into the voting process. As public servants, we have an obligation to encourage civic participation, not discourage it.”
Cymbrowitz has been working with the Russian community and his colleagues in Albany for much of the past decade to make the translation of voting materials into Russian a reality.
NYC Wins When Everyone Can Vote!
Michael H. Drucker
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