BAD RAP FOR BRANFORD Of late, hardly a day has gone by without daily newspapers telling of political shenanigans in the world of judicial selections. As overdue as some of these stories are, not all of them have been fair. An undeserving victim emerged in the person of Ernie Lendler, a Brooklyn Heights resident who runs Branford Communications, which handles publicity and campaign literature for candidates. Lendler's portrayal as a cog in a corrupt political machine sprang from a complaint by former Brooklyn Civil Court Judge Karen Yellen, who told Brooklyn District Attorney Joe Hynes's investigators that she hired Lendler as a condition of her endorsement by Assemblyman Clarence Norman, the Democratic county leader.

From this, the Daily News concluded that Lendler was an arm of the county organization. Stories in the other dailies implied as much, but the News's editorial board was particularly harsh. Unfortunately, no one bothered to look first at Lendler's clientele over the years, which includes plenty of candidates who were not endorsed by the machine and some who were openly at war with it. The News assumed the opposite would be true, and set out to do a follow-up story. But it quickly came across a snag: a judicial race last year which didn't fit the supposed pattern because Wavny Toussaint was endorsed by Norman but did not hire Lendler, while one of her opponents, Desmond Green, did. A News editorial even asked rhetorically why Brooklyn Civil Court candidate Robin Garson hired Lendler and spent $50,000 on her campaign when she lacked an opponent in the Democratic primary, and thus was assured of winning.

The answer is simple: she spent the money before her opponent Jim McCall was knocked off the ballot several weeks before the election because of a petition cover-sheet error. Had she known all along that a free ride was in store, Garson would have saved her cash for a future campaign for Supreme Court (a dream since derailed by the indictment of her husband, Supreme Court Judge Gerald Garson). The News has also taken to saying Norman "made sure" Garson would have no primary opponent, which implies that he pegged her for a free slot. If that were true, Judge Maggie Cammer would have run rather than retire and leave the slot for Garson and McCall to fight over.

Perhaps the News was blaming Norman for McCall's removal from the ballot, as if (A) there's something wrong with challenging someone's ballot petition, when in fact any candidate who noticed a fatal error on an opponent's petition would file an objection, and (B) Norman owns the judiciary and can have anyone knocked off the ballot, when in reality he's failed on numerous such attempts (in part because he doesn't own the appellate court).

Councilman Lew Fidler, who with Lendler's help staved off an all-out effort by Norman to oust him as district leader a few years ago, said, "The stuff about Ernie Lendler has been blood-boiling outrageous. Joe McCarthy wouldn't have had that much nerve. The Daily News should apologize." Lendler's not holding his breath, we bet. Fidler, incidentally, believes what Yellen told investigators was leaked not by Hynes but by supporters of Housing Court Judge Dawn Jimenez, eager to portray Jimenez's Democratic primary opponent for Civil Court, Shawndya Simpson, as Norman's pawn. Simpson, you see, is endorsed by Norman (though she doesn't use Lendler, according to her campaign manager Gary Tilzer).

Fidler worries that the News will therefore blast Simpson as a judgeship-buyer and endorse Jimenez a week before the primary, and that Jimenez will mail the newspaper clippings to tens of thousands of likely voters. That might well be unfair to Simpson, who has convinced even Norman's enemies that she's independent of the county leader, evidenced in part by her choice of campaign manager, Gary Tilzer, who guided Civil Court Judge Margarita Lopez Torres to reelection last year despite a furious effort by Norman to unseat her. Fidler is correct that Jimenez's campaign is trying to use the Norman connection to undermine Simpson, but the rest of his theory is dubious: that Jimenez's people heard second-hand what Yellen told the D.A. and converted that into a flood of media coverage.

The systematic appearance of the Yellen story, first in the New York Sun and the next day in the other dailies, and the specific, anonymous quotes corroborating it, point to Hynes's office as the likely source. A Jimenez campaigner could not have placed half a dozen articles by calling newspapers with a hearsay account of a private, secret interrogation. Newspapers generally demand sources with first-hand knowledge of the story, and in this case that means either Yellen (who's uneasy with the press) or Hynes.

