In 1998, I started writing a column for the Staten Island Advance and apparently, it stuck a chord because I was asked to be a keynote speaker at a Republican event afterward.
It was my first public appearance and I was a nervous wreck in front of an audience of GOP state politicians.
But I managed to send a warning to the GOP based on my experience growing up in a Manhattan barrio of Spanish Harlem.
I told them that all I saw in that community were Democratic clubs that neighbors could access to solve their problems. I never saw a Republican presence at all yet for some strange reason,
It was my first public appearance and I was a nervous wreck in front of an audience of GOP state politicians.
But I managed to send a warning to the GOP based on my experience growing up in a Manhattan barrio of Spanish Harlem.
I told them that all I saw in that community were Democratic clubs that neighbors could access to solve their problems. I never saw a Republican presence at all yet for some strange reason,
