Politics on the Hudson

Congressman Charles Rangel’s birthday bash at Tavern on the Green in Manhattan on Aug. 11 features an interesting assortment of headliner guests: Gov. David Paterson and Richard Ravitch, a former transit authority chairman and Paterson’s pick for lieutenant governor. Other featured guests include New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg, his Democratic opponent and New York City Comptroller Bill Thompson, New York’s junior U.S. Sen. Kirsten Gillibrand and Assembly Speaker Sheldon Silver, D-Manhattan. Should be lively.

The top contribution to Rangel’s Victory Fund starts at $2,500.

State Assemblyman Greg Ball, R-Patterson, a challenger for the 19th District Congressional seat, has proclaimed that the $182,149 he raised between Feb. 1 and June 30 shows broad support.

But the figures vaunted by Ball don’t take into account the time it took him to raise the money compared with U.S. Rep. John Hall, D-Dover Plains, who raised $160,549 between April 1 and June 30, according to Federal Elections Commission finance reports.

With the election still more than 15 months away, Hall has $291,842 in cash on hand compared with Ball’s $100,402.

Neither candidate is doing all that well by national standards.

Nationwide, Democratic congressional candidates, have raised $93.8 million, or $382,750 on average, while Republicans have brought in $52 million, or $206,250 on average, according to the non-profit Center for Responsive Politics.

Ball hopes to narrow the gap with a “Rockin’ Rib Fest & Battle of the Bands” on July 25 at the 300-acre North Ridge Farm in Patterson. Entry is $10 a head or $75 for passes to the “VIP Congressional Tent.”

The event is sponsored by the National Rifle Association, according to Ball’s publicity. State Sen. Vincent Leibell, R-Patterson, Putnam County Sheriff Donald Smith and Westchester County Legislator George Oros, R-Cortlandt, are listed as “event chairs and honorary BBQ judges.”

More than 160,000 New Yorkers have lost manufacturing jobs since 2001.

Tomorrow U.S. Senator Kirsten Gillibrand, D-NY, will release a report detailing those job losses by region and explaining how she plans to create new well paid jobs.

Stay tuned …

The failure of the state Senate to reconvene could have particularly negative consequences for Putnam, Deputy County Executive John Tully said today.

While 36 counties and the City of New York await the extension of their current sales tax rates, Putnam is one of the few that must put together its 2010 budget by September.

Most others have November deadlines for their budgets, Tully said.

Other measures affecting counties that are caught in the state Senate leadership impasse, according to the New York State County Executives Association, include:

Pension reform
Industrial Development Agency reform to foster job creation and construction
Stimulus-related legislation to help the state leverage additional federal support
Legislation providing procurement flexibility for local governments

The New York State County Executives Association plans a telephone press conference tomorrow to urge state senators “to get back to the people’s work” and deal with “end of session priorities pending before the New York State Legislature.”

Those expected to participate include:

Andrew Spano, Westchester County Executive

Scott Vanderhoef, Rockland County Executive

and

Putnam’s Deputy County Executive John Tully

In the Hudson Valley, the cost of child care is increasing by $781 a year, according to a statewide report released today by U.S Sen. Kirsten Gillibrand, D-NY.

The average Hudson Valley family spends about $13,341 a year for an infant in child care, $11,261 for a toddler and $11,254 for a school-age child, she reported.

Gillibrand’s plan would:

• increase the Dependent and Child Care Tax Credit maximum deduction to $6,000
• make the child care credit fully refundable for some low-income families
• provide larger tax breaks to employers who provide child care at the workplace
• allow employers to deduct 20 percent of the costs for child care resources and referral services
• create a new tax credit of $2,000 a year for up to three years for any college graduate who specializes in child care and works at least 1,200 hours a year in a child care facility
• encourage employers to institute telecommuting
• provide part time students with access to the Child Care Tax Credit

As President Obama met at the White House today with his South Korean counterpart, Lee Myung-bak, Peekskill Democratic Committee Chairman Darren Rigger was just returning from a 10-day exchange visit to the Republic of Korea sponsored by the State Department.

