1998 PLATFORM

This platform was adopted by the Green Party of New York/New York Greens Assembly in 1998. It is currently being updated through a county hearing process.

I. ECOLOGICAL SUSTAINABILITY

A. Ecologically Sustainable Agriculture
1. Farming
2. Genetic Engineering and Agriculture
3. Urban Support for Organic Farming
4. Urban Agriculture
5. Food Safety, Monitoring and Availability
B. Renewable Energy
C. Electric Industry Restructuring
D. State Superfund
E. Recycle Waste
F. Clean Air
G. Parks and Wilderness
H. Wetlands
I. Kodak

II. HUMAN RIGHTS AND SOCIAL JUSTICE

A. Criminal Justice/Death Penalty
B. Community Control of the Police
C. Indian Treaty Rights
D. Ending Sexism
E. Ending Racism
F. Ending Heterosexism

III. GRASSROOTS DEMOCRACY

A. Economic Democracy
B. Proportional Representation
C. Public Campaign Financing
D. Election Law Reform

IV. ECONOMIC JUSTICE

A. Economic Justice
B. Workers Rights
C. Full Employment
D. Guaranteed Minimum Income
E. Universal, Affordable Child Care
F. Welfare Reform
G. Affordable Housing

V. HEALTH CARE

A. Universal, Single-Payer Health Care
B. Reproductive Rights
C. AIDS / HIV
D. Mental Health

VI. FREE PUBLIC EDUCATION

VII. PARTICIPATORY CULTURE AND MEDIA

VIII. PUBLIC FINANCE

A. Progressive Tax Reform
B. State Budget Process Reform
C. Corporate Welfare Reform
D. Equal Revenue Sharing
E. No Mandates Without Money
F. Public Pension Funds
G. Social and Ecological Accounting
H. Eco-Taxes and True Cost Pricing

INTRODUCTION

In order to strengthen the democratic power of the people and to protect and restore the environment, the Green Party of New York State/NYS Greens advocates and pledges ourselves to work for the following measures through public education, nonviolent direct action, alternative institutions, alliances with the Green and kindred movements throughout the world, and independent Green candidates for public offices.

The Green Party of New York State/New York State Greens is affiliated with the Greens/Green Party USA and the Association of State Green Parties. National issues are addressed in the program of G/GPUSA and ASGP. We subscribe to the Ten Key Values:
Ecological Wisdom
Social Justice
Grassroots Democracy
Nonviolence
Decentralization
Community Economics
Feminism
Respect for Diversity
Personal and Global Responsibility
Future Focus

I. ECOLOGICAL SUSTAINABILITY

As temporary inhabitants of the earth we are not its owners, but its caretakers. We are charged with the immense responsibility of stewardship over the earth's resources, and with insuring that these resources remain intact to be passed down to future generations. We share this planet with many other species, and have a responsibility to promote continuing its biological diversity. The Greens believe in preventing pollution. In contrast, the State of New York has spent millions of dollars attempting to regulate pollution, and handing out permits to pollute.

Citizens should have the right to enforce the provisions of the Environmental Conservation Law, including the right to initiate lawsuits for failure to comply with statutory and regulatory requirements (i.e., the Citizen Lawsuit Bill). The Greens strongly support the right of community residents to participate in the decision making process related to the cleanup of hazardous waste sites. The Greens advocate ongoing health monitoring for inactive hazardous waste sites.

Energy conservation is the most ecologically sensible, economically sound and immediately available energy resource.

A. Ecologically Sustainable Agriculture

Ecological wisdom demands that we practice a sustainable agriculture that conserves water, soil and energy and results in a minimum of pollution. However, the bulk of our current agriculture consists of large-scale agribusiness that relies heavily on the use of chemical biocides and fertilizers, as well as economic subsidies. It mines water resources to grow monoculture crops and to raise grain-fed animals in factory farms. The system has resulted in the loss of half the nation's topsoil, pollution of ground water and waterways, a massive waste of water and energy and a decline in the nutritional quality of our food. This agricultural system is not sustainable.

The Green Party supports sustainable, organic agriculture policies and much strong food safety legislation than currently exists. We say no to dangerous pesticides and herbicides, no to genetic engineering of agriculture, no to mono-cropping, and no to irradiation of food.

1. Farming

a. encourage small-scale family farms, polyculture crops and regional food supplies. We should discourage large-scale agribusiness and the transportation of food over long distances to market.

b. phase out the use of petrochemically derived fertilizers, pesticides and herbicides, particularly those that contain know or suspected carcinogens or mutagens. Pesticide use of farms causes the loss of irreplaceable topsoil and victimizes farmers and farmworkers by increasing their dependence on and exposure to toxic chemicals.

c. require state and local agencies to establish nontoxic, least impact pest management strategies, to reduce reliance on pesticides;

d. encourage alternatives to pesticides, such as integrated pest management;

e. use grazing animals and similar methods to control undergrowth rather than spraying herbicides;

f. ban the development of plant varieties that are tolerant of increased levels of chemical biocides;

g. prohibit large corporate, insurance company and bank ownership of farmland;

h. ban the importation of products treated with chemicals banned in the U.S., as well as those grown with slash and burn farming methods;

i. tighten standards for organically-produced food. Fight USA attempts to include genetically engineered, sludge-grown, and irradiated food as organic.

j. offset higher prices / costs for organics so more people can afford them.

k. expand and diversify family and cooperative organic farming;

l. improve the pay and working conditions of farm workers;

m. protect farm workers from dangerous pesticide and herbicides. Require farm owners to provide stipulated equipment and protection to workers.

n. hire inspectors to ensure compliance.

o. stop giving tax incentives to chain supermarkets and instead provide support to cooperative and community-owned food markets;

p. increase the diversity and self-reliance of the food and agriculture economy of New York

q. stop subsidizing large corporate farms, support family farms;

r. stop subsidizing and protect sod farms;

s. ban the sale of irradiated food in New York;

t. require agriculture colleges to teach organic and sustainable farming, integrated pest management and other holistic methods;

u. implement soil conservation practices such as planting stands of trees as windbreaks, and contour planting, to curb topsoil loss and prevent future dust bowls.

v. endorse the Dairy Price Compact to raise the price farmers receive for milk in order to help make family farms in NY State more viable and competitive;

w. establish a producer marketing structure in which farmers can ship directly to the city;

x. help farmers identify and install best management practices to reduce environmental/water quality impacts. Well-managed dairy farms and the pen space these farms represent have been identified as a preferred land use in the NY City watershed, serving an important function in preserving drinking water quality for millions of New Yorkers;

y. purchase development rights from farmers in order to preserve agriculture land,

2. Genetic Engineering and Agriculture

Greens oppose the patenting of life. We call on the State as well as Federal governments to:

a. recognize an organism's genetic code as "their own", as the inalienable property of that individual;

b. refuse to grant or recognize "intellectual property rights" - the patenting of living organisms or their DNA sequences for private profit;

c. ban the use of genetically-engineered Bovine Growth Hormone in milk production;

d. ban the genetic engineering of plants to afford a higher tolerance of herbicides and pesticides;

e. require public schools and hospitals to purchase only organic, non-genetically-engineered milk;

f. ban the transportation into New York of all genetically engineered agricultural products; and

g. require labeling of all milk derived from cows treated with recombinant Bovine Growth Hormone (rBGH).

3. Urban Support for Organic Farming

a. increase urban support for organic farming;

b. increase organic vegetable and fruit purchases in schools and hospitals;

c. require the N.Y. City Board of Education, and all schools and public facilities, to purchase any organic milk available from farmers in N.Y. City's watershed.

d. develop a price preference for organically produce items (food, textiles, etc.) in state, county and local procurement procedures. The preference should be based on the differential market prices between "organic" and "non-organic" products over a reasonable period of time. This would bring healthier food into schools and hospitals and make the State a partner in supporting organic agriculture and sustainable land practices.

e. provide incentives for those Greenmarkets that provide a minimum percentage of organic produce;

f. build coalitions with upstate farmers in N.Y. City watershed to forestall development;

g. link upstate and Long Island farmers to urban consumers in order to increase the economic diversity and self-reliance of the food and agricultural economy of New York;

h. vastly increase support for Community-Supported Agriculture (CSAs).

4. Urban Agriculture

a. Support community gardens on publicly-owned property so that as many New Yorkers as possible can grow their own food and develop green open spaces for their neighborhoods and give neighborhood children an opportunity to learn about growing plants.

b. Support funding to build compost facilities in community gardens to reduce the large amounts of organic waste in the city's waste stream and turn that waste into wonderful, rich soil in the city. The average N.Y. City household throws away two pounds of organic waste each day. This adds up to more than a million tons of organic waste thrown away in the city each year. We are working to get this valuable organic matter into community garden compost piles.

c. Support the development by the N.Y. City Department of Sanitation of large-scale in-vessel and worm composting facilities such as the pilot facility of the Lower East Side Ecology Center on the East River in Manhattan.

d. Require 72-hour notification of pesticide usage to neighbors of the property where the pesticides are to be applied. Lawn care, agriculture and indoor use of pesticides should all require prior notification. If the state does not enact such protections, local governments should do so.

