
By Carol Tannenhauser
To run for the New York City Council, you must be 18 years old, a U.S. citizen, live in the district you’re representing, and not be a draft dodger.
At 26, Zack Weiner meets all the requirements. He grew up on the Upper West Side, well after there was a draft to dodge. He currently lives here with his parents and two siblings. Before entering the race he was a “moderately successful” indie screenwriter and filmmaker.
West Side Rag: Are you having trouble getting people to take you seriously because of your age?
Zack Weiner: Definitely. I’ve had people explicitly say, “I’m not voting for you. You look way too young.” I’m happy they stop to tell me. That way I have a chance to tell them a little about me. I feel very prepared. I’ve spent the past year exhaustively studying the issues and a lot of the legislation. I read almost everything Helen Rosenthal wrote. But it’s totally fair for people to say that.
WSR: No fairer than for them to say someone is too old to run. What made you decide to get in the race?
ZW: It was January, 2020, right before the pandemic hit. My friend Joe and I had gotten more into politics, because of national events. What got us interested here was the empty storefronts. We thought they seemed like a layup being missed: there was all this money on the table, all this valuable empty space. We thought we’d get involved on the community board level, so we went to a meeting and were shocked. I imagined it would be like Parks and Recreation, the TV show, with everyone engaged and interactive, but it wasn’t; it was stonewalled. The topic was parking meters, and everyone was very upset. They just moved through it procedurally. When it ended, no one was happy and no one felt listened to. It clicked for me that we had to shake things up. At that point, it seemed like more of a long shot, because people were not as interested in local politics. This was prior to the Lucerne controversy, which really animated the voter base.
WSR: Where do you stand on The Lucerne controversy?
ZW: The placement of the Belleclaire and the Lucerne so close to each other was always going to be a mistake. I think it was also an incredible bureaucratic failure, which I believe our elected officials were implicated in. Services were not being provided. Three homeless people died in the Lucerne. The average for other shelters during the pandemic was one. Their party line is that treatment is perfect inside the hotel, and it’s not. Their rhetoric overall has not been around treatment, and the rhetoric coming out of WestCo, if you read their letters, a lot of it is about treatment. That’s what the people going through homelessness I’ve spoken to say they want first.
WSR: Where do you stand on the spectrum between WestCo and Open Hearts?
ZW: I believe in moderate as a brand. I’m in between Open Hearts and WestCo, but frankly, I’ve spent more time and I’m closer to the leadership of WestCo.
WSR: Segueing to street homelessness, what are your thoughts?
ZW: I don’t think any good-hearted person disagrees that every homeless person in New York City should have shelter. In fact, the law of the land is that if you’re homeless and you want a bed in New York City, you get one. The vast majority of people who are homeless on the street, who are unsheltered are choosing it, because they don’t like the shelters or they’re often untreated for serious mental illness or drug addiction. The first step is to talk about treatment and what could be provided them in that regard, and to start building an infrastructure that’s headed that way.
WSR: You know that people have the right to refuse treatment?
ZW: Riker’s is the largest mental institution in New York City right now, and a lot of that is people who get arrested, who are mentally ill, and get sent to jail. We do have a system in place that pays attention to people who don’t want treatment: Kendra’s Law. It was named for a woman who was thrown in front of a train by a man experiencing a schizophrenic break. Kendra’s Law authorizes the court to mandate treatment for people who are a danger to themselves or others. A major proponent of it is the man who killed Kendra, who went to jail and was treated. He says, “I wish to God I had Kendra’s Law before I was the reason for it.”
The good thing is this isn’t a budget issue. It’s a policy issue. We actually have more funding available than we have had in a long time. Just Thrive NYC alone, which is meant to treat mental illness and addiction, has close to a billion dollars in funding. But the mandate driving Thrive is all screwed up, and there’s not a lot of accountability. The lion’s share of the money is being devoted to the general population, instead of the seriously mentally ill. Hundreds of millions of dollars are being spent on anti-stigma and educational campaigns. If we could redirect a large portion of that to the treatment of the homeless and seriously mentally ill, it could make a massive difference.
WSR: Talk about retail vacancies, the reason you initially decided to run.
ZW: People get very pessimistic about retail, but I’m optimistic. I think people are really going to want to go outside again. A lot of people say stores are never coming back; there’s going to be no such thing as stores. I don’t believe that. I know people like to be in stores. They’re going to have to be reinvented, and I would love to see the Upper West Side be the incubator.
