Yesterday, we offered our recommendations in state Senate primaries across Queens, the Bronx and Manhattan. Today, we turn to Brooklyn.
In the 17th district, (Borough Park and Midwood), incumbent Simcha Felder — a Democrat who caucuses with Republicans — is facing a challenge from lawyer Blake Morris.
Felder is the emblem of Albany obstinance and arrogance. He almost single-handedly killed school-zone speed cameras in the city; if not for some ingenuity by Mayor de Blasio and Gov. Cuomo, children would be at risk today due to his mischief.
His meddling preempted a City Council law placing a modest fee on plastic bags. He has made it harder, if not impossible, to hold a few ultra-Orthodox yeshivas accountable for failures to deliver a basic education.
Morris is competent and reform-minded, and held up under rigorous questioning from this board. So imperious is Felder, he refused even to answer our questions.
Vote Morris, with gusto.
In the 18th district, Marty Dilan has represented Bushwick for eight terms. Unlike other senators targeted this year, he never joined the IDC.
Hardly a flashy guy, Dilan was the prime sponsor of Leandra’s Law, imposing tougher penalties on drunk drivers, and of the payroll tax that bailed out the subway in 2010. Bravo on both.
His opponent, Julia Salazar, hasn’t made the case for throwing him out; she’s just cast nasty aspersions at his contributors. She has made false statements about her background and family history, then attacked those who raised legitimate questions as sexists.
And, oh, in a phone interview with this board, she had incoherent positions on key policy issues and couldn’t begin to explain what she meant by “universal rent control.”
Dilan’s the better choice.
In the 20th district, (Crown Heights and Prospect Heights), Sen. Jesse Hamilton previously told voters in his district that he wouldn’t join the IDC, only to flip in 2016. Breaking your word is unbecoming, and breaking your word just to bring bacon home to your community is especially cynical.
Challenger Zellnor Myrie is a sharp young activist. As a former Council legislative aide, Myrie helped draft the Tenants Bill of Rights.
In the Senate, he would promote home ownership and overhaul JCOPE, the ethics oversight body that’s inexcusably captive to legislative leaders.
Vote for Myrie.
In the 22nd district, (Bay Ridge and Dyker Heights), two young Democrats are facing off for the right to face incumbent Republican Marty Golden in November.
Both Ross Barkan, a journalist, and Andrew Gounardes, a longtime staffer for pols including Brooklyn Borough President Eric Adams, are bright liberals who, like us, support congestion pricing, want an ethics overhaul, back speed camera expansion and oppose ending exam-based admissions to the city’s selective high schools.
Barkan gets the edge for being a transit wonk who focuses as much fire on fixing broken MTA contracting as he does on finding a permanent funding stream for the subways. He will not pull ethics punches even when fellow Democrats are at fault.
Bubble in for Barkan.
