The following story is an updated version of the one that appears in our latest print edition.

 

On a brisk Thursday afternoon, George Diaz Jr. descends the steps of Norwood’s 205th Street subway station, located at East 205th Street and Perry Avenue. After swiping his metro card, Diaz shares with Norwood News what changes he would like to see in the station. “We need an elevator,” he said. “Feasibly, it is probably better to make the elevator by this entrance because when you step out, you see Whalen playground, a City park. It should be easier for the MTA [a State-run agency] to work with the City,” he said.

 

In the eyes of Diaz, the station symbolizes a larger issue. “It represents neglect,” Diaz said. “It represents the neglect of our government and the people who are in office, and have been in office a long time. How often do they go to these stations? When they do go to a station, it is very strategic.” Meanwhile, Diaz said he has ridden the D line train since he was in high school.

 

Now, at 40, he is vying for Assemblyman Jeffrey Dinowitz’s 81^st district seat once again, having previously challenged Dinowitz unsuccessfully in the 2020 Democratic Party, when he won 36.2 percent of the vote, as reported. Dinowitz, meanwhile, has served as assemblyman in A.D. 81 since 1994. The district comprises Norwood, Woodlawn, Wakefield, Kingsbridge, Van Cortlandt Village, Kingsbridge Heights, Riverdale and Marble Hill.

 

“I am running because, after nearly 30 years of the same representation, we can do better,” Diaz said. “I am the one that actually sees the issues that are going on. I am someone that has lived in the district most of my life. I feel that a lot of elected officials, the incumbent in particular, don’t see these issues that are really affecting the community.”

 

He also believes that the current crop of elected officials has failed to stand up on big issues. “You don’t call out the [Assembly] Speaker for not bringing things to a vote?” Diaz asked, not referencing any particular bill. [He mentioned this point once again during a candidate forum hosted by Northwest Bronx Indivisible on Sunday, March 13, in the context of the New York Health Act.] “How are you going to continue to tell us you fight for these issues if you can’t call truth to power? And it’s the ‘go along to get along’ policies that we have been stuck with, decades. If you say you are about the people, be about the people!”

 

Diaz has lived in Norwood since he was 12 years old. Previously, he resided in Wakefield and Kingsbridge. “I know people in different neighborhoods,” Diaz said. “I spend time in every neighborhood. I feel comfortable there.” He is not the only candidate who will be challenging Dinowitz in the 2022 Democratic primary. As reported, Jessica Altagracia Woolford, a former New York City press secretary for U.S. Sen. Kristen Gillibrand, announced in November that she would also be running.

 

We ask Diaz what separates him from the other candidates? “I have done the work in the community long before I decided to run,” Diaz said. “My experiences are also different because I know what it’s like to really struggle. There was a time when my mother and I had to go to food pantries to get the things we needed so we could continue to eat while I looked for a job.”

His work in the community started while he was attending Saint Raymond High School in Parkchester. At that time, Diaz said he volunteered with God’s Love We Deliver, an organization that delivers meals to people who are physically unable to prepare meals for themselves. After graduating from high school and later, The City College of New York with a degree in media communication arts, he worked at the office of former New York City council member, [Gabriel] Oliver Koppell, for five years. Koppell also served in the State Assembly and as New York attorney general. Diaz started out as a volunteer in December 2008.

 

During this period, he focused on issues surrounding transportation, paratransit and the police. According to his website, he helped dozens of people continue to receive their Access-A-Ride Paratransit Service. Diaz said this was despite efforts by the City to cut them off. He said he also worked behind the scenes to help get the Living Wage Bill passed, as well as create a space for the NYPD and local young people to engage in dialogue. Diaz is also a board member of community groups like the Bronx chapter of the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP), Concerned Citizens for Change, Northwest Bronx Indivisible, and Bronx Progressives.

 

When what has changed since he last ran that gives him confidence that he will win this time, the Norwood candidate said this time around, the outcome of the race will be different. “I have money this time,” Diaz said. “My name and face are also more recognizable now. Additionally, I have had more time to work on my ideas. I have ironed them out better.”

 

In terms of campaign contributions raised to date, according to the NYS Board of Elections data, Diaz has raised $2,705.85 as of March 12, while Altagracia Woolford has raised $41,351, Dinowitz has raised $146,351 and “Pazmino for 81st Assembly” has not raised any financing, as of the same date. We understand that the latter may be the committee behind freelance filmmaker, Kevin Pazmino, who, as reported, previously ran and lost against District 11 City Councilman Eric Dinowitz, son of Jeffrey Dinowitz. We reached out to Pazmino for comment and will update this story upon receipt of a response.

Meanwhile, Diaz said unlike his opponents, he has a strong grasp of the issues that matter to people in the district. “At the same time, people are more aware of safety and quality-of-life issues. This benefits me because I am the one who talks about the issues of quality of life.” Specifically, he argues that the police need to crack down on fireworks and noise complaints.