Our money's on Hynes, in part because the Yellen story fit the pattern of numerous other leaks about Hynes's investigation. It would seem to be the work of the same source. Not that we're criticizing Hynes for the leaks. Investigators commonly leak stories about ongoing probes because it elevates their own profiles and because the news coverage generates leads. Unfortunately, in this case Hynes might not have anticipated Ernie Lendler becoming a collateral casualty of a careless media onslaught.

As for Jimenez, if her people are spinning tales, it's certainly not her idea. She is a political novice (unlike her handlers) and has built her career more on talent and work than back-room maneuvering. This "shortcoming" has cost her some political support, like when she was pitching herself to State Senator Marty Connor and naively offered that Assemblyman Dov Hikind supported her-a comment akin to pointing out a pimple on your date's forehead. But given the recent revelations of politicians' influence on the judiciary, Jimenez's lack of political savvy could well be a positive in voters' eyes. Perhaps that should be the premise of her campaign.

MONEY CAN BUY LOVE It has become obvious in recent weeks that an endorsement from the Brooklyn Democratic organization often carries a hefty price tag. The most telling example was Mark Green paying $245,000 for the organization's backing in the 2001 mayoral race, an arrangement being investigated by Brooklyn District Attorney Joe Hynes.

The cash was distributed by the Democratic club of Assemblyman Clarence Norman, the county chairman, to various friends, including half-sister Jackie Ward (who got an unheard of $95,120 for six weeks' work), confidant Fred Taylor ($18,000), City Council candidate Omar Boucher ($5,000), crony William Boone ($4,500), and approximately 500 (if the club's filings are to be believed) $8-an-hour election day workers affiliated with Norman's club.

But this is not a phenomenon unique to Norman. The New York Post reported that then-Civil Court Judge Maxine Archer balked at joining a slate of Brooklyn candidates put up in 2000 by Rep. Ed Towns and election attorney Mitch Alter when she was told it would cost her $140,000, including $56,000 for petitioning, mailing, and Election Day operations and $54,000 in consulting fees. Betty Williams accepted Towns's offer to join a slate of candidates opposing Norman's and defeated Archer, winning a 10-year term at $125,000 per annum. It is not wrong for candidates to pay their endorsers for services necessary to win. After all, printing campaign literature ain't cheap, and finding people to hand it out for 15 hours on primary day isn't easy, even if you pay them. In fact, campaign finance law requires candidates to reimburse these costs.

But are all these services necessary? Really, $54,000 in consulting fees to run a low-level judicial campaign? Or $95,000 for a few weeks of consulting by the county leader's half-sister? Question Number Two: Are king-makers like Norman and Towns endorsing the best candidates or the ones who offer the most money?

Former Manhattan Borough President Ruth Messinger recently said that when she ran for mayor in 1997, Norman and his sidekick Jeff Feldman were only interested in how much she would pay. When she didn't offer enough, they endorsed Freddy Ferrer instead.

If Towns thought Archer were a good enough judge to offer to endorse her, why did he then run someone against her? We can think of just one reason: he wanted the money for Alter and other friends. (Word from the Towns camp is that the congressman was already disenchanted with Archer and might not have endorsed her even if she'd met Alter's budget request.) Money may well be driving many of these races. Archer was apparently the target of an old tactic of election attorneys, who in so many words tell judges up for reelection, "Either hire me or I'll run someone against you." As one source explained, "They word their conversations in ways that leave people who are likely to be paranoid, paranoid."

The source gave an example of what an election attorney might say: "Well, you know, I've got to eat this year. I don't know what I'm going to be doing, but if I'm doing you, it will leave me less of an opportunity to do other things." Ostensibly, it's good for our democracy to have contested elections. But it's hardly comforting to know that cash, and not ideology, motivates the formation of judicial slates.

