Council majority leader open to municipal ID cards
KINGSTON, N.Y. » The majority leader of the Common Council says he’s open to the idea of establishing a municipal ID card program for Kingston residents who are unable to get traditional forms of identification.
Alderman Rennie Scott-Childress said the program would be beneficial for the entire Kingston community.
“This could be a source of pride for everyone,” Scott-Childress, D-Ward 3, said in a recent interview. “[It could] create a better sense of community.” He said businesses could benefit by offering discounts to people who show ID cards.
“The main focus of [those calling for the ID program] may be undocumented resi-
dents, but that doesn’t have to be our main focus,” the alderman said.
Scott-Childress was referring to the group Nobody Leaves Mid-Hudson, which has called for legislation to create a municipal ID program in Kingston. The group was successful in its recent effort to get the city of Poughkeepsie to create an ID program, just the second in the state. The other is New York City.
Kingston Mayor Steve Noble, A Democrat who would have to sign the ID legislation if it’s approved by the council, has said he supports the effort.
Jonathan Bix, executive director of Nobody Leaves Mid-Hudson, said previously that “Kingston has the chance to be part of [and take leadership in] a Hudson Valley-wide effort, the likes of which hasn’t been done anywhere else in the country; to have several different municipalities in a local region formally recognize each other’s municipal IDs.”
Nobody Leaves Mid-Hudson also is involved in the effort to expand driver’s license access to undocumented New Yorkers.
“We have hundreds of undocumented members across Ulster, Orange and Dutchess [counties] — including in Kingston — who struggle everyday with critical tasks those of us with government-issued ID may take for granted, such as picking their children up from school, filling prescriptions, seeing a doctor, opening bank accounts, using the library and interacting with the police,” Bix has said.
“We’re committed to being part of the broader movement to free all people from all forms of injustice, and these IDs are part of that,” Bix said. “That these IDs empower not just
Latino immigrants but also black immigrants, transgender people, the homeless, youth, the elderly, parents and working-class people of color in particular as a category that cuts across all these other ones — that’s part of why we’re pushing for these.”