28 The QUEE NS Courier • APRIL 21, 2016 for breaking news visit www.qns.com The Queens Courier and the Mayor’s Office are proud to present a weekly column in which Mayor Bill de Blasio answers your questions about issues that concern you the most. If you have a question about anything going on in the city, in your neighborhood or on your block, we want to hear from you! Email us at editorial@qns.com and Mayor de Blasio will get you an answer! QUESTION: Northeast Queens has a very poor transportation infrastructure. There is an express bus line the QM2 to midtown Manhattan, but nothing going downtown to Wall Street or the Lower East Side/Meatpacking District. Also, to get from northeast Queens to Queens College, one would have to take two long bus rides. Is there any way to shorten the ride? I live near the Q15 and Q15A. ANSWER: Thank you for your question. We always look to New Yorkers to gain feedback on how to improve our transportation system. That’s why we decided to revamp the Q44 SBS, which will connect to Queens College faster and more efficiently. We always look forward to the input of New Yorkers, and we will work with the MTA in any way we can to create better, more efficient and faster commutes across the five boroughs. NEW YORK TO BERNIE: FUGGEDABOUTIT New Yorkers dealt Presidential hopeful Bernie Sanders a decisive blow on April 19 in a race, and in a state, that was mustwin for the brash Brooklynite. Hillary Clinton took the stage early at the Sheraton New York hotel in Midtown, with “Empire State of Mind” by Alicia Keys and Jay-Z blaring in the background. “In this campaign, we’ve won in every region of the country, from the North to the South to the East to the West,” Clinton said. “But this one is personal.” And personal it was. Bernie may have been born in Brooklyn, but Hillary proved that New Yorkers care little about place of origin. They know Hillary and unashamedly cast their vote for someone who has taken more political punches than any other figure in modern politics. “Hillary has done more for New York than every other candidate put together,” said Congresswoman Carolyn Maloney, a huge Clinton supporter, Queens Politics & More BY MIKE FRICCHIONE who took to the stage Tuesday night. “We passed critical healthcare for our 9/11 first responders together and then we continued to fight for those New Yorkers that the rest of the country forgot about.” It also highlights two different styles of campaigning. Hillary ran a classic shoeleather campaign, from dancing the merengue in Washington Heights, to drinking bubble tea in Flushing with Congresswoman Grace Meng. She was able to rely on and take full advantage of her longstanding relationships with diverse communities from all over the city and state. Leaders from Caribbean- American to Orthodox Jewish enclaves were courted years in advance, while many claimed they had yet to hear from Sanders. Bernie’s campaign was more symbolic, and perhaps better suited for a European city. He held huge public rallies that did little in terms of helping him court and turnout actual eligible voters. He complained on election night of voter irregularities and alluded to a rigged system in New York State, since only registered Democrats are allowed to vote in the Democratic Primary. What may have worked for the Sanders campaign in other states, where open primaries or caucuses are the norm, did not prevail in the Empire State. The rules are different everywhere. Successful campaigns and candidates readjust their strategy and style accordingly. Such is true in everyday life. Bernie isn’t the first person to leave New York with a sour taste in his mouth. He certainly won’t be the last. REMEMBERING THE FUTURE Recycling newspapers leads to a career of battling hate crimes and gangs BY ARTHUR FLUG As a young girl, Mariela Palomino Herring, Chief of the Gang Violence and Hate Crimes Bureau for Queens District Attorney Richard Brown, was about to made a big mistake. “I just wanted to sit quietly in back of the classroom, be shy and not get involved.” Fortunately for Queens and many crime victims, she would have a change of heart. Born in Peru, she accompanied her parents to New York City in 1962 searching for a better life and settled in Ozone Park. Her early schooling proved to be typical and uneventful until she became part of a newspaper recycling project at PS 108. This rather insignificant venture ignited within her Mariela Palomino a passion for community involvement and social justice that followed her as an honor student through John Adams High School, NYU and Fordham Law School. Accompanying this desire for social service was a feeling of loneliness and isolation that grew when entering college. “As a Latino advancing through school, I began to feel isolated and out of place. There were so few of us.” This future prosecutor and champion of victim’s rights would not allow herself to become a victim of this situation and joined others in developing a Latino student organization. This served to open her realm of experience and transported her to a unique world that included Gays, Jews, Muslims, Asians handicapped, aged and countless others that make up the communities of Queens. In 1985, upon becoming an Assistant District Attorney in Queens County, she would begin a highly active career servicing this multicultural constituency. In assisting these groups and as a spouse and mother of four, Mariela maintains a 24/7/365 schedule .In her ascent from Trial Attorney, to Career Criminal and Major Crimes Bureau to Anti – Bias Bureau and Chief of the Gang Violence and Hate Crimes Bureau, she has handled some of the most difficult major crime cases in Queens County. Mariela, by dint of personality and a keen ability to view a situation from a variety of positions, has become an educator, social worker, community organizer, an ardent victim’s rights advocate and a force for professional achievement. And it is through such abilities that she co- founded the Latino Lawyers Association of Queens County, is a Mentor for the National Association of Women Judges, helped to establish the Queens District Attorney’s Youth Diversion Program and is a recipient of the Kupferberg Holocaust Center Community Service Award and the Asian American Council’s Prosecutor of the Year Award. Loneliness can be debilitating. Mariella Herring used it as a springboard to success. FOR MORE NEWS VISIT QNS.COM Ask the MAYOR
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