Essentially, we’ve come to an impasse in the commercial real estate market. The landlords, entrepreneurs, and banks are all struggling to find a model that works so they’re able to fill these vacancies. We’ve conceived of a solution. In essence, it’s something called Startup Retail, which is a revenue-sharing agreement between entrepreneurs and landlords. The small business owner would pay utilities and a cut of their sales. They don’t have to pay any rent or startup charges. It’s actually very appealing to landlords, too, because they’re not making any money now, but on top of that their problem is, if they lower the rent, it can have severe mortgage consequences. So, a work-around is retail, with a shorter lease, that’s not lowering the rent value. Imagine telling an entrepreneur, you can start retail on Broadway, where you’re not going to have to pay any rent or pop-up charge. You just have to go in there, sell your stuff, cover the electricity, and give a cut to the landlord.
WSR: How do you feel about running against Gale Brewer? You know, you were about six years old when she was first elected to the Council.
ZW: (laughing) I actually hadn’t done that math. It is kind of daunting. She’s a really respected politician for good reasons. But Gale and I have policy differences. For me, it’s a matter of focus, strategy, and priorities. I’m hearing a lot of talk about what should stay, but, in terms of evolving I’m not seeing a lot of innovation. I think a lot of our policy differences — this might sound unusual — are not irreconcilable. I think there’s a lot of stuff we would agree on if we spoke about it or she read some of the stuff I wrote. One of the core problems is a reluctance to innovate, shake things up, and have the conversation be a little different.
WSR: By the way, whatever happened to your friend Joe?
ZW: He’s my campaign manager.
This interview was condensed and edited for clarity. It is the sixth in a series covering the candidates running for the District 6 City Council seat in the June 22nd Democratic primary.
Click on their names to read WSR’s interviews with Gale Brewer, Maria Danzilo, David Gold, Sara Lind, and Jeffrey Omura.
This young man has made some salient points, and I believe his values are very much inline w/ many UWS’rs that I know. Sadly he will likely be dismissed as being “too young”, or not progressive enough compared to his peers. Many young people run for local office, but the UWS is not a district that would easily accept “new blood”, especially a moderate. I’m sure we will re-elect GB, then complain that “nothing ever changes”.
Good Luck sir, and I hope you continue your foray into politics. Your level headedness is sorely lacking in NYC politics these days, and in the younger generation as a whole.
I have no problem with Mr. Weiner running at age 26. This interview is an excellent reminder that you can have terrible politics at age 26, just as you can at age 46 or 66. Fortunately our City Council district will not elect someone of any generation who spends time with and is “closer to” the leadership of WestCo.
Agreed!
If he and others have the audacity to be NIMBY about housing homeless in empty hotels during a pandemic, they should live where everyone have backyards!
Where do his comments venture into “NIMBY” territory? He speaks about treatment. Boiling everything down to NIMBY vs YIMBY is the death of anything forward thinking and sensible.
Sniping between different activist groups on the Upper West Side. What a novel occurrence!
After 40+ years living here if found that the usual result is that no one is happy with the end result. God forbid people should try to come to a consensus.
Mr. Weiner, unlike so many of our other wannabe politicians, seems to have some concrete ideas on fixes. I am interested in hearing more about them and others..
While I don’t know much about Westco., from what I know, it’s a social media group started by some Upper West Side moms who strive for safety and cleanliness in the UWS. Have they become a hate group of some sort? Why would his dialogue w/ them be some sort of a Scarlett Letter??
And I believe when Gale Brewer was asked a similar question on her WSR interview, she gave some ambiguous politically correct answer about not taking a side on the issue and trying to unite people (even after clearly siding w/ keeping the Lucerne as a shelter). If anything, his answer has been the most upfront and honest response I have seen so far from any of these interviews. Sadly being upfront and honest can only hurt your chances of succeeding in politics.
Frank, AOC was upfront and honest, and she succeeded.
Yes, there was considerable spewing of hatred toward the homeless. It was awful.
Don’t judge a group by its worst elements. Most of WestCo were looking for win-win solutions.
And in the view of Open Hearts, speaking the truth about Lucerne “residents” being bad neighbors was hate speech. Anyone who said something they didn’t like was racist, classist, Republican. Tell that to the small business owners who were constantly being harassed until those running the Lucerne finally started doing something. Cancel culture at its finest.
Also, please note that Mr. Weiner did not fully align with either group.
