Statement on Disqualifications of DeBlasio and Alan Gerson from Ballots

Every so often, something happens that shines a light on an important problem that is usually hidden. The actions taken by the NYC Board of Elections, in which Bill DeBlasio and Alan Gerson were thrown off the ballot for Public Advocate and City Council, respectively, illustrates the point.

DeBlasio needed less than 10,000 petition signatures to get on the ballot in September; he turned in around 125,000. Why was he thrown off? An idiotic technicality: His campaign staff filled out a form wrong—by a single digit. The campaign turned in 132 folders of signed petitions, but mistakenly wrote on the form that they had 131 folders. The fact that this error would actually count against DeBlasio, making it seem that he had less signatures, and therefore couldn’t possibly be in any way interpreted as fraud didn’t matter—he was disqualified from the ballot.

For Gerson, it was the same type of thing: Gerson needed only 900 petition signatures, but turned in around 7,000. Unfortunately, because of an error made by Gerson’s printer, his wrong home address was displayed on the forms: Instead of his house number being listed correct as 505, it was listed as 1505. Gerson’s team corrected the error; they crossed the extra digit off. But that didn’t matter either—Gerson was disqualified.
Whatever one thinks of DeBlasio or Gerson, this is sheer lunacy.

Both DeBlasio and Gerson are scheduled for a hearing at the Board of Elections. If they lose there, they will go to the courts, which will most likely reverse the negative BOE decisions. Nonetheless, New York’s system is full of this kind of preposterous nonsense. These hyper-technical rules, the intricacies of getting on the ballot, are pointless. Worse than that, they are anti-democratic. For example, a candidate with strong support in his or her community but who is underfunded may not be able to go to court to challenge such disqualifications.

Under this system, candidates with less money—less money to employ lawyers to make sure that all of the city’s arcane filing regulations are fulfilled, and less money to fight battles if the Board of Elections says they’re not—are at a disadvantage.

In the interest of democracy and allowing New Yorkers the right to vote for whom they wish, we call for the city’s filing regulations to be simplified dramatically. There is simply no real argument for these rules.

The law allows for finding submissions valid if the error is insignificant, thus leaving room for the BOE’s discretion. The problem is that the Board of Elections is controlled by the right wing of the Democratic Party machine. We believe that either an independent review panel should be set up to handle any of these types of issues and to watch over the BOE, or to at least put it fully under the control of the city council.

This would be another step, albeit a small one, towards a more democratic New York.

By Dan Margolis
New York State Communist Party

All out July 29th: Fight Atlantic Yards!

NYS Communist Party Statement on Education

At 12:01 this morning, the law that enshrined mayoral control of New York City’s public schools formally sunset, as the New York State Senate remained paralyzed by crisis. The old Board of Education was automatically resurrected, as were 32 community school boards, whose members are to be elected.

Whether or not this will stand, or if the State Senate will come back to order and re-issue some form of mayor control remains to be seen. However, what we’ve seen so far is not good: Bloomberg is making sure to keep himself and his corporate-world school’s chancellor, Joel Klein, firmly in control, with as little in the way of checks and balances as possible.

The seven-member board is composed of two people directly appointed by the mayor, and one person appointed by each of the five Borough Presidents. The mayor and the BP’s have made their appointments, and six of them are sympathetic to Bloomberg: There are three deputy mayors and three allies. The other, Dolores M. Fernández, was appointed by Bronx Borough President Rubén Díaz Jr., and thankfully, she is expected to oppose Joel Klein’s continued reign as well as many of Bloomberg’s policies.

It’s too bad that four of the five Borough Presidents decided not to challenge Bloomberg’s power. If they had, we could have seen a board that would fire Joel Klein, and bring in someone who has an actual background in education. Klein has imposed a top-down corporate model on the schools, and has left room for virtually no input by parents or the community.

Fight Bloomberg's Cuts!

It's short notice, but anyone who possibly can should come to the rally listed below in support of New York's Department of Education employees. Bloomberg wants to lay off many of them. Doing so will hurt these workers and their families, teachers who will have to pick up the slack, and all schoolchildren who will get a worse education.

