Dave Pollak

In case you were wondering, the departure of State Democratic Party co-chair Dave Pollak does not mean Hillary Clinton's superdelegate count is down. That's because Pollak, a committed Clinton superdelegate, will be replaced by Reggie LaFayette, who is now the party’s second highest-ranking member.

In other words, this is different than the unexpected departure of Eliot Spitzer. David Paterson was already a superdelegate for Clinton, so his ascension to governor resulted in the net-loss of one.  read more »

State Democratic Party co-chair Dave Pollak is leaving his position, the party announced a few minutes ago (right when most people are heading out the door for the weekend).

Pollak had previously run the group Democratic Leadership for the 21st Century, which brought political leaders in front of young professionals and provided a place for those leaders to recruit campaign operatives and legislative employees.

Pollak, along with chair June O’Neill, was hand-picked by Eliot Spitzer to run the party after the departure of former chair Herman Denny Farrell. Pollak was charged (naturally) with bringing the party into the 21st century.

The departure comes amid a number of personnel changes David Paterson has made to replace Eliot Spitzer's hires with his own.

Here is the official statement:  read more »

Last night at David Weprin’s fund-raiser for his city comptroller campaign, I learned that the City Councilman’s long-time chief of staff, Jack Rubin Friedman, is leaving in January to become the head of the Queens Chamber of Commerce. One attendee told me that Rubin might run for Weprin’s seat in 2009. (Rubin was standing nearby and interjected that it’s only a possibility at this point.)

The event at the Woolworth Kitchen and Towers drew a number of notable attendees: Dan Gardonick, Eric Gioia, Dave Pollak, Hank Sheinkopf, Domenic Recchia, Diane Savino and George Arzt.

Press-shy top aides to Christine Quinn, Ramone Martinez and Chuck Meara, were also there, and probably weren’t thrilled when Weprin announced their presence over the microphone.

Calling all DL21C types: There's a fund-raising party at the Fourth Avenue home of State Democratic Party co-chair Dave Pollak. With a surprise special guest!(Guesses?)

Tickets start at $50 and go up to $10,000.

Admission free for canvassing volunteers.

Details of the party invite, which a reader sent to me, are after the jump.  read more »

The State Democratic Party is starting to execute something resembling an organized push-back to the Spitzer Trials, criticizing Senate Republicans for the hearing they held in Albany yesterday after a Daily News editorial today called it a partisan show.

“This is not an investigation, this is Act One of Saving Joe Bruno’s Majority, coming to theatres near you in November, 2008,” said Dave Pollak, the Co-Chair of the state party, in a statement.

Chairwoman June O‘Neill said, “Eliot Spitzer has already demonstrated that he is vigorously determined to finally elect a Democratic State Senate as a necessary step to getting things done for the people of New York. Senate Republicans will go to any length to tie up and obstruct this Governor so he can't bring much needed change to Albany.”

Speaking of DL21C, I also caught up last night with Dave Pollak, who Eliot Spitzer picked to be the new State Democratic Party co-chair along with upstate county leader June O'Neill.

Pollak describes the heirarchical structure of the DL21C group he founded as "flat" -- that is, more reliant on technology and grass roots support than on a heavy-handed leader. Sounding very much in tune with Spitzer's campaign theme of using technology to improve access to data and create transparency in government, Pollack touted his group as something of a model for a new-and-improved state party.

And in what seemed to be a pretty clear slap at his predecessor, Pollak described the party infrastructure that he's inheriting as woefully out of date.

"Ninety percent of the counties in New York don't have web access, don't have computers and have to pay the state party to get walking lists from the voter files. Forget hierarchy," he said.

More of our conversation is here and here.

-- Azi Paybarah