Bing, Lundahl Make Their Case

By [Dan Rivoli ] Assembly Member Jonathan Bing and his challenger Gregg Lundahl laid out their agenda for Albany recently in separate interviews with Our Town. The Democratic primary is Sept. 14. Bing, who is seeking his fifth term in the Assembly, talked about the bills he has authored and passed into law during his eight years in Albany. In this past session, he sponsored 10 bills and had seven either signed into law or sent to Governor David Paterson"s desk. Bing highlighted a bill he sponsored that allows higher education and cultural institutions's his district contains parts of Museum Mile along Fifth Avenue's more flexibility with their endowment. Most notably, he carried the no-fault divorce bill in the Assembly. New York was the last state to adopt no-fault divorce, which allows a couple to split up without needing a reason. Though the bill had been introduced before, Bing said he reached out to his Republican colleagues to sponsor the legislation. That helped the bill finally move through the Legislature. Similarly, bus lane cameras had stalled in the Assembly for years. Having cameras in bus lanes was considered crucial to the East Side bus rapid transit system"s success. â??When that happens, you can say Albany"s dysfunctional, forget it," Bing said. â??Or you can say I"m going to try again. I tried again and, like the no-fault divorce bill, built a coalition. But there was one piece of legislation that landed him in a race for re-election. [caption id="" align="alignright" width="360" caption="Jonathan Bing"][/caption] He sponsored a bill that ended the â??last hired, first fired practice of teacher layoffs. It replaced seniority as the sole criteria for layoffs with a panel made up of teachers, principals and administrators. That earned Bing the wrath of the United Teachers Federation, which is financially supporting Lundahl, a high school teacher. â??I probably would not win a UFT executive committee election but I"m not running for executive committee of UFT, Bing said. â??I"m running to be the representative of the East Side of Manhattan which was going to lose teachers under â??last in, first out." Bing"s bill earned him the endorsement of Mayor Michael Bloomberg. And he still retained some union support, such as the doorman"s union 32BJ and CSEA, a state employees union. Lundahl also has endorsements from the AFL-CIO and 1199SEIU, the healthcare workers union. Lundahl, a high school government teacher at Washington Irving High School, laments crowded classrooms and insufficient space for physical education and art. â??I intend to lead the fight for a balanced curriculum, Lundahl said. But his qualifications for this office, he said, are that he is not a â??career politician or â??part of the machine that is broken. Lundahl lays blame for Albany"s dysfunction at Bing"s feet. â??We know what the problems are, Lundahl said. â??We just need leadership that can fix them.