On Wednesday, Common Cause/New York, along with our coalition partners Citizens Union, the League of Women Voters of New York and NYPIRG issued a Reform Report Card, pointing out that two years after extensive promises of reform in Albany, little has been accomplished.

Final grade, as of today: F. Aware of our criticism, and having been urged on several occasions by CC/NY and its coalition partners to introduce a strong campaign finance bill, Governor Paterson finally got off the dime and announced the details of a bill he plans to introduce - as we were holding our press conference. At least we know we had some effect! You can watch Albany Channel 10's report about the press conference and the Governor's actions.

Here's a recap of Common Cause's work over the past two weeks. We're celebrating hard-won victories regarding the FEC and FCC and highlighting other important work throughout the country.

Federal Election Commission (FEC): We Stopped The White House Again!
On May 16 controversial White House nominee Hans von Spakovsky withdrew his name from consideration for a position on the FEC. Common Cause, working with a coalition of voting rights and reform groups, had opposed von Spakovsky because of his work at the Justice Department rolling back voting rights laws.

Here in New York, we've been roiled over the last month and a half by repeated revelations of huge amounts of public money paid out at the sole discretion of an individual elected official. Over $350 million in the New York City budget is controlled by individual City Council members, state legislators' member control items totaling almost $140 million, and over $1 billion in the state budget is controlled by the Governor and legislative leaders for discretionary "capital projects."

Elected officials like to call these amounts "discretionary funds."  Here at Common Cause/New York, like other members of the public and the press, we call them what they are: slush funds. Why do we even have these slush funds at all?

On Tuesday, April 29, almost 200 Common Cause activists and allies gathered in New York's capital for "take your ethics to work day" in order to demand more of our state government. Recent scandal (after scandal after scandal) has only reinforced the urgent need for changes to the way Albany does business.

A paper in Binghamton underscored this last week when it wrote: "If ever there was a state government in need of [reform] it's ours, which has correctly been labeled the most dysfunctional in the land. Albany is to government what Britney Spears is to motherhood." Legislators, Blair Horner of NYPIRG pointed out, "have to do something to regain the trust of the public before facing them in November."

We gathered for Reform Day 2008 to offer legislators a way to regain that trust. We provided principles of a reform agenda, endorsed by dozens of organizations throughout the state, around which they could craft meaningful reforms. The broad issues for reform include changes to the way campaigns are financed, the way the legislature operates, how legislators are held accountable to the public, and termination of the partisan gerrymandering in New York State.

Click "Read More" for more on Reform Day 2008.

Common Cause/NY is saddened by the situation which led to Governor Spitzer's resignation today. Our thoughts are with the Spitzer family and we hope that they will weather this storm.

At the same time, we look forward to working with Lt. Governor David Paterson as he assumes the responsibilities of the governorship of our great state. We are genuinely impressed with the bi-partisan reputation that precedes Mr. Paterson's entry to the Governor's Mansion and know firsthand that he is a strong supporter of meaningful reform.

Should citizens in the capital of the United States be represented in Congress?  Should we be able to confirm that votes are counted correctly?  If you thought those were easy questions, well, you haven't been paying close enough attention to the inner workings of our Congress.  Common Cause is pushing for a "yes" on both of those counts and holding elected officials accountable, in Washington and around the country....

• Common Cause New York report triggers lively media discussion about pay-to-play
• Newly-created Connecticut "Clean Elections" system kicks off with special election next month
• Milwaukee Rep. joins Common Cause Wisconsin's call for hold on campaign contributions
• Media consolidation hearing in Chicago this week; Common Cause on the scene
• Voting and election bills on the cusp in Congress

Check out this new video from Common Cause/New York:

Senator Joseph Bruno has just made headlines with a controversy revolving around the usage of taxpayer's money to fly to New York City from Albany. Documents show that he flew in a state helicopter to a New York City heliport and then had a state trooper escort him to the office building housing a major CEO who has donated to the state Republican Party.

This is unacceptable behavior for any public figure, including Bruno (or Governor Spitzer for that matter). To get approval for the helicopter, he had to sign a document saying that it was for legislative business, so he most likely has proof that he was doing more than fundraising. He also attacked Governor Spitzer's office for reporting him and even said of Governor Spitzer, "[he] does not understand that he is not a dictator." (As quoted in the New York Times article by Danny Hakim)