HomeMy WebLinkAbout10-07-2011 - Redistricting Committee Minutes e Oct. 7, 2011
Ward IV Dem. committee. 7 p. .m. Monday. Oct. 10. 414 E. Buffalo
Invited: County Comm. members Jane Marcham, John Marcham, Tony
Montgomery, Svante Myrick, Paul Nino & Nate Shinegawa. Adjunct
members Graham Kerslick, Eddie Rooker, Carolyn Peterson, Nancy
Schuler, Jennifer Lynn Wilkins. I have yet to get agreement
from Peterson, Rooker, or Wilkins whether they want to serve.
I will hand-deliver this to all but Montgomery, try mail
for him and phone.
I include minutes of the Oct. 4 meeting, to which I add:
The committee considered concerns about any redistricting
that sought wards made up heavily of Cornell undergraduates.
Whether they could stir interest. We proposed a meeting of at
least County Dem. chair Irene Stein, Montgomery who heads the
Cornell Dems, Myrick, Kerslick, Wilkins, and John Marcham to
discuss how to continue student involvement without short-
changing long-term residents in student-dominated wards and to
improve the contributions of students elected to Common Council.
Note that Marcham's suggestion to the county redistricting
committee has been modified in the face of concerns expressed.
The change: if the city has four county legislative districts,
with two city wards in each, and two student wards emerged, they
not be in the same county district.
His/my statement to the county and city redistricting
committees is enclosed, along with a note to this effect.
Agenda: 1. Introductions
2. Review of Stage II plan for this meeting, including the
fact the committee agreed to approach Ms. Wilkins about being
ward chair after I step down before the next county Dem.
committee meeting in late January or early February of 2012.
I have broached the idea with her and she didn't say yes or
no; awaiting this meeting and how we consider our near future.
3. Plan October drive to canvass ward to register new
voters, encourage votes for Myrick and Kerslick, get feedback.
District leaders: Montgomery, 1; Nino, 2; Kerlick, 3.
4. Pay dues, $5 for 112.
5. Elect secretary and treasurer.
Call me with any suggestions or questions. --John
Marcham at a hearing on redistricting 9/27/11, before the
county redistricting committee, with the city redistricting
committee present. This copy changes my recommendation to a 14-
seat county board, with four county districts solely within the
city. Guive Dan Cogan credit for pointing out errors in my
original math that led me to favor 13 sets for the county.
I speak for myself; my background is listed at the end.
With the latest census figures out in March, I urged the
county and city redistricting committees to consider four
proposals, and a fifth of primary interest to the city:
Proposal 1: Reduce the number of city wards to four,
because the city now has 30% of the county's population, and
Proposal 2: The county consider having a smaller board, say
14, and
Proposal 3: Save the city and others money; I'll explain
below.
My assumption is based on the city's 30% of county
population earning it 4. 14 members on a 14-seat board (below) .
Both the city and county face very small federal law and
court allowances for deviations in the sizes of city wards and
county districts. An average of 14 county districts would
contain 7,254.5 residents, the average of 4 city district would
have 7,503.5 residents, for a deviation of 3.4 per cent, well
within the 10% deviation allowed by the courts.
Proposal 4: The 14-seat, 4 city-seat plan has the added
value of allowing each county districts in the city to contain
two city wards, allowing for an 8-member Common Council.
The eight city wards would then enable the city to split
the two current large wards that embrace West and South Hill,
and Fall Creek and Cornell Heights into more neighborly wards.
By tradition and for practicality, previous county
redistricting awaited a city recommendation for its districts
and started from that decision. I believe a consensus exists in
the city for county districts in the city.
Proposal 5 is primarily for the city committee, that two of
the resulting wards contain as. many Cornell students as
possible.
The reason: For the past decade-plus we in Ward IV have
often been represented on City Council by undergraduates,
promoted by the Cornell Campus Democrats and nominated by
student-leaning Democratic ward committees.
Their efforts to represent students meant the elected
student Council members paid little or no attention to the
interests of long-term residents in matters of noise, parking,
garbage, partying, noise, trash, and urinating into shrubbery;
pushed a plan many of us considered to be overdevelopment of
Collegetown. In fact undergraduate student interests usually
conflict directly with those of permanent residents.
In the short stay on Common Council students, with several
exceptions, failed to give the ward muscle on the boards that
deal with city and county business. For two effects alone, look
at our broken streets and sidewalks and the variances that have
shredded zoning and led to two very bad developments on East
Hill.
Ithaca College students who live on South Hill are spread
among long-term residents and have shown little interest in city
government.
College students bring the city a lot of census population
and and the state and federal aid that follows. They deserve to
be represented. Some plans I've heard promoted try to
gerrymander them among all wards to blunt their influence.
Material forwarded to the city and county redistricting
committees and omitted from my opening remarks:
The county may prefer an odd number of districts to avoid a
lot of tie votes (With 16 members on the County Board in 170 &
171, we split 8-8 between Democrats and Republicans, and took
100+ votes to elect a chairman in each of the first two years
under the new charter in the 1960s. ) Such division appears less
likely now that one party dominates 10-5.
