A Report of Citizens Union of the City of New York CIRCUMVENTING DEMOCRACY: The Flawed System for Filling Vacancies for Elected Office in New York 2011 Update 2= Research and Policy Analysis by Citizens Union Foundation Written and Published by Citizens Union JUNE 2011 Citizens Union of the City of New York 299 Broadway, Suite 700 New York, NY 10007-1976 phone 212-227-0342 • fax 212-227-0345 •
[email protected] • www.citizensunion.org www.gothamgazette.com Peter J.W. Sherwin, Chair • Dick Dadey, Executive Director Citizens Union Report – Circumventing Democracy: the Flawed Process for Filling Vacancies June 2011 ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS & METHODOLOGY Data was compiled and research prepared for this Citizens Union report with resources and support provided by Citizens Union Foundation. It was written by Rachael Fauss, Citizens Union’s Policy and Research Manager. It was reviewed and edited by Citizens Union staff Alex Camarda, Director of Public Policy and Advocacy, Adelia Harrison, Executive Assistant, and Dick Dadey, Executive Director. This report builds on the original report first issued by Citizens Union in 2007, “Circumventing Democracy: the Flawed Process for Filling Vacancies for Elected Office in New York.”1 Like the first report, its research involved using biographies of legislators, analyzing board of elections results, contacting legislative staffs, researching press accounts and news archives, and consulting the New York Red Book to determine how legislators were first elected to office. 1 Citizens Union Foundation. “Circumventing