Bush’s Endorsement By Firefighters In Queens Take Spotlight Off Convention In NYC
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By John Toscano

Queens, one of the most Democratic-voting boroughs in the city, was the site of one of Republican President George W. Bush’s major successes in the recently concluded GOP presidential convention.

The president went to the Italian Charities of America Club in Elmhurst, where firefighters from a nearby firehouse had arranged to use the facility to announce that the president was receiving the endorsement of the Uniformed Firefighters Association of Greater New York, because of his leadership following the September 11 attacks on the World Trade Center and the Pentagon.

The endorsement tied in perfectly with the convention theme highlighting the president’s actions after September 11, including providing recovery funds to New York City and helping many victims of the vicious terrorist attack, including families of the 343 firefighters who perished in the collapse of the World Trade Center towers.

About 100 firefighters turned out for the endorsement by their union at the Queens Boulevard club which is a few blocks from the firehouse on Grand Avenue where Engine Company 287 and Ladder Company 136 have their quarters.

The Queens news event came before the president’s speech at the convention in Madison Square Garden, where he accepted his party’s nomination to run for a second term. The speech closed the four-day convention with a bang and provided a decided “bounce” in the polls, which the president’s strategists were hoping for.

In a Gallup Poll conducted three days before Labor Day, the president led rival Democratic candidate John Kerry by 7 percentage points, 52 to 45 percent. Prior to the Gallup Poll, Time and Newsweek magazines released polls which showed the president leading Kerry, but they were done during the convention, watched by millions on television. But the Gallup survey, done after the convention, truly shows the bounce political observers were looking for following the convention.

Meanwhile, Kerry’s campaign is also experiencing a trend downward as the embattled candidate has shuffled his campaign team.

Right now, things are looking decidedly good for Bush , and there are only 55 days left to campaign until Election Day on Tuesday, November 2.

ENDORSEMENTS: The prestigious Citizens Union (CU) endorsements in next Tuesday’s primaries went to state Senator John Sabini (Jackson Heights) and Assemblymember Barry Grodenchik (Flushing, both Democrats.

Grodenchik, running against Benjamin Singer and Jimmy Meng in the 22nd Assembly District (Flushing) was endorsed, CU said, because “[Grodenchik] has taken the bold step of calling on the leaders of his own party to open up the legislative process in Albany to allow legislators a greater level of involvement and power.”

CU said its endorsement was based “largely on the basis of a candidate’s] support for far-reaching reforms aimed at changing the way the New York state legislature functions.”

OTHER KEY ENDORSEMENTS: There have been may other endorsements in the Sabini-Rosero contest. Virtually every local Democratic leader is in Sabini’s corner, as well as Congressmember Joseph Crowley, who’s popular with heavily immigrant-populated Jackson Heights, and Borough President Helen Marshall.

Backing Rosero are City Councilmember Hiram Monserrate, the leading Hispanic public official in the Corona/Jackson Heights area, and Hispanic pols Charles Castro and Nestor Diaz.

Another marquee name, state Senator Frank Padavan (R–C, Bellerose), perhaps the most prominent Republican in the borough, has endorsed Gonzalo Policarpio against Stephen Graves, the Queens GOP choice, in the Republican congressional primary in the 5th Congressional District in northeast Queens.

POLS GET FUNDS FOR QC CHEM BLDG: Governor George Pataki signs off on it, Queens College will get a $30 million, three-story addition to the half-century-old science building on the Flushing campus, Assemblymember Barry Grodencik (D–Flushing) announced recently.

Grodenchik was accompanied by colleagues Assemblymember Nettie Mayersohn and state Senator Toby Stavisky, both Flushing Democrats, when he broke the good news to college officials. He said the capital funds for Remsen Hall, which houses the chemistry and biochemistry, family nutrition and exercise science classes, labs and demonstration facilities, were long overdue.

ONORATO FUNDRAISER: State Senator George Onorato (D–Astoria), who’s running for re-election in November, is holding a fundraiser on Wednesday, September 22 at Riccardo’s, 21-01 24th Ave., Astoria from 6:30 to 9:30 p.m.

On the honorary committee heading the affair are Queens Democratic Party County Leader Thomas Manton, Congressmembers Joseph Crowley and Carolyn Maloney, Assemblymembers Brian McLaughlin and Michael Gianaris and Councilmember Peter Vallone Jr and former Speaker Peter Vallone Sr.

WEPRIN NIXES TOY LIGHTERS: Councilmember David Weprin (D–Hollis), who has tried to get a law keeping toy guns out of children’s hands, now has filed a bill to prohibit the sale of novelty cigarette lighters that could be mistaken for toys by kids and so endanger them. The bill would prohibit sales of lighters shaped like toys, guns, watches, musical instruments, cars and cartoon characters.

Brandishing one shaped like a race car, last week Weprin, council Finance committee chairman, said the green light it shows when snapped on “doesn’t really look like fire but it is.” The gadgets sell for $3 to $7, he said.

SALUTE TO LABOR LEADERS: Flushing Democratic leaders Charlotte Scheman and former Councilmember Morton Povman announced that labor leaders Edward Cleary, president emeritus, New York State AFL-CIO , and Charles Hill, president of the marble and tile workers union, Local 7 of New York and New Jersey, will be the honorees at the John F. Kennedy Regular Democratic Club of Queens County tomorrow night at Terrace on the Park in Flushing Meadows–Corona Park at the club’s 58th annual dinner-dance, “Salute to Labor.”

The leaders said, “Cleary and Hill’s unfailing commitment to issues within their unions and allegiance to all working families in this region makes them the type of leaders the JFK Club takes great pleasure in recognizing.”

PADAVAN: POKER MACHINES ILLEGAL, REMOVE THEM: Charging that video poker machines are clearly illegal, state Senator Frank Padavan (R–C, Bellerose) called for the device to be outlawed in the state. He had also asked in a letter to Nancy Palumbo, director, New York State Lottery Division, to remove them from the Saratoga Raceway where they are among the most popular of games.

Padavan, a constant opponent of state-authorized gambling, said the video poker machines require a player to use skill, making them illegal.

“Either the game is illegal because skill is involved, or they’re just letting the poor saps putting money into machines think skill is involved,” said Padavan.

The lawmaker explained that video poker is based on five-card draw poker in which the player is dealt five cards and then picks which ones to hold before taking a second spin of the machine.

“This implies that the gambler actually can affect the outcome of the game through skill,” Padavan said. “If the game relies on the gambler to use some level of skill, it is considered a video poker machine and is therefore illegal.”

DELAY IN FILLING SCHOOL SPOT CRITICIZED: Borough President Helen Marshall is expected to fill an opening on the Panel for Educational Policy this month, according to her spokesman, Dan Andrews.

There has been some grumbling in the borough because the post has gone unfilled since Evita Belmonte left in mid-June. But Andrews pointed out that Marshall wants to be sure she has chosen an effective person who will stand up to Schools Chancellor Joel Klein in representing the interests of a quarter-million students.

QUEENS PARKS HEAD RETIRING: Queens Borough Parks Commissioner Richard Murphy announced his retirement recently, ending the 59-year-old official 34-year career with the department. He will move on to the Nassau County parks system, where he has been appointed first deputy commissioner.