4th Congressional District
U.S. Rep. Carolyn McCarthy, a Democrat running for her seventh term in the House, is being challenged by Republican Jack Martins, the mayor of Mineola.
McCarthy, the first congresswoman from Long Island, is the chairwoman of the Subcommittee on Healthy Families and Communities and serves on the Education and Labor, and Financial Services committees. She is a lifelong resident of Mineola and has more than 30 years’ experience as a nurse.
Martins has been Mineola’s mayor since 2003, and he implemented the village’s first Comprehensive Master Plan project in 60 years. He also began televising village board meetings and launched the village’s first Web site. He, too, has lived in Mineola all his life.
Martins said he believes people should be given tax credits to pay for their health care. He proposed credits of $2,500 for individuals and $5,000 for families. McCarthy said that tax credits would not be enough, with the average family paying $12,000 for health insurance.
Martins said that the House Committee on Financial Services’ Subcommitee on Oversight and Investigatons, on which McCarthy sits, did not start its review of banking institutions and predatory lending until the financial situation hit rock bottom. What was needed in the first place, he said, was a stimulus package that would have allowed more liquidity in the credit markets.
McCarthy said that Congress had started to curb predatory lending in 2005, adopting regulations on Freddie Mac and Fannie Mae, and that Republicans did not want any oversight whatsoever in the 10 years before that. That is why, she said, “we’re in the mess we’re in today.”
On the issue of gun control, both candidates agree that it is up to the federal and state governments to control who can purchase guns, and that there should be a “cool-down” period so a gun buyer can not take a gun home the same day.
— Mary Malloy
6th Senate District
Republican incumbent Kemp Hannon, a lifelong Garden City resident who has held the seat since 1990, is being challenged by Democrat Kristen McElroy, a criminal defense attorney. This is McElroy’s first campaign for public office.
The candidates are vying to represent a district that encompasses Franklin Square, West Hempstead, Lakeview, East Meadow, Salisbury, Garden City and Hempstead, among other areas.
As the chairman of the state Senate’s Standing Committee on Health, Hannon, 62, said he has worked diligently to create and support legislation that addresses health issues and improves patient care. This year alone, he said, he has sponsored more than 10 laws aimed at enhancing health care services and patient safety, and he took part in a joint effort with the Long Island delegation to secure $750,000 in state funding for the creation of a Medicaid fraud unit in Nassau County, which is now in the works. He also serves as the co-chair of the Senate Medicaid Reform Task Force.
Hannon is running on the Republican, Conservative and Independent party lines.
McElroy, 33, also a lifelong resident of Garden City, said she is running because she wants to bring “a real change in leadership in Albany.” She said the district needs a fresh face, someone who will bring “new and bold ideas” to the Senate.
McElroy also said that one of her strengths is that she is not a career politician, and does not owe any favors to special-interest groups and lobbyists. As a taxpayer, an attorney and a mother, she said, she knows firsthand how difficult it has become to raise a family on Long Island.
If elected, she said, she wants to create legislation and initiatives that “hold the line on taxes and provide real property tax relief.” She is in favor of a property tax cap on school spending as well as a “circuit breaker” that would cap property taxes based on income.
McElroy is running on the Democratic and Working Families party lines.
— Dana Williams
9th Senate District
Senate Majority Leader Dean Skelos has served the district since 1984. The 60-year-old Republican from Rockville Centre, who was elected to his leadership post by Senate Republicans last June, is seeking his 13th term.
Challenging Skelos is Democrat Roy Simon, 59, a West Hempstead resident and a professor of ethics at Hofstra University’s law school who is making his first run for public office. A Chicago native who moved to Long Island in 1992, Simon graduated from Williams College in Massachusetts and NYU Law School. He was a litigator for several years before he became a professor at Washington University in St. Louis.
Skelos, a Rockville Centre native, graduated from South Side High School in 1966, and earned a degree in history from Maryland’s Washington College in 1970 and a law degree in 1975 from the Fordham University School of Law. He is counsel to the Mineola-based law firm Ruskin Moscou Evans & Faltischek.
Skelos takes great pride in and is well known for “bringing home the bacon” — delivering state grants that support a variety of community organizations throughout the district. He is the author of Megan’s Law, which created the New York State Sex Offender Registry; he led a crackdown on Medicaid fraud; and he serves as the state representative on the Metropolitan Transportation Authority’s Capital Programs Review Board.
