James Vacca is an American

politician A politician is a person active in party politics, or a person holding or seeking an elected office in government. Politicians propose, support, reject and create laws that govern the land and by an extension of its people. Broadly speaking ...

who served in the New York City Council from the 13th district from 2006 to 2017. He is a

Democrat Democrat, Democrats, or Democratic may refer to: Politics *A proponent of democracy, or democratic government; a form of government involving rule by the people. *A member of a Democratic Party: **Democratic Party (United States) (D) **Democratic ...

. The district includes Allerton,

Baychester Baychester is a neighborhood geographically located in the northeast part of the Bronx, New York City. Its boundaries are East 222nd Street to the northeast, the New England Thruway (I-95) to the east, Gun Hill Road to the southwest, and Boston ...

Bronx Park Bronx Park is a public park along the Bronx River, in the Bronx, New York City. The park is bounded by Southern Boulevard to the southwest, Webster Avenue to the northwest, Gun Hill Road to the north, Bronx Park East to the east, and East 180 ...

, City Island,

Country Club A country club is a privately owned club, often with a membership quota and admittance by invitation or sponsorship, that generally offers both a variety of recreational sports and facilities for dining and entertaining. Typical athletic offe ...

Ferry Point Park Ferry Point Park is a park in the Bronx, New York City. The park site is a peninsula projecting into the East River roughly opposite the College Point and Malba neighborhoods of Queens. The park is located on the eastern shore of Westchester ...

, Hart Island, Morris Park, Pelham Bay,

Pelham Bay Park Pelham Bay Park is a municipal park located in the northeast corner of the New York City borough of the Bronx. It is, at , the largest public park in New York City. The park is more than three times the size of Manhattan's Central Park. The pa ...

Pelham Islands The Pelham Islands are a group of islands in western Long Island Sound that belonged to Thomas Pell in the 17th century. The islands, and most of the surrounding area, were purchased from the Siwanoy Indians by Pell in 1654, creating Pelham Ma ...

Schuylerville Schuylerville () is a village in Saratoga County, New York, United States. The village is located in the northeastern part of the Town of Saratoga, east of Saratoga Springs. The Village of Victory is adjacent to Schuylerville to the southwes ...

Throggs Neck Throggs Neck (also known as Throgs Neck) is a neighborhood and peninsula in the south-eastern portion of the borough of the Bronx in New York City. It is bounded by the East River and Long Island Sound to the south and east, Westchester Creek on ...

, part of Van Nest and

Westchester Square Westchester Square is a residential neighborhood geographically located in the eastern section of the New York City borough of the Bronx. Its boundaries, starting from the north and moving clockwise are: East Tremont Avenue and Silver Street, Blon ...

The Bronx The Bronx () is a borough of New York City, coextensive with Bronx County, in the state of New York. It is south of Westchester County; north and east of the New York City borough of Manhattan, across the Harlem River; and north of the New Y ...

Early life and education

Vacca was born in

and raised in Pelham Bay. He attended New York City public schools, graduating from P.S. 71, J.H.S. 101, and Christopher Columbus High School in the Bronx. He holds a Bachelor of Arts degree in political science from

Empire State College Empire State College (SUNY Empire or ESC) is a public university headquartered in Saratoga Springs, New York. It is part of the State University of New York (SUNY) system. Empire State College is a multi-site institution offering associate, ...

and a Master of Arts in Urban Studies from

Queens College, City University of New York Queens College (QC) is a public college in the Queens Boroughs of New York City, borough of New York City. It is part of the City University of New York system. Its 80-acre campus is primarily located in Flushing, Queens. It has a student body ...

Career

Since 2003 Vacca has served as an adjunct professor at CUNY Queens College, where he teaches a variety of courses in the social sciences. He was appointed as distinguished lecturer in the Urban Studies Department in 2018. In addition, Vacca serves as an executive member of the Academic Senate at Queens College. He recently founded the college's food pantry to address the needs impacting the school's students. Continuing his work from his days in the New York City Council as chairperson of technology, he is a member of the Queens College Tech Incubator Advisory Board. Prior to being elected to the city council in 2005, Vacca served as district manager of

Bronx Community Board 10 Bronx Community Board 10 is a local government unit of the New York City borough of the Bronx, encompassing the neighborhoods of City Island, Co-op City, Pelham Bay, Throggs Neck and Westchester Square. It is delimited by the Hutchinson River a ...

for 26 years, and was appointed to the position in 1980, when he was 25 years old, becoming one of the youngest district managers in the city's history. He had previously served as chairman of the board. For numerous consecutive years under his leadership, Board 10 was ranked the cleanest and safest community board in the Bronx.

