All Over Albany

Andrew Cuomo is calling for the legalization of recreational marijuana (also a Green New Deal and voting reforms and many other big items)

Like a State of the State address, but not. / screengrab via Cuomo admin Youtube video of the speech

So, this feels like a step: On Monday Andrew Cuomo -- the governor of New York -- called for the state to legalize recreational marijuana in 2019.

He made the call as part of a larger speech outlining priorities for the next year, what his administration is calling a "justice agenda." (The speech very much had the feel of a State of the State address.) The list is long and includes a bunch of big issues. And it's very possible there could be legislation passed on many of them now that both chambers of the state legislature will be controlled by Democrats.

As with many of the items on the list, Cuomo didn't mention many details to go along with the call for marijuana legalization. But he framed it as a matter of justice, and what he described an unfair targeting of African-American and minority communities.

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New York is one of just a handful of states that still don't allow early voting

Electoral fact of the day: New York is one of only 13 states that do not have some form of early voting. [NCSL]

Given that early voting makes it easier to vote and is popular in many other states, Common Cause New York's Susan Lerner told the New York Times its absence here is "an embarrassment." [Brennan Center] [NYT]

Back in February a Siena poll asked people in the state about early voting. Two-thirds of respondents said they supported it. Though there was a partisan split on the issue: 81 percent of Democrats said they supported it, but just 48 percent of Republicans. Among Independents, 64 percent supported it.

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The deadline to register to vote for the November election is almost here. So don't wait.

A quick heads-up that the deadline to register to vote in New York State for the November election is this Friday, October 12. And if you're sending an application in via the postal mail, it must be postmarked by that date and received by the board of elections no later than October 17.

If you're changing the address on your registration, the notice must be received by your county board of elections by October 17.

And if you want to change your party enrollment -- so that you can vote in a party primary, for example -- you must do that by this Friday, October 12 for primaries that are in 2019.

If you're already registered to vote, it's worth taking a quick second to check the state Board of Elections website to make sure your registration info is up to date and that you're actually registered (because stuff happens sometimes).

We're just going to put this track on repeat: Voting is one of the few ways many of us have to directly influence our governments. So learn a little bit about what's going on, show up, and vote -- each and every time. This is especially true for local elections in which a few votes can sometimes affect the outcome.

Here are a bunch of ways to register to vote in New York State.

If you're not registered to vote, you should do it today. And if you are registered, you should check your registration today.

Today is apparently National Voter Registration Day.

Whatever day -- today, tomorrow, sometime soon -- it's a good day to register to vote if you're not already registered. Or, if you are registered, to check your registration and update it if you've moved or want to change your party affiliation.

Because: You should vote in every election, especially local elections.

The state Board of Elections has an online function for checking your registration and enrollment -- it will also tell you your polling place. (See a longer note about this below.)

If you're not registered to vote? DON'T WAIT! The deadline to register in time to vote for the November election is October 12.

And here are a bunch of ways you can register to vote -- online, via the mail, and in person.

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Today in America

Our country's been going through some rough times politically. It's hard to feel optimistic at the moment.

Then you watch 20 people become American citizens.

We stopped by the Albany Capital Center Thursday afternoon for a naturalization ceremony in which people from 16 different countries around the world took the oath of citizenship. Young and old. Families and individuals. Everyone with a smile, snapping pictures, hugging, excited to make this their country, to be a part of our collective story.

Maybe we'll be OK.

Messages from the "Inaugurate Resistance" march and rally in Albany

Thousands of people marched in Albany Saturday as part of the "Inaugurate Resistance" event, one of many similar marches around the country coinciding with the Women's March in DC.

We wandered through the crowd to ask a bunch of marchers why they were participating -- and what message they hoped to send by being there.

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A call for early voting and other ways to make it easier to vote in New York State

There are a lot of steps before you get this to this point.

Given that the United States republic is more than two centuries old, it's remarkable that we still struggle with the mechanics of one of the fundamental aspects of democratic government: voting.

New York State is no exception, as a new report from the office of state Attorney General Eric Schneiderman notes the presidential primaries this year highlighted multiple problems with how the state's voting system is set up and administered. Among the most amazing examples: A person already registered to vote had to have declared or changed her party affiliation 193 days ahead of the primary in order to be eligible to vote.

The report details many of these problems and also offers a slate of potential upgrades of the state's voting and voting registration processes. One that we suspect would be popular: early voting. A clip from the report:

Permitting early voting is an easy solution to the problems of long lines and overwhelmed poll sites. Under New York State Election Law, the only way by which voters can cast a ballot early is by submitting an absentee ballot. However, access to absentee ballots is limited to a specific set of circumstances ... As a result, New York is one of only 13 states that fails to provide all voters the opportunity to cast a ballot in person prior to an election day. Permitting early voting in New York would make voting more accessible while simultaneously alleviating some of the pressure on poll sites and workers caused by heavy Election Day traffic.

