North American Correspondent
Grace Meng
The three main Democratic candidates, State Assemblyman Rory Lancman (D-Fresh Meadows), State Assemblywoman Grace Meng (Flushing), City Council member Elizabeth Crowley (D- Glendale) for the sixth district of Queens, had a ‘face-off’ last week on issues affecting diverse ethnic communities in New York. The 6th District runs from Flushing and Bayside to Maspeth, Middle Village, Glendale and part of Ridgewood.
Large numbers of Guyanese-Americans are settled in the district and community activists are lining up behind their candidates with some backing Meng and most backing Lancman who along with Crowley, is well known among Guyanese voters. But analysts say the race is a top-up between Lancman and Meng.
During the ‘face-off’ in the presence of reporters and voters, the candidates made their pitch to win support. Lancman said he is running a campaign on issues, rattling off a list of stops where he has taken questions from the public and reporters on social security, veterans’ affairs, taxes and federal finances, education grants, violence against women and the U.S.-Israel alliance.
On the economy, Lancman said he wants equity in [tax] rates. “We should eliminate things like oil company subsidies, and agriculture subsidies that most small family farms can’t get.”
The candidates say a way to tackle the $16 trillion deficit is simply getting more people back to work, something he said could be jump-started by the formation of a national infrastructure bank that would fund public-private partnerships to repair and replace the country’s bridges, tunnels and roads.
Lancman also called for easy access to loans for small businesses. “Banks will go to the Federal Reserve discount window [for money], but they’re not lending it out”.
Rory Lancman
