Four Time-Sensitive Resolutions to Sign

We have time-sensitive resolutions that we need State Committee Members to sign onto if we are to present these resolutions at the upcoming “Spring” NYDSC meeting, which may take place during the third or fourth week of July. Each of these resolutions needs ten signatures as soon as possible – the specific contact info for each resolution is noted below.
The Republicans took the U.S. House, Senate and White House last November because of a long, calculated strategy of focusing on key state legislative races and ensuring that they either flipped or stayed Republican. Why? Because state legislatures draw up Congressional voting districts. Which is why we now have such grossly distorted and inequitable voting districts that are specifically designed to defeat Democratic, progressive candidates and ensure Republican majorities, despite the will of the voters.

It is increasingly clear that state legislatures, and by extension, state parties are the linchpins to re-claiming our democracy. The ONLY way we can change this is by taking back state legislatures throughout our nation. Here in New York, we know how tremendously damaging a Republican majority in a state legislative system is: our Senate is the body where good legislation goes to die. But what is unconscionable is that here in New York it is supposed DEMOCRATS who are enabling this destructive Republican majority.

I refer, of course, to the so-called Independent Democratic Caucus, Democrats who collude with the Republicans and give them the majority that they need to block basic legislative reform. And like the corrupt pay-to-play Independence Party that fund their campaigns these IDC members bring home the loot, for themselves and their Districts, but at the expense of the common good.

In the past, the Progressive Caucus has put forward resolutions calling upon the members of the IDC to come on home to the Senate Democratic Caucus. We have also offered a separate resolution calling upon the Governor and all other New York Democrats to reject the Independence Party line – thereby depriving it of the necessary vote minimum it requires to sustain its political line and power.

We now say enough. We are submitting a resolution to the upcoming meeting demanding that members of the IDC no longer run on the Democratic Party line. Further we call upon the NYS Democratic Committee to no longer provide any funding, directly or indirectly, for any IDC State Senator, or serve as a pass through for funding of any IDC State Senator, or provide in-kind services for any IDC State Senator, until such Senator leaves the IDC and returns to the Senate Democratic Caucus.

If you wish to support our anti-IDC resolution, please send a signed copy of the resolution to me at rachel_lavine@yahoo.com or email me to make alternative arrangements.

We must also reclaim the State Committee and make it a transparent body that once again operates according to reasonable Rules and that are accessible to rank-and-file New York Democrats. State Committee Member Kelleigh McKenzie has taken on the impressive task of reviewing the State Party Rules and drafting resolutions that would amend the Rules to be more logical and consistent. Kelleigh has drafted five separate Amendments to the State Committee Rules that would enable more practical timing notices for resolutions and greater representation of State Committee Members in the actual functioning of the NYSDC.

If you wish to join me in supporting these Rules Amendments, please send your signature to Kelleigh at kelleighmck@gmail.com.

In addition to encourage further transparency as to State Party functioning, we are interested in examining the State Party finances, including its budget and expenditures. State Committee Member Ben Yee, has drafted a resolution asking that State Committee members receive, as per the Bylaws, a regular audit of the State Committee finances.

If you wish to join me in supporting this Budget transparency resolution, please send your signature to Ben at ben@benjaminyee.com.

In addition, at our last interim Progressive Caucus meeting in February, we discussed Trump’s draconian and unconstitional travel ban and the fact that two major international airport hubs are located within New York City.  In response, we sought to support policies and legislation that would make New York a Sanctuary State, calls on all New York officials to take strong and public stances in opposition to the Trump administration’s state immigration policies, and demands that New York resist providing resources or support for federal agencies that seek to target and penalize immigrant communities.

Ben has drafted a resolution codifying that support and calling for the passage of NY State Liberty Act. If you wish to support this Sanctuary State resolution [7], please send your signature to Ben at ben@benjaminyee.com.

Again, we need your signatures as soon as possible for the above resolutions.

Finally, in celebration of our country’s great Constitution and our historic tradition of resisting tyranny, let us honor the invocation of the great Langston Hughes and “Let America Be America Again”

In solidarity,

Rachel Lavine, Chair