City Council
On the City Council, Gioia advocated for the poor, and wrote laws to help alleviate child hunger and to protect the environment. He served as Chairman of the Oversight and Investigations Committee of the New York City Council, in which capacity he conducted over 50 investigations, leading to the passage of laws which protect homeless people with HIV and AIDS, ensure the availability of emergency contraception, increase government accountability and transparency, and encourage voter registration among young people.
He was particularly active in expanding opportunity for the residents of public housing. He founded a youth baseball and basketball league and brought a bank to Queensbridge Houses in Long Island City where previously the closest bank was over a mile away. He led a campaign to get more New Yorkers to claim the Earned Income Tax Credit (EITC), and passed legislation strengthening the Taxpayer's Bill of Rights.
In September 2007, he was named one of City Hall's "40 under 40" for being a young influential member of New York City politics.
Gioia has been mentioned as a possible candidate for New York's 14th congressional district.
Read more about this topic: Eric Gioia
Famous quotes containing the words city and/or council:
“A sturdy lad from New Hampshire or Vermont who in turn tries all the professions, who teams it, farms it, peddles, keeps a school, preaches, edits a newspaper, goes to Congress, buys a township, and so forth, in successive years, and always like a cat falls on his feet, is worth a hundred of these city dolls. He walks abreast with his days and feels no shame in not “studying a profession,” for he does not postpone his life, but lives already.”
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