Opinion

The worst City Council candidates

Think Eliot Spitzer and Anthony Weiner are the only clowns running for office this week? Check out these ballot buffoons.

  1. 1. Inez Dickens

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    Council Member Inez Dickens David McGlynn

    Democratic Primary, 9th District, Manhattan

    Dickens not only faces a likely re-election to the City Council, she’s a prime candidate for speaker. She’s also a slumlord. Dickens — ironically head of the ethics committee — has racked up more than $265,000 in unpaid code violations, property taxes and water bills. She owns four apartment buildings with her sister, properties that have been fined for missing smoke detectors, faulty electrical outlets, mold and other dangerous violations. Some of the violations date back a decade. Of course, keeping her tenants in squalor is not her fault — and pointing out the problems is racist, she claims. “They don’t want a black woman from Harlem as council speaker,’’ Dickens said.

    Opponent: Democrat activist and businessman Vincent Morgan

  2. 2. Ydanis Rodriguez

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    City Councilmember Ydanis Rodriguez donning a hooded sweatshirts March 28th in support of Trayvon Martin. William Farrington

    Democratic Primary, 10th District, Manhattan

    Rodriguez is the front-runner in a race for his Washington Heights and Inwood seat — even though the incumbent has done little more than occupy Wall Street. During his first four years in office, Rodriguez has passed only one law. “He’s never made the transition from activist to elected official,” one council insider told The Post. Another insider said simply, “He’s an anarchist.” Cops cuffed Rodriguez when they shut down Occupy Wall Street’s tent-city in Zuccotti Park in a post-midnight raid. He told officers that he was there in his official capacity. Two months later, the OWS supporter sought City Council approval to donate his $5,000 stipend to the cause. He was denied. Rodriguez also hired spokesman David Segal, who served a six-month prison term for firebombing a Bronx army recruitment center. When The Post exposed him, Rodriguez fired Segal, but called the act of throwing a flaming rag at the Parkchester army center “a minor civil disobedience.” Bizarrely, he hired him and then fired him again.

    Opponents: Community organizer Francesca Castellanos Rodriguez; former fiscal monitor for the NYS Comptroller Cheryl Pahaham 

  3. 3. Micah Kellner

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    Assemblyman Micah Kellner David McGlynn

    Democratic Primary, 5th District, Manhattan

    Kellner, an Upper East Side assemblyman, could have easily slid into an Upper East Side council seat vacated by Jessica Lappin, who’s running for Manhattan borough president. But then came the revelation of a 2009 sexual-harassment complaint swept under the rug by Speaker Sheldon Silver’s top counsel Bill Collins. “I wouldn’t mind falling asleep with you but not remotely,” he wrote to a young female staffer. “Did I offend?” He’s also accused of making sexual advances to a male staffer. While he apologized for the late-night Internet come-ons made during his days as a bachelor, the state ethic’s committee has launched an investigation. Lappin, Scott Stringer and state Sens. José Serrano and Brad Hoylman rescinded their endorsements.

    Opponents: Attorney Ben Kallos; community activist Ed Hartzog

  4. 4. Olanike T. Alabi

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    Olanike Alabi

    Democratic Primary, 35th District, Brooklyn

    Alabi was fired as district manager of Community Board 2 in 2001 for alleged incompetence. She spent four years fighting the dismissal in court. Finally, an appellate court granted her $100,000, saying the Community Board failed to follow proper procedures for dismissal. Alabi also participated in one of the wackiest races in the city, a 2010 contest for a part-time, unpaid position as district leader in Fort Greene/Clinton Hill. Alabi allegedly accused her opponent, Renee Collymore, of making a sex tape. Collymore filed a police report and requested an order of protection from Alabi, accusing her of sending numerous harassing e-mails.

