Not So Fast: Council Should Not Be In A Hurry To Change Its Rules
New York City's government and politics have big changes underway. The civic ground beneath our feet is shifting. But concerning the rush to implement reform in the operations of the City Council—reforms which would transfer much power to individual members and away from the Speaker—New Yorkers in every neighborhood in every borough should caution their elected representatives to slow down.
Reform is just another word for change, and putting the term “progressive”—the hot adjective these days—in front of it doesn’t automatically make it the right thing to do. Whether the motivation is progressive, conservative, libertarian, Green, or from any other political point of view, modifying a branch of government to fit in with popular sentiment is a perilous undertaking that should be carefully considered. By rushing to embrace these changes, individual councilmembers may very well find themselves momentarily empowered, but in the long run end up suffering as a result of the structural weaknesses they inflict upon the city.
Regardless of who is the mayor and speaker, branches of government have responsibilities and powers that must be fervently guarded. A strong Council with a strong Speaker is a necessary part of city government; as a counterbalance to the mayor and as a vehicle for advancing policies perhaps not supported by the administration. As the representatives of the level of government closest to the people, the Council and Speaker provide a perspective that it healthily different from the one held by public officials elected citywide.
As an institution, the City Council needs to be forcefully represented and run with discipline. More than that, as a body it needs to be forceful. The priorities and values of the constituents represented by their locally elected representative—neighborhood by neighborhood and district by district—guide the Council and the Speaker. Synthesizing and integrating different concerns from different neighborhoods into a Council position and then acting on that position in a way that advances citywide goals is a very different process than the way a citywide elected public official operates. An electoral mandate for the mayor is the mayor’s alone; it should not compel structural changes in the Council.
Our system of governance is not a zero-sum game, nor is it binary. The mayor and comptroller and public advocate represent the city as the city. The Speaker represents the city as the neighborhoods that make up the districts of the Council's members. This distinction is important. The language used for discussing and assessing citywide offices is not the vocabulary that should be used in legislative discussions.
An effective and fair city government embraces this balance—the space between citywide as a city and citywide as a collection of neighborhoods and ethnicity—as a workable and constructive tension. The Council and the Speaker have a very important role to play that should not be recklessly endangered. If a new Speaker is being chosen based on promises to relinquish power and diminish the institution, New York policy and politics will likely suffer as a consequence.
New York City is headed in a direction of greater authenticity; an important correction has been made. Each of the five boroughs is unique and special, and its residents are proud of their homes. Our neighborhoods don’t elect local mayors. We elect representatives of a legislative body who need to protect the institution in which they serve. In doing so, they best represent their constituents, the community institutions that serve their constituents, and ultimately the city as a whole.
Mayors, councilmembers and other offices are elected. Speakers are selected. Nobody should pretend otherwise, though it likely feels good to do so.
Michael Tobman is a Brooklyn-based political and communications consultant.