[EL] HELP NEEDED: Local Clean Election Law for NY

Mon Aug 26 07:16:34 PDT 2019

Mike,

Greetings! You have stumbled onto a listserv where a small but occasionally
effective (and, this morning, feisty) minority believes *Citizens United*
was properly decided and that the First Amendment is not a balancing test,
particularly at the hands of, well, anyone who would like it to be.

Your candor is welcome, but if mimicked by those voting on such an
ordinance it would tee off viewpoint discrimination or content-based
arguments if one were to challenge the ordinance in question on free speech
grounds.

I suspect there’s a lot of candor like this amongst legislators at all
levels when crafting what end up as facially neutral laws. But, still
lacking that giant dark money check from [insert dropdown menu of big money
boogeypersons here], adventures in FOIA on my part will have to wait.

All the best,

Steve

On Mon, Aug 26, 2019 at 9:51 AM Mike Ewall <mike at energyjustice.net> wrote:

>
> Friends:
>
> This isn't an issue of siding with "some interest" over "other
> interests," but one of having a neutral law that makes it harder for
> special interests (private, corporate, moneyed interests) from
> dominating an election, so that other candidates who operate more in
> the public interest aren't drowned out by money buying the election.
>
> Any model local laws anyone can share would be most appreciated.
>
> Thanks!
> Mike
>
>
> At 09:22 AM 8/26/2019, Sean Parnell wrote:
> >So, to clarify - you are seeking the proper language for an ordinance that
> >will fund a campaign to make it more likely that the candidates supported
> by
> >some interests win and the candidates supported by other interests lose?
> >
> >That seems... problematic.
> >
> >Sean Parnell
> >
> >-----Original Message-----
> >From: Law-election <law-election-bounces at department-lists.uci.edu> On
> Behalf
> >Of Mike Ewall
> >Sent: Friday, August 23, 2019 3:27 PM
> >To: Election Law Listserv <law-election at uci.edu>
> >Subject: [EL] HELP NEEDED: Local Clean Election Law for NY
> >
> >
> >Hi all,
> >
> >Is there anyone on this list who could help me design a local Clean
> >Elections Law for a Town in the state of New York? The objective is to
> make
> >it harder for a corporate polluter to take over the town in the election
> >this November. We'd have a majority willing to pass the law soon if we can
> >get it crafted.
> >
> >Here's a little background on the situation.
> >
> >First, I'm new to this list, having just learned about it from Richard
> >Winger. I'm the Executive Director of a national environmental justice
> group
> >called Energy Justice Network. We help communities stop dirty energy and
> >waste industries, among other things.
> >
> >In the past two years, I've been working with residents to stop plans by
> the
> >world's largest cement corporation (LafargeHolcim) to burn trash from
> 50-70
> >Connecticut towns in the huge cement kiln next to a high school in the
> Town
> >of Coeymans, New York (Albany County). We got that stopped in late 2017,
> but
> >then the company doubled down on wanting to burn tires there, which we
> >stopped when the Town hired me to draft a Clean Air Law, which was passed
> in
> >late March 2019. It was passed in a 3-2 vote of the Town Board. It happens
> >that the three YES votes are Democrats who are all up for election this
> >year. The others are both Republicans who almost voted the right way, but
> >did not. The company's stooges are trying to take over the town in this
> >year's election, and they only need to win one seat to overturn our Clean
> >Air Law. The sitting Dems seem willing to pass a Clean Elections Law if we
> >can draft one for them quickly.
> >
> >My thoughts on this so far are that we'd need something that fits the
> >situation and isn't likely to get caught up in lengthy legal challenges.
> It
> >has to be something that a local government in NY can pass. We should also
> >recognize that the Town probably doesn't have a lot of money to be putting
> >into publicly financing the election in any way. While I'm pretty familiar
> >with an array of needed election reforms at various levels of government,
> >the only one that seems particularly relevant to this situation right now
> >would be something where the Town would make very public the campaign
> >contribution data that is already having to be reported to the
> state/county
> >government.
> >This might mean paying for a mailing to all voters, having something in
> the
> >local paper, and/or having prominent signs outside of polling locations
> >stating who received what money from which interests.
> >
> >I'm open to other suggestions, and could use help in drafting any of this,
> >since I haven't written these sorts of laws before.
> >
> >Please feel free to call or email me to discuss.
> >
> >Best,
> >
> >Mike Ewall, Esq.
> >Executive Director
> >Energy Justice Network
> >215-436-9511
> >mike at energyjustice.net
> >http://www.energyjustice.net
> >
> >
> >---
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> >
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>
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-- 
Steve Klein
Attorney
https://www.linkedin.com/in/stephenrklein
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