Many of the other proposed reforms also seem very reasonable, such such as...

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Opportunities for becoming more politically and socially active in the community?

Alyssa emails:

Hey AOA! After the most recent election, I'm looking to be more politically and socially active in the community. Know of any local activist groups I can join?

We've heard something similar from a lot of people recently, that they're interested in actively getting involved with some sort of cause, campaign, or effort. So, we'll expand Alyssa's question a little bit to include not just activist groups, but also non-profits pushing for change that have volunteer opportunities.

Got a suggestion for Alyssa, if not a specific group then maybe a cause to focus on? Please share!

Earlier on AOA: It's time to dig in.

It's time to dig in

It's clear that this presidential election season left a lot of people discouraged and fearful. Even if you were OK with the outcome of the vote, there's still a not-small chance that you don't feel good about how the whole process played out. As a nation we didn't wrap ourselves in glory on this one.

The uncertainty about what happens now -- the anxiety -- is understandable. I've felt it in a way that I don't think I've ever felt about politics before. And I can't even imagine how people who already felt threatened because of some of the rhetoric during the campaign now feel. There's a lot for all of us to consider about how we ended up here.

So, it might feel like a time to withdraw. But what I've tried to remind myself is that now is actually the time to dig in, to steady ourselves for the ongoing push to make the sort of country in which we want to live.

And a good place to start is on a local level. Here are a few ways to do that.

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How do you feel about our country right now?

So, about this election. It's been tough.

On television, on social media, and face-to-face we've gotten the sense that a lot of people are discouraged right now. This election cycle has, for some people, brought out some challenging realizations about our differences. And whatever happens Tuesday night, the nation is going to have to find a way to pick up the pieces and move on together. We've been thinking about how hard it's going to be for people do that because of where the election has left people emotionally.

So we stopped outside a few polling sites around the Albany area Tuesday to ask people this question:

Based on everything that's happened this election season, how do you feel about our country right now?

Here's are some of the answers we got...

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That time I was put in charge of a polling location at the last minute

A few years ago, I was in between jobs. I knew one of the two Montgomery County election commissioners because I was volunteering for some local campaigns, and he asked me to be a poll worker for the general election that November.

The county has been struggling to staff polling places. The shift is long, the usual folks are all getting older, and not as many people want to (or can) do it any more.

The job comes with a stipend. I needed the hundred bucks, so I said yes.

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There's still time to register to vote

Just a heads up that the deadline for registering to vote most people in New York State for the upcoming November election is this week. (You might have heard that the country will be electing a new president.) From the NYS Board of Elections:

MAIL REGISTRATION (N.Y. Election Law Section 5-210(3))
Applications must be postmarked no later than October 14th and received by a board of elections no later than October 19th to be eligible to vote in the General Election.

IN PERSON REGISTRATION (N.Y. Election Law Sections 5-210, 5-211, 5-212)
You may register at your local board of elections or any state agency participating in the National Voter Registration Act, on any business day throughout the year but, to be eligible to vote in the General Election, your application must be received no later than October 14th. If honorably discharged from the US Military or have become a naturalized US Citizen after October 14th, you may register in person at the Board of Elections up until October 29th.

CHANGE OF ADDRESS (N.Y. Election Law Section 5-208(3))
Notices of change of address from registered voters received by October 19th by a county board of elections must be processed and entered in the records in time for the General Election.

You can download a voter register form from the Board of Elections website. They're also available at post offices. And if you have a NYS DMV-issued ID, you can register to vote or update your info online.

Don't know whether you're registered to vote, or where your voting place is? You can check on the Board of Elections website.

Think you might need to vote via absentee ballot? Here's how to get an absentee ballot.

openAlbany

A screengrab from a crime map at openAlbany.

The city of Albany unveiled a new website today -- called openAlbany -- for sharing municipality data with the public -- stuff like crime reports, parking tickets, and city employee salaries.

Said mayor Kathy Sheehan today at a press conference about the reasons for putting together the site: "The first is that we spend a great deal of time responding to information and FOIA requests, so now we can just steer the community to Open Albany and it will be there. Also we know there are a lot of people -- who are a lot more tech savvy than me -- that know how to use this date to make maps and organize it in a way that will be helpful."

We've been banging the drum (softly) for something like this for years. And we gotta say, after poking around openAlbany today, it appears to be an encouraging start.

A few that caught our eye on the first pass...

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How would you rate this traffic ticket?

Starting this week the Albany Police Department is participating in a national study that includes what's sort of like a customer satisfaction survey distributed to people who come into contact with the police department. We get the feeling it's kind like those "rate this experience" surveys that show up on receipts at retail stores and restaurants.

