ERIE COUNTY LEGISLATURE
Downsizing hearing appears to favor 13 legislators
About 15 members of the public attended a hearing Wednesday on the proposed downsizing of the Erie County Legislature to 13 members from its current 15.
While a majority of those who spoke seemed to favor reducing the size of the Legislature to 13—some reluctantly— there was no great clamoring to cut the Legislature further, with the exception of a couple of Legislators who also spoke at the hearing held in County Legislature Chambers.
Legislator Edward Rath, RAmherst, said there was an overwhelming call from residents in his district for a significant reduction in the size of the Legislature. However, none of them appeared to be present at Wednesday’s hearing.
Instead, residents like Mary Wydysh of Kenmore and Diane Pavlik of Blasdell, who did show up, stated their support for a Legislature with only two fewer members.
“I feel that any further reduction would impede the business of the Legislature and have a negative impact on the residents of Erie County,” said Pavlik.
Wydysh who, like Pavlik, also supports increasing the term of office for legislators to four years from the current two, expressed concerns that reducing the Legislature to 13 would jeopardize representation of both urban and rural districts in the Legislature.
L. Nathan Hare, president of the Community Action Organization of Erie County, and Frank Mesiah, president of the Buffalo branch of NAACP, both embellished on those fears as it concerned African-American and Latino constituents in the county, who overwhelming reside in the City of Buffalo.
“It would be an extremely difficult leap of faith for City of Buffalo residents to believe that creating fewer districts with even higher percentages of non-city Buffalo residents would be of any help to the City of Buffalo at all,” said Hare.
Mesiah added: “The only thing I have heard relative to Erie County Legislature reduction has been from one number to another number. I have heard nothing about how a controlling majority of white legislators will, with reduction, now have control over the African- American and Latino communities.”
Michael Pliszka, a member of the 21st Century Commission that was charged with recommending reforms to county government, said he initially recommended a reduction to 13 legislators, though the commission eventually agreed to recommend a reduction to 11 members.
After the hearing, Legislature Majority Leader Maria Whyte said she thought it would have been inappropriate to seek to reduce the Legislature by a greater number than two without having first received relevant data from the U. S. Census Bureau.
While Legislator Timothy Kennedy, D-Buffalo, expressed his support during Wednesday’s hear for following the commission’s recommendation, Whyte said she did not see the rationale, without accompanying data, for supposing that the number 11 was just as arbitrary as 13.
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