Brooklyn Daily Eagle.   By Harold Egeln

BROOKLYN HEIGHTS — On the stomp and the stoop with his campaign headquarters on Brooklyn Heights’ “main street,” City Council hopeful Doug Biviano is running on issues that plug in local concerns with national ones, building a civic bridge between City Hall and the national political stage.

“Cities like ours have a huge stake in national policies,” said the streetwise Biviano in an interview at his campaign base at 89 Montague St. “People’s lives here are affected by the for-profit healthcare and defense vested interest industries on the national level and developers with their special-interest influence on the community level, where all politics is local.”

With that focus, the national health care reform debate and the impact of nearly $1 trillion in war spending on urban funding were cited as two campaign flash points by Biviano, who is running in the 33rd Council District race. He competes with six other Democrats in the Sept. 15 primary election to replace Councilman David Yassky.

“The City Charter holds the city responsible for the health, safety and welfare of its citizens, so there is room for local discussion on the need for a public option single-payer health plan,” said Biviano, who advocates extending Medicare to everybody. “San Francisco enacted healthcare security legislation, so why can’t we here? In the council, I will do what I must do on this issue, with over 400,000 uninsured people in Brooklyn.”   Read article ...