Council Member Carlos Menchaca

2013 Election Campaign

As a resident of Sunset Park Brooklyn, I spent a considerable amount of time trying to communicate with Sara Gonzalez, the Member of the City Council who represented our district.  I was never got a response from her office until I complained to one of her staff at a meeting of our local Community Board.  It was also well known that she had one of the worst attendance records in the Council and her production of legislation was abysmal. I was interested in working in a campaign for anyone but her in the Democratic primary.  A friend of mine, Dave "Paco" Abraham, was a founding member of a new safe-streets political action group, StreetsPAC,.  It was working on endorsements for the City Council and the candidacy of  Carlos Menchaca, who was running against Gonzalez, was one of their first endorsements.  Paco called me and said "you have to meet this guy."  I did and immediately determined that I should do what I could to get him elected.  Since I was 76 years old at the time, I was made a quasi-liaison with older people in the district.  I met with them along with Carlos and my call list was exclusively older.  Carlos received almost 60% of the vote, which was considered remarkable because Gonzalez was the incumbent and incumbents almost never lose. 

2017 Re-election Campaign

After working in an unsalaried position for Carlos throughout his first term in the New York City Council, I developed great admiration for his commitment, his outlook and his values, and after concluding that he has a great future ahead of him, I was anxious to do what I could to help him get reelected. I became the campaign Chair and focused on getting the campaign organized, recruiting volunteers, developing databases and raising money.  After a couple of months, I withdrew as chair and focused on writing applications to organizations for endorsements.  Carlos was opposed by 4 candidates in the Democratic primary, the strongest of which was the Assistant Speaker of the New York State Assembly who had won his last 22 elections.  Carlos beat him by 16% and got 49% of the vote.