For Mayor the Star-Revue endorses Bill de Blasio.
We like Bill for a couple of reasons.
Bill de Blasio has been a friend to the neighborhood of Red Hook, as well as all of Brooklyn as a whole. He is from the area, having represented the 39th District as City Councilman until his election as Public Advocate in 2009. His replacement, Brad Lander, is his friend and supporter, and that means much to us. During his tenure as Public Advocate, he has fought for our hospital as well as the entire Brooklyn healthcare system.
Bill represents the working class. His focus extends into the outer boroughs just as much as Manhattan. We believe as mayor, Bill will fight for middle and lower-class rights and slow down an overdeveloped real estate market where other reasonable services are needed more than high dollar condos.
For City Council in the 38th District, the Star-Revue endorses Sara Gonzalez.
Sara Gonzalez, a longtime Sunset Park community activist, came out of nowhere to win a seat in 2002. Now running for her third and last term, she faces an earnest and young Carlos Menchaca.
Carlos came to the neighborhood’s attention during last year’s hurricane. He was sent to Red Hook as an outreach worker for Christine Quinn. He impressed many with the dedication he put to this task, which went over and above his official duties, spending long hours in the dark Red Hook Houses helping.
While we believe that Carlos has a bright future as a public servant, we think that Sara’s experience and seniority in the City Council is reason enough to bring her back for a third term. We hope that the campaign experience will energize her in the fight to mitigate the negative effects of gentrification that we will surely be facing over the next four years.
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2 Comments
This is an embarrassing endorsement for the StarRevue editors. Calling Gonzalez “an activist” who “came out of nowhere” is disingenuous at best. The editors are clearly telegraphing to the incumbent their desire for her to fight against gentrification that she has slavishly committed herself, while praising Carlos Menchaca’s real work and political vision. An editorial endorsement is supposed to be a strong recommendation for citizens to exercise their vote, not a passive-aggressive lobbying effort on an elected official in which you are dissatisfied. The ambivalence suggests the editors wanted to choose Carlos but didn’t trust their own judgement. A more cynical reading would be the editors bowed to business interests to protect the paper’s bottom line. This is a disservice to residents and displays questionable competence to your readers.
Actually, we have done a tremendous service to our readers by inviting each candidate to talk to Red Hook voters directly. Pages 12 and 13 in the current issue, which you can read online at http://www.redhookstar.com (click on the front page to gain access to all the pages).