Update Village Incorporation Law

About the Outdated Law
Currently, New York’s village incorporation law allows for as few as 500 people to secede from a town and set up their own village. All they need is 20% of the qualified voters in the proposed new village to sign a petition OR the owners of 50% of the property in the new territory. The process has minimal oversight and has become a way for people to circumvent established building and zoning codes and environmental regulations. Town officials have no recourse but to allow these secessions, even if they see potential problems.

About the Bills ...

About the Outdated Law
Currently, New York’s village incorporation law allows for as few as 500 people to secede from a town and set up their own village. All they need is 20% of the qualified voters in the proposed new village to sign a petition OR the owners of 50% of the property in the new territory. The process has minimal oversight and has become a way for people to circumvent established building and zoning codes and environmental regulations. Town officials have no recourse but to allow these secessions, even if they see potential problems.

About the Bills
In June 2023, the New York State Senate and Assembly, with strong majorities in both houses, passed significant legislation to help curb these dangerous abuses of Village Law Article 2. S.7538/A.7754 and S.7537/A.7761 improve the village incorporation process by increasing the minimum number of petitioners; requiring analyses of environmental, financial and operational impacts; and establishing a neutral state body to evaluate each petition and its justification.

About Mountainkeeper’s Campaign
Mountainkeeper is calling on the Governor to sign the legislation and is also urging her office, the Senate, and the Assembly to strengthen the bills’ impacts on the current, outdated, and easily exploited village incorporation process by agreeing in the 2024 legislative session to codify additional protections.

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Email Governor Hochul Today

The clock is ticking for Governor Hochul to sign two bills that will protect the Catskills before the end of the year. If she doesn't sign the bills, they have to go through the entirle legislative process again in 2024, enabling a delay that we can't afford.

These two bills (S.7538/A.7754 and S.7537/A.7761), which passed with overwhelming support in the legislature, hold the key to updating our laws and safeguarding the Catskills. Your email will send the Governor the strong message that New Yorkers want robust laws to protect our air, water, and communities.

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Dear Governor Hochul,

As a Catskill Mountainkeeper supporter, I’m writing to ask you to sign S.7538/A.7754 and S.7537/A.7761 into law.

These bills will update New York State Village Law Article 2 and improve the village incorporation process by increasing the minimum number of petitioners; requiring analyses of environmental, financial and operational impacts; and establishing a neutral state body to evaluate the petition and its justification.

Alarmingly, New York State Village Law Article 2 is currently being used across the state to circumvent local land use and building codes, which threatens communities and natural resources throughout New York; as a result, reforms are quickly and desperately needed. Village Law Article 2 allows groups as small as 500 people to petition their local town supervisor to create an independent village without any fiscal, environmental, or technical review. In the early 1900s, Village Law Article 2 made sense, helping support rural communities. But times have changed and unfortunately today this law is being exploited to create small independent villages that are no longer accountable to existing local land use and building regulations, undermining sustainable development and critical environmental protections.

Three recent independent reports from the NYS Comptroller’s Office, the Rockefeller Institute of Government, and the Elizabeth Haub School of Law at Pace University confirm that the creation of new villages today is often motivated by a desire to circumvent local land use, zoning, and building codes in service of the interests of very small groups of people, contrary to the greater public good. The consequences of such unfettered development include poorly conceived and constructed projects that threaten natural resources. This also puts citizens of affected towns at significant financial risk. In addition, new villages created under Article 2 are mandated to provide their own services, such as police, water, sewer, and fire protection; however, when they lack the tax base required to support these services,  surrounding towns end up paying such costs.

Given the need for reforms, I’m urging you to sign S.7538/A.7754 and S.7537/A.7761 as soon as possible.

With thanks,

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