New York City Council

In early 2005, with Councilwoman Madeline Provenzano term-limited out of office, Vacca announced his candidacy for the 13th Council District seat. Already an established public figure in the East Bronx due to his years as district manager, he was endorsed by Congressman

Joseph Crowley Joseph Crowley (born March 16, 1962) is an American politician and consultant who served as U.S. Representative from New York's 14th congressional district from 1999 to 2019. He was defeated by Democratic primary challenger Alexandria Ocasio-C ...

and Assemblyman Michael Benedetto, as well as dozens of community and civic groups, and ''

The New York Times ''The New York Times'' (''the Times'', ''NYT'', or the Gray Lady) is a daily newspaper based in New York City with a worldwide readership reported in 2020 to comprise a declining 840,000 paid print subscribers, and a growing 6 million paid d ...

''. In the September 13, 2005, Democratic Party primary, he faced four opponents: former Assemblyman Stephen B. Kaufman, Joseph A. McManus, Ismael Betancourt, and Egidio Joseph Sementelli. He won with nearly 40% of the vote; Kaufman captured roughly 25%. In the general election, he defeated Philip Foglia, candidate of the Republican, Conservative and Independence Party lines, with 64% of the vote. In 2009, facing a little-known challenger running on the Conservative Party line, Vacca was easily re-elected to a second term, winning 92.8% of the vote. He easily won election to a final term in 2013 with over 83% of the vote. On Council, Vacca was an advocate for responsible

zoning Zoning is a method of urban planning in which a municipality or other tier of government divides land into areas called zones, each of which has a set of regulations for new development that differs from other zones. Zones may be defined for a si ...

laws and for prevention of

overdevelopment In international economics, overdevelopment refers to a way of seeing global inequality and pollution that focuses on the negative consequences of excessive consumption. It exists as the mutually constitutive counterpart to the more commonly known ...

. In 2007, Vacca was also named co-chair of the council's Working Group on School Governance and Mayoral Control, established to guide the council recommendations upon the expiration of mayoral control in 2009. After months of informal meetings with educators, union leaders, Administration officials, advocates, and parents, the Working Group issued its report in June 2009. The report suggested a new system of municipal control. Later that month, the New York State legislature passed 8903-A, a bill relating to the management and operation of the New York City School District. Vacca has also been influential in protecting funding for the

Fire Department of New York The New York City Fire Department, officially the Fire Department of the City of New York (FDNY), is an American department of the government of New York City that provides fire protection services, technical rescue/special operations services, ...

. He also has been a proponent of

congestion pricing Congestion pricing or congestion charges is a system of surcharging users of public goods that are subject to congestion through excess demand, such as through higher peak charges for use of bus services, electricity, metros, railways, tele ...

. In August 2017, as chair of the Committee on Technology, Vacca introduced an

algorithmic transparency Algorithmic transparency is the principle that the factors that influence the decisions made by algorithms should be visible, or transparent, to the people who use, regulate, and are affected by systems that employ those algorithms. Although the phr ...

bill, Int. 1696-2017, that would require city agencies "that use algorithms or other automated processing methods that target services, impose penalties, or police persons to publish the source code used for such processing"—a nationwide first. The bill was influenced by the scholarship of

Danah boyd danah boyd (stylized in lowercase, born November 24, 1977 as Danah Michele Mattas) She noted her mother added lowercase 'h' in birth name "danah" for typographical balance, reflecting the lowercase first letter 'd' and later changed her last na ...

Kate Crawford Kate Crawford (born 1976) is a writer, composer, producer and academic. Crawford is a principal researcher at Microsoft Research (Social Media Collective), the co-founder and former director of research at the AI Now Institute at NYU, a visitin ...

, and

Cathy O'Neil Catherine ("Cathy") Helen O'Neil is an American mathematician, data scientist, and author. She is the author of the ''New York Times'' best-seller '' Weapons of Math Destruction'', and opinion columns in Bloomberg View. O'Neil was active in th ...

. After public hearings and negotiation with city agencies, an amended bill, Int. 1696-A, passed the City Council unanimously in December 2017. The amended bill creates a task force to consider the issue and report to the city in late 2019. Researcher Julia Powles, assessing the amended bill in ''

The New Yorker ''The New Yorker'' is an American weekly magazine featuring journalism, commentary, criticism, essays, fiction, satire, cartoons, and poetry. Founded as a weekly in 1925, the magazine is published 47 times annually, with five of these issues ...

'', predicted that the task force's findings will have significant international and domestic impact, but warned that the bill's lack of reporting requirements for city agencies means the task force will need to rely on agencies' voluntary disclosures, which may be sparse.

Personal life

Vacca

came out Coming out of the closet, often shortened to coming out, is a metaphor used to describe LGBT people's self-disclosure of their sexual orientation, romantic orientation, or gender identity. Framed and debated as a privacy issue, coming out of ...

as gay in 2016.

Election history

References

External links

Official website
{{DEFAULTSORT:Vacca, James Living people New York City Council members Queens College, City University of New York alumni New York (state) Democrats 1955 births Gay politicians American LGBT city council members LGBT people from New York (state) 21st-century American politicians Politicians from the Bronx