After we posted about our Roosevelt Avenue, Jackson Heights walk with Assembly candidate Hiram Monserrate last week, we got some sparking comments on social media about why we would give this guy any press at all.
When we sat down with Hiram, he wanted to clear the air about his reputation and questioned a recent article from the Ledger which referred to his past legal troubles. After explaining that our readers are savvy and leaving it out could signify that we were trying to hide his past, he talked about his new life with a wife and young child. He also showed us that the part of his past life that has not changed is his love and fighting spirit for his community. And we will tell you something that is only talked about in the highest of Queens political circles: Monserrate is ‘relevant’ and he has a following which many in the democratic clubs fear fractures Queens democratic politics. He is running for Jeff Aubry’s seat. Larinda Hooks, who is well known at Elmcore, is the choice of county — and Aubry. Stay tuned for that race.
Internet trollers who minimize the message from our reporting about the sex workers and child labor tragedy going on in his neighborhood should focus on the message: that area needs attention. It doesn’t need a sweep once every six months. The illegal activity is rampant and for those living near Roosevelt Avenue, to have a reasonable quality of life shouldn’t be asking too much.
By the way another nugget he suggested is that the MTA should be an agency, not an authority, which doesn’t have the oversight and agency, would. Not a bad thought.
Carl Heastie, the leader of the NY State Assembly is doubling down on his notion on not recognizing that people who loot and harm retail workers should not be considered felons. Mayor Adams disagrees. But the power the Assembly Speaker wields means it goes nowhere. The missing piece in Heastie’s stance is that cops continue to lose the ability to perform their job. It means workers at these retail stores don’t pursue shoplifters. It means that what we continue to witness in drug stores all over the city the lawlessness of looting will not change. Don’t wonder why we will see store after store have simple everyday items behind locked glass shelves. It takes ten minutes to track down a store worker to open the glass showcase to get a bottle of aspirin… if you can even find a drug store within walking distance from your home anymore.
We don’t think reformers of criminal justice had this in mind. If criminal justice is truly to be reformed, laws and procedures like this have to be rolled back. The ‘new common sense’ goes too far when real criminality is not dealt with in a true ‘common sense’ manner.
