{"id":183701,"date":"2026-04-02T19:33:09","date_gmt":"2026-04-02T19:33:09","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/183701\/"},"modified":"2026-04-02T19:33:09","modified_gmt":"2026-04-02T19:33:09","slug":"nyc-council-members-would-have-more-control-in-establishing-community-boards-per-new-bill","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/183701\/","title":{"rendered":"NYC Council members would have more control in establishing community boards, per new bill"},"content":{"rendered":"

\t\t\t\t\"Residents\t\t\t<\/p>\n

The crowd at the Manhattan Community Board 2 Land Use Committee meeting on Jan. 10, 2024 regarding 388 Hudson St. in Greenwich Village.<\/p>\n

Courtesy NYC Department of Housing Preservation and Development<\/p>\n

The process of appointing board members to NYC community boards<\/a> will change if a new bill proposed by the City Council becomes law.\u00a0<\/p>\n

City Council Member Frank Morano (R-Staten Island) wants NYC Council members to have the authority to appoint up to half of each community board\u2019s 50 volunteer members, per his new bill, Intro. 0322-2026<\/a>.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Currently, only the city\u2019s five borough presidents can appoint members to the boards, with some input from the council.\u00a0\n<\/p>\n

Morano said his bill, which would require revising the City Charter, would be fairer to New Yorkers, since community boards are civic groups designed to represent the people who live or work in local neighborhoods.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\u201cCouncil members are the ones closest to the neighborhoods. We\u2019re the ones people call when there\u2019s a problem,\u201d the South Shore council rep said. \u201cIt makes sense that we should have a direct role in who represents the communities.\u201d<\/p>\n

Borough presidents would still get to decide who sits on the remaining half of community boards in their respective boroughs.\u00a0\n<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s about fairness, and it\u2019s about balance,\u201d Morano said. \u201cNo one is taking away power from the borough presidents. We\u2019re simply saying that power should be shared, and not concentrated in one place. I think if community boards are going to speak for the public, then more than one elected official should have a say in who sits on them.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n

Implementing the law would require amending the City Charter. If Intro. 0322-2026 is passed in the City Council this year, New Yorkers would vote on the bill via ballot referendum in the November general election.<\/p>\n

The idea is gaining traction in the City Council, receiving bipartisan support from council members across the city. Among the co-sponsors of the bill are Chris Marte and Elsie Encarnacion (D-Manhattan), Nantasha Williams (D-Queens) and Vickie Paladino (R-Queens), Susan Zhuang and Chris Banks (D-Brooklyn) and Justin Sanchez (D-Bronx).<\/p>\n

amNewYork contacted several NYC borough presidents for their thoughts on the bill, since they have a vested interest in its outcome. The newspaper is awaiting responses.\u00a0\n<\/p>\n

Meanwhile, Morano reiterated that having appointments from just one official\u00a0\n<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s basic fairness. It\u2019s a matter that is more democratic and adds a little bit of accountability,\u201d he said. \u201cWhen appointments come from one place, you can wind up with outcomes that don\u2019t necessarily reflect the full community. This helps fix that.\u201d<\/p>\n

Intro. 0322-2026 is currently in the council\u2019s committee on governmental operations, state and federal legislation. It must pass through the legislative process before it becomes law.\u00a0<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The crowd at the Manhattan Community Board 2 Land Use Committee meeting on Jan. 10, 2024 regarding 388…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":182364,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[8],"tags":[11563,9841,73935,9,56,63,51410,65,64],"class_list":{"0":"post-183701","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-new-york-city","8":"tag-city-charter","9":"tag-community-boards","10":"tag-council-member-frank-morano","11":"tag-new-york","12":"tag-ny","13":"tag-nyc","14":"tag-nyc-council","15":"tag-nyc-headlines","16":"tag-nyc-news"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/183701","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=183701"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/183701\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/182364"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=183701"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=183701"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=183701"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}