Winner of Vol. 72, No. 6
the Pulitzer Prize
Thursday, March 18, 2021
$1.00
All that campaigning comes down to this Early Voting
Through March 21
Special Election
Tuesday, March 23
What’s inside?
Budget crunch Dark clouds of controversy may hang over Cuomo’s head, but he might still get his way negotiating the budget. Page A3
n Candidates educate voters about new ranked-choice system in election final days By ETHAN STARK-MILLER estarkmiller@riverdalepress.com
It’s the ultimate countdown. There’s just five days until the March 23 special election to replace Andrew Cohen on the city council. Early voting is under way now, and after months of running during a pandemic, the end is faintly in sight for the six candidates — environmental activist Jessica Haller, former teacher Eric Dinowitz, real estate attorney Dan Padernacht, arts non-profit executive Mino Lora, retired New York Police Department detective Carlton Berkley, and independent filmmaker Kevin Pazmino. This special election, along with another to MINO replace now-U.S. Rep. LORA Ritchie Torres in a neighboring district, will be only the third test case of ranked-choice voting in the city. The new system — where voters choose their top five candidates in order of preference — has so far only been tested out in a pair of Queens special elections, where just one of them required DAN pADERNACHt additional rounds of counting. The ranked-choice outcome will affect the election’s timeline. If one candidate gets more than 50 percent of first-choice votes on election night, they’re automatically the winner. If no one gets 50 percent, the worst performing candidate is eliminated and their second-choice voters are redistributed to the other candidates. This process continues until there are just two candidates remaining.
HIRAM ALEJANDRO DURÁN / Illustration
After nearly three years of running to replace Andrew Cohen on the city council, former teacher Eric Dinowitz says he and his volunteers are excited for election day. Dinowitz is one of six competing in the March 23 special election. If this election requires these elimination rounds, it could be April before we find out a winner. The final weeks of campaigning have been eventful. State Sen. Alessandra Biaggi endorsed Lora and Haller last week while also sharply criticizing Dinowitz. She tied the son of Assemblyman Jeffrey Dinowitz to the local Democratic Party machine she says supported her 2018 opponent Jeff Klein, who as a state senator, led the Independent Democratic Conference, a group of breakaway Democrats who backed Re-
publicans, and gave them majority control. Additionally, Padernacht and Berkley said they were following a route already established by Haller and Lora, pairing up to encourage voters to make them their top two choices. And they’re encouraging voters to do the same. “My second choice is Carlton, he’s an extremely sincere and good person,” Padernacht said during a forum last week hosted by Common Cause New York and The Riverdale Y. “If I don’t become the councilmember, I would love to see someone as
good as Carlton be our councilmember.” Tuesday’s finish line was a long way coming for the candidates, but even longer for both Padernacht and Dinowitz. Both launched their campaigns to run for Cohen’s seat within days of each other in Summer 2018, when the idea of the councilman being lured away with a job as a judge was nothing more than a poorly kept secret. “There’s a lot of excitement on the ground for the campaign,” Dinowitz said. CAMPAIGNING, page A4
Year after closing, public schools reopen for all Endorse, of course State Sen. Alessandra Biaggi makes no secret who she supports in next week’s city council race — and who she doesn’t. Page A6
PLUS:
the history of a three-year campaign. Page A4
n High schoolers are last to return in wake of COVID pandemic
‘I’m just really excited that I’ll be getting my student MetroCard back. That’s the big deal for me.’
By ROSE BRENNAN rbrennan@riverdalepress.com
It’s a gruesome anniversary. One year ago, New York City was overcome by the coronavirus pandemic. And the public school system — once infamous for never closing — was no exception as 1.1 million students took their lessons home and abandoned physical campuses. For the better part of a year, remote learning was the way. While students did return to campus for a short time in October, bringing students together and fighting the coronavirus were just two things that couldn’t come together. But there’s a beacon of hope. High school students return to their physical classrooms on Monday — the last group to do so — marking the beginning, once again, of nearly fully opened campuses part of the week. Teachers are already back in school now, ensuring all preparations for their
— Raphy Jacobson
HIRAM ALEJANDRO DURÁN / File
Raphy Jacobson’s senior year at the High School of American Studies isn’t shaping up the way he expected, thanks to the coronavirus pandemic. He and his classmates will return to the building next week. But at this point, Jacobson has his sights set on college. students’ return are fulfilled and everything else is squared away. High school students last stepped on campus before Thanksgiving. Preschools, elementary schools and specialized District 75 schools reopened in
December, and middle schools followed suit only last month. But older students — who didn’t require parents to stay home with them — were held back from returning as long as possible. That’s because Mayor Bill de
Blasio wanted to ensure younger students and those with higher learning needs returned to campuses first. But four months after the entire system locked down a second time, the mayor now thinks it’s safe for this final group
of students to move back into the classroom. Together. “We have all the pieces we need to bring high school back and bring it back strong — and, of course, to bring it back safely,” the mayor said during a recent daily press briefing. “Why do we know this? Because we set the gold standard for the nation, and our rules became the blueprint for the Centers for Disease Control(‘s) … own plan for bringing back schools.” English teacher Christine Vaccaro says her school, Riverdale/ Kingsbridge Academy, was in a bit of a unique position when it came to reopening since RKA teaches both middle and high school grades. When the West 237th Street school reopened in REOPENING, page A4
It’s back to the drawing board for Independence n Recommendations are upended after anonymous flyer posted in neighborhood By ROSE BRENNAN rbrennan@riverdalepress.com
A stretch of Independence Avenue has been the subject of special attention from Community Board 8’s traffic and transportation committee over the last six months. And now, thanks to a faceless neighbor with access to a copy machine, that attention will continue for at least a while longer. As reckless driving plagued Indepen-
dence late last year, a working group from the traffic committee developed several suggestions they hoped the city’s transportation department might want to take up. Some of those suggestions, however, were targeted by some neighbors including Whitehall co-op president Jeffrey Moerdler, even before the committee could consider them, like bicycle lanes that some believe could slow down traffic, as it would narrow vehicle lanes. Ultimately, only a few of the working group’s suggestions made it out of the transportation committee and in front of the full community board. Suggestions like adding speed bumps, truffle paint and flexiINDEPENDENCE, page A4
BRIGHT AND BEAUTIFUL 4705 Henry Hudson Pkwy, Apt. 3K 2 BD | 1.5 BA // $385,000 ALISON BARTLETT Alison.Bartlett@sothebyshomes.com
HIRAM ALEJANDRO DURÁN
It looked as though Community Board 8’s traffic and transportation committee was finally getting somewhere developing recommendations to curb reckless driving along Independence Avenue. But random flyers anonymously posted in the neighborhood criticizing details of the process has forced the committee to start back almost at square one.