The Flatbush Jewish Community Coalition, representing the greater Flatbush Jewish Community, announced its endorsement of longtime askan Pinny Ringel in the upcoming race for District Leader of the 48th Assembly in the Democratic Party primaries on Tuesday.
The FJCC noted that Ringel, who is well known in the community, has earned their support as a token of appreciation for his two decades of public service, in particular, his tireless work on behalf of the community at City Hall.
“For the past eight years, he has been an important go-to person on nearly every issue of importance involving city government and our community,” the FJCC said in a statement. “Pinny is a proven, effective and responsive leader.”
The FJCC joins an ever-expanding list of recognized communal leaders representing all major Chassidic sects and school administrators in Borough Park.
Ringel first served as a community liaison to former Councilman and now-State Senator Simcha Felder where he represented him in community board meetings and police council meetings. Since 2009, Ringel served in various citywide positions that empowered the community’s representation in one of the most challenging times for frum Jews in the city.
The primary is on Tuesday, June 28. Polls are open from 6 am to 9 pm.
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6 Responses
I keep seeing that he’s a proven and effective leader. What has he done for us?
I mean this in a serious way. What has he done for the community if someone can point out specifics. Ty.
He was deblassio’s Jewish liaison, so I’m voting for the other guy.
“For the past eight years, he has been an important go-to person on nearly every issue of importance involving city government and our community,” the FJCC said in a statement. “Pinny is a proven, effective and responsive leader.
Really? Tell us ONE thing he did on behalf of our community that makes him such a proven, effective and responsive leader.
Just one. That’s all I’m asking for
These four guys would make a great band.
mms601; The other guy David Schwartz was Andrew Yang’s Jewish Community Outreach Director!
So I don’t think I can vote for either guy.
I was always confused as to what is District Leader anyway.
This is what I found.
New York has an extra layer of elected representatives who exist, in theory, to help run the political parties in each county, which correspond to each of the five boroughs.
Traditionally, their duties include voting for party leadership, choosing poll workers and nominating judges.
But the unpaid, volunteer role can be what you make of it, and some use the district leader position to register voters, lobby for policy changes or connect New Yorkers to services.
“They’re able to do a lot of things that are not really defined,” said Richard David, a district leader in Ozone Park and Richmond Hill, Queens, since 2018.
For him, the job has involved pushing city government for more COVID testing capacity in his neighborhood, connecting those affected by Hurricane Ida with resources or helping to get an official designation for the area as Little Guyana.
“A lot of it is what you make of it,” he said.
Where do district leaders come from?
Though district leaders are volunteer positions, they are still elected officials and must be voted into the office every two years. They have no term limits.
The role is a holdover from New York’s hyper-partisan 19th Century, “when a well-connected local party boss could find a loyal constituent a job, an apartment or a key to getting out of jail,” The New York Times wrote in a 2019 obituary of a powerful former district leader, James McManus, the last boss of a political dynasty that ruled the West Side of Manhattan.
District leaders’ power has diminished over the course of reforms in the 20th Century, but their role is still enshrined in state law.
For John Blasco, who served as a Lower East Side district leader between 2019 and 2021, the job is an opportunity to recruit people to get involved in city politics.
“You’re helping to build up a Democratic Party. You’re doing it locally in your own Assembly District, and you’re contributing to the larger county,” he said.
And it’s tough, he added, because the process and system is so hard to parse. There’s typically been little information about district leaders, or the county system, readily available online or elsewhere.
“It’s so political. And it feels so underground,” he said. “Once you learn about it, you’re like, ‘I didn’t know I had all these micro elected officials!’”
In New York City, the Conservative, Republican and Democratic parties all have district leaders. Among the Democratic party, district leaders represent an area that corresponds to the state’s Assembly districts — but not always.
In Manhattan, a district leader represents one half, one third or one quarter of an Assembly district, depending on the area. The parts are labeled with an A, B, C or D. (Blasco represented the 74th Assembly District, Part A, for example.) In Queens, districts have a part A and B. All the other boroughs have two district leaders per one Assembly district — except for Assembly District 82 in The Bronx, which has two parts.
Got all that?
And to make things even more confusing, state law allows for each district to have one male and one female district leader, a rule all of the city’s five counties have adopted.
The concept is a spillover from the days of suffragettes like Eleanor Roosevelt, who pushed to mandate the male-female rule as a way to get more women involved in politics.
Wow! So whose running for female district leader in the 48th AD?
It’s a shame that Jews are playing the dirty game of non Jewish politics. The whole endorsing business is about kissing up to one person and not so subtly trashing the other. David Schwartz is the incumbent, he’s doing a fine job. Whether it is correct for Mr. Ringel to try to oust him and take his job away is a debate for another time, but ‘askunim’ should not get involved.
On a side note, David Schwartz was Andrew Yang’s campaign manager, so Eric Adams endorsed Mr. Ringel. Just to show that we don’t play this dirty game is enough of a reason to vote for Mr. Schwartz, in my opinion.