Galef’s lack of leadership failed hometown constituents
September 17, 2012 — Assembly Candidate Kim Izzarelli says she hears the question so often from fellow Briarcliff and Ossining residents, that she almost has the conversation timed to a rhythm.
They ask: “Can you tell me why Ossining is part of Rockland now?” says Izzarelli, “And I tell them, ‘Your sitting assemblymember, Sandy Galef, didn’t think you’d mind being 5% of a senate district on the other side of the Hudson River’.”
“But...she’s still a nice lady, right?” quips Izzarelli.
Joking aside about Galef’s kindly, indulgent “grandmotherly” image, Izzarelli, who is 51, says most residents are unaware how the redistricting process occured or how her opponent, Sandy Galef, a 20 year incumbent, played a significant role in diminishing the voting power of her own constituency.
SEE Galef, speaking on March 11, 2011 - YouTube clip below speaking on non-partisan redistricting
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FuEnqsUQDfM
Izzarelli notes (at the 2:30 minute mark of the YOUTUBE video “Non-Partisan Redistricting: “Do You Expect Us to Wait Ten Years?”) that it was fairly obvious back in March 2011, that Galef did not intend to fight on behalf of her constituents and was leaving the heavy lifting to Governor Cuomo.
“Galef routinely acquieces to men in power” says Izzarelli, refering to Galef’s continued reticence and failure to demand resignations of Assemblyman Vito Lopez and Galef’s own party leader, Speaker Sheldon Silver, whose approval of a cash settlement payment and confidentiality agreement earlier this year circumvented the Assembly’s Ethics Committee. “As a woman, I have an issue with Galef’s unwillingness to challenge men in authority roles. She’s clearly not advancing constituent concerns.”
Meanwhile, Galef continues portray herself as an innocent victim in the 2012 redistricting . She hides behind a veil of voting against the redistricting itself, yet in the next breath, claims it as win for the legislature for its approval of an independent redistricting commission to draw the 2022 map. Coincidently, the same year that Galef will turn age 82.
Izzarelli repeats “Nice lady or not, if Galef is incapable of leading her party to consensus to resolve complex issues, why give her two more years to serve? She has been unable to lead for the last 20."
