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State Sen. Serf Maltese (R-Glendale) currently holds the 15th Senatorial District seat. He has represented parts of western and southern Queens for nearly 20 years, and aims to continue to do so through re-election next year.
But hot on Maltese’s heels for a spot in Albany in what promises to be an entertaining race are City Councilman Joe Addabbo (D-Howard Beach) and attorney and community activist Albert Baldeo.
Last week, Baldeo announced he would file a third party nominating petition in addition to the Democratic Party designating petition, and would seek nominations from third party lines such as Family First, Working Families and Independent.
This week, he once again urged Addabbo to instead run for State Assembly. He also blasted the councilman’s stance on the Howard Beach Halloween melee and the spending of taxpayers’ dollars on advertising, and questioned his motives for running for the Senate seat.
Addabbo has consistently maintained that he would not engage in personal attacks during the campaign, but will rather focus on “the interests, needs and concerns of the people of the 15th Senatorial District.”
Baldeo attacked Addabbo for calling for a hate crimes investigation into last week’s incident where a group of black and Hispanic individuals allegedly beat a group of white teens on Cross Bay Boulevard, while characterizing an incident earlier this year involving a white man allegedly threatening his Guyanese neighbor, Kris Gounden, with a bat and shouting racial epithets as “a neighbor dispute.”
Michael Hussey, 19, was eventually charged with several offenses under the Hate Crimes Statute.
“Addabbo’s pandering to white voters,” Baldeo said. “He’s talking out of both sides of his mouth.”
Addabbo said the two events are not the same.
“The Gounden situation was a one-on-one neighbor dispute that may have escalated into an unfortunate situation, but it started out as a neighbor dispute,” Addabbo said. “That cannot be compared to a group of individuals coming from Brooklyn looking to do trouble on Cross Bay Boulevard. What I asked personally of the district attorney is to investigate it as a hate crime. Every case of that nature should be investigated like that. Hate crime, no matter who it’s against, no matter where it happens, no matter when it happens, is unacceptable.”
Baldeo cited good government watchdog group Citizens Union’s recent report detailing City Council members spending of taxpayers’ funds on advertising in community newspapers and ad journals. According to the report, over the past seven years, Addabbo has spent more than $44,000 in taxpayer funds on ads.
“He’s spending our tax dollars on advertising himself,” Baldeo said, adding, “[Addabbo’s] really looking for a job, that’s what it’s all about. It’s not about the people, it’s not about reform in Albany, it’s not about delivering the majority to the democrats. It’s all about him.”
Addabbo said what he did was not illegal, and that he explained to Citizens Union Executive Director Dick Dadey that the ads are “taxpayer dollars going back to the taxpayer.”
“This is not promoting me,” Addabbo said. “Always on my ads is my name, address and phone number. These ads are not only goodwill, but also keep our information – address, phone number – on the forefront of the readership of the local papers so they’re reminded that, ‘this is my council member and I need to call him about an issue.’”
Baldeo has long accused Addabbo of dividing the democratic vote, “passively giving support to Maltese.” He went as far as to speculate that Addabbo “is in Maltese’s pocket,” and characterize Addabbo as “a Republican masquerading as a Democrat.”
“He has been injected into this race to divide the democratic vote so that cronyism and special interests can remain in office,” Baldeo explained.
“The bottom line is we have a lot of work to do,” Addabbo reasoned. “And I’m not going to let the boundaries that separate us by race, political affiliation, religion stop us. That’s always been my philosophy, [and will be] in the future.”
Baldeo ran as a Democrat against Maltese last year and received 49 percent of the vote. Maltese did not return calls for this story.