A new Constitution for a new Century
The people's opportunity to act
After decades of decline, New York State has at long last made a solid start on its comeback. We are cutting taxes, encouraging work and job growth, welcoming new business investment, and fighting hard to improve our educational system.
But the world is changing faster than we are. As we approach the new Century, New York needs to make a breakthrough. We need to restructure our state and local governments, producing a system that is accountable, cost-efficient and, most important of all, effective in meeting the needs of our young people, our businesses, and all of our citizens.
To make that breakthrough, New York urgently needs a new state Constitution. The Business Council therefore urges the people of this state to vote in November to call a New York State constitutional convention — and we pledge to work hard for a program of thorough-going reform that will give New Yorkers an effective, competitive and accountable government for the 21st Century.
What is at stake
The people of New York have the opportunity, and the obligation, to vote every 20 years on whether or not to call a convention to revise their state Constitution. This gives them a great and sovereign power — a chance to judge not just how well their individual elected representatives are serving, but how well the system of state and local government overall is functioning.
In our role as the leading advocate for economic growth, The Business Council has repeatedly called attention to a basic paradox about New York State. Our state has one of the nation's best and most productive workforces — yet one of its slowest rates of job growth. How can this be? We believe a key reason has to do with the structure of government in New York -- a structure that is too big, too expensive and too intrusive; and that is not accountable for the results it achieves.
These two problems reinforce each other, and together they undermine government's effectiveness in doing what we need it to do — in educating children, caring for those who depend upon it, and growing the economy.
The plethora of overlapping state and local government units and political bodies both drives up costs, and blurs the responsibility for failure. There is a circle of finger-pointing in which state officials blame local officials, local officials blame Albany, competing officials in Albany blame each other, everybody gets re-elected, and too little gets done. The excessive size of government in New York has made the system even less accountable, by giving it the leverage and resources the "ins" need to become self-sustaining. And a system that becomes progressively less accountable becomes progressively less effective — because it is a system sustained by political staying power, rather than by results achieved.
The process of reform
Constitutional reform, and only constitutional reform, can attack these cost and accountability problems. But the fact that a constitutional convention can address these problems does not guarantee that it will. If the voters approve the call for the convention, they will then need to be both vigilant and demanding:
- Vigilant in ensuring that the convention delegates they elect are thoughtful people with a genuine commitment to reform.
- And demanding in insisting that the convention undertake a serious program of comprehensive reform — not just a "quick-fix" list of fashionable ideas.
To maximize a convention's chances for success, we offer two caveats:
- First, the convention will need strong citizen participation. We recommend, for example, that if the people vote to call the convention, the Legislature quickly adopt a process under which citizen candidates for convention delegate can qualify more easily for the November 1998 ballot without needing the support of a political party.
- And second, we recommend that the delegates take two years (rather than the traditional one) to develop a new constitution — with the first year devoted to fact-finding, citizen participation, public hearings and detailed studies of constitutional issues, turning to the actual drafting of a new constitution only after the groundwork has been properly laid.
An agenda for change
We advocate a constitutional convention because we seek fundamental changes that will attack both the cost and accountability problems. We do not, however, have a lengthy list of detailed constitutional provisions we will be advocating; nor do we have closed minds on any issue. The grave nature of the task the convention will confront demands that we — and, we think, all other citizens and interest groups — approach the process with an inquiring, public-spirited and open frame of mind.
We will, however, ask a convention to consider fundamental reforms that would have significant impact on the twin problems of cost and accountability — not just minor or cosmetic changes in the existing Constitution. We would recommend for consideration, among other things:
- Expanding home rule for local governments, banning unfunded mandates and rolling back existing state mandates on them (such as state oversight of their collective bargaining relationships).
- Facilitating shared services and/or consolidation of local government units — by reforming constitutional provisions that now impede consolidation, by barring legislative actions that interfere with shared or privatized services, and by providing strong incentives for steps that will control costs and reduce the local tax burden.
- Imposing effective limits on taxation and debt at both the state and local levels.
- Improving accountability in state government by, for example, providing for a non-partisan legislative reapportionment process, providing remedies for late budgets, and giving the Governor a role in a non-partisan selection process for the Board of Regents.
- Spurring education reform by requiring the Regents to set standards for schools, and by guaranteeing all children a way out of schools that do not meet the standards.
- Reforming the court system and the litigation process.
At the same time, we want to be clear about what we are not asking a constitutional convention to do. We do not favor, and we will not support: abrogating the state's role in the care of the needy; repealing the "labor clause" of the Constitution; undermining the pension rights of public employees; or destroying the constitutional protection of the Forest Preserve.
Trust in the people
Many of those who oppose holding a constitutional convention make two basic arguments: that "the same old political insiders" would run it; and that a convention would do radical and dangerous things.
It is hard to see how these arguments could both be true; why would the "insiders" need or want a convention to do "radical" new things? And it is interesting to hear this argument being made by public-sector unions, who are, in truth, card-carrying members of the Albany establishment; it is as though they think that by attacking the status quo, they can preserve it.
We believe, in fact, that neither fear will be realized — that a convention will attract many new voices and ideas, and that the voters will elect delegates who will approach their responsibilities soberly. History tells us, as well, that the voters will exercise sound judgment before giving final enactment to the convention's proposals.
We put our trust in the people. It is the people, after all, who ushered in the positive era of change that has begun in New York. It is the people who can now take the next step in forging this new direction.
We urge the people to call a convention — and then to be vigilant in ensuring that the convention delegates and their work are worthy of the New York we want to build for the century ahead of us.