The candidates for New York’s 45th state Senate district seat clashed over several issues during a debate at Mountain Lake PBS Wednesday afternoon. WAMC’s North Country Bureau Chief Pat Bradley was a panelist and has this recap.
The 45th Senate district has become the largest geographically in New York, spanning much of the northeastern portion of the state from Queensbury to the Canadian border, the eastern and northern Adirondack region and further extending into St. Lawrence County to include Massena, Canton and Potsdam.
Republican Dan Stec is seeking his second term. He previously served four terms in the state Assembly.
Democrat Jean Lapper is a CPA from Queensbury who has not previously held elective office.
The duo disagreed on a number of issues. The first question illustrated their differences with Lapper emphasizing her support for full access to women’s health care, including abortion. Stec opposes abortion with exceptions for rape, incest and a mother’s life. He voted against a proposed state constitutional amendment to protect abortion and contraceptive rights.
“The constitutional amendment is very vaguely worded which means it could be very openly and broadly interpreted and potentially abused, asserted Stec. “I can see this opening the door for more late term abortions, you know, up until the last term of pregnancy. If it was worded more tightly then perhaps I'd give it another look.”
“Thank you.” Moderator Thom Hallock turns to the Democratic challenger, “Miss Lapper.”
“Equal rights as it relates to women,” cites Lapper. “Right to privacy, right to access as an abortion, to an abortion. Protecting pregnant women. Those are all in the Equal Rights Amendment. And we need to protect more people, not fewer people.”
Lapper and Stec traded barbs during an exchange on repurposing closed prisons scattered across the North Country.
"My fear,” noted Stec, “Is that this is going to continue to happen and we will have these blights on our North Country communities. And there’s no excuse for these governors to allow this to happen.”
“Miss Lapper?” Hallock asks.
“Clearly the state should make better use of these assets,” replies Lapper. “And I want to know where Senator Stec was when he was in the Assembly and the Senate for how we should repurpose these buildings.”
“Clearly my opponent isn’t familiar with my Assembly district,” retorts Stec. ”But the eight years that I was in the Assembly none of the prisons that were shuttered were in my assembly district. I’ve opposed the closure authority that was given to the governors to do this and they control these buildings and there’s nothing that the legislature can do about it directly.”
“I am familiar with your Assembly district because I live there,” responds Lapper. “I hear that you’ve opposed things but I didn’t hear any solutions being offered.”
Lapper and Stec disagreed on crime rate statistics and the need for further bail reform.
"We have not seen an increase in crime in our area,” asserts Lapper. “And the crimes that we do see are related to drugs and alcohol for the most part. And we need to provide solutions to get to the core reasons for crime.”
“I completely disagree,” asserts Stec. “I’m the author of the Repeal HALT Bill. I’m also cosponsor of the bill that would repeal bail reform.”
“We need leadership that looks at the issues and comes up with some commonsense answers,” retorts Lapper, “and not politicians that are working on fear just so that they can get re-elected. The numbers are bearing out that crime is not on the increase.”
“This isn’t politics of fear,” Stec throws back. “This is fact. In 2022 alone there have been two homicides in Plattsburgh. There’s a homicide in Tupper Lake. Last week there was a homicide in Malone. This is just my Senate district just this year. Crime is on the increase.”
Both candidates agreed that there is a shortage of affordable housing, but their exchange on how it is affecting multiple sectors morphed into an attack by Lapper on Stec’s voting record.
"Right now we’re in a crisis of affordable housing,” said Lapper. “And what I’m seeing is him voting against every item in the budget so the funding that provides the affordable housing is being denied to this area.”
"Why vote against budget bills?” responds Stec. “Well, bail reform was done in the budget. The prison closure authority was done in the budget, $2.1 billion for unemployment for illegal immigrants was in the budget. Take that $2.1 billion and put that into affordable housing upstate, that would have made a difference. But we gave that to illegal immigrants. There’s good stuff in the budget but I’m not going to sell my yes vote in order to throw dollars out the window.”
The full debate premieres Friday at 8 p.m. on Mountain Lake PBS and online.