5. Food Safety, Monitoring and Availability

a. Immediately quadruple the number of State food inspectors.

b. Curtail the mass dispensation of antibiotics in animal feed - a contributing factor to high levels of asthma and resistant organisms. High levels of antibiotics should be unnecessary if chickens (and other animals) were allowed to range freely.

c. Increase access to food stamps and WIC.

d. As a short term solution, the Greens endorse the Dairy Price Compact to raise the price farmers receive for the milk so they may remain in business. However, the price supports should go to those farmers who need it the most.

B. Renewable Energy

Our energy needs must be met through the development and use of renewable resources, not through the continued use of destructive measures. The Greens advocate energy conservation and efficiency, and clean, renewable energy sources such as solar-hydrogen fuel, solar-electric photovoltaics, solar-thermal electricity, solar heating, small-scale hydro, wind power, and biofuels, being given priority over ecologically detrimental and socially irresponsible energy sources (i.e., nuclear power, fossils fuels and Hydro-Quebec's James Bay project).

1. The Greens advocate:

a. using NYPA low-power subsidies to support a solar-hydrogen fuel industry;

b. electric and gas utilities being required to provide financial assistance to residential and agricultural customers who install solar and wind equipment;

c. a shutdown of all nuclear power plants in New York State now;

d. no storage of radioactive materials in West Valley; keep nuke waste at reactor sites;

e. conversion of at least 10% of the state vehicle fleet to non-polluting vehicles, such as electric or solar-hydrogen combustion by 2000. The state should also equip a percentage of their parking spaces with recharging outlets for use by state employees who commute to work in electric vehicles.

C. Electric Industry Restructuring

The Greens support restructuring the electrical energy to promote energy conservation, renewable energy and clean energy. The Greens oppose forcing ratepayers or taxpayers to bail out shareholders for "stranded costs" such as nuclear power plants. Residents customers, not just industrial and commercial customers, should benefit from any rate reductions under deregulation. Residential rates should be cut 25%.

1. Create more public power utilities More municipally owned and operated power systems are needed to ensure that residential customers are able to benefit from cuts in electric rates. More than 50 communities in NY State already have public power, saving local consumers as much as one-third of the cost of electricity; Unfortunately, many of the recent proposals for municipal utilities only focus on buying cheap electricity for government buildings (hospitals, nursing homes, county buildings), not for residential customers.

Establish minimum pollution standards for energy companies that want to sell power in New York. There should be generation-based performance standards for all plants regardless of where they are located.

2. Renewable portfolio standard Each power generator located in New York should be required to have a small percentage of their power produced from renewable energy sources. Renewable power suppliers should be allowed to obtain credits for the power they produce that can then be sold to companies with no renewable power sources.

3. Systems Benefit Fund The Greens support the establishment ofa Universal System Benefit Charge which would be a surcharge everyone would pay in proportion to the number of kilowatt hours consumed. This fee, amounting to a fraction of a cent per kWh, will generate a fund which would finance relief for low income and the elderly, and programs to promote efficiency and the development of clean renewable resources. The fund should be at least $300 million per year.

D. State Superfund

The Greens strongly support the refunding of the State Superfund program, which is running out of money. In 1982, the State Legislature created the state Superfund program to clean up the thousands of toxic waste sites throughout New York. There are currently more than 850 inactive hazardous waste sites in New York. In addition, a legal loophole has left hundreds of additional sites ineligible for Superfund financing since the contamination is due to the presence of hazardous substances rather than hazardous waste. Approximately $2.5 billion is needed to clean up the various sites. Prime responsibility for this fund should be polluters rather than taxpayers. The Greens support the use of front end fees (fees that are assessed at the time the polluting materials are produced or sold). Fees on corporate polluters should pay for at least 75% of cleanup costs. We need to strengthen, not weaken, cleanup standards.

1. Toxics Reduction

The Greens support a ban on the dumping of cancer-causing chemicals into our drinking water, as required in the state Safe Drinking Water Act. The Greens support a comprehensive Toxic Use Reduction program for all New York waste generators, along with strict timetables for testing and permanent cleanups of hazardous, radioactive, and industrial waste dumps.

2. Implementation of 1996 Environmental Bond Act

Expenditures of the recently passed Bond Act should be subject to wide public scrutiny and input. Bond Act projects, with the possible exception of land acquisition projects, should be identified in budget bills on a project-by-project basis. No Bond Act funds should be used for noncapital expenditures, to promote or support garbage incineration, or to relieve companies of the financial responsibility for pollution they have created. Regulations should be adopted to govern the selection and implementation of Bond Act projects and programs. The existing regulations regarding public input into the Superfund program (6 NYCRR Part 375) should govern the environmental restoration program. Bond Act funds should not support unnecessary and inappropriate development, such as for real estate developers masquerading as supporters of public access to open space and to bodies of water. All funds for recycling and landfill closure (other than the Fresh Kills landfill) should be appropriated this year. Bond Act funds should be spent on the basis of environmental and public health needs, rather than according to a geographical distribution formula.

3. Authorize Citizens Suits

The purpose of the Environmental Conservation Law (ECL) is to protect the natural resources of N.Y. State from polluters. While the Department of Environmental Conservation and Department of Law are supposed to pursue polluters who violate the ECL, neither agency has the necessary resources to insure adequate enforcement; in addition, sometimes laws are not enforced due to political pressure. Citizens should have the right to sue polluters when the government fails to do so.

E. Recycle Waste

1. Those who produce garbage should be held financially responsible for ensuring its safe disposal. The Greens oppose:

a. the use of garbage incineration. Close and ban trash incinerators;

b. the use of mixed waste co-composting, since the end product is often contaminated with toxics, plastics, metals, and other contaminants.

2. The Greens support:

a, a move toward total recycling through reduction of non-recyclable wastes, composting organic wastes, and increasing the reuse and recycling of other materials.

b. a solid waste program based on promoting waste reduction (such as the state's Environmentally Sound Packaging Act and the German packaging law), re-use of materials, comprehensive recycling and green composting of only food and yard waste, with the residue to be placed in small, environmentally secure landfills.

We support continued Environmental Protection Fund (EPF) spending for DEC's recycling program and the Department of Economic Development's Office of Recycling and Market Development (ORMD). By promoting recycling, the state has also promoted economic development and job creation, with more than 21,000 people now employed in recycling. The state should expand efforts to facilitate job creation and private sector capacity to recycle. For example, we support a requirement that all packages disclose the amount of recycled material contained in the package as a measure that would promote the use of recycled material.

F. Clean Air

Only Los Angeles and Houston suffer from worse ozone pollution than the N.Y. City metropolitan area. In addition, N.Y. City residents breathe dangerous amounts of both carbon monoxide and particulate matter every day. While levels of pollution are generally higher in the N.Y. City area, poor upstate air quality poses a significant health threat as well. In fact, not long ago, the Capital District recorded higher ozone readings than all eight air monitors in the N.Y. City metropolitan region, with the exception of the World Trade Center. The impacts of ozone (smog), carbon monoxide and particulate matter on public health are significant and costly. Research shows an alarming association between pollution levels and hospital admissions for respiratory diseases.

Most of this air pollution comes from the transportation sector. While progress has been made in reducing pollution through better motor vehicle emission standards, more cars are being driven more miles, and diesel buses and trucks remain heavy polluters. Increases in driving have also led to transportation gridlock. In the N.Y. City metropolitan area traffic congestion is stalling the economy and deteriorating the quality of life. Without affirmative measures to control emissions, New York faces loss of federal transportation funds and possible imposition of severe restrictions on the use of automobiles.

1. To improve and maintain air quality we need:

a. strict tailpipe emission limits;

b. an effective inspection and maintenance program for motor vehicles;

c. expanded transit ridership; and

d. improved, least cost transportation planning.

2. New York has adopted the California Low Emission Vehicle (LEV) program,

which contains the Zero Emission Vehicle (ZEV) mandate and encourages the development of alternatively fueled vehicles. New York should continue this program and help spawn enterprising companies to develop clean fuel vehicle industry in N.Y. State, while improving air quality. In addition, diesel buses in urban areas should be phased out and emissions from diesel trucks should be controlled and reduced.

3. Alternate-Fuel Vehicle purchase incentives

Legislation should be passed to provide companies and individuals with incentives for the purchase of alternatively fueled vehicles and the fueling infrastructure necessary to support them. Incentives could include investment tax credits, personal income tax credits and elimination of motor fuel and sales taxes, all of which have been successfully enacted in other states.

4. Heavy Duty Diesel (HDD) Emissions Testing

Legislation must be passed to require DEC to establish a testing program for HDDs in ozone and/or particulate non-attainment areas. Testing should encompass HDDs that are not registered in New York, but travel on roads in the non-attainment areas of the state. Roadside inspections similar to those used for weight of vehicles should be part of the testing program.

5. Emission Fee Cap

In addition to the transportation-based pollution reduction programs, we also need legislation that would eliminate the per ton emission fee cap for stationary sources of air pollution. Currently every ton of pollution up to 6,000 tons carries a set fee, while every ton of pollution over the 6,000 ton amount is, in effect, free. This cap should be eliminated to provide a disincentive to pollute.

