Last year in 2005, around March I got a phone call from someone who said they were the campaign manager of Ben Shuldiner's campaign. They had gotten my phone number from someone in DFNYC telling Ben that they should meet me since I was a young activist up in Westchester County which is part of the NY - 19 Congressional District.
While I'm actually in NY - 18 there are many people in my CD who want to see Tom Delay's hand puppet Sue Kelly go down in flames. So there was already an effort underway even as early as last year March, to get some sort of grassroots movement going. Before I got that first phone call, I'd heard from the more older activists in the area ( who are sort of the Dem establishment but they're actually good people ) that there was this "23 year old kid" who's already going around saying that he's running for Congress. His name of course, was Ben Shuldiner. These people obviously did not want to take him seriously and quickly brushed him off. They still sort of do that, and often focus on two other candidates, but I'll speak more on that in a minute.
So this is the image I had in my mind as I decided to meet Ben one day in White Plains last year. I expected to see someone who was younger than even I was. I try never to form any opinions of someone until I meet them, or until I really get enough information, so I waited until I met him in person.
Here's what I learned, he's not 23 LOL. I think he was 28 at the time, but he was one of the youngest High School Principals in the country. He graduated magna cum laude from Harvard with a degree in History and Science. After that, he went over to England to begin his teaching career thanks to a fellowship. He then came back to NY and taught at Erasmus Hall where he taught History.
But then came the really interesting thing. He got a grant to build a high school. I believe it came from the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation ( I hope that's where I think it came from ). In 2003, he opened the High School for Public Service. Now that's an amazing accomplishment for a 23 year old, or a 28 year old! The school is doing rather well from what I've read on his website.
Ben's visionary leadership and outstanding managerial skills have brought the school rapid success. The High School for Public Service boasts a 97% passing rate on the Regents Exam. The school also has a 94% attendance rate, one of the highest in the region. Each and every one of Ben's students engages in the community: teaching kindergarteners to read, volunteering at soup kitchens, and organizing coat drives.
Ben has received national recognition for his public service achievements. In 2003 he was selected as the keynote speaker for the National Hemophilia Conference, an organization he has worked with for years.
Ben was also recently chosen from a nationwide pool as the recipient of the Jefferson Award for the Greatest Public Service by an Individual 35 Years or Under. This award has honored the public service of prominent young Americans such as Dr. Sally Ride, Lance Armstrong, and Wendy Kopp, the founder of Teach for America.
After I met him and looked at the first incarnation of his website last year ( it looks different now). I thought to myself, if this guy isn't someone who can run for Congress, then who can? And I do encourage anyone to run for public office, no matter your background. We need people to take back government for people everywhere. If you have good ideas, and are knowledgeable about government and the issues that concern your area, then I say you should run for office.
But the point was that Ben obviously was qualified to run for Congress and I think people were too quick to write him off so early. I even got some Democratic activists to come up to Peekskill and meet him at his grandparents house. Alas, I think they too have now fallen under the bandwagon spell of the two other perceived "top candidates." While I was sorry that even as early as 2005 I could not bring along more of the activists and Deaniacs in the county that I knew to support Ben, I told him that I supported him, and I felt he had every right to be in this race for the 19th CD. No, he did not ask the establishment for "permission," he did not seek their "consultation" he was merely asked by a few people to consider running, and so, it went from there.
As 2005 went along I would see Ben and the people that were helping him at some events in Westchester County. It was still very early and people were more focused on 2005. In Westchester County there was a big push to help Tony Castro run for District Attorney and he did put up a good fight against the eventual winner a Republican. For me personally, I was caught up in my local town of Greenburgh's politics and a bloody primary fight. So I sort of lost touch with Ben Shuldiner and his quest to be the 19th CD's next Congressman.
Until last week...........
So It's Thursday last week and I'm trying to fight off all these email replies generated by these auto-invite emails from the Frappr website ( which is a pretty cool idea by the way ). I had accidentally without realizing it, clicked on something that emailed everyone I had in my address book in Gmail. So I was basically sending a whole bunch of "I'm sorry" replies back. It was especially gruesome since some email addressees were auto-added from jobs that I had applied to!
But one of the replies came from Ben Shuldiner the candidate I had not seen or heard much from in over eight months or so. At first I was shocked that he still wanted to run since there were two perceived "top candidates" in Judy Aydelott and John Hall that were getting all the attention now. Just recently, a certain Joe Trippi ( he's a cool netroots connected person you might know LOL) signed on with John Hall's campaign too.
It turns out that Ben had never given up. He was still in the race. And looking at who's raised money so far, he actually had more than John Hall at the time ( after the next FEC filing we'll see if Hall has caught up ). The email that Ben sent me asked for me to give him a call so that we could talk. When I spoke to him, he was very positive ( I'd hope you would have to be ), over the phone he invited me to come up to his campaign HQ to see how things were going. Since I'm currently an unemployed political activist who's looking for work and had a lot of time on my hands, I took him up on his offer.
Last week Friday we had beautiful weather and it was a great sight to enjoy the Hudson River as the Metro-North Railroad took me up to Peekskill, NY. Taking the Hudson line on a beautiful, warm, sunny day, is one of best train rides to be had in New York. It is one of New York's hidden secrets.
When I arrived in Peekskill I was greeted by Ben and his former campaign manager and good friend who now just helps out a lot LOL. Just recently Ben hired a full-time campaign manager and another good friend who worked for a Congressman out in California. So things were moving along slowly but surely.
It has to be known that Ben does not have a large amount of money to run this campaign. Yes, he raised over 100k, but no where near what Judy Aydelott has raised. What he has raised he's done mostly on his own ( which candidates should be doing with call time anyway, but he has no finance director or full-time fundraising staff ). What Ben is doing is running a grassroots door to door campaign. He's the only candidate that's doing the door to door thing aggressively.
From the train station I was taken to his grandparents house which Ben had taken over to live in. But I also learned that the basement had now been turned into the campaign headquarters! I actually thought it was pretty cool that he's taking his grandparents house and is going to convert it like that. He lives upstairs and the campaign goes on from below LOL. It is a big basement by the way, if ever you need to run a campaign from your basement talk to Ben!
What they plan to do is convert the house so that it can also provide housing for campaign staff. What they're trying to do, since they can't really pay everyone your normal campaign staff salary, is provide people with free housing and food. I think It's an interesting idea and I hope it works out. When I was there Friday they were interviewing people over the phone for press, field, and finance positions. Many of them are college kids who will be free for the summer. Also, there's always the petitioning drive that you need people to help you with. Ben seems to be doing great with the "Millienials" they all are coming out to help him on the weekends and etc. I believe I heard the Vassar Dems are helping out too.
While Ben may not have Judy Aydelott's money or the name recognition of a John Hall who can call on the support of Bonnie Raitt and company, Ben's a good candidate. No, he's not the 23 year old I thought he was, he's not the teacher that everyone keeps on referring to him as, he's a Principal. He wants to fully fund No Child Left Behind, Recruit high-quality teachers, and create high-tech classrooms in all the schools of NY - 19. He wants to protect Social Security and fight privatizing it. He wants to ensure that the Indian Point nuclear facility is fully secured. He wants to work towards affordable healthcare for the whole country, and protect the VA hospitals. He's idealistic, he's youth, he's your next Congressman, he's Ben Shuldiner.