They Need To Suspend Term Limits For This?

If it’s common to ask questions composed by interest groups during hearings then elected officials are obviously interchangeable, and we don’t really need them there for another term:

Nearly half the members of a City Council committee who got cue-card questions from the teachers union at a heated charter school hearing got campaign cash from the labor group.

Eight of the 17 members of the Council’s Education Committee collected $25,650 from the UFT’s political arm in the last three years, campaign records show.

The totals ranged from $1,600 to $4,950 each for Council members Bill de Blasio (D-Brooklyn), Melinda Katz (D-Queens) and John Liu (D-Queens).

. . .

“In the past, I have asked questions recommended by the UFT — as well as dozens of other organizations participating in hearings,” Liu said.

Gothamschools.org posted images of the cards with questions like “Doesn’t the Department have a clear legal and moral responsibility to provide every family in the city guaranteed seats for their children in a neighborhood elementary school?”

Several Council members said it is routine for constituents or groups to suggest questions for them to ask during hearings, but they had never seen such an organized effort.