Politics

General Election 2024: Michaelle Solages focuses on successes in the Assembly

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Assemblywoman Michaelle Solages has been a fixture in the Assembly for over a decade. At age 39, she is seeking her sixth term, and says she has the political courage and clout to tackle two of the hottest issues in this election season — the rising cost of living and increasing threats to Long Islanders’ quality of life.

“I’m a leading voice in making sure that we do right by New Yorkers,” Solages said, touting her track record of legislative wins this term.

“The price of health care is always going up,” she said. “I was able to pass legislation that creates a study on hospital pricing and how we can make it more affordable for the average New Yorker.”

The hospital pricing transparency bill, signed into law last year, mandates that the state create an annual report disclosing hospital prices and cost comparisons to keep those prices down.

Another one of Solages’s legislative efforts has centered on curbing the alarming number of infant deaths, especially among Black women who are new mothers. 

“The governor signed my bill about expanding donor breast milk for New York state, especially for low-income families,” she said, citing cases of powdered baby formula tainted with a rare, though often deadly, bacterial infection in hospitals.

The Elmont Democrat has also been credited with spearheading the first paid leave law for pregnant women in the country, allowing them to take paid time off for pregnancy care.

While the jury is no longer out on the ravages of climate change, Solages says that if Albany moves to roll back its climate goals, she will continue to “fight for infrastructure and resiliency money” to shield the 22nd District from the worst effects of increased flooding.

When Gov. Kathy Hochul proposed cut the annual funding for clean water infrastructure to $250 million per year from $500 million, Solages and her allies were “able to get that fully restored in the budget.”

“Clean water infrastructure is entwined with flooding prevention, and we need to protect and harden our systems,” she said.

She has also been a leading supporter of Long Island Cares’ emergency food pantry in the heart of Valley Stream’s business district. “That’s something that we’ve been working on for so long, and it came about during Covid, when people were just struggling financially,” she said.

A large part of the cost-of-living crisis on Long Island is the shortage of affordable housing, driven by restrictive zoning regulations, inadequate infrastructure and strong local opposition to development. Solages’s proposed solutions were neither sweeping nor new: She recommended that stakeholders sharpen their focus on expanding affordable housing options in downtowns, where they can best be accommodated. She endorses a carrot rather than a stick approach to increasing Long Island’s languishing housing stock, by emphasizing incentive-based programs.

“We should be focused on making sure that we talk to the community leaders who are in charge of zoning and building,” she said, “and make sure they have the money to build housing.”

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