Rigger was one of six young (under 40) political and policy leaders from across the U. S. selected “to study Korea’s political system, engage in dialogue on international issues, and forge professional relationships and friendships,” according to a press release from The American Council of Young Political Leaders, a not-for-profit based in Washington, D.C.

“We’re running really behind their great technology,” Rigger said of the 100 percent “wired cities” he visited during his trip.

“We’ve got to learn not to assume that the only way to do things is the way we do them,” said Rigger, a member of the Westchester County Democratic Committee and a political consultant for Democratic Congressmen Charles Rangel, D-Harlem, and John Hall, D-Dover Plains.

“The biggest thing that sets us back in the U.S. is that we ask ‘how much’ instead of ‘how do we fix it,’” he said.

Most of Westchester’s legislators want voters in the county to continue to use mechanical lever voting machines because, as they wrote in a letter to Gov. David Paterson, they are “reliable, user-friendly and cost-effective.”

While preferable to touch screens, optical scan voting have malfunctioned in many counties throughout the U.S. including in Florida, West Virginia, Michigan and Washington, D.C., says the letter signed by 16 of the 17 Westchester legislators.

“Replacing lever voting machines is very costly,” the letter continues. “It has proved to create voter confusion and may result in the use of machines that could compromise the integrity of future elections.”

In 2002, the federal government enacted the Help America Vote Act (HAVA), which required states to replace older and unreliable voting systems and to insure that voting is accessible to all voters, including those with disabilities.

While Westchester uses lever voting machines, it makes paper ballots available to those with disabilities. The ballots are counted with optical-scanning voting machines.

The State Board of Elections has approved a pilot program to introduce a paper ballot-optical-scan system for all voters in most of the state’s 62 counties. However, there are several holdouts: the five boroughs of New York City, and Nassau, Suffolk and Rockland counties.

Westchester County Legislators Chairman Bill Ryan, D-White Plains, said the board doesn’t oppose implementing a system that incorporates optical scanners if they are used in conjunction with lever voting machines.

Two out of every five military absentee ballots in New York State are not counted, Sen. Charles Schumer, D-NY, said today.

It takes up to 82 days for troops stationed overseas to go through the process of voting absentee in New York State – the ballot spends three days with the voter, 72 days in transit, and 7 days being processed by the state Board of Elections, Schumer said.

New York is one of only three states to require the entire absentee voting process to take place by mail. New York is also one of 16 states labeled by the Pew Center on the States as a “No Time to Vote” state, meaning New York does not mail absentee ballots in time for military personnel to vote before the deadline.

The data below, obtained from the state Board of Elections, shows the number of local military absentee voters and their lost votes in 2008.

Hudson Valley military voters requested 3,539 absentee ballots in 2008, but only 2,125 were returned and counted. The other 1,414 ballots or 40 percent were “lost.”

In Westchester County 1,083 military ballots were sent out but only 534 were received and counted in 2008.

In Putnam County 191 military ballots went out but only 96 were received and counted in 2008.

Rockland did better with 295 military ballots sent out and 226 counted in 2008.

Now an officially announced challenger for New York’s District 19 seat in Congress, state Assemblyman Greg Ball, R-Patterson, has unveiled a new website titled Ball for Congress.

The new site is a first step in clearing up the fundraising muddle Ball had when using the same site to raise money for his Assembly campaign and his proposed challenge to U.S. Rep. John Hall, D-Dover Plains.

However, a quick tour of the site shows Ball has yet to follow the letter of the law.

At the bottom of the section called “Calendar of Events” Ball solicits funds but never lists which entity is paying for it. The “paid for by” is required by law so that the money raised can be tracked to know where it’s going

Another filing deadline looms for Ball. Candidates for federal office must now file a personal financial disclosure by May 15.

Until this year, the requirement affected only elected officials. Now candidates for Congress must also comply under the new open government reforms.