Siddhesh Joshi (Editor)

Jim Tedisco

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Preceded by
  
Chris Ortloff

Political party
  
Republican

Party
  
Republican Party

Preceded by
  
Charles H. Nesbitt

Education
  
Union College


Preceded by
  
Clark Wemple

Role
  
American Politician

Preceded by
  
Arnold Proskin

Name
  
Jim Tedisco

Succeeded by
  
Patrick R. Manning

Jim Tedisco httpsuploadwikimediaorgwikipediacommonsthu

Governor
  
George Pataki Eliot Spitzer David Paterson

Full Name
  
James Nicholas Tedisco

Born
  
July 15, 1950 (age 73) Schenectady, New York, United States (
1950-07-15
)

Jim tedisco he speaks for us


James Nicholas Tedisco (born July 15, 1950) is an American politician. He is the New York State Senator representing 49th District, which includes parts of Saratoga, Schenectady and Herkimer Counties and all of Fulton and Hamilton Counties. He served in the Assembly since 1983 and was the Assembly's Minority Leader from November 2005 until his resignation in April 2009. He was the Republican nominee in a special election for the 20th US Congressional District to fill the seat vacated by Kirsten Gillibrand, following Gillibrand's appointment to the United States Senate. On January 4, 2017 he was officially sworn into office to serve as the new State Senator for New York’s 49th State Senate District.

Contents

Jim tedisco one of us


Early life, education, and academic career

Jim Tedisco graduated from Bishop Gibbons High School in 1968, and then received his B.A. in Psychology from Union College. While at Union, he played varsity basketball for three years where he set 15 scoring and assist records, and left as Union's all-time leading scorer with 1,632 points. Tedisco earned multiple athletic awards during his college career, and was inducted into the Union Athletics Hall of Fame in 2002. In 1997, he was given the Silver Anniversary Award from the NCAA.

He went on to get a graduate degree in Special Education from the College of Saint Rose. From 1973 to 1982, Tedisco was a guidance counselor at Notre Dame-Bishop Gibbons High School in Schenectady, and was also the varsity basketball coach and athletic director. Later, he was a special education teacher, resource room instructor and varsity basketball coach at Bethlehem Central High School in Delmar, a suburb of Albany.

Tedisco is a resident of Glenville where he lives with his wife and son.

Schenectady City Council

Tedisco entered public service in 1977 when, at the age of 27, he was elected the youngest Schenectady City Councilman at that time. He was re-elected by an overwhelming majority four years later.

Elections

In 1982, Assemblyman Clark Wemple retired from the State Assembly, leaving an opening in the district. Tedisco won a four-way race in Republican primary, and then won the general election. As a freshman legislator, Tedisco was named Ranking Minority Member of the Children and Families Committee.

Due to redistricting, Tedisco represented the 107th District from 1983 to 1993, the 103rd District from 1993 to 2003, the 110th District from 2003 to 2012, and most recently represened the 112th District since from 2012 to 2017. The 112th District consists of portions of Schenectady County and Saratoga County, including the towns of Greenfield, Providence, Milton, Galway, Ballston, Charlton, Clifton Park, Halfmoon, and Glenville.

Tedisco ran uncontested in the 2008 general election and won the 2010 general election with 64 percent of the vote.

In 2010, he won reelection against Bahram Keramati. In 2012, he won reelection against Michele E. Draves, and he won his 15th term in 2014 against Jared B. Hickey scoring his highest margin of victory by 77% of the votes.

Tenure

James Nicholas Tedisco (R,C,I-Glenville) was first elected to the Assembly in 1982 and served as Minority Leader from 2005 to 2009. Throughout his tenure, Tedisco advocated for state government and budget reforms. He has authored numerous bills designed to make government more accountable to the people and bring about an on-time, fiscally responsible budget, though none passed the Assembly.

In 2014, Tedisco was widely praised for sponsoring constitutional amendment, Proposition 2, to save millions of tax dollars, make the legislature more efficient and stop the wasteful printing of paper that’s placed on legislators’ desk by enabling digital copies of bills to suffice.

Realizing that animal cruelty is a bridge crime and those who abuse animals often go on to hurt people, Tedisco was the driving force behind passage of the landmark Buster’s Law to protect our pets by making animal cruelty a felony. In 2011, Tedisco advocated for the first-ever NYS Animal Advocacy Day.

As the author of the proposed Common Core Parental Refusal Act, Tedisco has been a leader in the opt-out movement to stop the developmentally inappropriate over-testing of children that’s some feel rob them of their love of learning and teachers of their creativity.

Tedisco introduced “Charlotte’s Law” to permanently terminate driver’s license privileges for serial drunk and dangerous drivers. While Tedisco's bill was not passed, the DMV enacted regulations similar to what was proposed in the bill.

In 2009, Tedisco opposed former Governor Paterson’s plan to force drivers to get new DMV license plates.

On January 4, 2017 Jim Tedisco was officially sworn as the new State Senator for New York’s 49th State Senate District. The 49th Senate District includes parts of Saratoga, Schenectady and Herkimer Counties and all of Fulton and Hamilton counties.

Committee assignments

Tedisco was chosen as the Ranking Minority Member on the Committee on Children and Families and Chairman of the Assembly Minority Task Force on Missing Children. As Chairman of the Assembly Minority Task Force on Missing Children, Tedisco helped pass non-custodial release legislation to protect children from being abducted. Tedisco led the charge to enact the civil confinement law to keep dangerous sex offenders off the streets. Following years of research, legislation and statewide public hearings on the subject, he authored a book in 1996 entitled, “Missing Children: A psychological approach to understanding the causes and consequences of stranger and non-stranger abduction of children.”

He also served on the Assembly Committee on Economic Development, Assembly Committee on Racing and Wagering, Assembly Committee on Banks, and Assembly Committee on Rules.

2009 special congressional election

On January 23, 2009, after Governor David Paterson announced that he had selected Representative Kirsten Gillibrand to fill the United States Senate seat vacated by Hillary Clinton, Tedisco stated his intention to run for Congress to replace Gillibrand in New York's 20th Congressional District. Though not a resident of the district, Tedisco became its Republican nominee on January 27, 2009, and ran against Democrat Scott Murphy. The initial count from the election had Murphy leading by 59 votes, out of over 155,000 cast on March 31, 2009. This tally reportedly did not include any of the 10,000 requested absentee ballots, which needed only to have been postmarked by that date and could have been returned as late as April 7 (domestically) or April 13 (internationally). Eventually, about 7,000 absentee ballots were received; the vote count as of April 24 had Murphy ahead by 399 votes. On April 24, Tedisco conceded the election to Murphy.

Tedisco subsequently resigned as Assembly minority leader, reportedly at the behest of fellow Assembly Republicans who felt he was distracted by his House candidacy.

Elections

In 2016 Senator Hugh Farley retired, leaving an opening in the 49th State Senate District. After Tedisco handily won the Republican primary he went on to defeat General Election opponent Chad Putman. Tedisco won the election with 69% of the vote on November 8, 2016.

References

Jim Tedisco Wikipedia