Who said Tammany Hall has been vanquished from Lower Manhattan politics?
Probably not the five East Village Democrats who submitted sworn affidavits in a lawsuit being heard today in State Supreme Court, complaining their signatures were forged on Board of Elections documents!
Certainly not the three dead people who names miraculously – or illegally – appeared on the same papers!
The documents are signed petitions from two candidates running in the Democratic primary election on September 13. Candidates are just not haphazardly placed on the ballot. Election laws require a candidate to first gather a requisite number of legal signatures from registered voters. This petitioning process is an arduous and tedious task, done mostly by party volunteers and activists who stand on hot sidewalks for countless hours soliciting signatures from passers-by.
The urge to cheat is often too much for some folk. It is not uncommon, most famously in places like Chicago or New Orleans, for party apparatchiks to forge the signatures in kitchen-table operations. This consists of simply getting a voters list, sitting down and randomly forging voters' names on the petitions.
This is what appears to have occurred with some Lower Manhattan Democrats, who submitted hundreds of signatures to the Board of Elections nominating Jeff Galloway and Linda Belfer, both lawyers and Community Board 1 members, for Democratic district leaders of Battery Park City and parts of the Lower East Side. Galloway works for the prestigious international law firm, Hughes Hubbard.
District leader is an unpaid party post, similar to the old "ward boss", whose important duties are the worthy tasks of getting out the vote on election day and ensuring that the poll sites are functioning properly. District leaders carry some prestige and power, since candidates routinely seek their endorsement. So the post is aggressively sought after.
The petitions were submitted by the Lower Manhattan Democrats, a newly formed political club to which Galloway and Belfer belong. The contact person listed on the petitions is David Reck, current Democratic district leader on the Lower West Side. In 2009, Reck was subpoened in another complaint alleging fraudulent petitions submitted by him, involving former city councilmember Alan Gerson. Reck's reaction to these charges can be viewed here.
Bill Love, president of the Lower Manhattan Democrats, a Community Board 1 member and a lawyer who serves as counsel to the American and New York Stock Exchanges, is also listed as a contact person. He worked with controversial political operative, Ray Cline, in getting workers to gather petitions at $12.50 an hour. Love has commented in the past about his connection to New Orleans politics.
Besides the Supreme Court complaint, an objection was made last week to the Board of Elections, pointing out the deceaseds' forged signatures, along with their death certificates. The Board will likely make a determination today whether to throw out the individual forged signatures, or, possibly, all the collected signatures of those involved in the alleged fraud.
If the latter were to occur, it is likely Galloway and Belfer would not have acquired the requisite number of legal signatures and consequently not be on the voting machines on election day.
The New York Post also reports on this controversy.