G. Parks and Wilderness

1. N.Y. State must do more to protect our few remaining wilderness areas, especially the Adirondack and Catskill Parks. The Greens support:

a. expanding existing forest preserves through purchases of conservation easements and acquisition of land in order to preserve ecologically sensitive areas;

b. the establishment of at least 300-foot setbacks from shorelines for all future construction in the Adirondack and other wilderness areas;

c. state leadership in developing environmentally sound jobs for local Adirondack residents; and

d. the creation of the Working Farm and Forest fund to provide property tax abatements to landowners who pledge not to develop their property.

H. Wetlands

Wetlands are an especially sensitive and productive ecosystem, and it is imperative that they be protected. State law should be changed to protect all wetlands, not just those that are 11 acres or more.

1. Urban Reforestation

Trees in urban areas are one of the few signs of our natural landscape. Trees along city streets make cities greener, healthier, quieter, and more liveable. They provide shade and temperature moderation in the summer heat, and protection from harsh winds in winter. Older trees with graceful canopies not only add beauty and color to neighborhoods, contributing to the value of property, but they also preserve the balance of oxygen in our air, remove harmful pollutants and play an important role in water drainage and soil erosion. Unfortunately, many urban areas are losing trees to neglect, damage or disease and are unable to replace them at the same rate.

We will be asking the Legislature to designate a source of funds for urban reforestation, and suggest as a logical approach the establishment of a highway user fee for outdoor advertising. Billboard owners pay an astonishingly low fee of between $20 and $100 to the state for their use of public highways, while charging their customers tens of thousands of dollars, depending on the size and location of the sign. A fee paid to the State for billboards on interstate and primary roads could raise critically needed funds to establish an urban reforestation fund.

2. Elect DEC Commissioner

The Greens support the direct election of the Commissioner of the state Department of Environmental Conservation. DEC is presently doing an inadequate job of protecting the state's environment.

3. Investigate Brookhaven National Laboratory

The State Legislature should launch an immediate investigation into the public health, safety and environmental risks posed by Brookhaven and other nuclear facilities in N.Y. State.

I. Make Kodak Clean Up

Kodak is one the largest polluters in the N.Y. State and the 20th largest in the U.S.; it is the number one source of air pollution in the Great Lakes. Kodak needs to immediately install state of the art pollution controls at its hazardous waste incinerator, and to change its waste disposal practices to stop the emission of methylene chloride, a known carcinogen.

1. Lead Poisoning

The Greens support increased efforts to protect children and other residents from lead poisoning.

Lead poisoning in children can cause short term memory loss, central nervous system damage, impaired kidney function and in extreme cases can result in brain damage, seizures, coma and even death. Yet lead poisoning is a preventable environmental threat. Since 1993, N.Y. State has required that all young children be screened by their pediatricians for possible exposure. Tens of thousands of children under age 6 tested so far register intolerable lead levels. Lead exposures must be reduced. The Worker Certification and Training Bill is the logical next step, requiring that workers involved in lead removal know how to take the precautions necessary to protect children. This bill will create jobs in N.Y. State while taking advantage of federal funds for lead abatement projects in low and moderate income housing.

2. Environmental Racism

The Greens oppose the present practice of routinely siting environmentally polluting facilities in minority communities. The Greens support legislation to end the practice.

3. Home Rule on Gravel Mining

The Greens support repealing the state legislation that gave the state rather than the local communities the right to regulate and control gravel mining. DEC should be prohibited from issuing a state mining permit until the local government has issued a permit; too often the state's grants a permit even when the operation would be in violation of local zoning.

4. Transportation

Traffic congestion must be addressed by implementing measures that would reduce the need for driving. Transportation planners should be required to pursue least cost transportation demand management strategies on heavily traveled corridors. These include alternatives to road widening, such as:

a. provisions for mass transit, car and van pooling;

b. congestion pricing;

c. land use policies that foster transit-oriented development; and

d. other measures that move people and goods on a given corridor more efficiently than vehicles with single occupants.

One particular bill that should have passed last year would allow local governments to use State road and bridge money for bike and pedestrian paths.

While New York has substantial state and federal transportation resources, these funds are limited and must be spent prudently. Investments in mass transit make prosperous metropolitan regions possible. New York should maintain its commitment to mass transit by:

e. continuing to upgrade subway, bus and commuter rail systems;

f. maintaining fares; and

g. supporting innovative ridership incentive programs such as unlimited ride transit passes and regional fare cards.

Full funding of mass transit capital and operating programs is imperative.

II. HUMAN RIGHTS AND SOCIAL JUSTICE

A. Criminal Justice

1. All New Yorkers should feel safe in their homes and communities. And our criminal justice system should operate to significantly contribute to such safety through effective and just means.

2. A progressive approach to criminal justice recognizes that the matter of criminal and social justice is really about the relationship between the two. Although traditionally there has been a strong and abiding effort to separate them, social justice is a measure of how fair and equally our society operates for all its people, including those adversely affected by the criminal justice system.

3. New York has chosen to address the problem of crime and other serious problems by adopting policies and engaging in acts of social revenge against the poor and people of color. Using harsh punitive and racist measures that often produce more crime, alienation, cynicism and violence, New York has failed to advance public safety and promote equal justice.

4. The Greens recognize that law-breaking by corporations and other white collar criminals is as much a threat to the public well-being as the more commonly feared street crime. The Greens support restructuring the criminal justice system so that corporate and street crimes are prosecuted in proportion to the magnitude of the harm inflicted. OSHA and other government studies show that more than 100,000 workers per year die from occupationally-related disease and preventable accidents in the workplace - far more than the number of individuals who die annually from street crime. White-collar crimes cost the public far more each year than street crime.

5. New York must rethink the way it responds to crime and other deep social problems and restore human values to the criminal justice system.

6. To accomplish these goals, we must:

a. Abolish the death penalty. It is ineffective and costly. It is a form of violence. And it is racist and immoral.

b. Reject life without parole sentences. They fail to recognize the human capacity to change and fully appreciate the value of each human life.

c. Make white collar crime the top priority of law enforcement. These crimes cause more harm to society than so-called `street crime.' White collar crime includes embezzlement, bribery, political corruption, price-fixing, misuse and theft of corporate property, corporate tax evasion, fraud, money laundering, racketeering conspiracies, quasi-legal scams, the maintenance of dangerous work conditions, and intentionally causing occupationally-related diseases.

d. Halt all new prison construction. This will create a saner public climate in which crime and criminal justice issues can be discussed and policy formulated. We must rethink our current response to crime so we can develop a system that is empowering, restorative, community-specific, fair and just.

e. Consider the natural and human impact of new prisons. The New York Environmental Quality Review Act (SEQRA) should be changed to require that the impact on the natural environment and the human impact on prison staff, prisoners, their families and communities be adequately considered before a prison can be constructed in N.Y. State. The Act should also allow community input from residents of communities from which the majority of prisoners will come and return.

f. Eliminate the practice of double-celling. A recent study reports that, `Besides the obvious privacy issues that arise from having to take care of even the most personal bodily functions in such close proximity, there are inherent dangers of violence breaking out between two prisoners so closely confined for long periods of time and of contagion from inmates who may have communicable diseases.' The newly constructed `high tech' double cells used to eliminate all human contact, confine two prisoners in a small space for 24 hours a day, year after year. This isolation has been shown to do irreparable psychological harm and produce deep effect on the soul of the prisoner that can prove quite disabling when they are released into free society.

g. Define and approach the current disproportionate incarceration of African Americans and Latinos as a civil rights issue. These ethnic groups make up more than 85% of the current N.Y. State prison population which has been found to result in part from racial discrimination in the administration of justice.

h. Address the economic development needs of communities now dependent upon a prison industrial complex.

i. Develop and provide a full range of alternative incarceration sentences. Those alternatives should be accessible and available to those convicted of crimes defined as violent and non-violent.

j. Repeal mandatory sentencing laws. They remove judicial discretion and deny justice, which recognizes the uniqueness of each individual and the circumstances of each case.

k. Redefine and use prison as an alternative to community-based sentencing and use prison only under the most extreme circumstances. And when used, prison must focus on individual needs, accountability of the offender, and harm done to the community.

j. Restore the vote to prisoners. Members of African American and Latino communities are more likely to be discriminated against and given prison sentences that disenfranchise prisoners and dilutes the voting strength of their communities. There is no compelling reason to deny prisoners the right to vote.

m. Rethink the drug problem in New York. We must focus on the root causes of drug abuse and make a commitment to eliminate those factors. Drug use must be approached as a health issue rather than a criminal justice issue.

n. Repeal the Rockefeller Drug Laws. Provide quality drug treatment on demand. Relapse must be seen as a natural aspect of treatment.

o. Develop a comprehensive public legal services system for the poor that adequately addresses their civil and legal services needs.

P. Separate the development of criminal justice policy from the Executive Budget process. Criminal justice policy should be developed in an open forum that will allow public scrutiny and input.

