Weinberg Citizens Union on Intro 951 - prediction markets

Thank you.

Good morning.

Oh, wait, where's my, here we go.

Good morning, council members.

Thank you, chair.

My name is Ben Weinberg.

I'm the director of public policy at Citizens Union, a nonpartisan good government group that works to advance honest and accountable government and fair and open elections in New York.

Thank you for holding this hearing.

I will largely comment on the, on intro 951 on prediction markets.

The campaign finance board have provided a pretty thoughtful testimony on Intro 12A, the one on AI-generated campaign content.

So on Intro 951, we commend Councilmember Thomas Henry for recognizing the ethical risks posed by prediction markets.

When public officials can profit from outcomes they influence or know about before the public does, there is a clear risk of conflicts of interest and abuse of insider information, as the prominent examples mentioned before in the committee's report indicate.

However, we believe much of the content, much of the conduct, sorry, the bill seeks to prohibit is already covered by the city's code.

conflicts of interest law.

Chapter 68 prohibits public servants from using their positions for financial gain and from disclosing confidential information to advance their private interest.

Those provisions apply to all public servants, not just policymaker as the bill does.

For that reason, we recommend addressing any remaining gaps through Chapter 68 rather than creating a separate regulatory framework.

Building on the city's existing ethics laws and its definitions would make enforcement clear and more effective.

We also recommend removing provisions that would impose penalties on relatives of public servants.

The obligation to protect the integrity of public office should rest with the public servants, and extending the COIB's enforcement authority to spouses or parents or siblings would raise practical and legal concerns.

Now, if the council does determine that existing law is insufficient in addressing the new risks posed by prediction markets, it could consider other alternatives.

Our written testimony offers some options.

For example, one could prohibit public servants from participating in prediction markets when the event, so-called event, is related to their official duties, whether they...

Whether they participated in it or not.

The North Carolina governor issued a similar executive order recently.

One could tailor a specific definition of non-public information

that's relevant to this context if the current definition of confidential information doesn't cover all cases related to prediction markets.

You could also require written affirmation of existing restrictions so that every public servant will have to kind of sign that they acknowledge that restriction and that provides for

a way to enforce that form, basically signing that form later on.

Perfect.

That's all.

I'm actually done with that one, so I'm happy to take any other questions.

All right.

Thank you.