TOWNS BACKS REV. AL (OR NOT) We heard that Rep. Ed Towns's Hasidic constituents were in an uproar upon hearing that their congressman had endorsed the Rev. Al Sharpton on the steps of City Hall on June 23. One activist named Isaac Abraham even dashed off a press release assailing Towns.

But wait! Towns's aide Karen Johnson told us her boss had neither endorsed Sharpton nor even attended the event. (Sharpton wasn't there either, an embarrassing scheduling snafu.) We checked back with our source, who insisted that a Towns staffer was seen reading the endorsement. We relayed that to Johnson, who e-mailed us, "It was not an endorsement. The statement merely said that Al Sharpton brings all races together, congratulated him for his energy, and wished him luck as he embarks on his journey. Period. No endorsement."

UNION MAN VS. LAWYER VS. BUTCHER Okay, so that's a crude way of framing the race for the Democratic nomination in the 47th Council District. But indeed, the different backgrounds of the candidates is striking, not to mention appropriate given the diversity of the shorefront district, which includes communities of Russians (Brighton Beach), blacks (Coney Island), Orthodox and other Jews (Sea Gate), and Italian-Americans (Bensonhurst).

The incumbent is Domenic Recchia, an attorney and the overwhelming favorite in the September 9 primary. His challengers, assuming they make the ballot, are Joe Hochhauser, a service representative for Verizon and a former union steward, and Anatoly "Tony" Eisenberg, a Russian-American who runs Brighton King Meats. Recchia's task is not so much to win the election, which is likely, but to avoid demonization by his Russian constituents, some of whom won't be satisfied until they elect one of their own. Recchia must also avoid antagonizing the Russians while addressing speculation that he engineered new district lines that put thousands of his Russian constituents into Councilman Mike Nelson's domain, thus minimizing the chances that a Russian will be elected in the next 10 years. "That will be answered during the course of the campaign," promised Recchia's campaign spokesman, Hank Sheinkopf.

We'll be eager to hear Recchia's explanation, because to this point he hasn't acknowledged any role in splitting Brighton Beach, except to say he didn't oppose it. Political insiders know it was the kind of redistricting that doesn't happen without behind-the-scenes input and approval from the presiding councilmember. Recchia also didn't win many Russian friends by endorsing Assemblywoman Adele Cohen last year over Susan Lasher, who nearly rode strong Russian support to an upset. But just as Recchia will have trouble collecting votes from Russians, Eisenberg will struggle to get votes from everyone else. And "everyone else" is the majority of the district.

If Eisenberg is to reach beyond his enclave, he will have to lose the attitude he expressed when he told Brighton Neighborhood Association executive director Pat Singer during her campaign for the seat in 2001, "You are not one of us. You do not speak our language. Your time is over." Singer now supports Recchia. "I don't think the Russian people realize what a good man he is. He's willing to sit down with anybody," Singer said. "I don't think you should look at the ethnic background of a man," Singer added. "Look at his character. That's what Tony [Eisenberg] doesn't understand." Eisenberg didn't return our call before deadline.

The one candidate who figures to stay out of the fray is Hochhauser, who finished last among six candidates in the 2001 Democratic primary with 5 percent of the vote. "I have nothing bad to say about him," Hochhauser said of Recchia. The most critical comment we could milk from the Bensonhurst/Gravesend resident was, "I'm a union guy, a working-class guy. Domenic is a lawyer. He's a good guy, but I don't think he can understand the working people of the community the way I can."

Of Recchia and the redistricting, Hochhauser said, "I wasn't there, so I can't say what involvement he had in it, but at the same point, there are a lot of people who are upset about it." Nor would Hochhauser knock Eisenberg. "I'd love to meet the guy and I'm glad he's running," Hochhauser said. "We need people to step up and run."

Borough Politics Archive

2003
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2001
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2000
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1999
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