B. Community Control of the Police

1. Support the establishment of citizen review and oversight of police departments that is full-time, independent and expert. Communities must create a system that forces police departments to become responsible for developing and implementing management policies that reduce the likelihood that misconduct will occur. Administrators must be held accountable.

2. The police are public servants employed to serve the community and must be responsive and accountable to community needs.

a. Decentralize the urban police forces by placing them under the direct control of elected boards at the neighborhood level.

b. Require that police live in the neighborhoods they serve.

3. Citizen Police Review Boards The Greens endorse the establishment of citizen police review boards wherever supported by the community. Civilian police review boards should have a direct role in the development of policy, as well as reviewing complaints about police conduct. Internal police review of police misconduct should be eliminated.

The citizen police review boards should:

a. be elected;

b. have subpoena powers;

c. have career-track professional investigators with no ties to the police department;

d. provide protection of both civilians and officers due-process rights;

e. have authority to impose sanctions on police officers who violate citizens rights.

C. Indian Treaty Rights

1. Respect the sovereignty and treaty rights of New York's Indian nations. The Greens call upon the federal and state governments to honor their treaty commitments to indigenous peoples. The Greens support governmental recognition of indigenous nations right to self-determination and self-government.

2. Stop N.Y. State's imposition of sales taxes on Indian businesses on sovereign Indian land.

3. Stop the exploitation of natural resources on the lands of indigenous peoples by the state and private companies, and the destruction and pollution of those lands by mining and waste-dumping practices.

4. The Greens support the rights of indigenous people to participate in and celebrate their own culture.

D. Ending Sexism

1. The Greens want to create an open, non-sexist, non-racist society in which all people will be free to develop to their full potential. Historically, women's contributions have been fundamental to the development of our society and yet continue to be undervalued.

2. In a society where leadership is almost exclusively male, we support:

a. active efforts, including numerical goals, to create opportunities for full participation by women;

b. strong, effective affirmative action programs, including programs within unions, to bring about full representation of women.

3. Women's liberty is severely restricted by the ever present threat of violence. We reject the acceptance of violence as normal in male-female relationships. At least one out of four women is physically beaten by a male partner. We must provide help for battered families, including legal resources, psychological counseling and accessible centers and programs which aid women in achieving freedom from economic dependence on men.

4. Rape is an act of violence. We support:

a. programs which provide strong, effective measures to combat rape, including marital rape;

b. active reform of existing rape laws (including enlargement beyond traditional legal concepts the circumstances under which the crime is considered to have occurred);

c. legal and medical support for rape victims;

d. school and community programs which train women to defend themselves from rape.

5. The Greens support:

a. the enactment and enforcement of legislation to prohibit sexual harassment.

b. elimination of job discrimination against women with children;

c. programs such as flexible work hours, work-place child care, and part-time employment at all job levels.

E. Ending Racism

1. Racism remains a major problem in our society. The struggle for democracy has been continuously and systematically frustrated by racist practices and assumptions which affect every institution of American life. This dynamic is the basis of oppression of African-Americans and other minorities, as well as the means by which an overwhelming majority of whites also lose in the quest for democratic government. The profits derived from racism have contributed to the corporate domination of American life.

2. The Greens are actively anti-racist. We oppose institutional, interpersonal and cultural racism.

3. The Greens support:

a. the full implementation of affirmative action programs in both public and private sectors of the economy;

b. equality of opportunity for all members of our society, regardless of their religion, gender, sexual preference, race, age or ethnic origin; and

c. strong enforcement of Civil Right Laws.

F. Ending Heterosexism

1. The Greens support legislation to outlaw discrimination based on sexual orientation. The Greens support:

a. the rights of gay, lesbian and bisexual people in housing, jobs, benefits, child custody and all areas of life;

b. the legal recognition of gay and lesbian relationships;

c. legislation to provide penalties for acts of violence and intimidation motivated by bias based on race, creed, color, national origin, sex, disability, age, or sexual orientation.

d. enactment of legislation to require private organizations and clubs whose membership services significant business purpose to accept members on a non-discriminatory basis without regard to an individuals race, creed, color, national origin, gender, disability, age, or sexual orientation.

2. Multi-cultural Democracy Institutionalized racism, sexism, and heterosexism must be uprooted through:

a. affirmative action to ensure equal opportunity;

b. social programs that guarantee every person full access to the means to life: food, housing, health care, education, employment, and a non-toxic environment;

c. participatory democratic political and economic institutions that enable every person to contribute the full measure of their abilities and creativity to improving the community and the environment;

d. economic reconstruction that equalizes wealth among communities;

e. public education to foster mutual respect and understanding by people of all ethnic groups, genders, and sexual orientation.

III. Grassroots Democracy

The average citizen should have the right to make the political and economic decisions that determine the quality of life for their families and communities. The Greens support the use and development of democratic forms of government that will break the stranglehold that large corporations and the wealthy have over our political and economic system. Political power must be transferred to the people at the grassroots level.

A. Participatory Democracy

1. Political power must be transferred from political elites in elected and bureaucratic office to the people at the grassroots. The Greens want to replace the vertical hierarchy of the centralized state with a horizontal confederation of citizen assemblies. We call for city and county charter changes and state constitutional changes to:

a. establish face-to-face citizen assemblies in each neighborhood and town as the legislative power in society, with legislative authority in their own communities and legislative control from below over the larger jurisdictions (municipal, county, state) with which they are associated. They should be guaranteed sufficient funding to citizen assemblies to insure that they can hire the staff and experts needed to play an autonomous role in the decision-making process;

b. empower citizen assemblies to give binding instructions to their representatives and the use of immediate recall to enable voters to remove elected officials who no longer are representing the will and interests of the local residents;

c. confederal assemblies with legally enforceable claims on confederal resources to insure adequate floors for income and basic services and on the basis of legally enforceable guarantees of civil rights and liberties for all people without regard for race, color, creed, nationality, sex, or political views. These guarantees, already in the state constitution, should be retained and enforced.

d. replace centralized chief executive officers (mayor, county executive, governor) and their concentrated executive power with executive branch agencies that are more accountable to the legislative branch whose power derives from the confederation of citizen assemblies. The legislative branch should make policy. The executive branch should be limited to administering policy. More executive branch officials should be elected.

e. significantly curtail the powers of the Assembly Speaker and Senate MajorityLeader in the State Legislature. The practice of providing lulus to State Legislators should be ended; state legislative salaries should be set at the average salary for N.Y. State residents (based on a full-time, full-year job).

f. extend the Freedom of Information Law and Open Meetings Law to the State Legislature.

g. provide no increase in salaries for elected and public officials once they have been elected or appointed to their term of office (i.e., a general election must take place between the time the pay raise is approved and it takes effect).

h. amend the civil rights law to permit the exercise of free speech and the right to petition in the common areas of shopping malls.

A. Economic Democracy

1. Economic power must be transferred from corporate and state ownership to democratic forms of ownership and control: worker and consumer cooperatives, decentralized and democratic public enterprise, non-profit community development projects, and small individual businesses. Regulation of the economy must move from the profit motives of the wealthy few to the democratically chosen priorities of the majority. The Greens therefore call for:

a. public funding and technical assistance for worker cooperatives and worker/community takeovers of private corporations;

b. increased community control and ownership of banking, insurance, energy, transportation, media, health care, land and natural resources; and

c. decentralized, democratic structures of participatory economic planning to insure community control of local development and grassroots-democratic control of regional and statewide projects.

B. Proportional Representation

1. Our winner-take-all electoral system is fundamentally anti-democratic. It denies people of color and political minorities their fair share of representation and power. By systematically under-representing minorities, it inflates the power of bare majorities or pluralities far beyond their actual support in the population.

2. Every democratic country in the world uses some form of proportional representation except the U.S., the U.K., and Canada. The new democracies in Eastern Europe and in South Africa chose proportional representation. New Zealand just switched to proportional representation. In countries with proportional representation, more people vote, more women and minorities are elected, and more parties and points of view get representation.

3. The Green Party calls upon N.Y. State to lead the U.S. in replacing the undemocratic winner-take-all system with a proportional representation system. Specifically, we call for:

a. Instant Run-off Voting for the Election of Single-Member Offices (Governor, Lieutenant-Governor, Attorney General, Comptroller, U.S. Senators, District State Legislative Representatives): With instant runoff voting (also called preference voting) voters rank candidates in order of preference. If a candidate receives over 50% on the first ballot, she wins. If not, the last place candidate is eliminated and ballots for that candidate are distributed to the designated second preference. This process continues until a candidate receives over 50%. Instant Runoff Voting eliminates the problem of choosing the lesser evil, giving all parties the true measure of their support in the first round of counting.

b. Mixed-Member Proportional Representation in a Unicameral State Legislature: Voters will vote once (by preferential ballot) for their district State Legislative Representative and then again for the party of their choice. Half the seats will be elected from single-member districts and half from the party vote. Seats are awarded in proportion to the party vote, with district seats elected counting toward the party's total. This mixed member proportional system combines the advantages of proportional representation -- a fair share of representation to all groups -- with the advantages of single-member district representatives -- representation of and service to the districts' constituents. The unicameral legislature better represents the democratic will of the people. Our current bicameral legislature often results in the thwarting of the democratic will by institutional gridlock.

