Since 1994, Carl Kruger has brought his windshield perspective to Albany. A Democratic who represents some transit-rich and not-very-transit-rich areas of Brooklyn, Kruger emerged over the last few years as one of the Fare Hike Four, those State Senators who vowed to anything to put a stop to a rational and equitable plan of East River bridge tolls or congestion pricing that would have allowed the MTA to avoid massive service cuts. Now, with anti-incumbent sentiment running deep, Kruger has a primary challenger in Igor Oberman, an administrative judge at the Taxi & Limousine Commission.
Oberman spoke with Streetsblog yesterday, and he’s saying all the right things. “Are bridge tolls popular in this district? No,” he said. “But more popular than cutting student MetroCards.” Oberman, who believes that the subways are “as important to the [residents] as police service or ambulances,” criticized Kruger for never taking the subways and vowed to fight for better transit if elected. While only those in District 27 can vote in this primary, there are other ways pro-transit forces can make their voices felt, and it’s about time these obstructionist Senators were give a run for their seats.
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Igor does not list transit on his issues page. I hope the anti-incumbent sentiment is enough to kick Kruger out. I find that the state politicians are very hard to remove, probably because people don’t really knows what they do in the first place.