CWA members from District One attended the second day of the Democratic State Convention to show their support for Assemblyman Richard Brodsky. Assemblyman Brodsky, along with 4 other declared candidates, was at the primary in hopes of winning the majority of votes to be the next Democratic candidate for Attorney General.
The State Party Chairman, Jay Jacobs, announced that State Committee members would move to allow all the Attorney General candidates on the primary ballot, regardless of how many votes were committed to them as the convention began.
Under party rules, any candidate with 25 percent of the vote automatically wins a place on the Democratic primary ballot. Going into the convention, only two candidates — Ms. Rice and State Senator Eric T. Schneiderman, who represents a Manhattan-Bronx district — appeared likely to meet that threshold.
To allow everyone onto the ballot, Mr. Jacobs said, party leaders would hold two rounds of balloting, which would allow some Committee members to vote for more than one candidate. “We made the decision that it was smart to get everyone on the ballot,” said Mr. Jacobs, who is also the chairman of the Nassau County Democratic Organization.
The first round of voting by party delegates put Kathleen M. Rice, the Nassau County District Attorney; State Senator Eric T. Scheiderman, and Assemblyman Richard L. Brodsky on the primary ballot.
A second round of voting put two other candidates – Eric R. Dinallo, a former State Insurance Superintendent, and Sean Coffey, a trial lawyer and novice politician — on the ballot as well.
Assembly Richard Brodsky represents a district in Westchester County where the convention is being held. In order to improve telecommunications consumer protections and service quality, Assemblyman Brodsky authored significant legislation. His Cable Television Reform Act was signed into law in 1990, and his legislation of 1994 limited surcharges and increased penalties for Consumer Owned Currency Operated Telephones (COCOT) service vendors.
Richard Brodsky backs CWA politically by sponsoring bills like the following:
Bill # A02208C – Sponsor: Assemblyman Richard Brodsky
Requires the public service commission to conduct an in-depth public interest analysis of proposed mergers by telephone corporations and other telecommunications services providers; requires the demonstration of certain public benefits as a condition for approval thereof.
Richard Brodsky has been a good friend to CWA and has also shown his on-going support by attending many of the CWA rallies. CWA was happy to attend the convention and show their support for Richard Brodsky.