C. Public Campaign Financing

The Clean Election / Clean Money Option

1. Our democracy is in crisis. At the heart of this crisis is the increasingly unfair and unworkable system by which private interests finance the election campaigns of public officials. State legislators and the Governor spend the legislative session soliciting campaign contributions from the special interests that lobby them for political favors. This system of privately financed election campaigns disenfranchises ordinary citizens who cannot afford to make large campaign contributions, and encourages our elected representatives to put the private interests of their campaign contributors ahead of the needs and concerns of their constituents - and of our state as a whole. Many good candidates never run for office due to the huge sums of money needed to mount an effective challenge.

2. Piecemeal reforms will not resolve this crisis - nor, unfortunately, will our existing state legislators who benefit from the present system. We need an entirely new system of democratically financed election campaigns. Under such a system, qualified candidates for public office who pledge not to accept or spend any private money whatsoever during the primary and general election would be eligible to receive total public financing and other public resources with which to conduct their campaigns.

3. The Clean Elections Option would work as follows:

a. Candidates accept spending limits and give up private contributions. "Clean Election" candidates must agree to strict spending limits. The candidates must also agree not to accept any private money during the election campaign.

b. Candidates qualify as a Clean Election candidate by showing broad public support, such as collecting four thousand $5 contributions during a prequalifying period of January through April for a statewide campaign (e.g., Governor), with correspondingly lesser amounts for lower offices (e.g., 250 contributions for State Assembly)

c. During the pre-primary period, candidates could raise contributions of up to $100 for seed money to start their campaigns. Any amounts so raised would be deducted from their subsequent public financing.

d. Candidates who qualify as Clean Election candidates receive equal funding and run on a level playing field.

e. One of the principal barriers to campaign finance reform remains the U.S. Supreme Court, which has protected campaign contributions, especially party and independent expenditures, as a form of first amendment speech. As with many election law cases, the Court is wrong - it refuses to recognize the overriding public interest in clean elections. However, the Clean Elections Option is constitutional, because it is a voluntary option. If a candidate's opponent decides not to accept the Clean Elections Option, then there would be an increase in funds to the Clean Elections candidate. Similarly, if independent expenditures are made on behalf of a candidate, the Clean Elections candidate would receive additional funding.

f. The funding for a Clean Election candidate would be limited to 65% of the average of the last two campaigns for such office. Funding for primaries would be available, with additional funding also provided to non-primary candidates engaged in the same general election. Independent/third party candidates would also be eligible for funding. The Greens support Clean Elections for county and local candidates as well as state legislature.

g. The Greens would reduce the legal limit on campaign contributions to political parties from $70,000 to $200. Candidates not agreeing to abide by the Clean Elections Option would have a limit of $100 per contribution.

h. The Clean Money Option would save tax dollars, because the cost to taxpayers of special favors, sweetheart contracts and tax breaks delivered in return for campaign dollars would be greatly reduced.

D. Election Law Reform

1. Voters, not the candidates ability to navigate the technical requirements of the states ballot access laws, should determine who represent them. The states election law needs to be dramatically overhauled to reduce the power of party officials and special interests to dominate the political process. To this end the Greens support:

a. limits on the number of terms an elected official can hold office to help return our elected bodies to the average citizen rather than career politicians;

b. giving voters the opportunity to vote against candidates by voting for None of the Above to force parties to put forth candidates and platforms acceptable to the people;

c. the adoption of strong ethics legislation to prohibit conflicts of interests among elected officials. Party and elected officials should be required to fully disclose all their financial interests and sources of income;

d. the adoption of the initiative and referendum at the municipal, county, and state levels to allow voters to directly decide issues of concern to them;

e. candidates having the opportunity to correct any technical deficiencies in their petitions once they are submitted to the Board of Elections;

f. dramatically reducing the number of signatures required to be on the ballot and candidates should have the opportunity to go out and collect additional signatures if the Board of Elections should determine that more are needed;

g. eliminating witness requirements for petitions;

h. amending the election law so as not to favor major party candidates over independents;

i. removing control over the Board of Elections from the two major parties (i.e., the Commissioner of the State and County Board of Election should not have an affiliation with any political party);

j. enacting progressive campaign finance laws to restrict the ability of special interests to dominate the political process;

k. guaranteeing all candidates equal access to the media;

l. limiting the maximum individual or PAC contribution for any race to $1,000.

IV. ECONOMIC JUSTICE

A. Economic Justice

1. The Greens call for building a new economy, one in which workers and consumers exercise democratic control (and ownership) over economic decisions. The Greens realize that strong environmental protection is key to the development of a sustainable economy that can provide a decent standard of living for all its citizens.

2. Economic decision making must be made part of the democratic process. The people must have an effective voice in deciding such essential questions as what goods and services shall be produced; where and how they shall be produced; what prices shall be charged; and how the wealth of the nation shall be invested.

3. N.Y. State now ranks worst in the U.S. in income equality - and the U.S. ranks worst in the world among industrial democracies. New York is even worse in the gap in income between the rich and the middle class. The average income of the top fifth of New York families is 19.5 times greater than that of the bottom fifth (national average is 12.7). Income inequality in New York is growing not simply because the rich are getting richer but because both the poor and the middle class are seeing their real income decline. Establishing income equality in New York is a top priority for the Green and must be the top priority of any economic development plan, agenda, investment, expenditures, etc.

4. N.Y. State should provide leadership in developing blueprints for economic development at the local, regional and state levels. A democratic economic plan should begin with a democratic method of defining realistic goals for the economy, and defining priorities. Priorities for local community investment must be developed. Indirect costs of projects need to be clearly identified - the impact on unemployment, pollution, and taxes.

5. There are a number of goals a democratic economy must accomplish to provide economic justice:

a. meet the social needs of our communities, especially in the critical areas of housing, food, energy, and health care;

b. distribute our state's wealth, income, and power in a just and equitable manner. Work should raise families out of poverty, enabling them to obtain a decent standard of living;

B. Workers Rights

1. We support:

a. the organization of democratic labor unions in all workplaces;

b. rank-and-file movements for democracy in existing labor unions;

c. international labor networks to coordinate struggles against the international power of capital;

d. the outlawing of permanent employment of replacements for striking workers;

e. democratic workplaces and workers control of the immediate production process;

f. the right of workers and their communities to seize the assets of runaway corporations through eminent domain or direct action.

C. Full Employment For All At Living Wages

Everyone who wants to work must be entitled to a job at a decent wage. Public job banks should be established so that people who cannot find decent work in the private sector can take a quality publicly funded job. These public jobs would be the core of a democratically organized system of unalienated and ecological work that fulfills community-defined needs and promotes ecologically sound development. To achieve full employment, the Greens support such measures as a shortened work week, lengthened vacations, limitations on forced overtime, and socially-useful public works to create jobs.

1. State Constitutional Amendment to Guarantee a Job for All New Yorkers

The Green support a state (and federal) constitutional guarantee of a job at a living wage for all those who wish to work.

2. Restrict Plant Closings

The Greens favor restrictions on plant closings which threaten the viability of communities. We support programs that enable communities to propose alternatives to closings, such as government guaranteed loans to enable workers to purchase plants and modernize them, and company or government guarantee of wages and benefits until workers affected by plant closings can find suitable employment.

D. Guaranteed Minimum Income

All New Yorkers, including welfare participants, should have the right to a guaranteed minimum income to ensure them a decent standard of living, including the ability to obtain such basic necessities as adequate housing, food, medical care, utilities, and education. The Greens support ending poverty now by doubling public assistance grants to 130% of the poverty line and, in the longer run, replace the welfare bureaucracy with a negative income tax that automatically gives low income people a guaranteed minimum income above the poverty line.

1. Fair Minimum Wage

The Greens support restoring the minimum wage to its historical level of 50% of the average, non-supervisory agriculture wage, and indexing it to inflation, raising the minimum wage immediately to $6.50 an hour. The minimum wage should be transformed into a Living Wage, starting at a least $10 an hour. The Greens support establishing of a maximum wage at a level no higher than 10 times the minimum wage.

2. Dislocated Workers

Instead of paying to keep people on unemployment, we should be paying to give them new skills to find jobs. We should provide more opportunities for people on unemployment to enter education and job training programs and should explore providing unemployment compensation grants for business start-up ventures.

3. Workers Superfund for Income Security and Reduced Work Hours at Same Pay

Income, education, and retraining should be provided to all workers displaced by bankruptcies, corporate flight, military conversion, and technological change. Income earning opportunities should be shared equitably by progressively reducing the work week with no loss in pay until everyone willing and able to work has a good job. This way social productivity gains will accrue to all instead of only corporate owners. The Workers Superfund would provide income and education/retraining grants to displaced workers until they find a new line of work and provide a second check to make up for reduced working hours, a social dividend representing each workers share of socially created wealth.

4. Economic Conversion

N.Y. State should establish a state program to support community-based programs for developing alternative uses for military and defense industry facilities and to assist demobilized soldiers and defense industry workers with income, education, and retraining grants.

