NYC Legislative Brief #0
Introducing the legislative brief // a regular overview of developments in NYC law // how does lawmaking work?
This post will be updated regularly as people ask more questions about the legislative process and NYC government/politics. You can jump to legislative brief #1 here.
CONTENTS:
What is this?
What is it for (goals)?
Who is it for?
Legislative technical overview
What is this?
The Maximum New York Legislative brief summarizes developments in New York City law, and comes out several times a month. You can keep track of what’s going on in the city all in one place, and ask whatever else you want to know via comment/email/Twitter DM/etc.
When there aren’t new developments in law to report, you can expect these kinds of posts:
Explainers: legislative process, law, history, other parts of the government like the mayor, the administrative agencies (think Dept. of Sanitation, etc), and more.
Legislator profiles
Rules adopted (rules are laws that city admin agencies adopt)
Other actions items from the City Council (land use call-ups, land use applications, state legislation resolutions (SLRs), and more)
State legislation impacting the city (I’ll focus on this more as demand dictates)
What is this for (goals)?
The legislative brief provides a skimmable overview of developments in city law, and provides jumping off points for you to go further as your interest dictates.
Ask yourself: do you know what your government is doing? Do you have a grip on what laws they make? Do you even know how many laws they make, and on what schedule?
If you’re most people, it’s “no” across the board.
I’ll give you this basic context, which is a key prerequisite to engaging with politics in a pleasant way; you can be pulled in by natural interest based on which legislation you see, not moral hectoring by people who you hope know what they’re talking about (just give them $5 more, just hold up one more protest sign, just…).
But the brief is a starting point, not an end. The City Council does not make inherent sense when you’re first approaching it—more context is required.
❓And so: I want you to ask questions.❓The point of this brief is that I will be responsive in the comments and via email, and include Q&A in future briefs.
Unless you’ve taken The Foundations of New York or otherwise bootstrapped your own understanding of NYC government and law, most of the legislative process will be a morass, misery, and mystery. Ask about what you want to know! This brief is meant to bring out those questions. I promise, everyone else has them too. Relatively no one knows how the government works, and this needs to change.
If you read this brief regularly, you’ll also develop an intuition for what kinds of laws are being considered, their magnitude, their focus, their nature, and which members of the Council do what. As present, most citizens have no idea what goes on in their city’s legal realm.
Who is it for?
The legislative brief is for abundance-minded New Yorkers who want to know what’s going on. Before you ask how to change the system, you need to know what it is! It is probably both worse and far better than you think.
More generally, the brief is for citizens who understand that self-governing societies only work if we actually self-govern—that means you. It is imperative that more of us apprehend our government.
Legislative technical overview
Here are some key terms and points of information to know when reading this brief going forward.
Stated meetings: The whole City Council meets at least twice a month to principally (1) introduce new legislation and (2) vote on legislation to pass to the mayor for potential enactment. These are called stated meetings.1 This means big legislative updates from the Council only come about every two weeks, rather than on a constantly rolling basis (good news!).
New bills immediately get referred to a relevant committee and start their journey to become a law; most will not make it.
Most bills that are approved by the Council will be enacted into law.
How a bill becomes a law (usually):
It is introduced into the City Council at a stated meeting. Most bills are introduced by City Council Members, but the 5 Borough Presidents and the Public Advocate can also introduce bills.
It is referred to its subject-matter-relevant committee(s). For example, a bike lane bill would go to the Committee on Transportation and Infrastructure.
The committee (might) hold a hearing for the bill, where it will be discussed and potentially amended. Maybe there will be more hearings.
The committee will next vote on whether to send the bill to the full Council for consideration.
If a majority of the committee votes in favor of the bill, it’s voted out of committee and onward toward the full Council at a stated meeting.
If a bill is passed at a stated meeting by a majority of the Council, it proceeds to the mayor’s desk for potential enactment.
Enacting local laws: once a bill has been approved by the City Council, it goes to the mayor. The mayor has three options2:
Sign the bill, in which case it becomes law. (“Signed”)
Veto the bill, in which case it goes back to the Council. The Council may override a veto with a 2/3 vote, rather than the standard majority required for most legislation to get out of the chamber. (“Vetoed”)
Do nothing, in which case the bill becomes law after 30 days, per §37 of the city charter. (“Charter Rule Adopted”)
Reading bill names: Bills are referred to like “Intro ###.” This is short for “Introduction,” as in “introduction of a local law into the City Council.” If you see a bill written out like this: “Intro 0004-2022,” that means “it was the forth bill introduced in that legislative session, and it was introduced in 2022.” Legislative sessions are the periods of time between City Council elections, and span multiple years.
New York City Charter, Chapter 2: “Council”, §42: “Meetings.”
(American Legal Publishing).
This is also reaffirmed in the City Council’s parliamentary manual:
The Rules of the Council, Chapter I: “Meetings of the Council”, §1.00: “Stated, Special”
(as adopted and uploaded from March 3, 2023).
New York City Charter, Chapter 2: “Council”, §37: “Local laws; action by mayor.”
(American Legal Publishing).
Are there opportunities for the public to speak in favor or against bills being proposed at city council meetings or other meetings? If there was a bill I saw that I really wanted to help succeed, is there anything I could do?