(From left: David Greenfield, Jonathan Judge, Joe Lazar, Avraham Shlomo Tischler. Photo credit: Brian Hedden)

The Jewish Press organized a debate last week with the participation of four of the candidates running for the empty 44th City Council seat (click here for their coverage). The Orthodox news site Vos Iz Neias had video produced of the entire two-hour function (their analysis is here). All 12 video clips are reposted below.

And of course, I was there as both a resident of the 44th, and as the South Brooklyn blogger!

One of the participating candidates – Avraham Shlomo Tischler – has already been dropped from the ballot, following successful challenges to the meager number of signatures on Tischler’s petitions.

The Daily News portrayed the 18-year-old Touro College student as the truth-to-power candidate, as some sort of modern-day David striking fear into the Goliath campaigns of David Greenfield and Joe Lazar. It’s stories like this that make it hard for me to take the Daily News seriously.

Tischler’s performance at the debate was beyond dismal – he definitively demonstrated that he was not, in any way, even remotely qualified for the job of City Councilman. He even said at one point, “I will have a well-trained staff that I know will guide me through each and every step of the way… I will learn becoming a Councilman the right and proper way” (video clip 4 below the fold, 6:05). Actually, he said that a lot. As if voters were somehow looking for an intern to fill the vacancy in the 44th.

As for the grown-ups in the room…

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Reminder: The Jewish Press is organizing a debate between the candidates for Council District 44 (Simcha Felder’s old seat) this Wednesday, February 24th. Those candidates are (at last count) David Greenfield, Joseph Lazar, and Jonathan Judge. The debate will start at 7pm, and will be held at the Borough Park YMHA, located at 4910 14th Avenue.

The special election to replace Simcha Felder – the outgoing Council Member from the 44th District – will be Tuesday, March 23. The Jewish Press will hold a debate between the four candidates – David Greenfield, Joseph Lazar, Jonathan Judge, and Nachman Caller – on February 24 at the Borough Park YMHA. Greenfield and Lazar are already piling on their celebrity endorsements from the likes of Ed Koch (Greenfield) and Bill de Blasio (Lazar).

Candidates previously considered to have an interest in running are Ezra Friedlander, Moishe Oiring, Pinny Ringel, and Brooklyn Civil Court judge Noach Dear.

Greenfield and Judge were both spotted pressing the flesh at the 18th Avenue N-train station in the past eight days.

Four new potential candidates have emerged in the race to replace outgoing Councilman Simcha Felder in the 44th District. Confirmed candidates David Greenfield and Joseph Lazar, and rumored candidate Noach Dear may be joined by Ezra Friedlander (second-generation Borough Park native and the CEO of a government affairs-oriented PR firm), Pinny Ringel (a 13th Avenue businessman), Moishe Oiring (a former aide to Borough President Markowitz), and Jonathan Judge (president of the Brooklyn Young Republican Club).

Felder’s resignation is to be made official on January 31, at which time Mayor Bloomberg will set a date for the special election.

UPDATE [Jan-21-2010]: Add Seymour Lachman, author of the Albany exposee Three Men In A Room, as a potential candidate for this seat.

Simcha Felder was one of the leading proponents of rewriting the term limits law to allow third terms for the City Council, and now, just a week into that third term, he’s leaving the job to join John Liu’s team in the Comptroller’s office.

The Daily News says: “Thanks for forcing a $350,000 special election.” (Not.)

That special election – for the 44th District representing Borough Park, Midwood, and Bensonhurst – was initially seen by The Jewish Week as a potential three way race between David Greenfield (founder of NYS Teach and the current Director of the Sephardic Community Federation), Joseph Lazar (former regional director the the NYS Office of Mental Health), and Noach Dear (18-year veteran of the pre-term limits Council, and a current judge on the Brooklyn Civil Court). Greenfield and Lazar were already gearing up for a run in 2009 before the term limits law was changed – neither opted to take on Felder, who won his short-lived third term uncontested.

But wait – Vos Iz Neias reports that Dov Hikind, a member of the Assembly and a power broker in the Borough Park Jewish community, has been clear in his opposition to Greenfield (his former chief of staff), and wishes to dissuade either Lazar or Dear from running against him.

Greenfield has already declared that he will run for Felder’s seat, and is seen as the strongest candidate in Council district’s neighborhoods outside of Boro Park. If multiple Boro Park candidates run against Greenfield, this would give Greenfield a leg up in the special election, Hikind said.

Greenfield served as Hikind’s chief of staff from 2001-2004. But political insiders say Greenfield is more independent of the Boro Park political establishment than other potential candidates in the race and represents a threat to Hikind’s influence.

“Dov has a tremendous disdain for the fact that Greenfield does and says whatever he wants,” said one political insider in the neighborhood, who is not affiliated with any campaign.

Neither of the three candidates currently live in the district – they will need to move there before the election date, which is to be set by Mayor Bloomberg.