Council Hopeful Puts an Emphasis on the Arts
Jeffrey Omura would be the fi rst LGBTQ Japanese elected offi cial in New York
BY TAT BELLAMY-WALKER
As anti-Asian violence surges in New
York City, out gay Japanese-American
City Council candidate Jeffrey
Omura is calling for schools to teach
Asian-American history to students in a bid to
curb future harassment.
“It’s a lot harder to otherize someone when
you realize that their history is your history,”
said Omura, who is running a campaign to
represent the Upper West Side, Lincoln Square,
Central Park, and Clinton in District 6.
Since the pandemic started, Omura said it
has been “terrifying” to watch ongoing incidences
targeting Asian-American communities
dating back to last spring.
“It’s like, ‘I don’t know if it’s safe for me to
walk to the grocery store by myself,'” Omura
said. “I’m lucky that I haven’t experienced anything
targeting me specifi cally, but I have a lot
of friends who have been targeted by violence,
or just by scary hateful words from strangers
on the street or on the subway.”
Currently, term-limited City Councilmembers
Peter Koo of Queens and Margaret S. Chin
of Manhattan are the only Asian-American offi -
cials on the City Council. If elected, Omura said
he would make history as the fi rst Japanese-
American elected offi cial in the state — and he
hopes he can gain traction as he focuses on issues
facing Asian-American people.
“We need to invest in the Asian-American
community,” Omura said. “Right now, we’ve
got this model minority myth, but one in four
Asian-Americans in New York City lives in poverty.”
Omura is up against several opponents, including
Manhattan Borough President Gale
Brewer and lawyer Maria Danzilo, in a campaign
to succeed term-limited City Councilmember
Helen Rosenthal, who launched a
campaign for comptroller but dropped out of
the race last summer. Omura is trailing behind
in remaining campaign cash among
candidates. To date, he has an estimated balance
of $103,377, following Brewer, who has
$202,566, and Danzilo, who has $123,280,
according to the New York City Campaign Finance
Board.
Omura, who was born and raised in Michigan,
is an actor, artist, former political campaigner,
and labor organizer who helped lead
the Fair Wage On Stage campaign, a grassroots
effort to advocate for higher wages for New York
City performers. Early next year, out gay termlimited
Councilmember Jimmy Van Bramer,
who is running for Queens borough president,
is slated to leave his post as chair of the Council’s
POLITICS
Out gay candidate Jeffrey Omura is running for a seat in District 6 of Manhattan in the New York City Council.
Cultural Affairs, Libraries, and International
Intergroup Relations Committee. Without
Van Bramer — who spent a decade as the chief
external affairs offi cer for the Queens Library
— Omura wants to make sure the Council
maintains a focus on arts.
“I realized that all of our arts advocates are
term-limited, and there may be no one left to
advocate for the arts at a time when we need it
most,” Omura said. “That’s when I realized that
someone had to step forward to make sure we
have an advocate for the arts and at least one
seat at the table, because we’re going to need a
lot of support within the city government to get
everyone back to work.”
The arts will continue to take shape as the
city recovers from the pandemic, but how the
programs rebound is just as important. Governor
Cuomo last month gave Broadway the goahead
to start up again, with rehearsals fi rst
and then full capacity performances returning
in September. Still, Omura raised several questions
about how that would pan out.
“We really can’t do social distancing in a
Broadway house because we have to be able
to sell as many tickets as possible,” Omura
said. “The question is, ‘Will we be able to fi ll
those seats when Broadway reopens?’ We’re
going to need those tourists. And if we can’t
bring international tourists in because they’re
not vaccinated, then we’re going to have to focus
on domestic tourists… we need butts in
seats.”
Omura is also placing a focus on different
LGBTQ initiatives and health issues during
his campaign. Pointing to the success of the
Chelsea Sexual Health Clinic, which is part of
the network of NYC Sexual Health Clinics offering
MICHAEL LEVY
low-cost or free services for sexual health,
Omura said he wants to push for more funding
of STI clinics throughout the city that provide
same-day test results. He also wants to increase
funding to house homeless LGBTQ youth and
boost resources for Title IX coordinators, who
could address anti-LGBTQ bullying and cyberbullying.
Omura relates to the adversity faced by LGBTQ
youth because the theater became an escape
from homophobic bullying in the Michigan
school system.
“Middle school was absolute hell for me as it
was for a lot of gay kids, getting called f****t everyday,”
Omura said. “It’s really hard to wake
up and go to school when that’s what you face.”
Meanwhile, he also wants to update hospital
software to allow LGBTQ men to donate blood
despite discriminatory regulations preventing
men who have sex with men from doing so. In
April, several gay men said they were unable to
give blood despite loosening FDA guidelines because
computers at blood centers were not updated
to accommodate the new rule, according
to NBC. Omura is pledging to support the reallocation
of police funding toward using mental
health experts to respond to individuals in crisis,
though he did not say how much he would
shift away from the NYPD.
His main focus, though, is on the arts — and
he is hopeful that those programs can play a
key role in helping the city overcome the hardship
of the last year and a half.
“I believe art is how we’re going to heal after
this pandemic,” Omura said. “We can go back
and have those shared experiences again.”
Early voting spans from June 12 to June 20
and primary day is on June 22.
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