Peter's Place

NYC Council Elections, Bronx CD #18, Part 4 I would be remiss as a journalist were I not to include the candidate whom everyone in The Bronx's Council District #18 has been talking about in today's NYC Council primary race: Michael Beltzer . I am sorry that family obligations prevented me from completing this Part 4 of my series of articles on the candidates in this race until the morning of the election, as opposed to last week when I had planned to release it. Beltzer is the third millennial in the race who is fighting the establishment's pick and who by far is the furthest removed from them. A Long Islander, he has made the Soundview  section of The Bronx his home for the past decade. There, he raises his daughter, Isabella Rose, who attends public school, which is one of many reasons why Beltzer is such a strong advocate of public education. In this way, Beltzer stands out from his opponents in that he supports free public education, including free public hig...

Amanda Farias NYC Council Elections, Bronx CD #18, Part 3 It took less than ten minutes from the time I'd sent the email to the time my phone rang. This can't be possible, I thought to myself. It must  be a bill collector. But on a Sunday afternoon? A short while later, it didn't take long for me to spot the maelstrom of information working its way down the block. There was a very familiar feeling here, not quite one of déjà vu but certainly one of comfortable familiarity. There was an ease with which the central figure I was focusing on worked with the people, not apart from them. "Yes, that must be her," I thought as I approached whom in fact turned out to be the person I was seeking, Amanda Farias . We had only a brief moment to meet so that I could observe her in action on the campaign trail. Which, to be honest, looked not much different than her in action at work, or at home in her community. She engaged with people, spoke with them, cared about ...

NYC Council Elections, Bronx CD #18, Part 2 One freezing frost-filled February night in 2013, I first met Elvin Garcia in the back corner of a too-small greasepit of a Bronx diner to enlist his support in our work to build a new LGBTQ community center for The Bronx, he with his friend, I with mine. If it weren't for my friend, I never would have known what actually had been said during that meeting. Thus was my introduction to the insane world of Bronx politics. Both it, and the turkey burger (my standard diner fare) left a bad taste in my mouth. At the time, Garcia worked for NYS Senator Gustavo Rivera as an aide. More importantly, Garcia was an out gay man in Bronx politics, something of a rarity (even to this day). Garcia declined to join our efforts to build an LGBTQ community center. In fact, when he moved to NYC Mayor Bill de Blasio's office to a position where he would have direct influence representing LGBTQ Bronxites' interests, he did little—if a...

NYS Senator Rev. Ruben Diaz Sr NYC Council Elections, Bronx CD #18, Part 1 It was a hot, steamy, sultry summer afternoon in 2014 and we were having difficulty finding the entrance to the building using the address given to us while the batteries on our mobile phones were limping by on emergency power. We feared we would miss the meeting—one everyone and their drag queen mother had warned us against—but we were obstinate and determined to make it succeed. Finally, we got through to the office and learned that the entrance was around the block. Somehow, in the heat visibly rising off the sidewalks, this made sense. We were ushered inside into the refreshing respite of the 20th centuries' greatest technological miracle: air conditioning. It looked to be like any other ordinary office, with piles of papers strewn about and desks haphazardly arranged into working spaces, workers frenetically going about their business—hardly what one might imagine to be those of a state senator...

[Updated 25 June 2017 at 7:20 pm EDT with information on driver requirements and safety features] As someone who's been using ride-sharing technology from apps such as  Lyft  and  Uber  for the past few years, I see a lot of misconceptions and misperceptions about them, especially by people who've never used them. Here are my thoughts, based on my real life experiences after having taken hundreds of rides with both services over the past few years. I'm not merely responding to the hype surrounding them based on stories I've read or heard about but my actual experiences. People are afraid of technology and have a tendency demonize anything new and disruptive to the status-quo. We need to get over our fears of change and embrace new technologies and the world we live in, especially when those technologies make our lives easier. Lyft  and  Uber  are companies that have been operating for years and have had time to work most of the kinks out of th...

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE CONTACT: PETER C. FRANK +1-914-417-9579 PCFRANK73@GMAIL.COM Who: A group of citizens concerned about Chick-fil-A's policies and practices What: LGBTQ Equality & Animal Rights Demo When: Saturday, February 11th, 10am - 1pm How: Politely distribute literature to prospective customers Where: Chick-fil-A West Hartford, 509 New Park Avenue, West Hartford, CT 06107 Chick-fil-A has a history of opposing LGBTQ equality . Actively denigrating a segment of our population can make it easier for them to turn a blind eye to the farm factories providing most of their food, which employ inhumane practices that are cruel to the animals they raise. Despite promises to the contrary, Chick-fil-A continues to donate millions of dollars to anti-LGBTQ organizations through its foundation and continues to source products from farm factories. The protest, spearheaded by LGBTQ rights activist Peter C. Frank , has the support of organizations s...

If you think education is expensive, try ignorance. ~ Benjamin Franklin (1706-1790, was a Founding Father of America)

Today, October 21st, is my birthday. Perhaps the most common question I am asked, especially when meeting someone new, is, "how old will you be?" My typical response is, "I'll be celebrating my 29th birthday." And it's a factual statement. One can celebrate anything one chooses, and I happen to choose to celebrate my 29th birthday. But it's not for the reason most people would think. Many may deem such a response to be a sign of vanity. There is, after all, an increasing amount of anxiety surrounding the entrance to one's fourth decade of life (or in layman's terms, turning 30 ). There also is the common myth among many gay men—especially those young adults and 20-somethings—that crossing the boundary into one's thirties is the death knell of gay life. Worst of all, thirty becomes that age when one no longer can get laid and instantly transforms one into an old troll or, worse, a chicken hawk. There's even a zeitgeist surrou...