I love this candidate’s ideas, and given ranked choice voting, I feel comfortable taking a chance on him. Best interview yet. He has actual ideas to help the homeless rather than just rhetoric, which seems to be what most other people have. I’m curious about his views on transportation and policing too, as well as construction.
Your comment proves that the young can be wiser than the old. In your efforts to allegedly be “open minded” you are being closed minded.
Step out of your bubble and realize that there are many who fell somewhere to the right of Open Hearts. In most of America we would be still called radical liberals. Here we are called names like racist, classist, Trumpist, etc. I’d like to think of us as caring Democratic pragmatists. We have been publicly silenced by the woke mob but we will be voting. Because we love the UWS and NYC.
Outside of that comment what did he say that you disagree with Bob ?
Finallya Weiner we can all get behind. I’ll vote for him
Well, this almost 60-year-old is thrilled to see smart young people getting into local politics.
It will be interesting to learn more about him and the young man who was featured in the previous interview.
We need fresh people with fresh ideas to help guide the city through the emergence of this past year.
Wow…thanks for this, WSR. It is encouraging to hear some smart and thoughtful ideas from a fresh voice. I think voting for Zack over the tired old, ineffective “leadership” is a grand idea and I look forward to hearing more from the candidates.
Hi Startup Retail proposal is nonsense. No landlord in the city is going to enter into a complex profit sharing arrangement with its tenants.
If Weiner really wants to end empty storefronts he would fight to lower the massive NYC real estate taxes landlords pay which they force onto their tenants in the form of high rents.
Commercial leases, a lot of times, are based on a percentage profit sharing already.
Weiner does say it should be a % of sales. But landlords can do this NOW, if they wish, and some (very few) do.
What exactly is it that Weiner is proposing NYC government do in re: this model? that is not clear, either in this interview or on his web site. Is he saying that legislation should be passed to force landlords to accept such an arrangement?
Agreed, he doesn’t provide any real details here anywhere in the interview
No, they’re based on a percentage of sales, not “profits”. Big difference.
And there is almost always a base guaranteed rent the tenant must pay in addition to a formula based on sales.
Who cares? Clearly what the strategy has been over the past couple years is not working. Perhaps we need someone without political entrenchment and some big ideas that might start a dialogue with business owners and entrepreneurs to make change. I for one believe the UWS was once and can be again a place for small and creative businesses to flourish.
Zach Weiner conveniently ignores the excessive-rents that landlords squeeze, while the neighborhood gentified.
Rather, he suggests “reimagining” feudalism.
Is there a role for sharecropping in his political outlook?
I like Zack Weiner. Yes, he’s young but alot of the others running are OLD. So what. He may not have enough experience but I agree with alot he has to say. If I wasn’t voting for Maria Danzilo, I would DEFINITELY VOTE FOR ZACK WEINER. I am an IND who switched to a DEM to vote in the primary election. Guess you could say I am a moderate, definitely not a progressive. I would like Zach to be on Community Board 7 or have some political position. Sounds like he loves the UWS and would work hard to bring it back to it’s glory. Good Luck Zack.
All sounds good to me. Good luck to him!
Not interested, and I’m not ageist, but he seems as capable as Trudeau, and he’s a very immature 49.
I could care less about how young he is, as long as he’s got the passion to pursue this and I like what he says, sure I’d vote for him. But this confuses me. Seems to back what so many have stated here over the years about the empty storefronts and why rents don’t go down, fueling the suspicion landlords get tax relief for empty stores.
“but on top of that their problem is, if they lower the rent, it can have severe mortgage consequences.”
So in essence, rather than having a free market where store rents should be dropping drastically to find that happy medium where renters are actually willing to pay to have a store, rather than an empty blight to the neighborhood. Instead the renter has to pay above market rates so the landlord doesn’t have severe mortgage consequences. Um, okay. Commercial landlords and the homeless at the Lucerne certainly get a lot of handouts. How do the rest of us get onto this gravy train?
Your resentment of the homeless men living in the Lucerne is not a good luck.
But if you are, in fact sincere about wanting what they have, just trade places with one of these men. I am sure you will find takers.
This kid has a future and I can’t wait to see how it unfolds.
This is the first I’m hearing of the deaths at the Lucerne. Does anyone know if they were covid-related or overdoses or what, thanks?
