[The weekly newsletter mistakenly indicated that this article was written by Sarah McNeil. The author is Clara Alger.]
In advance of the Nov. 7 general election, Vassar Voices for Planned Parenthood (VVPP) held a candidate panel on Oct. 25. Although the organization invited candidates from both the Republican and Democratic parties, only those running on the Democratic ticket were in attendance.
The panel included Kenya Gadsden for county clerk, Anthony Parisi for district attorney, James Rodgers for family court judge, Tommy Zurhellen for county executive, Lisa Kaul for county legislator of District 6 and Rebecca Edwards for Poughkeepsie town supervisor. Half of these six candidates have ties to colleges in the area: Edwards is a current Vassar history professor, Kaul is the former director of Vassar’s Community-Engaged Learning and Zurhellen is an English professor at Marist College.
VVPP was inspired to put on the event after they invited Edwards to one of their weekly meetings to talk about citizenship and local politics. Realizing that students may not know much about local issues, they decided a panel would help students engage with the Dutchess County community.
Dutchess County is a swing county, and elections are often very close. In 2021, Edwards lost her seat in the County Legislature by 43 votes. Greenberg says, “If my hall voted, we would change that.” She added, “If the students banded together, we could change every election.”
Panelists pointed to homelessness, food insecurity, domestic violence, climate change, waste management, incorporating migrant workers into the community and shifting Poughkeepsie into a college town as key issues in Dutchess County. Zurhellen was especially concerned about the proposed plan to put homeless people in the soon to be decommissioned Dutchess County jail. Kaul shed light on the dangers of Poughkeepsie’s system of burning trash and its outsize effects on low-income people and people of color.
VVPP Co-Communications Chair Maggie Greenberg ’26 explained the importance of local politics to the organization, “Planned Parenthood is in danger in a lot of places so it is political, and so I think that our reproductive rights are inherently tied up in who we are voting for.”
When asked about reproductive rights, all panelists affirmed their support for pro-choice policy. Yet, even though the right to abortion is protected in New York, panelists pointed out that voters still have to pay attention. Poughkeepsie has only one Planned Parenthood location, and Edwards and Zurhellen said there is a pregnancy crisis center that gives out false information. Edwards commented, “We are all focused on Texas, we are all focused on horrific things that are happening in other parts of the country as reproductive rights are rolled back, but there are a lot of barriers here to reproductive health for people who need reproductive health, and I am not just talking about abortion but other things as well. At the panel, we were able to talk about some of those barriers and what some solutions might be.”
All panelists wanted to emphasize that everyday lives are affected by county politics; even though 2023 is considered an off-year election, meaning it is neither a presidential nor a midterm election, Edwards emphasized that every vote matters in local elections. Greenberg said she was especially interested in learning about the positions of District Attorney and Family Court Judge, commenting, “They have so much power on people’s actual lives in a way I did not consider.”
Edwards also noted, “The Town of Poughkeepsie is really important to the life of people at Vassar in ways they might not even be aware of,” citing air quality, bus service, housing and amenities near campus.
Candidates said that no matter who students vote for, they should get to the polls and make their voices heard. “If young people understood the power they had, they could flip everything,” said Gadsden.