On Thursday April 9th, the Village Independent Democrats held their monthly meeting at St. John’s Church on Christopher Street. As usual, the meeting started with updates by club president Nadine Hoffman and Democratic district leaders Keen Berger and Arthur Schwartz on a variety of city and state political developments, followed by questions from the members.
Zephyr Teachout, the Democratic primary opponent to Mario Cuomo, spoke about her activities since the last election. These involved a variety of mostly state political issues and legislation, along with a description of her book Corruption in America and a wide-ranging question and answer period.
Andrew Berman, Executive Director of the Greenwich Village Society for Historic Preservation, discussed proposals from the DeBlasio administration to change zoning regulations to allow taller buildings in exchange for inclusion of affordable apartments. Berman argued that this would significantly change the nature of Greenwich Village, but not actually deliver significantly more affordable units than what is allowed under present regulations.
There were then updates on club activities including the recent small business forum and planned petition drive, the Candles for Clemency movement, the opposition to the Port Ambrose Liquefied Natural gas terminal, the “To Russia with love LGBT update” of the Chelsea Reform Democratic Club, and lastly a reminder about the VID awards gala on Thursday April 30 at Tio Pepe’s restaurant. (See villagedemocrats.org for details on all of these.) The next monthly meeting will be on Thursday May 14th at 6:30 at St. John’s.
Alec Pruchnicki is a member of the Executive Committee of the VID.
