On Tuesday, February 9, voters of the 24th Assembly District will go to the polls in a special election to decide whether, for the first time since 1973, they will be represented by someone not named Weprin.
They will chose between Democrat David Weprin, the former City Councilmember and brother of Mark, who left the Assembly for David’s seat in the Council – and Bob Friedrich, a registered Democrat who is running on the Republican line.
Mark Weprin first gained the seat in a special election in 1994 – when his father, Assembly Speaker Saul Weprin, died in office, after serving since 1973.
On their face, the odds do not favor Friedrich. The district has far more Democrats than Republicans and David Weprin’s name will also appear on the Independence and Working Families lines.
Weprin, who served two terms on the Council as Finance Committee chair, has four times as much money in his war chest. His old Council district largely overlaps the Assembly district, and the family name has high recognition.
None of this seems to faze Friedrich, who is the President of Glen Oaks Village Co-op, with 10,000 residents in the district. “That’s a huge number of voters who know how hard I work for people I represent,” he said.
While Weprin touts his eight years on the Finance Committee as reason to send him to Albany, Friedrich points out that his opponent’s focus on citywide issues kept him from paying sufficient attention to the people in this part of Queens. “I’ve been working here all along,” he said.
Some veteran political observers have noted that the vagaries of district line drawing in Albany have included areas that voted for a Republican in the last City Council election in the district.
Normally, that would be the slenderest straw for a Republican candidate to grasp – but this is a special election, when the normally miniscule number of voters could be reduced even further by winter weather.
While operatives in the Democratic, Republican and Independence parties have said they will get out the vote, many privately concede that Friedrich has a chance if fewer voters turn out.
For what it’s worth, the Farmer’s Almanac is predicting snow.
– See Editorial Endorsement on Page 36