    Opponents: Nonprofit head Laurie A. Cumbo; Ede S. Fox, chief of staff for Councilman Jumaane Williams; attorney F. Richard Hurley; community activist Jelani Mashariki

  5. 5. Maria del Carmen Arroyo

    9th Annual Ghetto Film School Spring Benefit
    Maria del Carmen Arroyo Marion Curtis/Starpix

    Democratic Primary, 17th District, Bronx

    Maria Del Carmen Arroyo turned in petitions with “the forged signatures of Derek Jeter, supermodel Kate Moss, [and] sportscaster Joe Buck,” her opponent, Julio Pabon alleged in court. But even with a Bronx judge tossing out over half of her 3,339 signatures, it wasn’t enough to rid her name from the ballot. She quickly blamed three petition carriers for fraud and filed criminal charges against them, according to court papers. Curiously, those workers all reported to her convicted felon nephew, Richard Izquierdo Arroyo. Her nephew spent a year in federal prison for embezzling over $100,000 from SBCC Management Co., a housing nonprofit in her district. Izquierdo Arroyo spent lavishly on his aunt and his grandmother, Assemblywoman Carmen Arroyo — even taking them on trips to Puerto Rico. Before the indictment came down, he founded and headed the South Bronx Charter School, which received money and support from his lawmaker relatives.

    Opponent: Businessman Julio Pabon

  6. 6. Vito Lopez

    Vito Lopez
    Vito Lopez AP

    Democratic Primary, 34th District, Brooklyn

    Though “Gropez” resigned in shame from the Assembly and as Brooklyn Democratic Party boss this year for sexually harassing six young women, he still thinks he’s fit to serve as a councilman. The pervy pol turned a young woman who had been raped into his masseuse, fondled the leg of another woman and asked his female staffers to wear skimpy clothes and heels. Then Assembly Speaker Shelly Silver made a private deal to cover it up. Meanwhile, the Department of Investigation probed Lopez’s Ridgewood Bushwick Senior Center, a nonprofit network that he founded and had funded. The DOI found that executive director Christina Fisher gave herself and Lopez’s girlfriend, Angela Battaglia, enormous raises. In this election, Lopez faces a serious challenge from Antonio Reynoso, who served as term-limited City Councilwoman Diana Reyna’s chief of staff. Democratic insiders are encouraging people to get to the polls and support Reynoso. “Every vote’s going to count.”

    Opponents: Term-limited Councilwoman Diana Reyna’s former chief of staff Antonio Reynoso; community organizer and home health aide Gladys Santiago; organizer of the Williamsburg Puerto Rican parade and festival Humberto Soto

  7. 7. Joan Flowers

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    Senator Shirley Huntley, Congressman Gregory Meeks, and Joan Flowers. Juliet Kaye

    Democratic Primary, 27th District, Queens

    Flowers always seems to have a front-row seat for scandal. She was campaign treasurer for Rep. Gregory Meeks (D-NY) from 2001 to 2007, when the Federal Election Commission fined Meeks for improper campaign spending. In 2000, Flowers drew up incorporation papers for the nonprofit New Direction Local Development Corp. It was started with the help of state Sen. Malcolm Smith and Meeks, and for years its address was the same as Flowers’ law office. That group solicited money to help victims of Hurricane Katrina but didn’t give out any of the funds raised. Controversially, she also helped influential Rev. Floyd Flake turn a nonprofit housing development owned by Flake’s church into a for-profit venture.

    Opponents: Businessman Manuel Caughman; community board member Greg Mays; union boss I. Daneek Miller; consultant Sondra H. Peeden; attorney Clyde Vanel

  8. 8. Ruben Wills

    Peace Week 2013 Press Conference
    New York City Council member Ruben Wills speaks during the Peace Week 2013 press conference at City Hall. D Dipasupil/FilmMagic

    Democratic Primary, 28th District, Queens

    Wills is under criminal probe after his former boss, state Sen. Shirley Huntley, cooperated with federal investigators. When Wills was Huntley’s chief of staff, he ran a nonprofit called New York 4 Life, to which Huntley steered $33,000 in taxpayer money. It doesn’t seem that the nonprofit did any work, nor did it explain what it did with the money. Meanwhile, Van Holmes, the head of another sham nonprofit called Young Leaders Institute already has been charged with grand larceny, forgery and other crimes. Wills steered taxpayer money to that group while on the City Council. Wills denies wrongdoing.

    Opponents: Retired sanitation worker Eugene Walter Evans; David B. Kayode, counselor for the Department of Homeless Services; attorney Hettie V. Powell