Queens Democratic Party leaders minimize role of County Committee in tense meeting
/
Queens County Democratic Party Executive Director Michael Reich (left) and Chairperson, U.S. Rep. Gregory Meeks met with County Committee members in Forest Hills Monday. Eagle photo by David Brand
By David Brand
The two top officials in the Queens County Democratic Party faced a faction of reform-minded County Committee members at the party office in Forest Hills Monday, informing them that committee membership was a means for gaining influence in individual political clubs — not for affecting decisions in the broader county party.
U.S. Rep. Gregory Meeks, the party chair, and Michael Reich, the executive director, held the meeting more than three months after 43 Committee members sent them a letter outlining a list of reforms designed to increase transparency and decentralize the organization’s power. Meeks was named party chair in March.
The meeting grew tense when Reich minimized the role of the 2,700-member committee in response to an attendee’s question.
“The County Committee is a function of the state election law, you understand,” Reich said. “The function of the County Committee is that every two years, under state election law, the political parties, whether it be Democrats, Republicans, Working Families Party — any of those parties — in order to do [their] constitutional duty, must have an organizational meeting every two years.”
Meeks added that Committee membership was a means for standing out and gaining influence within local Democratic clubs, which he said he considers the true drivers of power in the party. He recalled his own experience rising through the ranks of the party.
“The reason I got involved in the County Committee is because I did want to have more influence on my local club,” Meeks added. “I wanted to make sure that the club was more active and more involved in the processes of the local organization because that’s where you get the votes from.”
That statement left County Committee members, who are elected to represent just a few blocks within Queens’ larger assembly districts, feeling as though the party did not value them. Party leaders regard the Committee as serving only a “pro forma purpose” in order to comply with state election law, said one attendee.
“We were basically told we’re here to meet a legal requirement and that we check a box. Despite being elected,” said Sarah Kenny, a County Committee member from Assembly District 23, after the meeting.
The County Committee members who signed the April letter said the reforms would promote democracy within a county party that has until recently monopolized influence in the borough. Queens County Democratic Party leadership drafts candidates for judgeships and district leader positions, appoints members to fill vacant legislative positions and makes endorsements without input from the Committee.
Despite pointed questions, Meeks avoided committing to specific reforms, including the request to host full County Committee meetings more than once in a two-year term.
“That’s not unreasonable. They do it in Brooklyn. They do it in other places,” said County Committee member Evan Karl.
“It’s a joke to me that you literally have people from all over the county sitting here, saying that they want to be involved in this thing called County Committee, saying that they want to meet more often, but the only thing you can say is, ‘Oh, be a part of a club, that you’re already a part of,’” Karl added.
Party decisions are made by a small inner circle of three attorneys and the party chairperson — Meeks took over from ex-U.S. Rep. Joe Crowley. Their decisions are confirmed in voice votes by a portion of the party’s 72 district leaders, many of them elected officials, including State Sen. Michael Gianaris, Councilmember Costa Constantinides and Assemblymember Andrew Hevesi. There are also ten at-large seats filled by party leadership.
Meeks flat-out rejected a proposal to prevent elected officials from simultaneously serving as district leaders. But that arrangement makes it even harder for everyday citizens and lesser members of the party to run for district leader, County Committee members said.
They also specifically questioned Meeks and Reich about why candidates have appeared on the ballot for County Committee without even knowing they have been tapped to run. The maneuver enables party leadership to stock the committee with compliant — and at times, unwitting — members, The New York Times reported in 2018.
Meeks would not commit to instituting a policy mandating that candidates for the Committee consent to appear on the ballot, when asked during the meeting and questioned afterward.
“I’m going to look at that more,” Meeks told reporters after the event.
He said he certainly does not want dead people appearing on the ballot — an accusation that informed a 2016 lawsuit against the Bronx Democratic Party. And he he told meeting attendees only people who want to serve should appear on the ballot.
“[Y]ou always want somebody on there that wants to be on there because you want them to work,” Meeks told the Eagle and WNYC after the event. “The whole idea is to get people to work. To carry petitions, to be participants in their political club.”
Meeks said that he welcomed the overall activism of the Committee members who sent the letter and attended the meeting Monday.
“I think the energy in this room, the passion in this room of wanting to be involved with their Democratic organization and have a voice, it inspires me to want to make sure I get out there and touch folks because there's an energy and there’s people who care,” he said.
Committee member Melissa Bair said she was disappointed by the leaders’ perspective on the role of the County Committee, but she sounded a note of optimism after the meeting.
“[Meeks] sat with us today and he left the door open for future meetings,” Bair said. “He didn’t know us and I give him respect for talking with us.”
