Danny Liedka banks on numbers.
He started with a goal of 365. That’s how many doors he wants to knock on each week between now and Election Day. Now, he says, he’s up to 5,100.
“I’ve never been outworked by anyone,” said Liedka.
In the November election, Liedka is the Republican candidate running for the District 7 seat in the Onondaga County Legislature. He is also endorsed by the Conservative and Independence parties. His opponent is the Democratic party’s endorsed candidate, Lorene Dadey, who is registered as a voter unaffiliated with a party. She also is endorsed by the Working Families Party.
Dadey is also a former East Syracuse mayor. Liedka and Dadey are vying for the County Legislature, both are vying to succeed Thomas Buckel, D-Syracuse, who is running for state Supreme Court. The election is Nov. 8.
District 7 is a newly redrawn district, now in the northeastern/central regions of Onondaga County, including a small northeastern part of the city of Syracuse, most of the northern and western parts of DeWitt and East Syracuse.
Liedka spends his days flipping back and forth between his various roles: mayor of East Syracuse; candidate for the Onondaga County Legislature; director of businesses development for Marriot International; sportscaster for ESPNU, Time Warner Cable Sports and the NHL network and stay-at-home dad.
He responds to all emails within an hour, he said. No one in his district lives more than seven minutes from his house, which gives him little excuse not to hit every single door by election day, he said.
His persistence in door-knocking for voters’ support, say friends and co-workers, is typical of Liedka.
Patricia Derby, East Syracuse’s village clerk, has known Liedka since 2003. Of all the East Syracuse mayors she’s known, she said, Liedka is by far the most driven. “If he’s going to do something, he’s all in,” she said. “If he can’t do it 110 percent, he won’t even start.”
Liedka, 43, was born and raised in East Syracuse, where he now lives with his wife, Kimberly and their 4-year-old son, Luke. He spent 14 years with the Hilton Corporation as a sales consultant. In August, he joined Marriot International as director of businesses development for New York. He changed jobs, he said, so he could work from home and balance his political affairs with work and family.
In his political career, Liedka has been lining up contacts for a run at another office for some time now, making connections with other political figures, said Derby, the East Syracuse village clerk.
County Executive Joanie Mahoney, a fellow Republican, endorsed Liedka for legislator in July. “He shares my goal of streamlining county government, so we can reduce property taxes and create more private sector jobs,” said Mahoney in an email interview.
He also has the support of another East Syracuse mayor, Republican Tony Albanese. Liedka, said Albanese, is good at controlling expenses. “If something’s got to be done, if a budget has to be cut, he’ll find a way to do it and still have the same services,” said Albanese.
In 2010, Liedka ran unsuccessfully for the GOP nomination for the 49th State Senate District seat but lost to political novice Andrew Russo. Russo lost the election to incumbent Sen. Dave Valesky, D-Oneida.
District 7’s voter registration is 39 percent Democrat, 27 percent Republican, and 24 percent not affiliated with a party.
Those numbers, Liedka acknowledges, are against him. But he’s pitching others from his work as Easy Syracuse mayor, he said. By his own count, he’s put in 10,625 hours of work on East Syracuse affairs. He’s balanced four village budgets without raising taxes, Liedka told The Post-Standard in April when he announced his candidacy for the county legislature.
“I would put my record up against anyone, anywhere,” said Liedka.
(Rebekah Jones is a senior with dual majors in geography and newspaper journalism.) This story was corrected Nov. 1, 2011, to reflect that she and Liedka did not face each other in the 2007 mayor’s race in East Syracuse. It also clarifes Dadey’s voter affiliation.
-30-
