2010 Assembly District 38 – Democratic Primary

Nick Comaianni is President of the Community Education Council for Community School District 24 and Chairperson of Education Committee of Queens Community Board 9.  Comaianni is also active through his service on the Forest Parks Co-ops and the Glendale Civic Association.  If elected, Comaianni’s top priorities would be education, senior services, veterans’ assistance, and public safety but he provided few details on what he would address specifically for each of these priorities.  With regard to reform issues, Comaianni supports the establishment of an independent legislative redistricting commission believing that legislators should be removed from the process of drawing district lines.  He also emphasized the importance of providing greater disclosure and transparency in relation to campaign finance reform.  Citizens Union admires Comaianni’s active involvement in his community but was concerned by the abstract nature of his top legislative priorities.  While Comaianni supports Citizens Union’s agenda on many issues, we believe he could have greater in-depth knowledge of reform issues.

 

Michael Miller, the incumbent in assembly district 38, has been in office for less than a year, elected in a special election in September 2009. Before entering office, Mr. Miller was a manager at Tiger Federal Credit Union and a board member of the Greater Ridgewood Youth Council. On reform issues, Miller supports independent redistricting. He believes being a legislator should be a full-time job for everybody, as it is for him, and if legislators maintain outside employment, they should be forced to disclose all their clients. He differs from Citizens Union on a number of reform issues including lowering campaign contribution limits, creating a public financing system, and limiting transfers from party committees to candidates. He feels that when he first ran it would not have been possible for him to win as a working person and relative unknown candidate without the level of campaign contributions he was allowed to receive. In his time in office, Miller has emphasized community outreach, adding weekend office hours and making himself available 24 hours a day by giving constituents access to his cell phone number. His top three non-reform priorities are increasing the accessibility of his office, quality of life issues, and unemployment. Since his election, he has not had much time to make a mark within the legislature, but he was able to convince Assemblyman Sheldon Silver to initiate a rules change, reducing the time legislators are able to speak about a bill on the Assembly floor. He came to office through a special election which was called at the last minute to prevent other non-establishment candidates from staging viable campaigns. Citizens Union has concerns with the manner Miller came to office and also disapproved of some of his positions on reform issues, but admires his community work and accessibility within the district and his overall collegial approach.  We look forward to seeing what Miller does with a full-term should he be reelected but feel preferring him at this time is not yet earned.