From the Morning Memo:
In February, state lawmakers took hours of testimony — from labor experts, officials, victims and survivors — that centered around sexual harassment and misconduct in New York’s state government.
Today’s public hearing in New York City on the issue will be taking an even more global approach of tackling the problem and potentially approving new legislation by the end of the session next month.
The hearing starts at 10 a.m.
“It is clear and will be clearer after do our hearing on Friday that there’s a package of legislation that should move through both houses in this building and be signed into law to protect and ensure that everyone man or woman should know they cannot be sexually harassed or discriminated against in the workplace,” said Sen. Liz Krueger at a news conference this week at the Capitol in Albany.
Lawmakers are exploring an end to the “severe or pervasive” standard in sexual harassment cases, which has been criticized by survivors and victims of abuse who testified at the previous hearing, arguing that it fails to cover a range of misconduct.
“The severe or pervasive standard hasn’t been changed since 1986 — the year that I was born,” said Sen. Alessandra Biaggi. “That is outrageous that is the case. It’s essential this is the year that we do this.”
The hearings in large part came about due to an advocacy push from the Sexual Harassment Working Group, composed of former legislative aides and staffers who have faced harassment and abuse in state government.
Even before the societal reckoning of the #MeToo movement, Albany had been a focal point of illegal and inappropriate behavior by elected officials and powerful aides.
“We know we have solutions,” said Krueger, a Democrat from Manhattan. “We have models from other states. We have models from the (New York) City Human Rights Commission that we know can be better.”
Krueger is backing a constitutional amendment that would overhaul how the Joint Commission on Public Ethics, an ethics and lobbying watchdog, is structured. The amendment would be meant to strengthen the agency by changing how its members are appointed to give it more independence and explicitly empower it to tackle sexual misconduct cases.