"It's got nothing to do with the pickets, it's about respecting women's rights. It's easy to do the right thing. It's very easy." -- State Senate Minority Leader Malcolm Smith.
Although neither the Buffalo News nor the Niagara Gazette bothered sending a reporter, far more prestigious newspapers such as the Albany Times Union, the New York Daily News and the Rochester Democrat & Chronicle took notice of state Sen. Malcolm Smith's July 8 visit to Niagara Falls.
That's because Smith, who was recently elevated to the position of minority leader in the Senate, is likely to become the majority leader after the November election, one of the three most powerful positions in the state of New York.
During his visit, Smith snubbed embattled Niagara County Chairman Dan Rivera by refusing to attend a $500-a-plate fund-raiser at the Red Coach restaurant here. Attendance at the event was sparse, with just 18 social climbers and party hacks braving a line of nearly 30 women's rights protesters led by Kathryn Lake Mazierski, former state chair of the National Organization for Women.
Some of the attendees, like Niagara County sheriff candidate James Voutour, Niagara Falls Mayor Paul Dyster and Rivera himself, avoided the picket line by slipping in through a rear delivery entrance, while others, like state Rep. Francine Del Monte and former mayor James Galie, went smiling and waving cluelessly through the front entrance.
Rivera's latest political gaffe came in April, when he became involved in an altercation with former Democratic vice-chair Diane Roberts of Lewiston. Roberts said that Rivera grabbed her nose and pulled it, causing her physical pain, and then followed up his boorish behavior days later with an obscenity-laced phone call.
In an open letter to the Democratic committee, which was widely circulated and made available to the media here, Roberts resigned her post, saying that Rivera's physical and verbal harassment had reached an unacceptable level.
Mazierski, who has been a registered Democrat and a champion of women's rights for her entire adult life, was outraged.
"It's never OK for a man to put his hands on a woman in anger, period," she said. "The Democratic Party has always stood for that, and there are millions of Democratic women out there who would wonder why we in Niagara County are putting up with it."
For her part, Roberts has downplayed the incident that led to her resignation, and it has been suggested that pressure from Del Monte, a Rivera sycophant, may be playing a role in her more recent public statements.
"Whatever the reason, Diane Roberts is exhibiting behavior very typical of abused and battered women everywhere," Mazierski said. "Very often, the wife or the girlfriend will, in essence, change her story as time passes and the abuser begins acting civilly toward her."
Mazierski said she has also been dismayed by coverage Smith's visit received in area newspapers, particularly the Niagara Gazette, where reporter Mark Scheer and managing editor Dick Lucinski combined for a series of four articles and columns over a six-day period, lampooning the protesters' concerns and blaming the controversy on Mazierski and Smith.
"Given the history of their publisher, I suppose it's not unexpected they would rise to the defense of a guy who abuses women," she said.
Indeed. As revealed in an April 1 Reporter expose, Gazette publisher Carl Helbig was arrested near Rochester in July 2007 on charges of criminal trespass and aggravated harassment following an altercation involving a former girlfriend, Sharon Amico. The police report details the publisher's horrific behavior.
"Upon arrival, the offender was gone," the arresting officer wrote. "I spoke with the complainant, Sharon Amico, who stated that her ex-boyfriend, Carl Helbig, has been harassing her since early Saturday morning beginning at about 2 a.m. Sharon further stated that it was at that time that Carl showed up at her house when she had another man in her house, so Carl began pounding on the bedroom window asking 'are you (having sex with) him,' and various other expletives. He attempted to get into the house, and when Sharon thought he was inside the house, she ran outside and locked herself in her car. Carl then went into the house through the garage, which Sharon had opened to get outside, and had an argument with Sharon's friend, Steve Whalen, who was still inside the house. Sharon called the police at that time and Deputies Torlish and Habberfield responded. Sharon didn't want to press any charges, but wanted Carl to stay away from her. Carl was told to go home and stay away from Sharon and not to have any contact with her.
"Carl continued to come to Sharon's house, banging on the door and ringing the doorbell, as well as attempting to contact her by text message, voice mail and email," the officer wrote. "Carl did leave harassing text message and voice mails about 'reclaiming' Sharon. After Carl showed up at Sharon's house for about the 30th time today, Sharon decided to call the Sheriff's office again and this time she signed the information to have Carl arrested. Upon speaking with Carl, he would not say what had happened but only that Sharon is blowing everything out of proportion."
The Gazette publisher's comments to the police that night are eerily similar to Rivera's initial response. He claimed his behavior was being "blown out of proportion" by "political operatives" with "ulterior motives."
In its coverage of the incident, the Gazette chose to ignore Mazierski's decades-long commitment to women's rights in favor of the absurd theory that her true motivation is the six months she spent managing the campaign of Gary Parenti in his attempt to unseat Del Monte during the 2006 Democratic Primary.
Rivera lost his job as insurance investigator with Liberty Mutual after it was learned he'd used his position to dig up dirt on Parenti, which was then gleefully published by the Gazette. Parenti sued the company, and recovered a sizable settlement. Rivera now works for Buffalo attorney Marc Panepinto, a member of Laborers Local 210 in that city and an organizer for the union throughout the 1990s.
Mazierski said that when Scheer first called her regarding the protest, he told her he had never even heard of the National Organization for Women, which was founded in 1966 and has more than 500,000 members nationwide.
"Abusers tend to stick up for other abusers and justify their behavior," Mazierski said. "It's a well-documented fact. But I'm not going to sit by and watch a bully like Dan Rivera essentially berate a woman out of her leadership post."
Mazierski's views were strongly echoed by the man who will likely become the state's next Senate majority leader prior to meeting with the protesters outside the Red Coach. Smith's seven-year tenure in the Senate has been hallmarked by the great concern he has for all minorities and the work he's done on their behalf.
"The respect I have for women is such that I just wouldn't be going in there," Smith told the Reporter.
Rivera's tenure as Democratic chairman here has been marked by a never-ending series of pratfalls and mini-disasters that have led to fund-raising difficulties and an inability to get Democrats elected to top county posts. For the past two weeks, Democrats from Niagara Falls to Lockport have openly speculated about how much longer such a clown can remain in office and whether there is anyone willing to take on the task of cleaning up the mess he's created here.
| Niagara Falls Reporter | www.niagarafallsreporter.com | July 22 2008 |