On March 7, the New York Senate Elections Committee passed SB 218, which eliminates residency requirements for candidate petitioners, except that it still requires them to live in New York state.

District residency requirements for petitioners in New York were declared unconstitutional in federal and state court almost ten years ago, and this bill attempts to update the election code to reflect those court decisions.

The Senate Elections Committee on March 7 also passed SB 2792, which removes party logos from general election ballots. This is one step toward making it possible for New York ballots to become more orderly. Currently New York ballot design is so bad, some candidates (always independent candidates, or the nominees of unqualified parties) are in such obscure corners of the ballot, many voters can’t find them.