Also, I think it’s very interesting that a lot of people have said 26 is too young. It says more about that generation and how much longer it is taking people to act like adults, than it does this candidate. 26 isn’t young if you think about it. Older Gen X, baby boomers, etc – many of us were parents by that age. Millennials and generation below them just refused to grow up even when they became old enough to join the military, vote, and take on other age associated responsibilities. They created their own stereotype of immaturity by acting immaturely. But that doesn’t mean that it isn’t possible for a 26-year-old to be a responsible individual. Every generation before them managed it! And this candidate seems like a full blown, responsible adult to me! much more aware of the issues than the “old” candidate WSR profiled a couple weeks ago who droned on about the electoral college. It’s wrong to make negative or incorrect assumptions about this candidate just because so many of today’s 26-year-olds act like we did at 14 instead of acting, well, the way a 26-year-old is supposed to be: like a mature adult who’s quite capable of the job.
He’s got my vote.
The fact is, this guy is smart and brave enough to speak out about the horrible situation at The Lucerne and The Belleclaire, and that’s good enough for me. The other candidates are more concerned with pandering to the dangerous “Progressive” elements in the neighborhood than finding solutions to the problems they caused.
I love this guy. He is acting on his ideals, not on pandering to the perceived majority to get elected. If AOC did it, why not him? Go Zach.
Due to his age, I admit I was expecting some progressive nonsense but he made some very measured points, particularly about the mentally ill homeless.
I’ll vote For him
Again, whichever of these candidates moves the Citibike docking stations from Riverside Drive at 91st-92nd Street onto the wide adjacent walkway – it’s done on Fifth Avenue, folks, and in dozens of other locations in Manhattan! – gets my vote.
And this is more important than housing the homeless or filling empty storefronts? The desire to add even 10 parking spots should perhaps be placed into perspective.
kieth,
I am sorry to have to be the one to inform you of a very ugly fact of life here on the Upper West Side. Many in our neighborhood only care and vote their own narrow interest. The sense of something bigger, like community, is foreighn to them.
I suggest you readAdam Smith in The Theory of Moral Sentiments, “The Invisible Hand is a metaphor describing the unintended greater social benefits and public good brought about by individuals acting in their own self-interests. .”
That is what America about.
My sense of community is determined by what I feel is good for me and my family. I am not going to let some self appointed do-gooder tell me how to feel.
Yes, I am convinced that you do feel that it is every man for himself, as you claim, which will result in the best for everyone.
I am not of that opinion.
“Housing the homeless,” as you put it, and “filling empty storefronts” cannot possibly be accomplished by a council person representing the UWS. The social and economic forces are overwhelming. But moving Citibike docking stations off of Riverside Drive and onto the adjoining walkways can be accomplished, a move that harms no one, and one that will prove to
me that a candidate can be EFFECTIVE.
And, World Peacenik, the last time I checked, I AM a “member of the community,” my interests count too, but you have decided to disdain my concerns as they don’t line up with yours.
Some “community”!
Nevets, please direct your Reply to keith.
I wrote nothing about “Housing the homeless” and “filling empty storefronts” ”
The “Reply button” is just below his comment.
Great points about homelessness on the streets of NYC. Addressing Kenrda’s Law is key, point is a homeless young man name Walter (from the Netflix series Lennox Hill who battles with Schizophrenia) has for years sat on 97th and Broadway drawing and talking to people. Nice person who just needs guidance and help. There are so many people out there that haven noone to look out for them, and push them to treatment, so sometimes like Zack mentions, its best for the state to enact it. Otherwise, they will continue to erode on the streets and get taken advantage of. Homelessness = Mental Health Care resources. The problem is, like Zack mentions, is that these programs are run as goverment orgs and not corporations. As much as people want to disparage corporations, a majority are run efficiently, and gov’t and non profits involve a lot more fat that needs to be cut.
You lost me at: “The problem is, like Zack mentions, is that these programs are run as goverment orgs and not corporations. As much as people want to disparage corporations, a majority are run efficiently, and gov’t and non profits involve a lot more fat that needs to be cut.”
How’s the private prison system working these days?
And the private mercinaries?
And Chicago’s private parking system?
Uncritically parroting WestCo? HARD PASS.
He quotes approvingly WestCo’s statements that they only want the homeless to have services, *eyeroll*
Anyone who has followed events of the past seven months knows that WestCo did nothing, zero, nada to get services for the homeless. The entirety of their effort was to get the homeless kicked out of the neighborhood,
If Mr Winer has seriously been ‘studying the issues’ for ‘a year’ (eyeroll), he seems to have missed the central dynamic here.
