me thinking it would be funny to write a poem for the person writting poems in Union Square (notice I am sporting the Auerbach for Comptroller tee)
Quigley's NY Grill?!?!?! East 18th and !st ave NYC
Deo and I working for future Manhattan DA Richard Aborn
Comptroller Auerbach at the sold out Fundraiser for Majority Leader Reynolds
Comptroller Auerbach with future Alderwoman Jen Fuentes and Alderman Tom Hoffay
Comptroller Auerbach personally delivering a check for $61,486.90 which represents monies owed to the Town from a 2007 Payment In Lieu Of Taxes (PILOT) from the Nevele Hotel. The money was discovered by Elliott during an examination of payments made to Ulster County.
An examination of Vance's time in Seattle showed he gave $1,000 in 1998 to Christopher Bayley, a GOP Senate candidate who attacked the incumbent Democrat for supporting mandatory trigger locks and a ban on semiautomatic firearms.
Bayley, a former prosecutor in the Seattle area, sent gun owners across the state literature backing a proposal to let visitors to Washington state carry a concealed pistol if they had an out-of-state license.
Bayley also opposed abortion rights and supported a measure that would roll back state affirmative action programs.
Richard Aborn, one of Vance's opponents in the Democratic primary, jumped on Vance's support of Bayley, calling it wrongheaded.
"Manhattan residents can be assured that anti-choice, anti-gun control, anti-affirmative action zealots running for office will never have my support," Aborn said.
"We are significantly better off with the Democrat having won that election, and Mr. Vance and I simply have an honest disagreement about that," Aborn said.
Vance defended his support for Bayley as "appropriate." He called him a "very well-regarded" lawyer.
"If you look at my giving record, I think you will find that I am an active and repeat, almost recidivist, donor to Democratic candidates around the country," Vance said.
Aides said Bayley is the only Republican to ever received Vance's support. He has supported a slew of Democrats, including President Obama.
Vance, who is counting on Manhattan's liberal-leaning Democrats who typically vote in the primary to support him, moved to Seattle in 1988 to build a name for himself outside the shadow of his famous dad.
His father, Cy Vance Sr., was secretary of state in the Carter administration.
The winner of the Democratic primary on Sept. 15 is likely to win November's general election to replace longtime DA Robert Morgenthau.
Magician David Blaine will be delving into the dangerous world of New York politics for the first time next week when he hosts a fundraiser for Manhattan DA hopeful Richard Aborn.
Tickets to the event range from $125 (just to get in the door) to $5,000 (for hosts).
Here's the e-mail from Aborn campaign manager Mike Rabinowitz announcing the event; the subject line is "making crime disappear":
"Dear xxxxxx,
We are delighted to announce that next Wednesday, August 26th, David Blaine will work his magic for Richard at a special event to support our campaign.
A remarkable and unique entertainer, the famed endurance artist has spent hours encased in ice, upside down, and underground...but this is his first foray into politics. (Richard can identify).
We would be thrilled if you would join us and support this special event, which will be held at at RDV, 409 W. 13th Street, from 7 - 9 p.m. It promises to be a really enjoyable evening and a great way for us to raise critical funds for these final weeks.Space is limited. For more information, please contact Michael O’Regan at (212) xxx-xxxx or moregan@xxxxxx - or you can RSVP online.
Thanks again for all you are doing.I hope to see you next Wednesday!
Mike Rabinowitz
Campaign Manager
Aborn for DA
I’ve often been asked why I chose to leave the priesthood and it is a difficult thing to explain. First let me state that it was my choice and mine alone. Even five years later I was asked to reconsider and return. As happy and rewarding as school had been, even the seminary had its good moments, I was not prepared to live the life of a priest. I know that now, at the time all I knew was that I was increasingly unhappy. There are personal rewards for being involved in the lives of so many people, whether in a parish or school, but at the core there must be a strong center of personal belief and happiness or at least serenity. Mine was challenged in ways I was not prepared for.
My parents both died in December of 1979, after five years of suffering and pain. It was the great test of family and faith. I was away and alone and unforgiving for their suffering. At the same time there was a strike of the lay faculty association at the school and my sympathies were with the lay teachers and not the Archdiocese. With divided loyalties and personal tragedy, the situation was untenable and I decided to leave. I do not regret that decision.
A greater challenge was the personal acceptance of who I was, a decision I easily put off for years in the seminary and clergy. Slowly and with difficulty I came to accept that I was gay, would not marry and raise a family as my siblings had done. My family’s reaction to all this tumult in my life was the same, steady, love and acceptance I have always found there.
My active participation in a recovery program has helped me to accept who I am, find the serenity that I have always looked for in my life and take life one day at a time. This is the strong foundation that also allows me to contribute my talents and gifts in public and political life.
Politics:
I did find that clergy life had unexpectedly prepared me for politics, perhaps it was a keener appreciation of human nature or an increased sense of institutional dynamics. Shortly after returning to Kingston in 1982, I joined the City Democratic Committee, becoming the Chair, then the Ulster County Democratic Committee Chair in 1990. I found I really liked the political life and had some success working on campaigns I believed in, including Bill Clinton’s Presidential campaign, Maurice Hinchey’s Congressional campaign, Kevin Cahill’s Assembly campaign, Judge Karen Peter’s Supreme Court campaign and Judge Mary Work’s campaign for Family Court.
I served as County Chair for nine years and worked on numerous campaigns and issues. My love for Kingston found a perfect expression in Mayor TR Gallo’s campaigns and I served on various boards as part of his administration, including the Kingston Housing Authority and the Kingston Local Development Corporation. I also met an impressive young attorney from New York, Eliot Spitzer, worked on his campaign and then spent eight years working in the Attorney General’s Office.
My relationship with the Kingston Common Council started during my time as City Chair. I was fascinated by the interplay of personality, issue and institution and regularly attended the Council caucuses and meetings. Later on I discovered that one of my grandmother’s uncles had served on the Council and I was hooked. The Council position is unusual as there is an informal administrative relationship between the Alderman and the Ward as well as a more formal legislative role, more hands on than the County Legislature, for example. I can honestly say this is the only elected position I have ever really wanted, in-spite of my long association with the elective process.
After years away, my life has come full circle, returning to the Kingston I always loved and doing a job I prepared for through life experience more than education. Hopefully there are a few more chapters to come in this bio and I can make the case that the people of Ward Two are well served by my representation on the Common Council.
