Even Under Mamdani, New York City's Ballot Questions Might Cut Red Tape and Public Review Hearings

New Yorkers won’t be voting on any citywide offices this year, but they do have five ballot initiatives that could shape the city’s future more than any politician on this year’s ballot. Mayor Zohran Mamdani created a version of the Trump administration’s infamous Department of Government Efficiency in New York called the Commission on Government Efficiency (COGE). The plan is for COGE to modernize city operations and accelerate public infrastructure and permitting—in that vein, COGE placed five proposals before voters on the November ballot, largely targeting the bureaucratic processes governing new construction and business activity across the five boroughs.

Questions 1, 2, and 3 on the ballot would end or reduce the use of public hearings in different city review processes. Question 1 would, according to the ballot language, “simplify [the] process to use public space for uses such as ramps, planters and cafes, by removing mandatory hearings and Council disapproval of sidewalk cafes, while maintaining community and Council input.” Question 2 would “reduce paperwork for City contractors by authorizing [the] Procurement Policy Board to simplify [the] contractor questionnaire….[And] remove mandatory hearing for required client services report.” Question 3 would “simplify review of street safety projects to reduce construction timelines,” among other changes. Question 4 is about simplifying permitting.

These policies were not directly introduced by Mamdani, but they reflect a governing philosophy that New York City and other big cities desperately need: a local government that won’t allow a small group of organized opponents to obstruct progress for the city at large indefinitely.

Nowhere is the bottleneck against much-needed development clearer than at public review hearings. In theory, a public hearing is democracy at its purest: Every voice is heard. But in practice, it usually becomes a slow-motion filibuster. The most persistent and best-organized opponents get a megaphone, with little to no input from the millions of New Yorkers who would broadly benefit from more housing, better infrastructure, and businesses that can open without getting wrapped in red tape.

The 2026 ballot questions, if approved, would take small steps toward addressing these problems. If they all passed, it wouldn’t be a seismic change—a planter here or a parcel of land there. But that’s kind of the point: Should routine administrative decisions require another round of formal public review hearings to hold up any change, big or small?

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