Solons’ signatures sought

State lawmakers from Westchester and their opponents in the November election are being asked to back with their signatures a promise to support a quartet of reforms in Albany.

One incumbent already has signed the pledge recently sent out by the Westchester County Association as part of the business advocacy group”™s Call to Action effort to upend the political status quo in Albany. Other incumbents and candidates have said they”™re willing to pledge and are already active in the growing push for reform.

Westchester”™s rookie legislator in the Capitol, Assemblyman Robert Castelli, R-Goldens Bridge, already has returned a signed pledge, WCA spokesperson Amy Allen said recently. The county”™s senior state legislator with 25 years in office, Sen. Suzi Oppenheimer, D-Mamaroneck, was the first incumbent to sign the Call to Action pledge. WCA Chairman Alfred B. DelBello called her signing “a big step.”

Oppenheimer, though, will be asked to retrace her step and sign a slightly revised pledge since sent separately to incumbents. The revision eliminates a phrase that holds candidates to their promise “if elected on Nov. 2, 2010.”

“We want to hold the incumbents accountable for their vote on this year”™s budget, not just after election,” Allen said of the change.

Both incumbents and their election opponents are asked to pledge the following:

• “I am committed to a balanced budget completed on time and without increased taxes, fees, assessment or borrowing.”
• “I will fully disclose all outside income.”
• “I support a nonpartisan commission to redraw legislative district lines.”
• “I will not vote for any unfunded mandates.”

 

Regarding the commitment to an on-time budget, Oppenheimer described her reaction when reading it: “I said, well, that”™s sort of a silly question when we”™re already late.” As for the long-stalled budget in the state Legislature, “All we”™re lacking is the political will to get it done,” she said.

Castelli, of the Assembly”™s minority party, said he “was shocked at our inability to do the budget, because there is no political or strategic reason for doing it late.” He said he was “saddened that it really does come down to three men in a room” in budget negotiations ”“ the governor and majority leaders in the Senate and Assembly.

State lawmakers have not been paid through the budget impasse, he noted. “It”™s not like we have a vested interest in screwing ourselves,” Castelli said. “Nobody in their right mind elects not to get paid for eight weeks.”

“I just hope and pray that we get a budget,” said Assemblywoman Amy Paulin, D-Scarsdale. “At this juncture, we”™re not passing major bills” because of the budget delay, she said. “It”™s no way to run the state. It shows an ineptitude that cannot be tolerated.”

Paulin said she agrees with the thrust of the WCA reform effort, having supported an ethics reform bill vetoed by Gov. David Paterson and legislation that would create a nonpartisan independent commission for legislative redistricting. But the group”™s call for a timely budget that is balanced without increases in taxes, fees, assessments or borrowing “is probably not completely realistic,” she said.

“I certainly don”™t want to see any increase in taxes,” said Paulin. “But fees and assessments, some of them are out of our control” and set administratively.

Paulin said she supports a balanced budget this year without a tax hike. “In future years we have to make difficult decisions,” she said. “I”™m not going to make a lifelong commitment on that” pledge to oppose any revenue-raising increases.

Pledge-signing campaigns are not new to the halls of power in Albany, said Blair Horner, legislative director for the New York Public Interest Research Group. “Historically you get almost all the challengers” to sign “and you don”™t get the majority of the incumbents,” he said. “The likelihood that they (incumbents) will sign a pledge is greater the more politically vulnerable they are.”

Horner said a pledge can be a useful tool for an interest group in Albany. “It can build a legislative coalition in support of whatever the issue is you”™re pushing,” he said.