Group opposes ban on memorializing resolutions
A Kingston-based activist group has issued a call to action over a proposal to ban the Ulster County Legislature from considering memorializing resolutions.
Kingstoncitizens. org is urging county residents to contact their elected officials about the proposal, which would prohibit the Legislature from considering any measure over which the county Legislature doesn’t have authority.
“This is an opportunity for us to share with the public why we think memorializing resolutions are important to governance,” said the group’s founder, Rebecca Martin.
“To me, personally, taking away a tool for discussion and debate is a dangerous proposition,” Martin said. “I think we need to have as many tools as we can to engage the public and engage elected officials.
Martin, whose group made a name for itself opposing the proposed Niagara Bottling plant in the town of Ulster, called memorializing resolutions a “helpful tool” that allows the public and elected officials to bring up an issue for discussion and debate that is outside the normal policy making role of the Legislature.
At the Legislature’s February meeting, dozens of residents called on legislators to reject the proposal, saying memorializing resolutions are “the voice of the people.”
But Legislator Richard Parte, who proposed the ban, called such resolutions a “distraction” and said they take away from the time legislators spend on issues of county import.
Parete, a Stone Ridge Democrat who caucuses with the Republicans, wants to change the Legislature’s rules to ban the introduction of memorializing resolutions.
A memorializing resolution often calls on another body — generally the state or the federal government — to take a particular action, or it puts the county Legislature on the record on a particular issue.
In 2016, some of memorializing resolutions adopted by the Legislature opposed the Trans-Pacific Partnership trade deal, supported state legislation that called for the immediate suspension of Common Core, opposed the relicensing of the Indian Point nuclear power plant and supported state legislation known as “the gender expression non-discrimination act.”
Because the proposed ban would change the rules under which the Legislature operates, it must be considered at two separate meetings before it can be voted on.
It originally was to be on the Legislature’s February agenda, but Parete pulled it, he said, because several lawmakers who supported the ban were absent.
Legislators are expected to vote on a “first reading” of the measure at the body’s March 14 meeting. If that passes, the Legislature will vote on the ban in April.