By Dustin Brown
In a congressional district that bridges the East River from Manhattan into western Queens, two Upper East Side residents are vying for votes in Astoria and Long Island City.
U.S. Rep. Carolyn Maloney (D-Astoria), an incumbent who has held her seat for 10 years, faces Republican Anton Srdanovic in the Nov. 5 election for the 14th Congressional District.
Challenging the incumbent is nothing new to Maloney, who did so herself in 1992 when she won her first congressional race after leaving her post as a city councilwoman.
Now standing on the other side, Maloney is trumpeting her record in Congress of fighting to ensure New York gets its fair share of federal dollars to aid in the city’s recovery from the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks.
Maloney lobbied the Federal Emergency Management Agency to alter its mortgage and rental assistance program guidelines so people who were employed in Lower Manhattan but lived elsewhere in the city could receive assistance.
“A lot of Queens people became eligible for assistance based on that work,” she said.
Maloney said Social Security benefits, the scarcity of affordable housing and the rising costs of prescription drugs are the top issues voiced by people she has met in Queens senior centers, while education is a priority for parents.
“People shouldn’t have to choose between food on the table and prescription drugs,” she said. “One of the things we’re pushing very hard on the Democrats’ side is expanding Medicare … to cover prescription drugs.”
Maloney was also successful in preserving 440 units of Section 8 housing at the Marine Terrace apartment complex in Astoria last year.
Maloney said she is lobbying the Museum of Modern Art to keep MoMA QNS open to the public after the museum returns to its renovated Manhattan home in 2005.
“You’re drawing a whole new audience in Queens that is important to be exposed to art,” she said. “I think it’s very important that we keep MoMA there either full time or opened on the weekends.”
Srdanovic, 34, said he decided to run because he wanted to focus the city’s congressional delegation on the economy as well as security and safety issues, both of which he believes have been neglected.
Srdanovic began his career as an engineer working in the nuclear industry, but for the past eight years he has worked in finance, currently at Citigroup.
“Having someone coming out of a financial background will give Congress a little more of a tool or a go-to guy to ask the hard questions and be able to understand the answers,” Srdanovic said.
Srdanovic also thinks more funding should have gone to defense and national security long before Sept. 11.
“It’s a pretty easy vote to suddenly put more money to defense after Sept. 11,” he said. “I’m talking about having a vision for the future.”
Although he now lives in Manhattan, Srdanovic spent some of his childhood in Whitestone and said he understands the needs of people living on both sides of the East River.
Some of those differences have popped up on the campaign trail.
“In Queens, people actually ask me issues,” he said. “In Manhattan, they’ll take a piece of literature, take a few steps, turn and say, ‘How the hell old are you?’” he quipped, as people frequently mistake him for much younger than his 34 years.
Srdanovic said he wants to clear the air pollution that has made western Queens known as “Asthma Alley,” and therefore opposes any efforts to shut down the Indian Point nuclear power plant in Westchester County.
“Now is not the time to shut down a low-cost and environmentally friendly producer,” he said. “The result would be up to six new power plants in our backyard. It would not be a good policy, especially in an area that’s already overburdened with power plants.”
Reach reporter Dustin Brown by e-mail at Timesledger@aol.com or call 229-0300, Ext. 154.
