Mayoral Rivals Fight for Turf in Brownstone Brooklyn  

The shoppers and young families strolling along Seventh Avenue in Park Slope, Brooklyn, can normally slurp their iced coffees, nosh on bagels and French pastries and browse for books far from the tumultuous politics of City Hall.

But now it seems they cannot escape the mayoral candidates and their campaign workers prospecting for votes, as brownstone Brooklyn has become a key battleground in the looming Democratic primary.

The area is a vote-rich swath of gentrified neighborhoods where the residents pay close attention to city politics and provide the highest voter turnout in the city's most populous borough.

Last Saturday afternoon, Rep. Anthony D. Weiner charged up and down Seventh Avenue, the main drag in Park Slope, leading a pack of staff members and volunteers toting orange-and-blue signs and plying passers-by with buttons, stickers and fliers.

Two days later, along that same stretch of Seventh Avenue, Council Speaker Gifford Miller planted himself outside the Key Food supermarket to buttonhole voters.

Fernando Ferrer, the former Bronx borough president, passed through two weeks ago after campaigning at the farmer's market in Grand Army Plaza. He returned again the next week for another farmer's market in Fort Greene Park. And C. Virginia Fields, the Manhattan borough president, attended a festival last Sunday near Prospect Park and plans more campaign swings through brownstone Brooklyn.

"Willie Sutton robbed banks because that's where the money was, and politicians go where the voters are," said Kenneth K. Fisher, a lobbyist and former city councilman who represented the area for a decade in the 1990's. "If you're a candidate, certainly in the Democratic primary, the brownstone belt is critical."

While the affluent, brownstone-lined neighborhoods of Brooklyn Heights and Park Slope have long drawn some of the city's political and cultural elite -- well-known residents include the actors Jennifer Connelly, John Turturro and Steve Buscemi and Senator Charles E. Schumer -- a fresh wave of gentrification in recent years has expanded the area and brought many more voters into the surrounding communities of Cobble Hill, Boerum Hill, Carroll Gardens, Fort Greene and parts of the former industrial strip known as Dumbo.Not just any voters, either, but the sort of educated, upper-income professionals who vote even in local school board races, not to mention mayoral contests. While Manhattan's Upper West Side has long been a hotbed of campaigning in Democratic primaries, the changes in brownstone Brooklyn have the mayoral candidates increasingly looking to that area to mine its politically attuned neighborhoods.

In last year's State Assembly race for District 52, which includes most of these neighborhoods, nearly 61 percent of the 93,812 registered voters cast a ballot compared to 54 percent citywide. And overwhelmingly, those voters are registered Democrats.

"I always joke that if there was an election to decide when the local public school should hold its annual bake sale, the people would come out and vote," said Assemblywoman Joan L. Millman, who wore a campaign button with the nickname, "Brownstone Joan," during her successful re-election bid.

Among the city's politicians, brownstone Brooklyn is known as such a key swing district for Democratic candidates that it is often compared to Staten Island's importance to the Republicans. In 2001, Mark Green, the Democratic mayoral nominee, even chose to announce his candidacy at the picnic house in Prospect Park even though he lived on the Upper East Side at the time.

"It's statistically possible to win a general election without carrying brownstone Brooklyn, but it's unlikely," said Mr. Green, who became a common sight at the area's greenmarkets and subway stops. "And it's a competitive place unlike, say, Harlem or central Staten Island, which heavily tilt Democratic or Republican."

Brownstone Brooklyn's growing political clout has not gone unnoticed by Mayor Michael R. Bloomberg, a longtime Democrat who turned Republican to run for office. Bloomberg campaign officials say they are concentrating on this area because residents are likely to be receptive to the mayor's initiatives on education, crime and jobs.

In the last two months, Bloomberg campaign workers have knocked on more than 24,000 doors in those neighborhoods, and handed out 100,000 pieces of literature at subway stops, street festivals and summer concerts, said Stu Loeser, campaign spokesman.

Mr. Bloomberg's daughter, Emma, attended a breakfast last week for more than 200 elderly residents of Windsor Terrace, which lies south of Park Slope, and his sister, Marjorie Tiven, has visited several senior centers in these neighborhoods. In addition, at least half a dozen campaign briefings for supporters will be held during the next few weeks, including a "Mommy and Me" event in Park Slope.

The strategy may be working. Melissa Mantzouris, 30, a new mother in Park Slope, said that she planned to vote for Mr. Bloomberg because of his emphasis on education policy and safety in schools and his willingness to focus on the outer boroughs. Ms. Mantzouris, who describes herself as the lone Republican in her circle of friends, added that she has begun to hear positive feedback from them, as well, about the mayor. "I definitely think he has an opportunity to make some headway in a Democratic area," she said.

Alan Fleishman, a Democratic district leader for the area, said the flurry of campaigning has been particularly heavy this year, in part because many voters in brownstone Brooklyn have not yet made up their minds. "I think it's definitely up for grabs," Mr. Fleishman said. "It's not a lock for the Democrats, for sure. Bloomberg will get some votes, and among the Democratic candidates, it seems to be split."

Sally Brown, 60, a retired public school teacher, is the kind of voter that all the mayoral candidates are courting. Ms. Brown, a Democrat who has lived in Park Slope for three decades, cannot remember the last time that she missed an election. She voted for Mr. Bloomberg in 2001 but has since become disillusioned with what she described as his "scripted teaching policies."

"I haven't decided yet," she said after receiving a personal visit last Saturday from Mr. Weiner. "But it's very nice that we get the attention."

Mr. Weiner, who grew up in Park Slope, officially kicked off his campaign earlier this month outside his childhood home there and prominently featured the neighborhood in his television ads. Mr. Weiner's mother, Fran, has even collected petition signatures for him at a local gym.

"I consider Brooklyn my home," Mr. Weiner said. "And any votes I lose in Brooklyn, I'm going to be disappointed about."

But the other Democratic candidates are also stepping up their campaign in brownstone Brooklyn.

Earlier this month, Mr. Miller wrapped up a 30-day tour of 100 neighborhoods across the city that included 15 stops alone in brownstone Brooklyn, at centers for the elderly, subway stations and street corners. "We try to go everywhere," he said this week while shaking hands with voters outside Key Food on Seventh Avenue. "But clearly this is a place where there are a lot of engaged voters."

Mr. Ferrer has also increasingly campaigned for votes in Park Slope, Carroll Gardens and surrounding neighborhoods. And aides to Ms. Fields, who has visited that part of Brooklyn less frequently than her rivals, said they had also begun to pay more attention to the area.

Indeed, the brownstone belt has become so crowded lately with mayoral candidates and their aides that Jen Bluestein, a spokeswoman for Mr. Ferrer who lives in Carroll Gardens, has now twice bumped into Mr. Miller in her neighborhood. "No matter how many times the speaker's staff tries to introduce me to him at my subway station, I'm sticking with Ferrer," she said.