Comptroller Candidate Forum

Saugerties Democratic Committee News


The next meeting of the Saugerties Democratic Committee will
be on Tuesday, May 27th, at 7pm at the Greco Senior Center in
Saugerties. There will be a Candidates' Forum, followed by a
question and answer session featuring Elliot Auerbach and
David Donaldson, candidates for Ulster County Comptroller.
This meeting is open to the public.

School Board Candidate Debate on Channel 23

A request from Sally Colclough:

Below is the schedule for airing the LWV Forum for School
Board candidates that took place on Friday, May 9th at the
Frank D. Greco Center the program will be broadcast on
Channel 23, the Lighthouse Channel. Please pass the
information on to Saugerties Central School District residents.

Thank you,

Sally


5/14,Wed. 7-8:32pm
5/16,Fri. 5-6:32pm
5/17,Sat. 9-10:32pm
5/19,Mon. 2-3:32pm AND 8-8:32pm

Zimet Bows Out

Susan Zimet has bowed out of the County Executive Race, leaving us just one qualified declared candidate, Mike Hein.

Candidates still have some time left to declare, petitions not being due until early July, so the SDC is not yet endorsing any candidate for County Exec.

Looking forward to a Democrat in the White House?

Our recent poll question asked:

Which issue do you think a Democratic President will handle better than a Republican?

Your Answers:

The Economy 0% (0 votes)
Healthcare 0% (0 votes)
Clean Energy 0% (0 votes)
Education 0% (0 votes)
Middle East Peace 6% (1 votes)
The Environment 0% (0 votes)
All of the Above 94% (16 votes)
None of the Above 0% (0 votes)

County Executive Candidates Are Off and Running!

Michael Hein and Susan Zimet, announced candidates for Ulster County Executive, participated in a Candidate’s Forum on April 22nd at New World Home Cooking. The Saugerties Democratic Committee sponsored the Forum.

This was the first opportunity for voters in Ulster County to have both candidates together at the same venue answering questions from the public. Many of the questions concerned economic growth and the candidate’s vision for the future of Ulster County.

News was made when both candidates’s pledged to support the winner should there be a Democratic primary while foregoing the opportunity to run on a minor party line. This pledge of unity was extremely important to insure that the next county executive is a Democrat.

The Ulster County Democratic convention will take place on Monday, June 2, 2008 at a venue yet to be announced. All elected committee members will have the opportunity to vote for their candidate of choice and carry their designating petitions.

- Mike Harkavy

Library Renovation Meeting

The Saugerties Public Library is planning a major renovation which is long overdue. The public will be asked to vote on a referendum in the amount of $6.9 million to cover the cost of this undertaking. For a taxpayer, this comes to approximately $67 per year on a house assessed at $200,000. For this $67, the public will be treated to a beautiful and easily accessible library that will house an expanded children's area, a teen room, additional computers, a public meeting space for 90 people, and more. On Monday, April 14th, the architect for the project, Paul Mays, will be making a public presentation about the project at the Senior citizens center at 7 pm. I urge you and your friends to attend this presentation so that you can make an
informed decision when you vote on the referendum.

The vote will take place on Wednesday, May 7th, from 12 pm to
9 pm at the library.

You can also visit www.thenewsaugertieslibrary.org for all of the necessary information.

TEXT FROM BOBBY KENNEDY'S SPEECH WHEN ANNOUNCING MARTIN LUTHER KING JR'S DEATH

I have bad news for you, for all of our fellow citizens, and people who love peace all over the world, and that is that Martin Luther King was shot and killed tonight.

Martin Luther King dedicated his life to love and to justice for his fellow human beings, and he died because of that effort.

In this difficult day, in this difficult time for the United States, it is perhaps well to ask what kind of a nation we are and what direction we want to move in. For those of you who are black--considering the evidence there evidently is that there were white people who were responsible--you can be filled with bitterness, with hatred, and a desire for revenge. We can move in that direction as a country, in great polarization--black people amongst black, white people amongst white, filled with hatred toward one another.

Or we can make an effort, as Martin Luther King did, to understand and to comprehend, and to replace that violence, that stain of bloodshed that has spread across our land, with an effort to understand with compassion and love.

For those of you who are black and are tempted to be filled with hatred and distrust at the injustice of such an act, against all white people, I can only say that I feel in my own heart the same kind of feeling. I had a member of my family killed, but he was killed by a white man. But we have to make an effort in the United States, we have to make an effort to understand, to go beyond these rather difficult times.

My favorite poet was Aeschylus. He wrote: "In our sleep, pain which cannot forget falls drop by drop upon the heart until, in our own despair, against our will, comes wisdom through the awful grace of God."

What we need in the United States is not division; what we need in the United States is not hatred; what we need in the United States is not violence or lawlessness; but love and wisdom, and compassion toward one another, and a feeling of justice toward those who still suffer within our country, whether they be white or they be black.

So I shall ask you tonight to return home, to say a prayer for the family of Martin Luther King, that's true, but more importantly to say a prayer for our own country, which all of us love--a prayer for understanding and that compassion of which I spoke.

We can do well in this country. We will have difficult times; we've had difficult times in the past; we will have difficult times in the future. It is not the end of violence; it is not the end of lawlessness; it is not the end of disorder.

But the vast majority of white people and the vast majority of black people in this country want to live together, want to improve the quality of our life, and want justice for all human beings who abide in our land.

Let us dedicate ourselves to what the Greeks wrote so many years ago: to tame the savageness of man and make gentle the life of this world.

Let us dedicate ourselves to that, and say a prayer for our country and for our people.

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Two months later Robert Kennedy was shot dead and Richard Nixon became President. This is a very important election year, let’s remain dedicated to the job at hand.
- Mike Harkavy