5. Pension Funds

The largest owners of corporations in the U.S. are workers through their pension funds' investments. The Greens advocate taking away the control of these pension funds from banks and other financial managers and restoring control to their true owners.

6. Comparable Worth

The Greens support an economic system that recognizes and rewards the value of work traditionally done by women such as child care, homemaking, and care of elderly or disabled relatives. Women and men must receive equal pay for work of comparable value.

E. Universal, Affordable Child Care

1. All New York parents and their children should be guaranteed access to quality, affordable (i.e., nominal fee based on sliding scale) child care.

2. Inadequate child-care service is often cited as a reason people can't enter the workforce. The Greens support:

a. increased state funding of day care services to allow more people to go to work and to create jobs in low-income communities;

b. encouraging companies to develop work site child care options;

c. creation of a quality, free public daycare system for infants and children; and

d. an increase the salaries of all daycare staff.

F. Welfare Reform

The welfare system should help, not punish, participants.

1. Children. Most welfare recipients are children. The U.S. is the only industrial country in the world where children are the largest segment of the poverty population. More than one in four children in N.Y. State lives in poverty. The Greens support:

a. the adoption of a children's allowance program to ensure that every child has the income needed to obtain basic necessities and to become a productive citizen;

b. recognizing the value of child rearing.

2. Training and education programs:

a. are needed for welfare participants, tailored to the needs of the individual. The Greens recognize that such programs will fail unless there is a commitment to create decent paying jobs.

b. should be mandatory for all Department of Social Service workers.

3. The Greens support the establishment of maximum caseload sizes per worker.

4. The Greens oppose:

a. the fingerprinting of welfare recipients and applicants.

b. efforts to effect changes in recipients behavior by reducing the already immorally low level of benefits. The welfare system should not economically punish recipients for finding paid work.

5. The Greens support establishing an adequate guaranteed minimum income for all New Yorkers. As a short term step, the Greens support raising public assistance benefits to the mid-1970's level of 130% of poverty (with food stamps included).

6. The Greens oppose the use of workfare as unpaid forced labor. Workfare participants should have all the rights of other workers, including salary, fringe benefits and the right to unionize. The Greens support replacing workfare with a job at a living wage for all those able to work. Welfare reform should support individuals seeking job training and college education. Transitional benefits such as child care and health care should be extended to two years for welfare participants leaving for employment.

7. The Greens support use of the ADA definition of disability in terming exemption from work requirements under the existing state welfare law.

8. The Greens support $250 million in funding for a demonstration community services job program for welfare participants and unemployed individuals. The program would provide individuals with a pay check, real job experience and job training while meeting unmet community needs.

9. The Greens support $30 million in funding for transportation initiatives to help welfare participants travel to jobs.

10. Nutrition

The Greens believe that all New Yorkers have the right to an adequate diet. To support this right, the Greens support:

a. making the Women, Infants and Children (WIC) program an entitlement program;

b. requiring that every school participate in the federal school breakfast and lunch programs, and providing universal access to such programs;

c. providing full funding to the Meals on Wheels program for disabled, homebound senior citizens;

d. simplifying the application process for the food stamp program;

e. doubling funding for the state's Hunger Prevention and Nutrition Assistance Program (HPNAP) which provides funding to local food pantries and soup kitchens; and

f. expanding the state food stamp program for immigrants to include adults.

G. Affordable Housing

1. Every New Yorker has the right to decent, safe, affordable housing. Homelessness is a significant problem in N.Y. State that is primarily caused by a lack of affordable housing.

2. The Greens long range goal is to replace private speculative ownership of land and housing for profit with social ownership (public, cooperative, and limited-equity household) under tenant control, with security of tenure and equity assured, but with resale for profit prohibited. Additional public funding is required.

3. The Greens advocate:

a. public funding of housing to go only to non-profit builders;

b. public capital grants to replace debt financing to reduce public housing costs

4. N.Y. State faces a dramatic affordable housing crisis which has worsened over recent years, especially for low-income New Yorkers. A study by the National Low-Income Housing Coalition identified New York as the least affordable state in the nation for one- and two-bedroom units. 1.4 million New Yorkers live in housing that is unaffordable - one out of every three renters can not afford their housing.

5. Funding for the various state housing programs need to be dramatically increased. Funding for the Neighborhood Preservation Program for rental housing units should be increased to $24 million. Funding for the N.Y. State Housing Trust Fund should be increased to $50 million; for the Homeless Housing Assistance Program to $60 million; and for the Homeless Housing / Rehousing Program to $8 million.

6. The Greens support:

a. doubling state funding for programs such as the Homeless Housing Assistance Program, Low-Income Housing Trust Fund, Affordable Home Ownership Development Program, and Turnkey Program;

b. providing $15 million in state funds for the Homeless Prevention and Homeless Rehousing Assistance Program, which provides funding to local legal services and community-based organizations to help individuals resolve situations that could result in homelessness and to make the transition from shelters to permanent housing.

7. Public investment in affordable housing should be increased, including the use of public pension funds, in constructing affordable housing for low and moderate income New Yorkers;

8. Existing federally subsidized housing in N.Y. State through tenant protections, technical assistance, capital grants and capital loans should be preserved and $50 million should be allocated to such a grant and loan program.

9. Rural Rental Assistance Program

State funding of an annual $20 million should be given to the Rural Rental Assistance Program (RAP) which provides direct rental subsidies to low-income elderly, disabled and non-elderly large families residing in multi-family housing.

10. Mobile Home Cooperative Fund

A Mobile Home Cooperative Fund should be established to provide loans to support cooperative ownership of mobile home parks.

11. Special Needs Housing Program

The Greens support providing at least $15 million in funding for the Special Needs Housing Program to support the development of SRO (Single Room Occupancy) units;

12. Rent Subsidy The Greens support the establishment of a rent subsidy program to assist households with income below 150% of poverty and which require rental subsidies in order to obtain or maintain standards of health and safety. This will aid the nearly half of all low-income renters in N.Y. State who spend 2/3 or more of their income on housing.

13. Community Land Trusts The Greens support the establishment of community land trusts to eliminate speculation and profit-taking on the ownership of land.

14. Rent Control Rent control ensures the access of tenants to affordable housing while providing landlords a reasonable rate of return on their investment. The state's rent control laws should become permanent and be extended to every municipality with less than a 5% vacancy rate.

15. Urban Reconstruction under Community Control

A major portion of the savings from military spending cuts should be invested in a Domestic Marshall Plan for a humane and ecological reconstruction of our cities, including infra-structure, housing, transportation, public meeting space for neighborhood assemblies, and full employment. All redevelopment planning should be under community control, with boards elected by the people, not appointed by the mayors.

V. HEALTH CARE

A. Universal, Single-Payer Health Care

1. The Greens recognize that health care is a basic human right. The Greens support a health care system that provides quality health care to all New Yorkers regardless of their employment status. This includes:

a. the immediate adoption of a single-payer, universal health care system that provides affordable, quality health care to all New Yorkers. A single-payer system would eliminate the need for private health insurance, saving New York consumers an estimated $2.5 billion a year. A single-payer system would also impose important cost controls such as global budgeting on the health care industry while preserving the consumers right to decide from whom they receive health care services.

b. decentralize and democratize the health care delivery system by making it publicly owned and democratically controlled from the community level.

c. long-term care, prescription drug, mental health and dental care services;

d. deductible and co-payment barriers removed;

e. financing by the whole population based on the ability to pay; avoidance of premiums for each worker which are regressive. Large businesses should not have the option to opt out of the health care system to obtain their own health insurance.

f. increased resources to training primary care providers rather than specialists;

g. expanding loan forgiveness for primary care providers who practice in medically underserved areas;

2. In the short term, we need to greatly expand consumer rights with respect to Health Maintenance Organizations. The state should expand subsidized health insuranceto cover children up to 300% of the federal poverty level, which would cover 86% of the state's uninsured children. Premiums for Child Health Care Coverage should be on a sliding scale but only for families above 200% of the federal poverty level. The State should ensure medical care coverage for immigrants. New York should redefine Medicaid "emergency care" as broadly as possible to include all health care for any person with a diagnosed chronic medical condition, and any health care provided for a medical or mental health condition that will, if left untreated, potentially lead to the serious deterioration of the person's health.

3. Prevention

Our health care system should focus on keeping citizens healthy, rather than on curing people once they get sick.

The Greens support increased efforts to reduce exposure to second-hand smoke. The Greens support increased taxes on tobacco products to help finance our health care system.

4. Community Control

Our present medical system is overly regulated to increase the salaries and profits of doctors, insurance companies and HMOs, while restricting the ability of traditional health care providers such as midwives to provide needed medical services. Community control needs to be reasserted over our health care system including publicly owned hospitals and clinics.

5. Long Term Care

Any national or state health care plan should include long term care. The Greens support the establishment of a single Point of Access to long-term care to ensure thatthe needs of the patients and their families - not the health car providers - are met. Such an access system would ensure that all consumers receive help in obtaining the most appropriate and cost-effective services, often non-medical community based services, as they move through the long term care system. Early intervention can help the elderly and disabled adults maintain their independence longer.

