According to a tentative candidate list…
By Daniel Massey
Candidates declared their intentions to run for seats in the state Legislature last week, but in four districts that cover southern and western Queens, there was little or no competition for the incumbents.
According to a tentative candidate list released by the state Board of Elections, there will be no primaries Sept. 10 for the 15th state Senate District or the 23rd, 25th and 38th state Assembly Districts. The four districts also will be starving for drama come November, as there appear to be no serious threats to the incumbents.
In the 23rd Assembly District, which covers Ozone Park, Woodhaven, Howard Beach and the Rockaways, there are no Democratic challengers to Audrey Pheffer (D-Ozone Park). Pheffer will face off against Independent Party candidate Kenneth Burn, of Rockaway Park, in the Nov. 5 election.
Pheffer, who was first elected to the state Assembly in a special election in 1987, said she does not plan to open a campaign office, but will otherwise proceed as if she were facing stiff competition.
“My philosophy is you work hard as if you always have a race,” she said in an interview Monday. “I continue to work at the same pace I’ve always worked. I go to all meetings. I speak whenever I’m asked to be a guest speaker.”
The assemblywoman, who is running on the Democratic, Liberal and Working Families party lines in the predominantly white district, said overcrowded schools and low-flying, noisy airplanes were the issues foremost on her constituents’ minds.
In the newly reconfigured 25th state Assembly District, Assemblyman Brian McLaughlin (D-Flushing) is running unopposed, but that has not stopped him from leading an aggressive getting-to-know-you campaign aimed at his new constituents.
Even before the new district lines were finalized, McLaughlin became a regular in Richmond Hill, meeting with the neighborhood’s Sikh and Indo-Caribbean communities. The district is 30 percent Asian, due mostly to the large presence of groups that trace their roots to India.
Placards bearing McLaughlin’s name are plastered on telephone poles and lampposts across the district, which stretches from southern Whitestone through Flushing, Fresh Meadows, Kew Gardens Hills, Briarwood, Richmond Hill and a small pocket of Ozone Park.
McLaughlin, who was first elected in 1992, also has found time to campaign for others, heavily promoting Uma SenGupta’s drive for female district leader in the 25th Assembly District, Part B. On Friday, he was scheduled to host a fund-raiser at Bombay Palace in Great Neck, L.I. on her behalf.
Longtime Assemblyman Anthony Seminerio (D-Richmond Hill), who ran unopposed in 1998, will face off against Green Party candidate Darius Pereira, of Richmond Hill, in the Nov. 5 election for the 38th state Assembly District.
As a result of redistricting, the district no longer covers Middle Village. A section of Ozone Park also was removed. The new lines encompass Woodhaven, Ozone Park, Richmond Hill, Glendale and Ridgewood in a district that is 43 percent white, 31 percent Hispanic, 12 percent Asian and 14 percent others.
Seminerio first was elected in 1978 and his chief of staff, James Fitz Gerald, said the campaign would be business as usual despite the lack of Democratic or Republican party opposition.
“We do our normal business, which is to support our constituents and work on their behalf,” said Fitz Gerald, noting Seminerio also was running on the Conservative Party line. “We will make a mailing so people will know we’re still alive. You like to have a voter turnout and let the people know you are running.”
In the 15th state Senate District, two challengers filed petitions in the race against state Sen. Serphin Maltese (R-Glendale), but neither of the two were Democrats. Green Party candidate Dorothy Williams-Pereira, of Richmond Hill, and Working Families Party candidate Pamela Peters, of Forest Hills, both declared their intentions to run for the seat Maltese has occupied since 1988.
The district covers Maspeth, Middle Village, Glendale, Ridgewood, Forest Hills, Richmond Hill, Woodhaven, Ozone Park, South Ozone Park and Howard Beach and is 52 percent white.
Maltese, who first was elected in 1988, also is running on the Independent and Conservative party lines.
Reach reporter Daniel Massey by e-mail at Timesledger@aol.com or call 229-0300, Ext. 156.
