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Upstate Advocate for Child Victims Act to Mount State Senate Run As Democrat

By Denis Slattery
Daily News
December 12, 2019

https://www.nydailynews.com/news/politics/ny-child-victims-act-gary-greenberg-state-senate-republican-retirement-20191212-mur3vqies5ct5ewpxgld3pgs3u-story.html

Gary Greenberg (Bryan Pace for New York Daily News)

ALBANY ? An outspoken advocate of the recently passed Child Victims Act is preparing to enter the political arena.

Gary Greenberg, an upstate businessman who spent years fighting for laws to supporting survivors of child sex abuse and helping get lawmakers who backed the measures elected, is mounting a run for a Senate seat being vacated by retiring Republican Sen. George Amedore.

“I know how to run a campaign and how to win elections and I look forward to working to serve the people of the 46th Senate District by being the same tireless and strong advocate from my experience enacting the Child Victims Act," Greenberg said. “Public service is an honor and privilege and I look forward to this next chapter of my career in fighting for justice and good government.”

The 61-year-old is a minority owner of the Vernon Downs casino, hotel and racetrack and by no means a political novice.

Greenberg, who lives in New Baltimore, in Greene County, served as a member of the Albany County legislature in the early 1990s and was a member of the Albany County Democratic Committee for more than two decades. He is also the founder of the Fighting for Children Political Action Committee and spent his own money to help flip the Senate in Democrats’ favor in order to pass to the Child Victims Act.

Greenberg’s fight for the CVA, which changed the statute of limitations for child sex abuse cases and created a one-year civil suit lookback window, was a deeply personal undertaking. He was sexually assaulted by a hospital orderly when he was seven.

He’s now setting his sights on reining in the state’s ballooning budget deficit.

“We cannot simply continue to raise taxes in New York State," he said. " We need elected officials that have the ability to be independent and won’t be a rubber stamp for unending tax increases. New Yorkers need jobs and a future, they need elected officials who can get that job done."

Greenberg will face off against two fellow Democrats in next year’s primary. Michelle Hinchey, the daughter of former Rep. Maurice Hinchey, and activist Jeff Collins both laid out their plans to run for the seat before Amedore announced late last month he would not seek reelection.

The 46th district stretches up the Hudson Valley from Kingston, through part of the Catskills, all the way to the Albany suburbs.

A total of seven Senate Republican have already said they won’t run again or have set their sights on other opportunities since Democrats took control of the chamber last year. Dems currently hold a 40-23 majority over the GOP and are looking to expand their dominance in the legislature.

Senate Majority Leader Andrea Stewart-Cousins (D-Yonkers) said earlier this week she is optimistic that Democrats can add at least three seats in 2020.

“That is the floor, that’s not the ceiling,” she said. “I think we are ever closer to that and more.”

Senate Minority Leader John Flanagan, meanwhile, admitted Wednesday that his conference is in a “tough position.” Despite the rash of retirements and a near-empty campaign war chest, he’s still gunning for the majority.

“It’s an uphill battle,” Flanagan said. “I’m not going to suggest anything to the contrary, but if I came here and said, ‘Oh, I’m being complacent, and we’re just going to sit back and let things happen,’ that’s not the way it should work. That’s not what people expect from me in my home district. That’s not what people expect from us as a Republican conference.”

 

 

 

 

 




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