If elected, Simon said, he would clean up Albany and fight for the people of Nassau County. He said that despite all the talk about reducing property taxes, Skelos does not have a plan to do so. And, he added, Skelos’s largesse could be threatened if Democrats take over the Senate.
Finding a way to lower the property tax burden while continuing to provide strong financial support to the area’s schools tops both Skelos’s and Simon’s list of legislative priorities. They support the proposed 4 percent property tax cap, while insisting that it must be part of a larger solution to burdensome property taxes. Both candidates say that if the cap is enacted, the state must supplement funds not raised through taxes, and provide relief for unfunded mandates that have strapped local schools. They also agree that school districts should be encouraged to share services, but they differ on how to go about this.
— Judy Rattner
14th Assembly District
Bob Barra, a Lynbrook Republican who has represented the district for the past eight years, is being challenged by Joe Ferrara, a Democrat from Valley Stream.
Barra, a former Lynbrook village trustee and Hempstead town councilman, supports a three-year property tax freeze to help homeowners “catch up” with rising costs. He vows to continue the fight to bring more state aid to Long Island school districts, and said he is not afraid to take on other state leaders to do so. Barra also supports a “circuit breaker,” which would cap a person’s property taxes based on his or her income.
Ferrara does not support a tax cap for local school districts because, he said, it could have a negative impact on those districts. He does, however, support the circuit breaker, describing it as the best way to provide individual tax relief.
The 27-year-old Ferrara organizes blood drives for Long Island Blood Services. He formerly worked for the Tanglewood Preserve in Rockville Centre.
Both Barra and Ferrara say the state needs to do more to encourage the development of alternative energy, and that they would encourage incentives to make homes more energy-efficient. Ferrara said the state should provide subsidies for businesses to produce “clean and green” energy, as well as incentives for people to buy hybrid vehicles or solar panels for their homes.
Barra noted that he supported the Bigger Better Bottle Bill, approved by the state Legislature, which expands the bottle redemption program in the interest of reducing waste.
— Mary Malloy
18th Assembly District
The race in the 18th District pits Democrat Earlene Hooper, the incumbent, who has held the seat since 1988, against Republican challenger Darren Bryant, a community activist who ran unsuccessfully last year for a seat in the Nassau County Legislature. The two candidates are vying to represent a district that encompasses Lakeview, parts of West Hempstead, East Meadow, South Hempstead, Freeport, Hempstead and Roosevelt, among other areas.
Hooper, a 38-year Hempstead resident, said she decided to run for re-election because she wants to continue to improve the district. During her current term, she said, she has lobbied for and obtained millions of dollars for education, health care and revitalization and infrastructure projects, among other needs, in the district. She was part of an effort that provided $61 million to improve health care service delivery at Nassau University Medical Center in East Meadow. The funds, Hooper said, will fund emergency room upgrades and other improvements at the facility. If she is re-elected, Hooper said, one of her priorities would be to complete projects she has begun in Roosevelt and Hempstead to create new, full-service health centers. She also plans to continue to work with other elected officials to improve school district facilities and roads in Hempstead.
Bryant did not respond to several calls requesting an interview.
— Dana Williams
21st Assembly District
Democrat Alan Smilowitz is challenging Republican incumbent Tom Alfano in a district that includes North Valley Stream, Franklin Square, Elmont, Malverne and West Hempstead and that Alfano has served since 1996. Smilowitz is a West Hempstead resident and an attorney. He describes himself as a social liberal but a fiscal conservative, and says he would like to see state lawmakers cut spending, rather than raise taxes, to deal with the multi-billion-dollar deficit. He supports a property tax cap for schools, with the provision that the state provide more funding for education.
Alfano, who lives in North Valley Stream, said he will continue his fight to ensure that Long Island school districts receive their fair share of state aid. He also wants the state to do its part to promote the development of more affordable housing. Young people and senior citizens especially, Alfano said, are finding it harder and harder to afford to live on Long Island.
Belmont Park is a major issue for Alfano, who said he wants to see a major development project there to create job and boost the local economy. He said it is important that members of the local community have their say on the future of the racetrack property.
Smilowitz supports legalizing same-sex marriage and opposes the death penalty. He said that the 21st District is less conservative than it used to be, and he feels he could represent the area well.
— Andrew Hackmack
