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A Crowded Council Race
January 23rd, 2009

Five of the nine candidates vying for Staten Island’s 49th district City Council seat took turns pushing their political ambitions to 75 members of the Staten Island Democratic Association Thursday night. All are running in the special election to fill the seat previously held by Mike McMahon, who was elected to Congress.

The candidates were hoping to earn an endorsement from the Democratic club by the end of Thursday’s late night forum.

None of them got it.

Debi Rose got the most votes, 37 — more than double the votes of Tom Curitore, who came in second place– but was one vote shy of the majority needed for an endorsement. Tony Baker, Rajiv Gowda and Donald Pagano followed, with votes in the single digits. Kenneth Mitchell declined to attend, citing scheduling conflicts, but still finished with six votes.

Of the three special elections for City Council seats to be held on Feb. 24, the Staten Island race has the most candidates. And with a month to go, all the contenders are looking to set themselves apart from the competition.

The hot issues with the club’s members included transportation, health care and education. Club members seemed particularly agitated about Staten Island in relation to the other four boroughs, complaining the borough was not getting its “fair share.” They demanded to know the candidates’ position on a number of issues, including mayoral control of education, which has to be renewed by the state legislature by June.

Attendees and candidates alike also discussed the need for a better health care system on the island, which only has two hospitals but more than 443,000 people. Curitore, Rose and Gowda said education was their No.1 priority. Baker and Pagano cited health care as their top issue.

And it was no surprise that the economy and term limits were added to the mix. Rose, Curitore and Gowda specifically talked about youth involvement in the community and Rose said she wanted more funding to support jobs for youth. Pagano said he wanted to find ways to cut wasteful spending. He mentioned giveaway nicotine patches, adding they weren’t wasteful but “something like that” would be. Pagano also said he would legitimately consider Staten Island’s secession from the city, but only if it would be economically feasible.

On term limits, Baker, Rose and Gowda all said they would not run past the previous eight-year limit. Gowda said he thinks the council’s extension of term limits was unfair to constituents who had previously voted for a two-term cap. He thinks council members should “find something else to do” when their time is up, not run again.

“If you can’t do it in eight years, you can’t do it in 800 years,” he said getting laughs from the crowd.

By Khadijah Rentas on January 23, 2009, 3:44 pm
In category: Electoral Politics, Gotham City, Governing | No Comments »

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