News from City Council President's Office.
Yonkers City Hall
Yonkers, New York 10701
Re: Filling Vacancies and the Resign to Run Proposals
To the members of the Commission:
A year ago we proposed that vacancies on the Yonkers City Council be filled by special election similar to the manner in which vacancies are filled on the County Board of Legislators. With the story of your recommendations in the Journal News, we are now compelled to summarize our suggestions.
We propose that the City Council President call a special election within ninety (90) days of any vacancies of elected City Officials (including Mayor and Judges). In the event that the Council Presidency is vacant, the Majority Leader shall assume the position and shall call a special election.
We oppose the Resign to Run proposal. Filling vacancies in the manner described above would solve any concerns that there may be about filling long term vacancies being filled without direct election by the voters. The Resign to Run proposal is flawed on many grounds such as its inability to recognize that including city judicial elections, there are municipal elections almost every November (not just the odd years). There is also no logical reason to treat election to a City position differently than election to another level of government. This places an unreasonable burden on Yonkers elected officials that affect no other elected officials in our region. This runs counter to the spirit of term limits where Council Members are poised to serve a short period of time and then move up or out. Quite frankly it appears to be a thinly veiled attempt to protect the Mayor from any serious competition in his upcoming election.
We do however support the Charter Revision Commission's proposal to put reasonable time lines on the environmental review process. We thank the commission for the hard work they have put in deliberating these important matters.
Very truly yours,
Chuck Lesnick, Council President
Patricia D. McDow, Majority Leader
Dennis Robertson, Council Member
Sandy Annabi, Council Member
CITY HALL
40 SOUTH BROADWAY
YONKERS, NY 10701
TEL. 914.377.6060
FAX 914.964.1949
Posted By Roundup Newswires.com Editor Brian Harrod
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