Agree, wish he’d been pushed a little harder to take a real position anywhere in this interview.
His position seems clear enough to me. He believes that the shelters failed to provide proper services and says he’s identified ways to rectify that issue. Sounds to me like he’s hoping to serve as a mediator in the interests of the neighborhood as a whole. Which to me is what a representative should do. Interesting candidate
My biggest concern is that he is still living at home with his parents. I’d like a city council member to have a bit more real world experience than doing the dishes after dinner.
I was thinking the same thing! Surprised to see no one mentioning this. Still living with mama is not a good look for someone 26 running for office. The circumstances might be easily explained, but it does make you wonder if he has ever been out on his own.
Thank you Zach for committing yourself to making your community a better, more liveable place. While I don’t agree on your position on empty commercial spaces, you are at least acknowledging the problem and trying to come up with a solution. With these empty spaces and people leaving the neighborhood, the UWS island the city is losing its tax base.
I totally understand how you picked up that during Community Board meetings many people felt not listened to, especially around the issue of the homeless and the hotels. As someone is a Senior and who lived on the UWS during deterioration of the neighborhood when hotels such as the Endicott were used as housing for the homeless . Drug dens and crime were rampant. It didn’t work then and it isn’t working now. Hotels are not suitable for a therapeutic environment where vocational, recreational and most importantly, mental health and addiction counseling are provided for this population.
I do hope tourism returns so the city can recoup a main source of revenue and our hotels are again filled with our out of town guests and other visitors.
Great article and great candidate. I look forward to hearing more about him.
Now I’m curious: since when has most of the UWS not been considered “progressive”? Since when is progressive not actually public-minded, innovative, and useful, including on behalf of the nonwealthy and nonpowerful? Have people become that complacent (have I become that unobservant)?
Weiner is clearly thinking about issues, but another reader, Big Earl, makes an interesting point: will Weiner and others legislate that landlords not be rewarded by empty-storefront tax incentives, assuming that landlords in fact get numerous breaks? Most rents need to decrease, and merchants need to charge less; it sounds achievable if limitless greed can be restrained.
How do you define “Progressive”, particularly vs “liberal”? Most simply stated, to me the difference is one of outcome vs opportunity: Progressives seek a solution that guarantees outcome, whereby Liberals traditionally want to maximize opportunity. There is overlap here of course, where outcome itself is the only way to guarantee opportunity (affirmative action, DNI, minimum wage, etc.), but there is otherwise often a significant gulf between the two. Progressivism is less individually centered and desires a greater degree of government control over society and the economy, whereas liberalism typically promotes greater social, intellectual, and economic freedom. You can probably tell from this description where this old UWS liberal falls on the spectrum! Anyway, this was an excellent interview with more detailed responses than any other in the series, bravo. I agree that the profit-sharing for storefronts will likely not fly (and perhaps SHOULD not fly), but otherwise on difficult questions some thoughtful and enlightening responses. Can it actually be that a significant part of the $1B budget for the homeless is spent on “anti-stigma education”? If true, good grief.
“Progressivism” is today a pseudonym for socialism, communism, leftism, and any other version of marxism. It is the ANTITHESIS of true liberalism personified by such great Democrats in our state as Moynihan, Clinton, Koch, and nationally Biden, Bill Clinton, Johnson, Kennedy, etc. The “Progressives” like all authoritarians, left and right, are impervious to facts-their ideology replaces facts on the ground. They’re ruining the West Side.
Socialism can mean hundreds of different things depending on the country you’re in. Canada, Italy, UK, and Sweden all would be considered “Socialist” from an American POV, yet they’re all very different. But none are Communist. They’re Progressive, mixed economies. There are no communists in city government. Progressive is more Warren, Sanders, Roosevelt, AOC, Wallace etc. No Marxists on that list. Just because you are upset by the way things have gone doesn’t mean you can make completely uninformed statements. Grow up.
Wow! Now I got two people I like. Maria Danzilo and Zach.
Im 72 years old. I’ve lived on the Upper West Side for 34 years. I don’t want progressives. I’m tired of watching my city be destroyed and having it be considered OK because it’s a progressive move. I’ve been a democrat all my life, and I am now a democrat that doesn’t like progressives. I’m all about black lives mattering, but I’m not for a movement that is built on emotions and not facts. We let in a progressive and this city will only get worse. As of now, you can go rob the nearest store at 9am and be let go by 11:30am to go and do it again. The progressives don’t care about this. It’s not on their platform. It makes me sick.
