King of the Gadflies

By Peter Duffy
The New York Times
Sunday February 4, 2001

Dan Hogan Charles/The New York Times

"I will be the first vegetarian mayor of the city of New York, probably of any big city," George Spitz said.

QUOTE UNQUOTE

Speaking His Mind

On his political philosophy
"I believe in government. I would like the U.S. government to operate like Finland, with excellent libraries, excellent transit. They built a subway in Helsinki. When was the last time we built anything to speak of?"

On his platform
"It's not patented. My opponents are free to steal from it."

On Mayor Giuliani
"I am the un-Giuliani in this race."

On being a gadfly
"I've done some constructive things. I am not running for mayor to cause trouble."

On the number of times he has been fired from jobs
"At least 10."

GEORGE N. SPITZ, public gadfly and perennial candidate, is seeking office again. But this time It's different. He says he's running to win.
  "I think I have an outside chance," said Mr. Spitz, a 78-year-old retired state auditor, who wants to be the next mayor of New York. "I'm the only vegetarian, only road runner, only veteran of World War II, only senior citizen, only union person, only Orthodox Jew and only high school dropout in the race.
  "This is going to be my best race," he added. "I'm going to let it all hang out."
  So far, Mr. Spitz, a pesky critic of East Side politics for decades, is the only candidate to announce formally for the Democratic nomination. The City Council speaker, Peter F. Valtone; the public advocate, Mark Green; the Bronx borough president, Fernando Ferrer; and the city comptroller, Alan G. Hevesl, are his likely challengers.
  The contrarian Mr. Spitz, who retired from his state job in 1989, knows about the travails of campaigning. He first ran in 1968, when he lost a State Assembly race by just 1,220 votes, the closest he has ever come to being elected. The campaign was litter-free, which meant be didn't use posters, bumper stickers or fliers, anything that might end up as trash. He ran for the Assembly again in 1974, but lost a Democratic primary. He twice challenged State Senator Roy M. Goodman (1970 and 1976) and ran for the City Council (1980 and 1995). All in vain.
  In 1997, he ran for the Manhattan borough presidency on a single issue: If elected, he vowed to abolish the job.
  It's an understatement to say he was vastly outspent. He raised no money and refused contributions. An endorsement from The Daily News made no difference. He finished dead last among six candidates.
  All his electoral defeats don't seem to bother him. "He's a little out of touch with reality," said George Hirsch, publisher of Runner's World magazine, a former Congressional candidate and the first contributor to Mr. Spitz's mayoral campaign. "And that's what I think sometimes brings about change. He may be too honest for the process. He almost doesn't think politically. He thinks about what ought to be."
  That's not to say that Mr. Spitz is without successes. A longtime jogger, he came up with the idea of changing the course of the New York City Marathon to include all five boroughs, vastly increasing the popularity of the event by encouraging residents throughout the city to cheer on the runners.
  The change was made in 1976. (The marathon had previously been four and a half laps around Central Park.) In 1969, he devised a plan for depositing welfare checks directly into recipients' bank accounts. It was put into practice by the city in 1981.
  "He's just so bloody honest, and that honesty separates him from all other politicians," said Russell Hemenway, national director of the National Committee for an Effective Congress, who has been involved in New York politics for 50 years.
  "He has excellent ideas," Mr. Hemenway said, "but he gets under people's skins. I've warned him against aggressiveness and against being impolite, which he sometimes is. If a secretary says her boss is on the telephone, he will ask who he is on the telephone with."
  Mr. Spitz says he is running because of what he calls the steady deterioration In public services and a political system rampant with favoritism. He vows to restore free tuition to the City University, increase the hours of public libraries and halt taxpayer financing of professional sports stadiums.
  The salaries of police officers, firefighters and teachers would be equal to those in the suburbs in a Spitz administration. He would demolish patronage and eliminate workfare. "I don't think it's moral," he said, "to force people to work for their welfare checks." He would also greatly reduce the number of contracts put out to bid, by eliminating unnecessary work and by having regular city employees do the jobs.
  Patronage has long been a target of Mr. Spitz's wrath. He said the country would have been spared the impeachment crisis if Monica S. Lewinsky and Linda R. Tripp had not been patronage employees at the Department of Defense, where they met each other.
  "What were they doing there?" he asked. "What could they contribute to the defense of our country? New York Is filled with Monica Lewinskys and Linda Tripps."
  Mr. Spitz, who had his bar mitzvah at 65, has promised his rabbi that he will not campaign on Friday and Saturday nights. As a supporter of Palestinian rights, however, he does not count on receiving many votes from Orthodox Jews. Civil servants, the elderly, students, joggers and vegetarians are more natural constituents, he said.
  "I will be the first vegetarian mayor of the city of New York, probably of any big city," said Mr. Spitz, who eats one meal a day.
  Although Mr. Spitz's mayoral run will have the same reformist zeal as his previous campaigns, it will be different in other ways. For the first time, he is hiring a campaign manager and a treasurer. And he is raising money, mostly through a Web site, which has not yet been set up.
  "I realize the odds are, at best, against me winning," be said. "I'm an outsider. I've never been accepted. I've been causing a lot of trouble. But I have a shot this time."
  Mr. Spitz has said It will be his last campaign, a political original's final try to put his particular stamp on government.
  Mr. Hemenway. for one, scoffed at the idea. "He's been saying that for 20 years," he said.

The Progressive, Pro-Peace choice in the New York City Democratic Primary for City Council 5th District on Manhattan’s Upper East Side and Roosevelt Island.