Albany Times Union. June 25, 2024.
Editorial: No hiding flaws of proposed mask ban
Gov. Kathy Hochul’s proposal for a new ban on face coverings raises irresolvable constitutional and enforcement concerns.
When she took office during the COVID-19 pandemic, Gov. Kathy Hochul kept in place mandates that New Yorkers wear masks to help stop the spread of the virus. Last summer, meanwhile, the governor made one million masks available to protect residents from wildfire smoke.
Now, the Democrat is proposing a new ban on masks.
The whiplash-inducing change is necessary, Ms. Hochul claims, because criminals are hiding their identities as they commit their malfeasance, particularly on the New York subway system. Her proposal essentially would reinstate some form of a pre-Civil War statute that banned wearing masks in public places.
That law was repealed during the pandemic, of course. And rightly so.
There are all sorts of reasons why New Yorkers might want to wear masks — and they should be free to do so. Some might want some protection against viral illnesses, including COVID-19. Others might want to protect their faces on one of those bitterly cold days on which a ski mask comes in handy. Some might cover their faces for religious reasons.
Some might even wish to protest anonymously.
That last reason seems intertwined with Ms. Hochul’s push, given the objections raised about masked protesters demonstrating against the ongoing war in Gaza. In just one recent example, a group of masked protesters chanted outside a Manhattan exhibit that memorializes those killed in the Oct. 7, 2023, Hamas terrorist attack.
Whether a person finds those protests distasteful or cowardly is beside the point. The right to speak anonymously is a free speech right guaranteed by the First Amendment and backed by significant U.S. Supreme Court rulings, including one that in 1958 said the NAACP in Alabama could not be forced to reveal its membership lists.
And what, really, is the difference between speech delivered by a masked protester in public and someone commenting anonymously on Facebook or X? If Ms. Hochul’s push for new legislation is successful, the state can count on court challenges and will likely lose.
Granted, we have yet to see legislative language from Ms. Hochul, who says she plans to work with the Legislature to fine-tune a proposal that would target violent mask wearers while protecting peaceful protesters and religious attire. But we suspect no amount of tuning could hide the proposal’s inherent contradictions.
Even if the law is crafted to allow the wearing of religious face coverings and the N-95s offered last summer to protect New Yorkers from smoke, wouldn’t criminals simply choose to wear similar coverings? How will police judge who is legitimately wearing a mask and who isn’t? The impulse would be to target those who look suspicious, whatever that means, raising concerns about selective and prejudicial enforcement.
Even if the law is limited to masks worn in the subway, all the same concerns apply, as they would to a Republican version of the proposal that would criminalize loitering and congregating while wearing a mask.
In truth, New York’s former ban on face coverings, enacted in 1845, was bad legislation that should have been repealed long before COVID-19 emergencies. Ms. Hochul should abandon her plan to bring it back.
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Dunkirk Evening Observer. June 25, 2024.
Editorial: NEW YORK STATE: Borrello proposal worth attention
We have long advocated for a balanced approach when it comes to Chautauqua Lake.
That has meant advocating for the use of targeted herbicides in addition to weed harvesting. That has meant advocating for the state DEC to be the arbiter of where herbicides are used even though some lake groups advocated for much more acreage than the DEC will approve each year. That advocacy has been for additional funding for lake maintenance.
Now, that advocacy is focused on a bill that provides what we feel is a bit of necessary balance for New York’s Freshwater Wetlands Act. The act, as we’ve covered often in recent months, regulates activities near larger wetlands and created some concerns that new permits and regulations could impact the way Chautauqua Lake is governed. State Sen. George Borrello, R-Sunset Bay, introduced legislation in late May that will exempt inland lakes that are navigable waterways and have an area of 150 acres or more from the freshwater wetlands designations.
Chad Stansiszewski, assistant regional director for the state DEC Region 9, told those who gathered at a recent Chautauqua Lake Symposium hosted by Chautauqua County that the DEC already has the tools it needs to protect Chautauqua Lake’s ecology and fishery. And while we trust current DEC officials when they say the new wetlands regulations won’t change much right now on Chautauqua Lake, we can easily see a path where different leadership at Region 9 use the new wetlands regulations to enact changes that could hurt the local economy.
It’s important state law reflects the balance needed between ecology and economy – something Borrello articulated quite clearly during the lake symposium and which bears repeating today.
“I want to make one thing clear,” Borrello said. “I don’t want the lake to be like a swamp, but it’s also not going to be a swimming pool folks, OK? We need that balance. It is a lake. It’s important. People are here to fish. There are important ecological benefits to all of those things that make the lake what it is, so a balance, a common sense balance is what we need. So I’ve had this discussion with PJ (Wendel, county executive) and discussed this idea of introducing this bill because he has spoken to other county executives around the state, they’re in similar situations with these new wetland rules. They are concerned about their freshwater lakes.”
That concern must be addressed. We hope state legislators on both sides of the aisle support Borrello’s bill the next time the state Legislature is in session.
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New York Post. June 24, 2024.
Editorial: Hochul needs to call the bluff of the MTA fearmongers — and fully kill congestion pricing
Suspicions are widespread that the MTA is trying to pressure Gov. Hochul into letting congestion pricing go ahead after all by halting construction to increase accessibility at two LIRR stations, and similar refits, stopping work on the Second Avenue Subway and even raising fears about basic subway maintenance.
Yet much of the scare campaign is from the “transit advocates” who nearly saddled the city with those idiotic tolls, and Hochul’s best response is to announce that congestion pricing isn’t just temporarily halted — it’s dead for the long term.
The gov arguably invited this sniping by leaving that question open.
Fact is, we identified “accessibility” work as one of the first things to halt when she pulled the plug.
This is not to write off the mobility-challenged people who’ll benefit, but only to say it’s not where to put any of the agency’s scarce resources right now.
Plus, the MTA’s Access-a-Ride service gives those straphangers other options in the meantime.
The Second Avenue extension is another obvious candidate: It’d be great to have, but it can wait.
The congestion tolls would have dinged Manhattan drivers $15 or more, slamming the economy of the city’s main business districts and many who work there.
Losing the borrowing power it would’ve gained from $1 billion a year in tolls, the MTA has to put off most capital outlays, and prioritize “state-of-good-repair” work that keeps the trains running.
And that’s exactly what the agency is doing.
As for the supposed risk that vital maintenance must wait: If MTA chief Janno Lieber really thinks he can’t continue that, he should resign in protest, and make way for someone who can get it done.
The real betrayal of straphangers is the refusal of city district attorneys to prosecute freeloading turnstile-jumpers, who cost the system hundreds of millions a year.
And the politicians who prevent the MTA from getting tough with its unions to scale back overtime, which cost it MTA a record $1.37 billion last year.
Expanding subway lines and increasing accessibility are fine goals for the future, and can still happen — eventually.
But not at the price of bleeding average New Yorkers.
The gov needs to stick to her guns on the tolls; make it plain they’re never going to happen — and tell the “advocates” to start finding practical ways to fund their dream projects.
END