Queens councilmember to lead Republican caucus

Queens Councilmember Joann Ariola was elected as the new minority leader of the City Council on Friday.  File photo via NYC Council Media Unit

By Ryan Schwach

Queens Councilmember Joann Ariola will take over the mantle as minority leader of the City Council’s Republican caucus, around a week after her colleagues attempted to install Staten Island Councilmember David Carr as the next minority leader.

In a dramatic turn of events, Ariola was elected by three of the five members of the Council’s GOP in a vote on Friday. Ariola appointed her one-time rival, Queens Councilmember Vickie Paladino, to serve as the minority whip.

The Howard Beach councilmember’s new role includes a City Hall office and stronger input on budget negotiations and other matters.

“It's something that I've been working towards,” Ariola told the Eagle on Friday. “It’s something that I always felt I would succeed at if given the privilege to become minority leader.”

“It really does give me a seat at the table,” she added. “At finance, at the budget negotiation table and zoning…it does give me a voice, a voice for my own district, my own borough, but especially the boroughs of the other members of this caucus.”

With Ariola’s ascension to the role, Queens councilmembers hold the speaker’s office, the minority leader’s office and both the majority and minority whip positions of the council.

Ariola did not arrive at Friday's vote easily. Her successful election to minority leader followed a tenuous fight among the Council’s small Republican caucus.

In a vote last week, Carr was elected minority leader by Borelli and Brooklyn Councilmember Inna Vernikov.

Ariola, Paladino and Councilmember Kristy Marmorato did not attend the vote and called it “defective.”

Following the eventual disqualification of Carr’s election by the Council’s chief lawyer and with Borelli’s resignation going into effect on Jan. 31, the numbers shifted in Ariola’s favor, giving her two other councilmembers in her corner and only one backing Carr.

“Certainly, there was a vote that I disagreed with,” Ariola said.

However, she believes that the caucus will be able to look past the indiscretions of the last few weeks.

“I think that we were all adults, and now that a valid vote has been had that had ample notification and a quorum present…I believe that we will work towards our job, which is getting things done in our districts,” she said. “We will come together as a delegation. We're a delegation of five, and I think that we need to focus less on the would-be fracture and talk more about how each and every person in this caucus, in this delegation, wants to see it grow.”

As the new minority leader, Ariola will have to lead that mending.

“They will quickly understand that I am the type of person that is very hands on,” she said. “I'm very inclusive. I like to be in touch with the people in my office. I like to be in touch with the people in my district, and I would like to be in touch with the members of this delegation, find out what legislation they have pending, what's been stalled in the pipeline, what kind of budgeting they need during the budget cycle.”

“I want to be their voice for their district,” she added. “I want to go with them if they want to meet with the mayor's office, with the speaker's office, this office should be a place where the members of the delegation can come for support and guidance, and that's what they're going to get.”

Queens Councilmember Joann Ariola will become the next leader of the Republican Caucus in the City Council following a split with Staten Island Councilmember David Carr. File photo via NYC Council Media Unit

In her conversation with the Eagle, Ariola also backed her decision to name Paladino, one of the most controversial members of the council, as minority whip.

“[Paladino] is a very excellent councilwoman,” Ariola said. “She fights very hard for her district, and I know that she will, in this council, fight for solution oriented legislation to get people to go on to different bills that are solution oriented.”

Ariola and Paldino’s new roles gives Queens an outsized position in the Council’s leadership.

World’s Borough councilmembers now make up two-thirds of the body's leadership, with Ariola and Paladino joining Council Speaker Adrienne Adams and the South Queens Councilmember Selvena Brooks-Powers, who is the majority whip.

“I think it shows that Queens is really putting forth people who are good candidates, people who can win, and people who want to take leadership roles, not just to do what's right for Queens, but what's right for the borough, and for the other boroughs and the city at large,” Ariola said.

The process that resulted in Ariola’s new position began in January, when Borelli announced that he would resign from the Council to take a job in the private sector.

Borelli, who represented Staten Island, backed his fellow county-man Carr to be minority leader, along with Vernikov.

Those alliances split the six-member minority caucus right down the middle, with Borelli and Vernikov backing Carr, Carr backing himself, and Paladino, Marmorato and Ariola dissenting in favor of Ariola.

On Jan. 28, the anti-Ariola camp gathered for a vote to appoint Carr at Borelli’s office, voting 3-0 to make Carr minority leader. The other three did not show up for the vote.

Not long after the vote, Ariola and her backers penned a letter to Adams calling the vote a sham and asking her not to certify the results.

The councilmembers led by Ariola alleged that the vote was done improperly and without a quorum, and thus shouldn’t count.

“A purported meeting was held today for the minority delegation that was called with insufficient notice and no agenda, without quorum being met,” Ariola said in a statement to the Eagle at the time. “No business should have been handled without a quorum.”

Both Borelli and Carr defended their vote, however, the general counsel of the body didn’t quite agree.

In a ruling on Feb. 3, the general counsel determined that the vote that made Carr minority leader was “invalid and cannot be accepted.”

“As of Jan. 28th, there were six members of the Republican Conference,” the opinion read. “Therefore, four members were required for a quorum. Since the Objection Letter states that three members were not present for the selection, there is prima facie evidence that a quorum was never present and therefore, that no selection was made. Therefore, the Council must reject the Certification as void.”

In a social media statement Friday morning, Carr – who did not attend Ariola’s vote along with Vernikov – said he believed the decision to not certify his vote was wrong, but said he would continue to work with GOP caucus members.

“I have always obeyed Ronald Reagan's ‘11th Commandment’ to not speak ill of fellow Republicans, and I will continue to do so,” he said. “We have serious issues confronting our city, and I will continue to be a leader and work with my colleagues on these crucial matters moving forward, no matter my title.”