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Government & Politics

A Novice Challenges Shimsky For Her Assembly Seat

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October 16, 2024

By Barrett Seaman–

Alessandro Crocco, 36, of Hartsdale left his native Italy as a teenager, seeking “the American Dream” and leaving behind a nation plagued by “creeping socialism.” In the U.S., he got into the wine importing business, real estate and management consulting. His one and only experience with government to date has been with the Italian government, elected to represent the roughly 95,000 Italians and Italian Americans living in the metropolitan New York region (plus Bermuda). The job consisted mostly of dealing with consular issues, but he says that was where he “developed a passion for service.”

Unprompted, he notes that 95,000 is about the same number of constituents living in New York’s 92ndAssembly District whose seat he wants to wrest from the incumbent, MaryJane Shimsky. The district includes the towns of Mt. Pleasant and Greenburgh, plus parts of north Yonkers.

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Crocco is running as a Republican, though his agenda is more old-school fiscal conservatism than MAGA. Asked the threshold question about Trump, he says “President Biden won the [2020] election.” Further asked if he planned to vote for Trump in November, Crocco says “I haven’t decided yet.”

His yard signs planted in the rivertowns bear the tag line, “Keep Greenburgh United,” which most observers interpret as a reference to the campaign in the unincorporated community of Edgemont to secede from the township and operate as an autonomous village. Crocco opposes secession. “It’s just unfair for Greenburgh,” he says. “If they secede, taxes are going up. We are talking about an $18 million influx coming from Edgemont.”

Opposition to the Edgemont secession falls short of being a wedge issue in this Assembly race, however, as Shimsky also opposes the move—a position she took in her primary win last summer over the former incumbent, Tom Abinanti.

“Since when?” Crocco counters, claiming that in June of 2023, Shimsky introduced legislation that he says opened the door for Edgemont to re-file its petition to incorporate.

If there is a wedge issue in the race, it is tied to another item on the November ballot: Proposition One, otherwise known as New York State’s equal opportunity amendment. Like most Democrats, Shimsky favors the amendment, whose banner clause is the protection of women’s reproductive rights. “I am rooting for life,” Crocco says, “but abortion is not part of my political agenda,” calling choice “a settled issue in New York since 1970.”

Crocco’s problem with Prop One is with the section addressing other rights, including “sexual orientation, gender identity, gender expression….” The amendment, he maintains, is “poorly drafted,” such that it could be interpreted as opening the door for minors to initiate gender transition without parental consent. It could further grant “biological males” the right to unilaterally declare themselves female and use women’s bathrooms and locker rooms. “Will Catholic girls’ school be forced to admit someone who is identifying as a girl?” he asks. “It just isn’t clear.”

Shimsky fully supports Prop One, claiming that it will simply “enshrine in the state constitution protections that are already written into state law.”

Like other Republican candidates, Crocco links his opposition to Prop One to the “Save Girls Sports” movement that seeks to prohibit transgendered males from playing on girls’ teams.

His opposition research web site, slugged “Radical Shimsky,” focuses on her votes, both in the State Assembly and on the Westchester County Board of Legislators in favor of increased spending leading to higher taxes. “Instead of easing the burden on hardworking families,” the site asserts, “Shimsky is only adding to it. How much more can we take?”

As is often the case, such accusations tend to elide complex governmental transactions, exploiting and oversimplifying voting records. Shimsky has indeed established a record, having served 12 years in the county legislature, including as its majority leader, plus two years as a member of the Assembly. Her response to his candidacy: “He says he has had experience with the Italian government. What’s that?”

Shimsky’s record also includes bringing money into the district. She claims responsibility for bringing $1.5 million in infrastructure spending that supported reconstruction of Tarrytown’s H Bridge and the High Street Bridge in Dobbs Ferry. “We have to make sure our local governments get what they need,” she says. Crocco calls for more spending on schools, but if elected, he would be the junior-most member of a super-minority caucus with very little prospect of bringing home the funding and programs she is able to provide.

Originally scheduled to participate in a League of Women Voters forum, Crocco backed out, initially because of a date conflict but also because he didn’t like the format that relied on pre-selected questions rather than ones from a live audience. In addition, he found that the League’s endorsement of Prop One revealed them to be more partisan than professed. He also backed out of an October planned debate on October 10th, sponsored by the NAACP and Alpha Kappa Alpha sorority.

Having beaten her predecessor, Tom Abinanti twice, Shimsky has shown strength among Democrats who make up roughly 40,000 voters in the district. Crocco is counting on support from the 20,000-or-so Republicans, acknowledging that even if all of them voted for him, he can’t win. What gives him hope are the district’s 33,000 unaffiliated voters. “Out of those 33,000,” he reasons, “we should be able to get half, which would be enough to win.”

–with reporting by Solace Church

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