6. Family Medical Leave

The Greens support enactment of the state Family Medical Leave Act, which would require employers to provide up to sixteen weeks of unpaid medical leave during any 24-month period to

a. care for a newborn or adopted child;

b. provide care for a parent, household member or child; or

c. seek attention for a serious health condition.

The employer would be required to maintain health benefits for the employee for the duration of the leave period.

B. Reproductive Rights

1. Our health care system must include full reproductive freedom for women. We support:

a. the right to free and complete birth control information and devices for all men and women and for all adolescents with or without parental consent;

b. the right to free abortion;

c. the right to free counseling and support for pregnant women;

d. the right to complete free maternity care;

e. the right to post-partum leave for both parents;

f. the right to be free from involuntary sterilization;

g. full funding for the Prenatal Care Assistance Program; and

h. expansion of sex education programs in schools.

2. We oppose proposals that seek to impose parental consent requirements for teenagers.

C. AIDS / HIV

1. The Greens strongly advocate increased state and federal funding for programs to expand AIDS-centered research, education, and care programs.

2. New York is still the epicenter of America's AIDS/HIV epidemic, accounting for a quarter of all the AIDS cases in the nation. AIDS and HIV infection in our state has continued to expand, particularly among women, African-Americans, Latinos, poor people and IV drug users.

3. NY has made progress in the fight against AIDS by emphasizing universal access to a system of high-quality medical care and preventive services, including Medicaid, specialized AIDS housing programs and legal needle exchange and harm reduction programs for drug users. But funding for these programs have not kept pace with costs or with the demand for programs.

4. Successful new treatments are helping hundreds of thousands of New Yorkers beat HIV and regain their health, but to use the drugs you need basics like a home, food and refrigerator. Thousands of homeless New Yorkers are waiting for an opening in support housing programs. New York should increase the emergency HIV rental allowance to the HUD market rent, target $15 million for AIDS supportive housing programs at the Department of Temporary and Disability Assistance, and target $5 million for operating AIDS housing in the Homeless Housing Assistance Program.

5. $20 million is needed in 1998 to build high-quality and efficient HIV HMOs. Managed care delivery systems can increase assess to primary and preventive care for poor and disabled Medicaid consumers if they are built right. The HIV Special Needs Plans developed by NYSDOH with the AIDS community provides a road map to high quality and affordable HIV care.

6. New York should spend $3 million to maintain access to legal needle exchanges and HIV prevention services for IV drug users.

7. New York should invest $3 million in specialized job training and welfare-to-work slots open to beneficiaries living with AIDS and HIV.

D. Mental Health

1. The Greens support increased investment in community residences to enable those who suffer from mental health problems to live independently. Over the past four years of the Community Mental Health Reinvestment Act, over $100 million of the money promised to localities for community based programs have been taken away by the state government. The Greens support fulfilling the reinvestment promised by CMHRA. The Greens support renewing the Investment bill to ensure the future funding of new community programs. The new bill should include:

a. continuation of the reinvestment of the savings from the closure of psychiatric hospital beds and hospitals;

b. savings from profits generated from the managed care plans for individuals with mental needs (Special Needs Plans); and

c. savings generated from the sale of property around psychiatric centers.

2. State funding is needed for 14,000 new community beds for the mentally ill. The Greens support funding a joint N.Y. City/State venture to generate 10,000 new housing units for the homeless, mentally ill in N.Y. City.

3. The Greens support increased funding for mental health research.

4. Insurance coverage for mental illnesses needs to receive equal coverage to other physical illness. New York needs to pass "parity" legislation that has more teeth than the federal parity legislation. The federal legislation is limited to covering only employers with more than 50 employees. It also allows employers to drop the coverage if an increase of more than two percent occurs with premiums.

5. Ethics

Doctors should be prohibited from referring their patients to laboratories, clinics and other health care businesses in which the doctor has a financial investment.

VI. Free Public Education

1. The Greens regard education as the basic requirement of a democracy based on an informed, responsible and active citizenry. The quality of a child's education should not be dependent on the wealth of their parents or community.

2. The educational process must be restructured to emphasize critical thinking and lay the basis for independent judgement, respect for others, and social consciousness. We believe that the best educational climate is one that is flexible enough to adjust to individual needs and that encourages individual self-development through the recognition and promotion of individual strengths.

3. Focus on Individual Needs

The Greens support a greater emphasis on:

a. individual instruction;

b. small classes; and

c. the development of teaching aids designed to:

i. identify individual problem areas;

ii. evaluate individual progress; and

iii. tailor programs to satisfy individual needs.

4. Free Public Education through University Level for All

Education, including colleges, should be free, since college education is as necessary today as a high school diploma was 30 years ago.

5. Academic and Vocational Skills

Academic and vocational skills should be given equal weight and respect.

6. Bi-lingual Education

The Greens support the continuation and expansion of bi-lingual education program in areas with a significant number of non-English-speaking persons; Literacy and Adult Education We need to invest in increased literacy and computer skills programs that reflect the realities of the emerging workplace.

7. School-to-Work

Unfortunately, training for young American workers often takes place in fast food restaurants and other low skill jobs. Our middle schools and high schools need programs to expose youth to jobs at an early age, including youth apprentice programs that provide job training in conjunction with school.

8. Tech-Prep Centers

Our schools fall far short of preparing youth for jobs of the 21st century. Tech-Prep centers are model programs that combine the last two years of high school with two years of technical college and teach skills needed to work in high-tech fields.

9. Cooperation, Not Competition

The Greens oppose the way our present educational system tends to encourage competition between students. Education should develop cooperation among students through joint projects, student-to-student learning, etc.

10. Funding

a. Fund the schools out of progressive broad-based taxes, not regressive property taxes. The property tax is an unfair way to finance education. The property tax, instead of being a tax on wealth as initially envisioned when our country was founded 200 years ago, has become primarily a tax on housing. The property tax unduly burdens senior citizens and low end moderate income households since they pay a higher percentage of their income for housing. The quality of a child's education should not depend on the wealth of their local community. Schools should primarily be financed out of the state income tax and federal funds.

b. The state should immediately increase its funding to cover 50% of the total cost of operating public schools.

11. Mainstreaming

a. Those who are physically or mentally impaired should have access to mainstream public education. The Greens support the revision of curriculum and teaching methods to foster a critical citizenry rather than a passive, depoliticized workforce for capital.

b. While we recognize the need for testing to help measure a students educational progress, we deplore that it frequently serves in subordinating individual needs to the needs of a fictional norm. We also recognize that testing often reflects the cultural biases or limitations of those designing and administering the test.

c. N.Y. State should invest $15 billion over the next five years to rebuild schools. It is a scandal that in a state as wealthy as New York schools are literally falling down around students. Children shouldn't be sitting in classrooms with ceilings crumbling overhead, bricks falling off of walls and boilers not working.

d. The Greens also supports the immediate conversion of the 150 schools in N.Y. City that are still burning coal for heat. A report last year by the State Education Department found that $15 billion work of school construction is needed statewide over the next five years just to have safe, healthy schools. That doesn't include technology upgrades.

VII. Participatory Culture and Media

1. The Greens recognize that free and diverse artistic expressions are vital for challenging people to rethink their assumptions and for educating people about past and present issues and future visions. The Greens oppose censorship in the arts, and encourage individual and social responsibility by artists. We support:

a. public funding of artistic and cultural endeavors to benefit all and develop community, not elitist cultural centers;

b. public funding of independent artists through peer-review panels, free from state censorship; and

c. public funding for community media: TV, video, radio, alternative presses, and public bulletin boards in order to expand and diversity the voices heard on social and political issues

VIII. Public Finance

A. Progressive Tax Reform

1. Establish a progressive tax system which makes wealthy individuals and large corporations pay their fair share of the tax burden. In N.Y. State, as one's income increases, the percentage of one's income that goes towards paying state and local taxes (e.g., income, sales, and property taxes) decreases. This is unfair and should be reversed by:

a. closing loopholes on the corporate franchise tax making multi-state and multi-national corporations pay their fair share of the corporate tax burden. Corporations should be required to disclose how much taxes they pay to other states and countries.

b. extending the state sales tax to include business services (accountants, lawyers, consultants, data processing, etc.) to reflect how our economy has changed from a base of manufacturing to services;

c. making the state sales tax progressive by providing a simple sales tax rebate system as part of the state income tax forms;

d. restoring the personal income tax rate to 15% for the top income bracket;

e. exempting primary homes from the property tax;

f. establishing progressive wealth and inheritance taxes;

g. increasing the state Earned Income Tax Credit to ensure that all working individuals have an income above the federal poverty level; and

increasing the property tax credit for low-income homeowners and renters in order to provide property tax relief.

2. The Greens also support implementing the prior state law requiring 8% of state revenues to be shared with local governments. The Greens would grant municipalities and counties home rule on taxation so they can reduce regressive sales and property taxes and generate more revenues from progressive income, wealth and inheritance taxes.

B. State Budget Process Reform

The State Budget, which determines how the state's spending priorities for its $70 billion annual budget, is one of the more important pieces of legislation enacted by the State Legislature each year. In recent years, the State Budget has increasingly been decided by the Governor, Assembly Speaker and Senate Majority Leader behind closed doors, with little input and virtually no oversight from rank and file legislators or taxpayers. 1998 saw the use of joint conference committees to resolve budget differences between the two houses of legislature; while this was a step in the right direction, the budget was still primarily a closed door affair decided by legislative leaders.

