Two Democrats are vying in Tuesday’s primary in the New York state Assembly’s 102nd district.
Janet Tweed of Delhi and Mary Finneran of Cairo met earlier this month for a debate hosted by the League of Women Voters.
Tweed says she has spent the last 18 years as a physical therapist. Her campaign issues include affordable, accessible health care, along with "smart, sustainable infrastructure..." "...and broadband and cell service out in these regions, so that we can build our communities have more jobs, work on affordable housing and strengthen our schools. Lastly, it's about a resilient environment. We need to protect our environment, protect our environment, we need to promote local agriculture. And this all goes back to building our stronger communities," said Tweed, who adds there’s a need to protect the environment through promotion of local agriculture.
“As a village trustee, I was able to help lead the collaboration for our town and village to establish a climate, sorry, climate-smart communities Task Force. We applied for grants, we got money, and we're using that money to improve our municipal infrastructure, to reduce our carbon footprint and to save taxpayer dollars,” Tweed said.
Finneran, a retired art teacher, is a longtime been an environmental and social justice advocate. She says among the district’s most concerning issues are single-payer health care, peace, social justice, and climate change. She says she helped advocate against and stopped the Constitution Pipeline.
“Unfortunately, we won after they had already decimated a maple farm down in Pennsylvania. But that was stopped. I mean, the Constitution Pipeline was stopped. I advocated for changes in the education system with NYSUT. I've gone on with them. We've gotten more money into the schools because of our advocacy,” Finneran said.
Both candidates embrace the concept of Home Rule. First, Tweed:
“I don't think I could be an elected official and not be an advocate for Home Rule, especially in the small communities that we have. But Home Rule can mean a lot of things to a lot of different people. For some folks, it's ‘Don't tell me what to do,’ and that's not really what it means. What it means is that municipalities have rules, have zoning codes, have assessors boards that help guide their community and their community's needs,” said Tweed.
New York state grants local governments broad home rule powers.
Finneran said “I think the more government we have, the better. I support home rule because of, partially because of the district we live in, but also because it's been around for quite a while. And I do think people do need to have a say.”
Much of the 102nd district, represented by 3rd-term Republican Chris Tague, is rural. The candidates were asked to share their plans to assist farmers as they face the climate crisis over the next five years.
Tweed suggested that existing resources like the New York State Farm Board and Cornell Cooperative Extensions are being underutilized. “There can be innovative ways of, different ways of farming, whether it is produce or if it is animal products, and using those resources as a guideline and a way to continue to move forward. Also it's about reducing costs. If it's too expensive to farm, people can't do it, and so finding ways to reduce costs, to fund farms, small farms, middle sized farms, and even large farms, so that they can produce food, not just locally, but also for our entire state,” said Tweed.
Finneran would like to see climate change reversed. “And whether we can reverse it or not, I'm not sure. But we have to get the farmers, we have to get the farmers transitioned. We maybe need to figure out ways to protect their products. We have to figure out ways to protect the soils and to protect the water. There's also, you know, we either have drought or flooding in this area. We are actually in one of the best areas in the world for climate. It's one of the least impacted and we all see how it's being impacted here,” Finneran said.
The 102nd covers all of Greene and Schoharie counties and parts of Albany, Columbia, Delaware, Otsego and Ulster counties. The district has voted Republican since 1973.
