Sabini and Monserrate in heated debate

State Senator John Sabini and City Councilmember Hiram Monserrate engaged in a sometimes fiery and contentious first debate discussing issues that will affect voters within the 13th Senate District at the Democratic primary in September.
The Citizens Union hosted the debate at the Langston Hughes Library in Corona, on Wednesday, August 23, and the candidates opened the debate discussing their top three priorities.
Before running out of time to answer, Sabini said that the structure of Albany needed to change so that more issues could go through the system and that health needed to be addressed. Monserrate said his three priorities are affordable housing, health care and public safety.
During the debate, each candidate was given a chance to ask a question of his opponent. Sabini used his question to bring up the health care issues that exist within the 13th Senate District, including the lack of hospital beds and how busy Elmhurst Hospital is, and asked Monserrate what he would do &#8220to combat this impending threat against the health care system.”
Monserrate began by saying he is a &#8220great supporter” of Elmhurst Hospital and has given funds to it. He said that one way to assist in this area is by addressing Medicaid fraud, which results in the loss of billions of dollars on an annual basis.
When taking his turn, Monserrate said that, during four years as a Senator, Sabini has introduced 70 bills and passed two. Monserrate asked what Sabini would do differently in another term.
Sabini responded by saying that, with a Republican majority, it is difficult to get anything passed and that he was very proud of the two bills that were passed. One
granted free tuition to the surviving families of Flight 587 and the second made it so that &#8220high stakes testing” could not be done on religious holidays.
A question submitted by an audience member asked the two candidates what they would do to address the problems with Con Edison. Monserrate said the Public Service Commission has not been doing enough. He suggested fining Con Edison $1 million per day during a blackout. Sabini said that the commission &#8220has put its head in the sand” but that he was proud of the way his staff assisted residents during the blackout.