This ballot question guide is part of our full explainer article on all of the six proposals on the ballot in New York City this November.
What is Ballot Question 2?
Ballot Question 2 relates to sanitation and cleaning public property.
This is how it will appear on your ballot:
“This proposal would amend the City Charter to expand and clarify the Department of Sanitation’s power to clean streets and other City property and require disposal of waste in containers.”
Currently, the city Department of Sanitation (DSNY) controls cleanliness and waste management on New York’s streets and sidewalks. However, there are some areas that fall outside of DSNY’s jurisdiction, like highway medians and parks. This proposition would enable DSNY to clean any city-owned property and enforce any regulations related to city cleanliness.
A “yes” on Proposition 2 would also establish DSNY’s ability to specify what kind of trash receptacles people use, a crucial point in the Mayor’s containerization initiative.
Even though it’s not mentioned in the text that you’ll read on your ballot, there’s a third piece of Proposition 2: authority over street vendors. Voting “yes” on Prop 2 would give DSNY the ability to ticket street vendors on all city-owned property, including within parks, where the Parks Department and the NYPD already have enforcement power. The NYPD and Parks would maintain authority over these areas — if passed, the ballot measure would give DSNY enforcement power there as well, which could lead to increased ticketing of vendors.
As reported by THE CITY in June, summonses issued to street vendors in city parks have been climbing since 2020, and advocates say that this will only lead to more unfair targeting of a largely immigrant workforce.
“They’re trying to sneak in a change to vending policy by adding more enforcement at a time when vendors are already being issued thousand-dollar tickets by armed officers for selling dollar waters,” said Carina Kaufman-Gutierrez, deputy director of the nonprofit Street Vendor Project, to THE CITY in August. “And to not mention it in the ballot question? That’s manipulative and disrespectful.”
When approached for comment, both Parks and DSNY referred back to City Hall.
Where did this proposal come from?
Ballot questions 2 through 6 on New York City voters’ ballots this year went through a rocky process to make it your voting booth.
In the spring, the City Council put forth a ballot measure to expand the “advice and consent” process that gives the Council the power to approve some mayoral appointees.
Around the same time, Mayor Eric Adams created his own Charter Review Commission, assembling some of his closest allies to lead the process, as THE CITY has reported. His commission met for two months this summer, a timeline that has been criticized by City Council and advocacy groups as rushed.
The dueling ballot proposals caused a legal clash. According to city law, the City Council’s ballot proposals and the mayor’s can’t coexist on the same ballot, and the mayor’s takes precedence. That means only Mayor Adams’ proposed Charter revisions will appear this November.
The executive director of the mayor’s commission, Diane Savino, says that its five ballot measures were the result of listening to New Yorkers’ needs, taking input from thousands of people and that they reflect “the desires they heard from New Yorkers for clean streets, fiscal responsibility, public safety, transparency in the city’s capital planning process and support for Minority- and Women-Owned Business Enterprises,” she said in a statement.
Opponents to the mayor’s charter revisions disagree and say that though these ballot questions seem innocuous, they are actually an attempt to interfere in the city’s legislative process.
“[Propositions] two through six weaken checks and balances and weaken local democracy and increase power for the mayor at a time when people all over the country should be voting for democracy up and down the ballot,” said Joo-Hyun Kang, a representative for No Power Grab NYC, a campaign that was formed in response to the proposed Charter revisions.
“It’s a sophisticated and sneaky move by the mayor,” Kang said.
Have a question about the ballot proposals, or about voting in New York this year? Reach out to our newsroom at ask@thecity.nyc.
