Provides for a quorum of one quarter of the members and the presiding officer of a community board physically be present at a location where the public can attend for such board to conduct videoconferencing.
NEW YORK STATE ASSEMBLY MEMORANDUM IN SUPPORT OF LEGISLATION submitted in accordance with Assembly Rule III, Sec 1(f)
BILL NUMBER: A10276A
SPONSOR: Rules (Bores) TITLE OF BILL:
An act to amend the public officers law, in relation to lowering quorum
requirements for meetings of community boards held by videoconferencing
PURPOSE:
To ease requirements for in-person attendance of community board members
SUMMARY OF SPECIFIC PROVISIONS:
Section one: Reduces the number of community board members required to
physically attend a meeting using videoconferencing from a quorum to one
quarter of the members and the relevant presiding officer.
Section two: Establishes definition of "advisory body" for this section.
Section three: Establishes the effective date.
JUSTIFICATION:
The FY23 Enacted budget created flexibility for public bodies to use
videoconferencing while complying with the Open Meetings Law. One of the
requirements was that a quorum of the public body must meet in person.
For community boards in New York City, which can have up to 50 members
and are volunteer positions, gathering a quorum presents a significant
burden.
This bill will ease those requirements only for community boards by
requiring that a quarter of the membership and the relevant presiding
officer be physically present in order to allow the use of videoconfer-
encing for other members.
LEGISLATIVE HISTORY:
S.9221 of 2021-2022 (Hoylman): Died in Investigations and Government
Operations
FISCAL IMPLICATIONS:
None.
EFFECTIVE DATE:
Immediately.
STATE OF NEW YORK
________________________________________________________________________
10276--A
IN ASSEMBLY
May 16, 2024
___________
Introduced by COMMITTEE ON RULES -- (at request of M. of A. Bores) --
read once and referred to the Committee on Governmental Operations --
committee discharged, bill amended, ordered reprinted as amended and
recommitted to said committee
AN ACT to amend the public officers law, in relation to lowering quorum
requirements for meetings of community boards held by videoconferenc-
ing
The People of the State of New York, represented in Senate and Assem-bly, do enact as follows:
1 Section 1. The opening paragraph of subdivision 2 of section 103-a of
2 the public officers law, as added by section 2 of part WW of chapter 56
3 of the laws of 2022, is amended to read as follows:
4 A public body may, in its discretion, use videoconferencing to conduct
5 its meetings pursuant to the requirements of this article provided that
6 a minimum number of members are present to fulfill the public body's
7 quorum requirement in the same physical location or locations where the
8 public can attend, except that in the case of an advisory body, one
9 quarter of the members and the relevant presiding officer must be pres-
10 ent in such physical location or locations, and the following criteria
11 are met:
12 § 2. Section 103-a of the public officers law is amended by adding a
13 new subdivision 6 to read as follows:
14 6. For the purposes of this section, an "advisory body" shall be
15 defined as an entity that is involved in an advisory capacity only;
16 including but not limited to engagement in policy development, program
17 planning, and program evaluation, and that may or may not vote to deter-
18 mine a final policy or programmatic outcome, including but not limited
19 to a community board in a city with a population of one million or more.
20 § 3. This act shall take effect immediately; provided, however, that
21 the amendments to section 103-a of the public officers law made by
22 sections one and two of this act shall not affect the repeal of such
23 section and shall be deemed repealed therewith.
EXPLANATION--Matter in italics (underscored) is new; matter in brackets
[] is old law to be omitted.
LBD05005-04-4
