Everything about Borough President totally explained
Borough President (informally
BP, or
Beep in slang) is an elective office in each of the five
boroughs of
New York City.
The offices of borough president were created in 1898 with the formation of the
City of Greater New York. Prior to 1898, the city was conterminous with New York County. In 1898,
Brooklyn (Kings County),
Queens (Queens County) and
Staten Island (Richmond County) were added to a city that had consisted exclusively of what is now
Manhattan and
the Bronx. To balance local authority along with the centralization of government, the Office of Borough President was established with a functional administrative role derived by having a vote on the
New York City Board of Estimate, which was responsible for creating and approving the city's budget and proposals for land use. The Board of Estimate consisted of the
Mayor, the
Comptroller and the President of the
New York City Council, each of whom were elected citywide and had two votes, and the five Borough presidents, each having one vote.
In 1989, the
Supreme Court of the United States, in
Board of Estimate of City of New York v. Morris declared the New York City Board of Estimate
unconstitutional on the grounds that the city's most populous borough (
Brooklyn) had no greater effective representation on the board than the city's least populous borough (
Staten Island), this arrangement being an unconstitutional violation of the
Fourteenth Amendment's Equal Protection Clause pursuant to the high court's 1964 "one man, one vote" decision (
Reynolds v. Sims). .
The
city charter was revised in 1990 and the Board of Estimate was abolished. The Office of Borough President was retained but with greatly reduced power and budget which reverted to the
mayor or the
New York City Council. A BP has a small discretionary budget to spend on projects within the borough. The last significant power of the borough presidents—to appoint a member of the
Board of Education —was abolished, with the board, on June 30,
2002.
The two major remaining appointments of the Borough President, is one member of the city Planning Commission and one member of the Panel for Educational Policy. Borough Presidents generally have projects they push while in office. Post-1990, Borough Presidents are seen mainly as ceremonial leaders of their boroughs and borough cheerleaders. Officially they advise the Mayor on issues relating to each borough, comment on all land use items in their borough, advocate borough needs in the annual municipal budget process, appoint Community Boards, chair the Borough Boards, and serve as
ex officio members of various boards and committees They generally act as advocates of their boroughs at the mayoral agencies, the city council, the
New York state government, and corporations.
Borough presidents are elected to four-year terms.
As of 2007, the borough presidents are:
Borough Boards
Each Borough has a Borough Board consisting of the Borough President, the City Council members from the borough, and the chair of each of the borough's Community Boards. The Borough Boards meet monthly to serve the needs of the local communities. They may hold public hearings, make inquiries into the performance of public services, and make recommendations about city owned land use and sales within the borough.
Community Boards
New York City is divided into 59 administrative districts, each served by a Community Board. Community Boards are local representative bodies that serve as advocates for New York City residents and communities. Each Board has up to 50 voting members, with one half of the membership appointed each year for two-year terms; there are no term limits. Additionally, all city council members whose council districts cover part of a community district are ex-officio Board members and may participate in all Board activities. However, council members may not vote on Board issues. Borough Presidents appoint the voting Community Board members, with half of the appointees nominated by council members representing the district in proportion to the percentage of the community board's population they represent. Broadly assigned by the
city charter
to
"Consider the needs of the district which it serves," the Boards have been limited in their ability by
ineffective local communication channels, minuscule budgets and archaic technology. As a result, many residents have concluded that they've little impact on the operation of their communities or their lives. The
BeyondVoting Wiki and the
Community-Based Planning Task Force have begun to address the limitations. See Community Board 3, Queens'
website and
Livable Neighborhoods Report to learn more about a typical Board's operation and how these efforts hope to make improvements in the future.
List of Bronx Borough Presidents
Louis F. Haffen 1898-1909
John F. Murray 1909-10
Cyrus C. Miller 1910-14
Douglas Mathewson 1914-18
Henry Bruckner 1918-34
James J. Lyons 1934-62
Joseph F. Periconi 1962-66
Herman Badillo 1966-70
Robert Abrams 1970-79
Stanley Simon 1979-87
Fernando Ferrer 1987-2002
Adolfo Carrión Jr. 2002-
List of Brooklyn Borough Presidents
List of Manhattan Borough Presidents
List of Queens Borough Presidents
Frederick Bowley 1898-1901
Joseph Cassidy 1902-05
Joseph Bermel 1906-08
Lawrence Gresser 1908-11
Maurice E. Connolly 1911-28
Bernard M. Patten 1928
George U. Harvey 1929-41
James A. Burke 1942-49
Maurice A. FitzGerald 1950-51
Joseph F. Mafera 1951
James A. Lundy 1952-57
James J. Crisona 1958-59
John T. Clancy 1959-62
Mario J. Cariello 1963-68
Sidney Leviss 1969-71
Donald Manes 1971-86
Claire Shulman 1986-2001
Helen M. Marshall 2002-
List of Richmond/Staten Island Borough Presidents
George Cromwell 1898-1913
Charles J. McCormack 1914-15
Calvin D. Van Namee 1915-21
Matthew J. Cahill 1922
John A. Lynch 1922-33
Joseph A. Palma 1934-45
Cornelius A. Hall 1946-53
Edward G. Baker 1953-54
Albert V. Maniscalo 1955-65
Robert T. Connor 1966-77
Anthony Gaeta 1977-84
Ralph J. Lamberti 1984-89
Guy V. Molinari 1990-2001
James Molinaro 2002-Further Information
Get more info on 'Borough President'.
|
External Link Exchanges
Do you know how hard it is to get a link from a large encyclopaedia? Well we're different and will prove it. To get a link from us just add the following HTML to your site on a relevant page:
<a href="http://borough_president.totallyexplained.com">Borough President Totally Explained</a>
Then simply click through this link from your web page. Our crawlers will verify your link, extract the title of your web page and instantly add a link back to it. If you like you can remove the words Totally Explained and embed the link in article text.
As long as your link remains in place, we'll keep our link to you right here. Please play fair - our crawlers are watching. Your site must be closely related to this one's topic. Any kind of spamming, dubious practises or removing the link will result in your link from us being dropped and, potentially, your whole site being banned. |
