East Side Dems Meet Attorney General Candidates

Candidates seeking to succeed Andrew Cuomo in the attorney general"s office met dozens of dyed-in-the-wool Democratic primary voters April 18. That"s when five East Side Democratic clubs organized a forum to meet the candidates vying to be the state"s top law enforcement official. The attorney general"s post is possibly the most competitive statewide primary this year as Cuomo, a Democrat, is a presumptive gubernatorial candidate and will leave his current seat open when he officially declares his candidacy. Each of the five candidates took about 15 minutes to address the crowd of Democratic activists, board members, elected officials and staffers, and then participated in a brief Q&A. (The group also hosted Sen. Kirsten Gillibrand, her challenger Jonathan Tasini, State Comptroller Tom DiNapoli and drug activist Randy Credico, who is challenging Senator Charles Schumer in the primary.) The attorney general candidates's two state legislators, a district attorney, a class action attorney and a former government official's appeared to impress club members who attended the forum, held at Wagner Middle School on East 76th Street. â??We"re in an unusual position of choosing between good people, said Betsy Feist, president of the East Side Democratic Club, after the forum. Members" questions covered drug policy, civil liberties and the New York City Police Department, Wall Street reform and's unsurprisingly's cleaning up state government. â??We want people who are going to reform Albany, Feist said. Louise Dankberg, a longtime district leader in Gramercy Park, said she wants the next attorney general to keep in touch with average New Yorkers after being elected. â??We"re looking for someone to be our attorney, be our eyes and ears and to have a government that"s open and talks to us, Dankberg said. Below is a summary of what each candidate had to say about their personal and professional background, credentials and vision for the office. Richard Brodsky, a Westchester Assembly member, said he understands the importance of an attorney general who focuses on consumer protections, like Robert Abrams did, or Eliot Spitzer"s â??Sheriff of Wall Street model. But Brodsky wants his attorney general"s office to have a â??fundamental commitment to institutional reform in areas like the property tax system and insuring the right to privacy. â??There has to be some place where that debate can happen, Brodsky said. â??The attorney general should be the epicenter of reform. Brodsky, who has been in the Assembly for nearly three decades, touted his tenure there. He chaired a committee that investigated the Metropolitan Transportation Authority, introduced legislation on campaign finance reform and carried a constitutional amendment for independent redistricting of legislative seats. Though he never shied away from being labeled an â??insider, his long track record in state government made him a target for one club member who was concerned about a bump in pension payments, which the State Legislature approved. Brodsky said that pension plans were outside the scope of the attorney general"s office, but the woman persisted in getting him to discuss the issue. â??You were a state Assemblyman for 24 years, she said (for the record, Brodsky was elected to his seat 28 years ago). Ultimately, he stood by the legislation, saying, â??I"m not going to be a public employee basher in this race. Sean Coffey relishes his â??outsider status. His claim to fame is leading the class action lawsuit against WorldCom, which netted a $6 billion settlement for investors. â??I took on corporate America and corporate misconduct, Coffey told the crowd. â??I took people to task for lying to investors and hurting the working men and women and hurting pension funds. Coffey, who is partly self-funding his campaign, has never run for office before, but he said he considers himself a â??viable candidate. â??I saw there was a road for an outsider, he said. He cited three reasons for his campaign: Albany reform (â??I"m going to bring to Albany and fight for in Albany what I fought for in Wall Street: transparency and accountability ), patrolling Wall Street (â??We can"t kill it, but we got to have guardrails and gatekeepers ) and handling wage and civil rights cases. Coffey called for the public financing of the four statewide elected offices, starting with the attorney general and comptroller. He also promised not to run for governor, a practice so common that the A.G. is jokingly called â??Aspiring Governor. â??This is a capstone, Coffey said, â??not a stepping stone. During his time in Attorney General Eliot Spitzer"s office, Eric Dinallo is credited with bringing new life to an old law known as the Martin Act to prosecute financial fraud. That creativity, he told Democratic club members, is essential in fighting corruption. When the audience asked questions about how he would solve their problems as attorney general, Dinallo was prepared. He said the Tweed Law, which allows the attorney general to recoup money from corrupt public officials, was â??underutilized. On a question about homegrown terrorism, Dinallo said the office"s organized crime task force offered a â??great opportunity to tackle that problem. â??Albany is not going to give you any solutions, said Dinallo, a former state insurance superintendent. â??The only way that that office succeeds, the way that office continues to protect New Yorkers, is by using the law creatively. As attorney general, Dinallo said he would also protect the public on pocketbook issues, mainly the fees consumers have to pay on insurance, credit cards and banking. â??The checks we all write at the kitchen table, Dinallo said, â??is what that office can have a huge influence on. Nassau County District Attorney Kathleen Rice"s message balanced being a tough-on-crime prosecutor with â??smart initiatives suited to the liberal Democratic audience. â??I have done progressive, tough- and smart-on-crime initiatives addressing long entrenched drug problems we have in some of our crime-ridden neighborhoods, Rice said. â??I"m a Democrat who believes we can"t incarcerate our way out of a crime problem. Rice touted her work as a district attorney on alternative sentencing, drunk-driving and consumer issues, a focus she said she would bring to the attorney general"s office. â??We need to get back to what people expect their attorney general to doâ?¦ getting away from this job only being the â??Sheriff of Wall Street" and getting down to being the â??Sheriff of Main Street." Credentials aside, Rice made the argument that she is the Democrat who has the best chance of winning in the November general election. She said she is a proven vote-getter after deposing of a long-time incumbent district attorney, has fundraising prowess and is the only woman in the race. â??I am your outsider, Rice said. â??We need people elected in the general election. The State Senate, as of late, has been a major source of dysfunction in Albany. But State Sen. Eric Schneiderman was happy to discuss the Senate to explain his efforts to fix that chamber to Democratic club members. He won applause for taking up the â??thankless task of overthrowing the Republican majority in the State Senate and expelling State Sen. Hiram Monserrate from the Legislature after he assaulted his girlfriend. Schneiderman"s legislative accomplishments, he conceded, are thin because the G.O.P. controlled the Senate for most of his tenure. But he emphasized his leading role in repealing New York"s harsh drug laws from the 1970s. â??I"m very proud of the fact that three months [after] taking over the [Codes] Committee, we finally, finally repealed Rockefeller Drug Laws, he said. Schneiderman"s vision for the office is to use it to restore public confidence in government. â??I am very much driven by the desire to re-establish the idea that no one is above the law, and that everyone has to play by the rules, he said.