Let's change the law to build more homes and strengthen NYC's elections
My testimony to NYC’s Charter Revision Commission
In brief: NYC is considering big reforms to the city’s laws that could speed up housing construction and boost voter turnout. I testified at a recent government hearing urging the city to adopt structural changes to reduce housing costs and merge local elections into a single ranked-choice general election in even years. Video and transcript below.
New York’s Charter Revision Commission is a powerful entity that can propose changes to the structure and distribution of powers within the city’s government. The current incarnation of the Commission, appointed by the mayor in late 2024, is considering a slate of changes that will likely appear on New Yorkers’ ballots alongside the November 2025 general election.
This is a huge opportunity to reshape New York for the better. Seizing this chance to improve our city, I testified at last week’s Charter Revision Commission hearing, urging the commissioners to adopt common-sense charter amendments that will help make housing cheaper and strengthen our democracy.
Two headline ideas I pushed for are:
Making housing cheaper by streamlining housing approvals to cut time and cost from building homes. I suggested allowing staff at the Department of City Planning to sign-off on small housing projects, creating an expedited review path for housing projects that modestly change the size of what’s already built, and consolidating duplicative stages of the review process.
Strengthening our democracy by rescheduling city elections to the even-numbered years (aligning state and federal elections) and having a single ranked-choice general election that’s open to all candidates (rather than having separate party primary elections).
These may feel wonky, but how we decide what can be built and the way choose our leaders has a big impact on whether New York's future will be livable, affordable, and thriving — or not.
Here’s the video of my testimony (transcript below):
Hi, my name is Sebastian Hallum Clarke, and I live on the Upper East Side. I’m a member of a Manhattan community board, speaking tonight on my own behalf and not as a representative of the board.
Tonight I want to speak about housing and democracy, building on the proposals you’ve been discussing.
Housing
We need streamlined ULURP reviews, to build more homes, and make housing cheaper.
So, streamlined reviews: Currently, many housing developments get separately reviewed by a community board, a borough president, the planning commission, the city council, and the mayor. This is super slow and expensive. Every day we can shave off these reviews is a day closer we can be to solving our housing emergency.
To build more homes, we need to fast-track as many housing projects as we can, create one-stop zoning-administrator reviews, and compress the ULURP review process as much as possible. I say we combine the Community Board and Borough President review stages, and give more weight to citywide or boroughwide elected officials over the views of individual city council members.
Let’s streamline reviews, to build more homes, and make housing cheaper.
Elections
We all want a robust democratic process, where every New Yorker’s voice can be heard.
The problem is that the high frequency of elections leads to voter fatigue and low turnout. I counted, and New Yorkers have been summoned to the polls ten times in the past four years. It’s too much.
To fix this, we should move our municipal elections to even years and replace party primaries with a single, open, ranked-choice general election. Then, with one consequential trip to the polls every four years, every New Yorker can have their say about who runs our city.
With this Charter Revision, let’s streamline our elections and make every vote count.
And on housing, let’s streamline the process to build more homes and make housing cheaper.
Thank you.
The Charter Revision Commission will continue to consult with experts and receive public testimony through at least mid-July. They’ll then decide on specific reforms to put to voters alongside the next election.