 

In fact, the number one issue of his campaign is quality of life and public safety. “Everything from making it safer to [for] all of us dealing with COVID and the long-term aftermath, along with the community feeling safer because crime is up,” Diaz said. “People don’t feel safe on the streets. They really don’t feel safe on the subways. I feel less safe on the subway than I have ever felt.”

 

To address the issue of subway safety, he hopes to get on the State standing committee on corporations, authorities, and commissions. Once on the committee, he said he would investigate the MTA’s priorities. “I am going to be asking for reports that list every station, and a breakdown as to the stations that are in most need of repairs…….actually having MTA give us their priorities and then work it from there, looking and saying, ‘You have this as your number six priority, but I am seeing an issue that is a bigger priority’.”

 

He also plans to add elevators to stations that don’t have them already and making stations more wheelchair accessible. His goal is to make the subway safer and more functional. “You want people to take the subways to go to work, but if it is a big inconvenience because their stations are closed, you are affecting their ability to get to work and do their jobs,” Diaz said. “You need to be dedicated to the long-term, not just short-term fixes.”

 

Norwood News has previously reported on the latest installations of elevators at different Bronx subway stations, along with the MTA’s planning schedule for the remaining stations. ADA compliant projects listed in the MTA 2020-2024 Capital Plan include the following Bronx stations:

• Wakefield-241 St
• Kingsbridge Rd
• 167 St
• Burnside Ave
• 3 Av-138 St
• Van Cortlandt Park-242 St
• Tremont Ave
• Parkchester
• E 149 St
• Brook Ave
• Mosholu Pkwy

 

The second big issue of his campaign is reforming the education system. “You are in an overcrowded school,” Diaz said. “Teachers are overworked or overstressed. The system works against the students and the teachers – everything from the tests to how the schools are funded.”

 

He also highlights the cost of going to college. “Kids are in a situation like me,” Diaz said. “If I wasn’t working, I wouldn’t be able to go to school. And that also affects you. If you have to work five days a week to take five classes, you are losing a lot of time that you could have dedicated to your studies and your assignments.” To fund his college education, Diaz said he worked full-time in a hotel.

 

To make college more affordable, Diaz supports the “New Deal for CUNY,” a bill which is currently in the committee level stage of the legislative process, and which would make CUNY colleges tuition-free. He also says that he would introduce a new deal for SUNY. “It would give opportunities to go to a State college for free if you are a New York State resident,” Diaz said.

 

Regarding funding for schools, Diaz said he would introduce a bill that correlates funding to the schools’ student population. “We do that with the census in deciding how much money goes into communities,” Diaz said. “We have to siphon the funding so that it’s more evenly distributed. It should be based on the number of students at a school, as supposed to the income of their parents.”

 

The third key issue of his campaign is housing reform. “The issue that I am talking about that neither of my opponents [is] talking about is abusive landlords, how they are able to harass and intimidate tenants to get them to either comply or move,” Diaz said. “They refuse to make repairs.”  Indeed, Norwood News has reported on a number of occasions on the need for such repairs as well as various other housing-related complaints, raised by both community activists and tenants, most recently in the context of new legislation drafted in the wake of the recent Twin Parks fire tragedy.

 

Housing reform is personal for Diaz. A woman he knows had an abusive landlord. “Her landlord wouldn’t make repairs and would basically try to get her to shut up,” he said. “She was hospitalized due to the black mold and rodents in her building and apartment. She had a very serious health issue.”

Diaz considers what the landlords are doing to be a form of domestic violence. “Domestic violence doesn’t occur suddenly,” Diaz said. “It isn’t suddenly you get struck; it builds that way. Being ignored or being belittled, being verbally abused to eventually being intimidated, then it eventually leads to that point,” he added.

 

To solve this problem, Diaz wants to change the criminal code to make landlords criminally liable for their actions. “When landlords are arrested and they have a little perp walk on TV, that’s going to start changing minds,” Diaz said. “That’s going to change behavior.”

 

Diaz thinks, based on the conversations he has had as well as things he has observed on Facebook, that political dynamics in the district are in his favor. “The shift is that the district is becoming even more progressive,” he said.

 

He also credits the general anti-establishment wave. “It is continuing as people realize that this person has been there for a long time, and they are having trouble coming up with things that this person did that were good,” Diaz said. “I don’t just say that about the incumbent I am facing. That is a sentiment for a good number of elected officials as well.”

 

In conclusion, Diaz wants voters to know, regardless of their political leanings, that he will always be available. “They should know that were I to have the honor of winning this election and serving, I will be the candidate you see out in the street and have conversations with,” Diaz said. “Even if we disagree with a particular issue, I will always try to be respectful and inclusive. I am the one that is willing to work with everyone for change.”

 

Editor’s Note: Help is available for anyone who is or has been affected by domestic violence. The Bronx District Attorney’s office urges anyone suffering at the hands of an abuser to immediately contact the Bronx D.A.’s crime victim assistance unit at (718) 590-2115. The Bronx Family Justice Center can be reached on (718) 508 1220. For more help & resources, visit https://on.nyc.gov/2BqhBe8. or call 1-800-621-4673 (HOPE).

 

*Síle Moloney contributed to this story.