From an APD press release:

As police reports are filed, a letter will be sent to community members asking them to take a survey. The survey is available in Spanish and English and can be taken either online, or by telephone. The online survey can be accessed through a computer or by scanning a QR code with a smart phone or tablet device. The letters will include a special code needed to participate in the survey and ensure that only one survey is completed for each encounter. No one asked to participate in the survey should be concerned that the information could be used in other ways. None of the information will be collected by the Albany Police Department since all survey responses will be managed by the [University of Illinois at Chicago] researchers. The results provided to the agency will not include any information identifying the individual responding to the survey or the officer involved in the contact. Police encounters that involve traffic accidents and stops, as well as most non-violent crimes, will be part of the survey. However, encounters that result from domestic violence, sexual assault, or juveniles will not be surveyed.

As the blurb notes, the surveys are part of an ongoing research project called the National Police Research Platform, which is based on at University of Illinois at Chicago. The APD's participation is part of a second phase for these community surveys that includes police and sheriff's departments across the country.

So why do this?

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"Dear City of Albany..."

We were copied on this letter to the city of Albany from a 7-year-old girl who lives in uptown Albany. Here's the text (with a few copyedits):

Dear City of Albany
A water pipe was leaking so the construction men needed to dig a hole in our street and then they re-paved it but they left a pothole. Why it is a problem I was running on my street and it was really dark and I didn't see the pothole right in front of me so I ran right into it and my knee was bleeding and I can't do gymnastics or soccer because of it. I would like you to re-pave that pothole so that won't happen to me again or my brother or if my new neighbors have kids it won't happen to them. Thank you, Amy [last name]

Wait until this kid starts using that SeeClickFix app. Or shows up during the public comment period at a Common Council meeting.

A full image of the letter is after the jump.

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Checking out the Troy crime map

A screengrab from this afternoon.

The Troy Police Department unveiled a new online crime map for the public today. From the press release:

With the exception of crimes related to domestic incidents and sexual assaults, all reported crime in our city will be mapped with a built in 72 hour posting delay. The delay is designed to give Investigators a "first look" at an incident and apply any limitations they see fit specifically relevant to their investigation. Once mapped, the information remains embedded in the mapping, subject to numerous choices the user can make; eg. date range, type of crime, etc. Previously noted exceptions to the mapping will always be subject to inclusion should a public safety need to post the incident be evident.

This is a good step, as we've said a bunch of times before, it'd be great to see other local municipalities head in this direction.

A few more quick thoughts:

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NYS Neighborhood Revitalization Conference in Troy

This Saturday at Russell Sage College: The second annual New York State Neighborhood Revitalization Conference. Event blurbage:

The purpose of our conference is to bring together neighborhood activists, educators, business people, and elected officials to share successes and develop strategies to maintain healthy and vibrant neighborhoods throughout Upstate New York. As residents and businesspeople, we believe that the strength of our past and our diversity in people, cultures, and businesses, will enable us to make our neighborhoods destinations to live, work, and visit.

Scanning through the list of conference workshops, it looks like there are a bunch of interesting people who are doing interesting things. Among the presenters: Abby Lublin from Troy Compost, Laban Coblentz from Tech Valley Center of Gravity, and Anasha Cummings from Project Nexus.

The conference starts at 8 am Saturday (September 21) and wraps up around 5 pm. Registration is $25 / $10 for students.

Report: New York "the least free" state. Again.

New York once again ranked as the least "free" state in the nation, in the Mercatus Center's new "Freedom in the 50 States" report (Mercatus is a "market-oriented" think tank at George Mason University). The Empire State was last in 2011. And 2007. And 2001.

New York is "by far the least free state in the Union," according to the report. The state gets dinged for, well, pretty much everything: taxes, spending, regulation. Among the rare positives identified by the report: "better than average" marijuana laws, low alcohol taxes, and eventually same-sex marriage (the report only covers policy to the end of 2010).

Oh, and NYS ranks #32 in the "bachelor party" category, which "combines a variety of laws including those on alcohol, marijuana, prostitution, and fireworks" (sadly, there's no indication the category covers laws regarding coke-snorting donkeys).

Freedom is, to some degree, in the eye of beholder. And here is how the Mercatus Center beholds it. Slate's Matthew Yglesias offers a rather different view, arguing that the concept of freedom needs to be salvaged "from the wreckage of Mercatus."