Holding Legislature districts entirely within the city has
another advantage. Because the Town of Ithaca does not elect
its town board by districts, proposals to spill town districts
into the city is unneeded, which plan would require the expense
of additional polling places and added machines and sets of poll
workers for county-district elections.
In the city, at-large Common Council districts proposed by some
people would favor elite hill neighborhoods, whose long-term
residents are better known and would tend to favor elite
neighborhoods over renters and students. (Pie-shaped wards
minimize both. )
Marcham served on the county legislature 9 2/3 years between
1967 and 1980; on 4 redistricting committees; and is current
chair of the ward IV Democratic Committee, responsible for
recruiting, vetting, and electing candidates for elected office;
and promoting the ward's interests.
$ Statement to Common Council Oct. 5/11 JM as an individual
I'm worried that we are within weeks of giving up the protection
this city provides every homeowner who enjoys living in our
small city. I speak of the attack on zoning, represented by the
slide of every entity in City Hall to permit a five story
building to be built on the Challenge property at the foot of
State St.
Zoning is what protects those of us who live close
together in Ithaca, near shopping and commerce for many
reasons--jobs, convenience, infirmity, as investment in
affordable homes for now and later--for the general quality of
our lives.
We invest, often heavily, in older (and new) homes that are
protected by city zoning laws. These laws control the use of
our properties and those of our neighbors, subject only to rare
variances. Yet in the past year our city machinery has allowed
many, serious variances, for the upper East State St.
destruction of homes to be replaced by big ugly structures that
required important variances. And now are on the brink of
allowing many more, major variances for the five-stories of
apartments that are to shoot up in front of homes on East Seneca
St.
Rey offices and boards, the mayor and attorney, and Common
Council acquiesced. I don't know what can be done at this
point.
I do know one invested neighbor on Seneca St. whose
retirement home has a view over the city will instead face a 5-
story wall on the Challenge site instead of her view unless you
act. I know a longtime community political and civic worker
whose fine home faces the upper East State St. wasteland. I
understand both are seriously consider selling and leaving
Ithaca.
This is not "Smart Growth, " which many planners seem to
support in the abstract. The destruction up East State is
already done and irrevocable. But I plead with you to
reconsider the series of Challenge decisions immediately.
The precedents set by the Challenge variances on top of
the upper East State ST. ones will be used forever to finish off
the shredding of our zoning protections.
Statement to Common Council Oct. 5/11 JM as an individual
You would have had a court determination on this case if
the Building Office had not misinformed the nearest East Seneca
St. neighbor as to when she could file a legal, Section 8
appeal.
This is the city of my birth; my wife and I have lived in
our present East Hill house for 46 years, in the city for 52, I
for 60.
People who haven't chosen to, or haven't had to, live in a
small city have plenty of land and their own forms of municipal
control to protect themselves from tall, ugly, and intruding
structures.
Some good friends taunt by asking if we'd prefer a gas
station on the Tuning Fork. I can say yes, particularly as it
could be lit better than the proposed garish, overblown 5
stories of offices and high-priced apartments. It would also be
safer for traffic, allow Challenge Industries to sell, and in
the process retrieve our system of zoning that should protect
all our homes and neighborhoods.
One of the best mayors this city has known ran a gas
station across East State St. from the Challenge site, and I
dare say the proposed Challenge high-rise will not produce the
likes of him.
John Marcham
2
p Oct. 4, 2011
10/3/11 Ward IV Democratic Committee meeting
Present: Tony Montgomery, Svante Myrick, Paul Nino, Jane
Marcham, John Marcham; Nate by cellphone to Myrick at 414 E.
Buffalo St. , 7 pm.
Chair John Marcham said that since spring 110 the committee
helped state & national slate; found 2 good Council candidates;
chose Graham Rerslick; Myrick won the Dem. race for mayor; both
are working hard; we didn't turn out voters in the ' ll primary.
We agreed on rules for the meeting.
STAGE I: Reelected John Marcham chair, understanding he plans
to resign in early 2012 before county Dem. committee meets.
The committee agreed on a potential successor (permanent
resident) and reappointment of Nancy Schuler and Eddie Rooker as
adjunct members; Rerslick; and Mayor Peterson if they agree. He
will approach them.
He will use mail to notify members until someone with email
can take over from Myrick in notification role.
Set Oct. 10, 7 p.m. for neat meeting (Stage II) .
STAGE II: with all adjunct & county committee members invited.
Discuss what we did Oct. 3 and see if we can pick an
interim chair, any other officers we may need or want.
Select district leaders for October ' ll to get out the vote
and register new voters/Dems. Consider Nino for Dist. 2,
Montgomery for Dist. 1, for Dist. 3 (Rerslick?) .
STAGE III: Before election (Oct. 24?) Plan runup to election
and election day and night jobs: poll watchers, phoners, etc.
STAGE IV: Before late Jan. 112. Review progress; select
permanent chair and replacement for John Marcham on county Dem.
committee in preparation for first DCC meeting, and treasurer +
secretary and emailer, if needed. Pay $5 dues for ward
committee expenses.
STAGE V if needed: Meet to confirm votes of Stage IV.
Adjourn, 8 pm John Marcham