1. Key points of state budget process reform include:

a. developing an independent, non-partisan Budget Office to oversee revenue forecasting;

b. the use of conference committees to resolve differences between the budgets of the two houses;

c. a specific, agreed upon timetable for the adoption of the budget;

d. the adoption of a comprehensive three year financial plan;

e. opening up the budget-making process of individual state agencies to greater public scrutiny;

f. ensuring that all documents relating to the state budget are available to the public;

g. making the state budget more performance-based; and

h. requiring that legislators and the general public be able to read the budget before it is voted upon.

2. It is important that budget process reform be enacted into law.

3. The state budget should not be allowed to be adopted through a message of necessity from the Governor, which waives the normal three-day period before a bill can be voted upon. If the legislature is unable to agree upon a budget by the beginning of the fiscal year, the budget from the previous year should be used, with adjustments for inflation as certified by the State Comptroller.

4. Home Rule on Taxation

Grant municipalities and counties home rule on taxation so that they can reduce regressive sales and property taxes and generate more revenues from progressive income, wealth, and inheritance taxes.

5. Democratic Public Enterprise

Public policy and spending should support increasing community ownership of community wealth, so that as neighborhoods, cities, towns, and counties increasingly own and develop their own productive wealth, a portion of the surplus produced by economic activity goes straight into the public treasuries. The sectors that should be socialized, decentralized, and democratized as soon as possible include banking, insurance, energy, transportation, health care, and natural resources.

C. Corporate Welfare Reform

The Greens support the elimination of most if not all forms of corporate welfare. It is outrageous that the Governor, State Legislature and local governments continue to hand out billions in corporate welfare each year as vital services are cut and local property and sales taxes continue to skyrocket. Corporate welfare also hurts the competitiveness of small companies and other businesses that do not receive special breaks.

N.Y. State presently provides special tax breaks worth about $1.9 billion a year to favored corporations - more than $500 million higher than welfare payments to poor children and adults. Local governments provide property tax exemptions worth more than $600 million a year to corporations in the name of economic development, as well as other direct subsidies in the forms of low-interest loans, direct grants and cut-rate energy. It is time for a Corporate Responsibility Act.

1. Tie Corporate Welfare to Job Creation

Any corporate welfare that is provided should be tied to the accomplishment of clearly defined public policy objectives such as job creation. Corporations should be required to give back their welfare payments if they fail to live up to their bargain. It is especially shameful when corporations receive welfare from the state and federal government as a reward for corporate downsizing and layoffs. In 1995, ten of the country's largest companies - including AT&T, Eastman Kodak, Mobil and Proctor and Gamble - laid off more than 130,000 workers even though they had profits of $60.7 billion, including $8.3 billion in tax subsidies.

2. Reform the Investment Tax Credit

One of the state's major corporate welfare programs is the Investment Tax Credit, which is usually justified on the basis of job creation. Current law provides businesses with a credit equal to 5% of the money that they spend on plant and equipment (an additional Employment Incentive Credit of between 1.5% to 3% is also available for two years after the ITC credit). The ITC is so large relative to the level of corporate taxation that any company not running its equipment into the ground is able to reduce their tax liability to the minimum tax, plus builds up unused credits that can be carried forward for ten years. However, most of the ITC expenditures do not result in even a 1% increase in jobs. The ITC may actually act as a deterrent to job creation by subsidizing the cost of labor-reducing machinery relative to the cost of labor. Some groups support reducing the portion of the ITC that is based simply on making an investment and to increase the portion that is tied to job creation. The Greens would go even further and base the ITC solely on job creation. The Greens would also eliminate any carrying forward of ITC credits.

3. Recoupment of Tax Breaks and Subsidies

State and local governments should be required to recoup subsidies, on a prorated basis, from firms that do not live up to the job retention or job creation promises used to justify public subsidies.

4. Require State Corporate Tax Disclosure

Individual taxpayers have a right to know whether they are paying more in taxes than profitable corporations. Businesses demand public accountability of government agencies and should have no problem requiring the same of themselves. The Securities and Exchange Commission at the federal level requires publicly traded corporations to disclose how much they pay in federal taxes. This allows analysts to determine if profitable corporations are avoiding taxation. We need a similar mechanism at the state level. This would also hold firms accountable for the various tax returns they file in different states, to ensure that the information contained in them is consistent.

5. Increased Public Scrutiny of Industrial Development Authorities

IDAs tend to give tax breaks to companies based on political influence rather than merit. Tax breaks for companies often result in tax increases for local property owners. IDAs need to be democratically controlled by the voters. There should be a limit of one IDA per county. The composition of Board of Directors of IDAs should be reflective of the local community, with representation from local governments, schools, community groups and low-income individuals. Local governments should have veto power over any giveaway of their tax dollars. Companies receiving tax breaks or subsidies from IDAs should be required to sign contracts specifying the number of jobs that must be created to receive the welfare. Tax breaks and subsidies should only be provided for creation of new jobs, not the relocation of existing jobs from other communities or states. The size of the tax break should correspond to the number of new jobs to be created.

6. Renew and Expand the Ban on IDA Financing on Retail Businesses

Providing tax breaks to retail businesses such as supermarkets or chain stores like Wal-Mart does not increase jobs. More people do not buy food for instance if are more supermarkets are built; existing supermarkets not subsidized by taxpayers dollars are at a competitive disadvantage and often end up going out of business.

7. Right to Know Laws for Corporate Welfare

Businesses receiving economic assistance from the state and local governments should be required to state the specific public benefits, including jobs retained and created, that will result from the assistance. A process involving taxpayer and community input in evaluating applications and monitoring projects should also be established.

8. Time Limits for Corporate Welfare

Corporate welfare should not become a way of life for dependent corporations. All corporate welfare assistance should be sunsetted after two years. This would save taxpayers millions of dollars and would force lawmakers to revisit requests for renewing corporate welfare payments to see if the aid is achieving its objective.

9. Democratize Industrial Development Authorities, the New York Power Authority, and other Public Authorities

Bonding authority and project selection should be removed from technocrats accountable to politicians accountable to wealthy political contributors and be directly accountable to the people through boards elected, mandated and recallable by citizen assemblies.

D. Equal Revenue Sharing

A system of statewide revenue sharing should be established with a formula for equalizing payments to ensure that neighborhoods, municipalities, and counties have sufficient revenues to provide a minimum floor of comparable public services and comparable levels of taxation.

E. No Mandates Without Money

N.Y. State mandated local programs should be fully funded by progressive taxes at the state level.

F. Democratic and Ecological Investment of Public Pension Funds

1. Current capital markets and ownership structures are not adequately financing small and medium businesses, affordable low- and moderate income housing, and economic development in inner cities and rural communities. With over $100 billion in public pension funds and other state assets, N.Y. State can play a decisive role in meeting these needs by making prudent investments to fill capital gaps in these under-financed areas of the economy. The Greens call for the creation of a state bank with a competently staffed trust department to act as a fiduciary agent and manager of the public portfolio and other state cash assets, as well as receive deposits of ordinary citizens. The state-owned Bank of North Dakota has done this since 1919, consistently making a profit for the state. It serves as a yardstick for measuring the effectiveness of private banks in serving the financial needs of the economy. Investments of state public pensions and other state funds should be targeted to support the following:

a. revitalization of wealth-creating primary production in agriculture and manufacturing;

b. worker-, consumer-, and community-owned enterprises that anchor capital and wealth in our communities and state under democratic control; and

c. conversion to ecological technologies that promote sustainable economies.

G. Social and Ecological Accounting

1. The Greens call for a new social and ecological accounting system to provide a full accounting of the economy of New York that includes not only the government's accounts, but also,

a. the state of the private economy upon which the public economy rests;

b. the non-monetary household economy upon which the private economy rests; and

c. the state of the natural, human, and cultural capital upon which the public, private and household economies rest.

2. Natural capital includes renewable and non-renewable resources. Human capital includes the knowledge, skills, health, and motivation of the people. Social capital includes the organizational capacities and degrees of conflict or cooperation in businesses, trade unions, and government and non-profit agencies. N.Y. State should evaluate public policies using the new economic indicators that have been developed to summarize the state of the economy using full social, ecological, and economic accounting, such as the Index of Sustainable Economic Welfare which uses such indicators as income distribution, natural capital stocks, the value of household labor, and personal consumption to measure the ecological sustainability and social welfare provided by the economy.

H. Eco-Taxes and True Cost Pricing

1. Within the context of a progressive structure of income and wealth taxation, the Greens call for eco-taxes on the depletion of natural resources and the release of pollutants. Eco-taxes would be structured to create "true cost pricing" where the full costs of production, including their social and environmental costs, are no longer externalized onto society and the environment by private firms but internalized into firms' cost structures. Eco-taxes for true cost pricing will create disincentives for ecologically damaging products and production technologies and incentives for ecologically sustainable products and production technologies.

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