Fifth candidate seeking Gallagher’s Council seat

The field of candidates vying for Dennis Gallagher’s City Council seat has its newest and youngest addition as Middle Village native Mike Mascetti, 23, threw his hat into the ring for the position.
Mascetti is the fifth Queens resident to announce his candidacy for the 30th council district’s June special election which was necessitated after Gallagher resigned and pleaded guilty to assaulting a woman in his Middle Village office.
“It’s been my experience that the local politicians have not always been responsive to the things that people are concerned about,” said Mascetti, who works as a paralegal and runs a non-profit tutoring service in Manhattan.
The Stuyvesant High School and Fordham University graduate plans to spend the next few weeks collecting signatures and raising money for his campaign, and he believes he will bring a new perspective to the race.
“I don’t see myself as having to take the party line in the same way as everyone else will,” said Mascetti, who is a registered Democrat. “I haven’t been involved in the clubhouse politics that goes on.”
Republicans Anthony Como and Thomas Ognibene as well as Democrats Elizabeth Crowley and Charles Ober have already been fundraising and campaigning throughout the community.
Crowley, whose parents both served in the City Council and whose cousin, Joseph Crowley, is a Queens Congressmember and Chair of the Queens Democratic Organization, originally ran for this council seat in 2001 and is expected to receive the backing of the Democratic Organization.
Meanwhile the Republican race is beginning to heat up as Ognibene, who represented this district for 10 years before Gallagher succeeded him, is accusing the Queens Republican Party of dirty politics.
“I was shocked and dismayed to learn that the Queens County Executive Committee of the County Republican Party met on March 26 for the purpose of endorsing a candidate in the 30th Council District Special Election without extending an invitation to me,” Ognibene said.
The Queens County Republicans have thrown their support behind Como, who used to work for Senator Serphin Maltese and currently works as a Commissioner for the City Board of Elections in Queens.