Message from Bronx: Contact Congress on health care now

By Elena Mora

BRONX, N.Y. -- About 70 residents gathered here June 13 to “speak out” on the health care crisis. The event, co-sponsored by NW Bronx for Change and the Benjamin Franklin Reform Democratic Club, featured health care organizer Tim Foley, from New Yorkers for Change, and heard remarks from local elected officials and testimony from members of the audience.

“Health care is happening now,” Foley said. “Your representatives need to hear from you. We know who else they’ll be hearing from -- the private insurance industry and the pharmaceutical industry.

“People often say ‘my congressman is good on health care’ but you should call your representatives regardless, because there’s a great deal of pressure going on right now, and it’s happening very, very quickly.”

People in the audience signed postcards addressed to Senators Chuck Schumer and Kirsten Gillibrand, which read, “I strongly urge you to work for the inclusion of a public plan at a minimum.”

A string quartet of young musicians from the Bronx performed for the crowd, led by their former teacher Joe Sherman, who is the Bronx coordinator of Moveon.org. In his introduction to the group, Sherman said, “Music is related to health care. Stutterers can sing without stuttering. President Obama has a big agenda and health care is a biggie and events like this can help get it done.”

Numerous elected officials attended as well. Congressman Eliot Engel stated off the bat that he is for a single-payer plan. He went on to praise President Obama’s pledge to pass comprehensive health care legislation saying, “Health care is a right of every citizen, not a privilege. For us to have 47 million Americans without any health care whatsoever, in the year 2009, is a scandal.”

Engel cited some of New York’s bleak health care statistics: 2.5 million people or 13 percent or the population have no health coverage. Health insurance premiums have more than doubled since 2006, while wages have only gone up by 2 percent.

And Engel told his own health care crisis story. His daughter was born with a minor heart problem. When she graduated college she was dropped from the family insurance policy. When she tried to buy her own insurance from that same company she was denied because of a “pre-existing condition.”

He said, “President Obama and I want to end this kind of nonsense.”

Gustavo Rivera, representing Sen. Gillibrand, referenced his work in the Obama campaign, thanking NW Bronx for Obama for its work electing the president and for continuing to organize around the key issues at the grassroots.

State Assemblyman Jeffrey Dinowitz expressed his strong support for health care reform, and talked about a health care bill he’s co-sponsoring in the State Assembly.

City Councilmember Oliver Koppell got a round of applause when he declared, “I am 100 percent in favor of a single payer plan. It’s a disgrace that every industrial economy has single payer health care, and we don’t. I understand that we have to compromise now, but that’s what we should get, eventually.”

Moving testimony was given by lifelong Bronx resident Sasha Quinones, who said, “I had planned to tell my own story, but last week my best friend called me and said, ‘Next Thursday I’m losing my health insurance. Sasha, I’m going to go blind.’ Her medicine costs $300 a month. If she goes a month without it, she’ll go blind. Her doctor said she had to have this medicine, but she asked, ‘What am I going to do, how do I make a choice between putting food on the table, or buying the medicine?’”

Quinones who was diagnosed with MS at age 21, added “When I started my career, I couldn’t get health care because of my pre-existing condition. In the words of President Obama, yes we can, we have to change this now.”

Miriam Ford, a family nurse practitioner, said, “The first thing I have to ask patients is ‘what kind of insurance do you have?’ And that frames everything that I do.” Ford added, “Solving the health care crisis can’t be done in isolation, what about the money we’re spending every day in Iraq and Afghanistan?”

Another speaker, Sister Clair Regan, talked about the opposition to the public option. “They are using scare tactics saying a government plan will ration health care. But health care is already being rationed, controlled, limited. There are people who can’t even get on the line. We need to help our brothers and sisters, neighbors and friends understand that these are scare tactics. We all know someone that’s suffering now, someone who is not on the line. We need to be strong, loud and clear: we need something now, for everyone.”

Ariana Ami-Holback came at the issue from the other side. “I have health care because I worked for the city. I recently had a serious illness diagnosed, and I was able to get the care I needed. One of the tests I had cost $4,000, another was $3,000, and although I had to pay a part, they were covered. I didn’t have to think, ‘should I get this test, should I not get this test?’ I had to deal with the diagnosis and then worrying about what to do, but at least I had insurance.”

The event wrapped up with plans being made for delivery of the petitions and postcards to Sen. Schumer’s office and to participate in a June 25 health care demonstration in Washington.