Newcomer Diane diStasio Is Republican Candidate vs Gale Brewer in Council District 6

West Side Spirit: What’s your age, how long in the district and which neighborhood and civic/business and or/political background.

I’ve lived on the Upper West Side for over 10 years, working as the Managing Director for the Ellison Ballet Foundation. Prior to that I was an opera singer, and Emmy Award winning vocalist. While I’ve been an active voter and a concerned working single parent, this is my first time running for office.

2) Why are you running?

It breaks my heart to watch our neighborhood decline. Ever since the pandemic, I’ve watched the lawlessness, the grime, and the rising costs of every day things like rent and groceries creep their way back into our lives. It’s not the New York I fell in love with, and it’s not the New York I want my daughter or granddaughters growing up in. We need a new voice on City Council because too many residents feel like they’re not being listened to. We need new leaders who will work to restore safety and improve quality of life for every student, every senior, every hard working family in our Upper West Side community.

3) What do you see as the major issues facing voters in your district and what do you hope to do about it?

Crime, affordable housing, school choice, and saving SeniorCare are the greatest issues facing Manhattan’s Upper West Side right now. I’ve spent many hours with active and retired law enforcement officers, and their feedback has been a unanimous cry for more resources and trained personnel. Targeted police presence on the ground has always our best preventative deterrent to combatting violent crime, grand larceny, assault, and petty theft.

When it comes to affordable housing and homelessness, we need someone on City Council willing to work with landlords, tenants, and developers alike to make it easier to build and renovate apartments throughout the district. Our shelter system should not be a permanent way of life, and likewise our subways and sidewalks cannot be a substitute for mental health care or substance abuse treatment.

Our school system is in crisis. For the first time in decades, public school test scores dropped below 50 percent citywide. Enrollment in K-12 education dropped 12 percent, while religious, private, and charter programs have seen record demand. Getting teachers the resources they need, ending the citywide charter cap, strengthening gifted & talented programs, preserving specialized high schools, and expanding accelerated learning options are just a few ways we can improve academic outcomes, close the achievement gap, and set over 1 million New York City children on a path to success.

Mayor Adams is ready to dump Emblem Health’s current SeniorCare for municipal workers, retirees, and their dependents–claiming it will save the city $600 million by switching to Washington’s troubled Medicare Advantage program. Ensuring our seniors, municipal employees, and their dependents get to keep their favorite doctors, keep the coverage that’s been working for them for years, and feel secure knowing they will never be stuck waiting long hours, days, weeks, or months for life saving health care or costly prescriptions they couldn’t otherwise afford is non-negotiable.

Tracking from New York City’s Independent Budget Office revealed our state still holds a whopping $2.8 billion in unspent COVID-19 relief funds. If I were at City Hall, I’d be making calls morning, noon, night, and day to pry loose every last penny I could in order to close the $600 million gap to save seniors, municipal workers, and their dependents from ever seeing a single disruption to their every day health care.

4) Are you running on any other party line aside from the Republican line?

Yes, I’m running on the Arts & Culture and Clean Up NY independent ballot lines.

5) What is your stance on COVID vaccinations. And what about other vaccines for measles, mumps, rubella and chicken pox, et al. Do you feel they are medically safe? And should vaccines be required for children in NYC schools?

Vaccines are not only medically safe, but they are essential to combating deadly viruses, including COVID-19, and I would encourage everyone in District 6 to get vaccinated at the earliest possible convenience. Barring a religious or medical exemption, I support current legislation that requires children from Child Care, Head Start, Nursery, 3-K or Pre-Kindergarten up through Grade 12 to be vaccinated against measles, mumps, rubella, chicken pox, Hepatitis B, polio, meningococcal conjugate, hemophilic influenzae type b conjugate, pneumococcal conjugate, and influenza.

6) Anything else we should know about you?

As the daughter of first generation Italian immigrants, I’m especially sensitive to our city’s current Migrant Crisis. While it is now our responsibility to care for the immigrant families and asylum seekers already here, at the same time our city cannot support an endless wave of unhoused, unvetted, unvaccinated migrants indefinitely. City Hall is already expected to cut essential services by as much as 15 percent in order to fund the sudden influx of undocumented migrants. We need a new voice on City Council who will work to end Right-To-Shelter and ensure that there’s a more manageable flow of tired, poor, huddled masses who have made the long journey from troubled foreign lands seeking security and a new life for themselves here in New York City.