The top five states for freedom, according to Mercatus, are (from the top): North Dakota, South Dakota, Tennessee, New Hampshire, and Oklahoma. The least free (descending): Rhode Island, Hawaii, New Jersey, California, New York.

map: Mercatus Center

Checking out open.ny.gov

The Cuomo admin today announced the launch of open.ny.gov -- a sort of one-stop, online shop for public data in the state. Blurbage:

"Open data" refers to data that is free from restrictions and can be released in a format that can be retrieved, downloaded, indexed, and searched by commonly used web search applications. Open.ny.gov provides unprecedented "open data" access and transparency to the wealth of information collected and maintained by our state and local governments. It allows researchers, citizens, business, and the tech community direct, centralized access to high-value government data to search, explore, download, and share.

Among the first of a small group of local municipalities to participate (at least in a limited way): the city of Albany.

We have to admit that when we saw the press release, we didn't have high hopes. You know, it sounded good -- but stuff like this often falls flat.

But after checking it out this afternoon, there might be something to this...

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Many chances to see candidates for state Assembly and Senate, Albany County DA

A lot of Capital Region politicians are currently missing their hats because they've thrown them in to some ring or the other. That's what happens when a lot of incumbents decide not to run. The result: some very long slates for offices.

Something that might help you narrow the field: seeing the candidate for a race in person in one place. There are a bunch of chances this week (listed post jump). Bring a scorecard.

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You can register to vote online now

The Cuomo admin announced this week that the state DMV now offers online voter registration. And if you're already registered, you can also now update your voting address or party affiliation online, too.

The online registration is via the DMV's "MyDMV" service, which itself requires registration. Here's an FAQ about how it works.

From the Cuomo admin press release (link added):

The DMV processes roughly 300,000 motor voter applications a year. This is currently a cumbersome and time-consuming manual process, where drivers fill out paper forms at one of 129 DMV branches, which then have to be sorted and mailed by hand to one of the county boards of elections. This process is prone to human error, delays and, in some cases, to applications not getting processed.

It says New York State ranks 47th in the nation in voter registration -- less than 64 percent of eligible residents are registered to vote.

Earlier on AOA: New York State ranked last in voter turnout (2010)

Serving on a grand jury

One day a week here for eight weeks. It's better than being on trial.

Earlier this year I served on an Albany County grand jury. I had been dreading the experience -- one day a week for eight weeks was going to be a huge pain because of the work disruption. After it was over, though, I was glad to have served. In fact, I think everyone should serve on a jury at least once. It will make you see the world a bit differently.

You might have seen Kristi's post about serving on a grand jury. I can't say my experience was as dramatic -- no annoying fellow jurors, no exploding assistant district attorneys -- but it did leave an impression.

Here are a handful of things have stuck with me from the experience...

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New Congressional districts for the Capital Region

Here's the map of new Congressional districts for New York State approved by a panel of federal judges (large format). The state is down two districts, from 29 to 27, after the most recent census.

Under the new lines, the Capital Region is now spread over three districts: NY 19 (currently Chris Gibson), NY 20 (currently Paul Tonko), and NY 21 (currently Bill Owens). There's some significant reorganization, especially in the core of the area -- the cities of Albany, Saratoga Springs, Schenectady, and Troy are now in the same district (they had been split between districts represented by Tonko and Gibson).

The New York Times has posted a very good interactive map comparing the new and old districts.

All the new maps from the federal judges are embedded after the jump.

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New York State scores a "D"

A project called the "State Integrity Investigation" has released report cards for each state's "corruption risk." And, surprise (not really), New York State scored poorly.

New York State's score -- 65%, a D -- ranked #36. The state had low scores in categories such as public access to info, state pension fund management, budget processes, and redistricting.

The project is a collaboration between The Center for Public Integrity, Global Integrity, and Public Radio International. The scores were determined by journalists in each state based on a set of 330 question (apparently not among the questions: "Are bills passed by sleep-deprived legislators in the middle of the night?). In New York, the journalist was the Gotham Gazette's David King.

New Jersey was the top-ranked state (87%, B+), Georgia was the lowest (49%, F).

image: State Integrity Investigation

Lessons from Marcia

I love people-watching. Some days it's the only reason this introvert can tolerate being anywhere near other people. Human behavior is an endless source of mystery and entertainment to me, and because we tend to be creatures of habit, complete strangers can feel just as familiar as the places we frequent.

For me, one of those people was Marcia Pascarella.

AOA readers may remember Marcia as the inspiration for my "Stop whining and do something about it" Soapbox last March. Marcia was my favorite person to see approaching the podium at Troy City Council meetings. She never held back, always spoke her mind, and possessed the type of humor and natural comedic timing that usually left you wondering whether or not she actually meant to be funny. I think she did. Marcia was not known for political correctness. Sometimes she even swore at these meetings -- which are currently held IN A CHURCH. Oh, Marcia.

I learned of Marcia's passing from Jim Franco, who wrote that he'd heard that "God had taken His own name in vain" upon Marcia's arrival at the Pearly Gates.

I don't doubt this report one bit; heaven better be everything she expects it to be!

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