Zach, I wish you the best. Maria, I pray you you win and clean this place up.
Weiner said:
“Thrive NYC alone… has close to a billion dollars in funding… Hundreds of millions of dollars are being spent on anti-stigma and educational campaigns.”
Either Weiner is purposely misleading, or doesn’t know how to read a budget. Thrive NYC gets approx $230 million a year. “Close to a billion” is over 3 years.
As to “100s of millions” devoted to anti-stigma and educational campaigns: where does he see that in the Thrive budget? Everything is programmatic, with the exception of $1 million annually for “public education campaigns and educational resources.” Which, by the way, are important.
Thrive Budget: https://thrivenyc.cityofnewyork.us/wp-content/uploads/2021/02/FY22-Jan-Plan-Budget.pdf
Zack Weiner’s team built a directory dedicated to analyzing the Thrive budget at http://www.MyThrive.nyc …can only assume he was referring to the hundreds of millions of dollars unaccounted for and the mismatched spending on general population. The site clearly shows that the kid can break down a budget
i reviewed that site.
there are not “hundreds of millions” unaccounted for, or in fact any significant $s unaccounted for. His site has gross inaccuracies and bogus claims. it is simply a pile-on for the false charges in the NY Post.
once again, where are the “hundreds of millions” spent on “anti-stigma and educational campaigns”?
Here’s a Politico article discussing Thrive’s lack of accountability. But sure, any criticism of the program must be “parroted from NY Post”
“The City Hall budget shows $594 million in spending since ThriveNYC’s inception. The IBO budget shows $816 million. Both City Hall and IBO suspect the Office of Management and Budget included fewer programs in the City Hall version, accounting for the difference. But the budget discrepancies illustrate the difficulty in tracking Thrive.”
https://www.politico.com/states/new-york/albany/story/2019/02/26/with-obscure-budget-and-elusive-metrics-850m-thrivenyc-program-attempts-a-reset-873945
Impressive.
… and not be a draft dodger. At one point in time, being a “Draft Dodger” would have been a Medal Of Honor. I’m in my 80s…haven’t been a Dodger for years… other than being born in Brooklyn.
Keep in touch. Wiener sounds interesting.
I like Zack. He’s got a nice face and way about him. He makes a lot of sense and has done his homework, vs. Gale who is certainly likable but seems to be coasting a lot in the last few years. Not wild about the fact that he’s living at home, he should have moved out when he graduated from college. Yes, I know NYC rents are very high, but lots of younger people have more roommates than bedrooms to pay the rent.
I won’t judge people who live with their parents. In fact it is acceptable in many other cultures other than ours.
You go kiddo! You hit it on the head when you said we need to innovate and shake things up!!
Mr. Weiner’s comments, choice of words, and basic stands on policy indicate his youth. He might mature and become a worthy candidate.
I moved here just three years ago. I don’t know much about politics. I rented on 86th for one year, and ended up buying (at maybe the worst time to buy) at the end of 2019.
I have looked into all the candidates as best as I could. It seems like Gale Brewer is the favorite. Sara Lind sounds like she’s in second place. I don’t really understand the inner workings of the city, but I know I walk down the street and I have to check my surroundings constantly. I live on 77th.
I am shocked that only two candidates seem to even care about the crime happening. I am more shocked to read some of the comments that seem to say “eh, who cares about the crime” but then go on to explain how it’s important for us to have open hearts for the homeless. I’m all about having an open heart, but at what expense? How is this not a major piece on every candidate’s platform?
The ONLY person I see really talking about this is Maria Danzilo. She, like Zach, doesn’t have a lot of experience, but I feel more comfortable with Maria or Zach than Gale or Sara.
Sara doesn’t have much experience either, but most of her platform seems to be on buses? Bike lanes? Closing down streets? Better schools and less police? This is what the citizens of the UWS really care about?
You are not alone. Many of us agree with you. Unfortunately, the woke crowd who is so concerned about everyone’s rights is not concerned about our rights to voice our opinion. They view everything as an either/or situation. We can have increased safety without turning into a police state. We can voice our concerns without being racists/classists/Trumpists.
Your analysis of the race seems spot on. It will be interesting to see what happens at the polls. I think more people agree with you than you think. But will they show up? I hope so. Welcome to the neighborhood.