Saratoga Springs officials are looking to amend the city’s charter, again, but some residents are raising concerns over one set of proposed changes. We’re joined by WAMC’s Southern Adirondack Bureau Chief Aaron Shellow-Lavine who is following this story… Hello, Aaron.
Hi, Lucas.
Saratoga Springs’s most recent round of proposed charter changes have been around since the start of the year, can you walk us through these specific changes that are garnering attention now?
Republican Mayor John Safford created a charter reform commission last year and gave them two charges: one was to generate changes the city council can enact by local law and the second was to consider deeper changes that would require a referendum vote like changing the city’s form of government.
Among the first group of proposed changes is one that centers around the city’s representation on the Saratoga County Board of Supervisors. Currently, the city has two representatives and the charter has mandated that since the 1970s.
The proposed change would reword the charter to no longer require two supervisors and instead establish the number as “one or more.”
Charter Review Commission Chair Vince DeLeonardis spoke at last night’s city council meeting to clear the air about that proposal.
“I want to make it abundantly clear, as I have on multiple occasions, our proposed amendments did not, are not, and would not reduce the number of county supervisors in any manner,” said DeLeonardis.
But not everyone believes that, right? What are some concerns of the people speaking out against this change?
Exactly, people like Otis Maxwell, the former chair of the city’s Democratic Committee, are warning that this proposed change paves the way to reduce the city’s overall representation at the county level.
He also spoke at last night’s meeting.
“Which means they’ll also be able to say ‘sorry Saratoga Springs, you’re below the threshold, you no longer get two supervisors. This is a change that has no benefit for us in the city of Saratoga Springs. Both Democrats and Republicans should be against it,” said Maxwell.
So to put what Maxwell is saying into context, the population cut off for a municipality to have more than one representative on the county board of supervisors right now is 27,500 residents.
Something to keep in mind here is that supervisors’ votes on the board are weighted by the size of the population they represent. So, a community that is just below the threshold, and thus is allotted just one supervisor, is still provided a tremendous amount of influence.
Saratoga Springs’s population sits between 28,000 and 29,000.
I spoke with one of Saratoga Springs’ current supervisors, Democrat Minita Sanghvi, who says she and her counterpart, Democrat Sarah Burger, openly oppose this change.
She explained how the changes could impact the city’s representation in the future.
“In the future, if the Saratoga County Board of Supervisors changes their rules that only towns of 30,000 population have two supervisors, that would materially impact us at that point. And if that is something that’s in our charter, that’s a lot easier for them to move ahead,” said Sanghvi.
I should note that if Saratoga Sprins lost a supervisor on the county board, that would also mean less representation for the city on the various subcommittees at the county level.
For his part, DeLeonardis did say that the charter review commission’s recommendations are just that, and if the city council wants to adjust or reject any of them, they are free to do so.
