To the delight of local officials, state Sen. Jack Martins and state Assemblywoman Michelle Schimel held a press conference Friday at the Great Neck House to announce their recently-passed village election bill, which will allows villages to continue to use lever voting machines through 2012.
With the looming budget crisis and Medicaid reform dominating the discussion in Albany, the lawmakers were able to get the attention of state legislators from both sides of the aisle and get the bill approved just prior to the March 15 elections.
“For all of the faults that we have with or current system now, the idea of going back to using lever machines made sense,” said Martins, a Republican from Mineola.
In July 2010, the state enacted legislation under the Help America Vote Act that required all elections be conducted using optically scanned ballots.
Gov. Andrew Cuomo signed the Schimel and Martins bill Feb. 28 – his first as governor.
“Once we got there attention, and were able to say stop,” Martins said.
With optical scanning machines costing about $1,500 each to rent and lever rentals at $150 each, the new bill helps villages save money and time.
“What is the purpose of having a machine that tabulates the count when you have to go back and recount it anyway?” said Martins.
Schimel thanked Martins for his pragmatism and ability to work across the aisle for a bill she said was important to the entire state.
“This law was just a realistic and timely solution of reforming the process of our election system,” said Schimel, D-Great Neck.
Martins called Schimel “a great assemblywoman.”
The new legislation will help villages with the transition to using the optical scanning systems in the future.
“It clearly demonstrates that they understand and support local government,” said Great Neck Village Mayor Ralph Kreitzman, who gave opening remarks. “Thanks to them we now have some time to resolve yet another difficult, costly, unfunded state mandate that was thrust upon our village.”
Opposition to the Schimel-Martins bill, came from self-described “good government” groups who argued that the bill would disenfranchise voters with disabilities.
“Were not disenfranchising anyone. We are giving them the ability to vote in a medium they are familiar with,” Martins said.
Numerous calls from Saddle Rock Mayor J. Leonard Samansky were a driving force behind getting Cuomo to sign the bill, according to Martins.
“As the mayor of a small village I was not about to rent a machine for thousands and thousands of dollars in an uncontested election and throw the money down the sewer,” said Village of Thomaston Mayor Robert Stern, who said the new legislation will help his village during the upcoming election.
“I’m happy about it, I think we are headed in the right direction,” said Stern.
Calling Schimel and Martins “Batman and Robin,” Marvin Natiss, president of the Nassau County Village Officers Association and mayor of North Hills, hailed the pair’s local government roots and ability to officials reach across party lines.
“They came from opposite sides of the political spectrum but they both started in local government,” said Natiss. “I’m so happy that you were able to get this passed.”
Schimel said because of the hundreds of e-mails and phone calls to Albany from village officials and residents, leadership had to react.
“Your phone calls and letters worked,” said Schimel. “You really made a spill.”
Schimel said the hardest part about pushing the legislation through was the six-week timeline and the fact that it was election legislation, which is sometimes difficult to get through.
