The comptroller candidate is waiting on the steps of the Upper East Side brownstone for the woman he wants to date. He found out where she lives a few days earlier—as a wonkish pick-up line, he asked her address to figure out her district. Now he is trying to close the deal, offering her a voter registration form and an opportunity to come campaign with him in Staten Island.

Eventually, she says yes.

That, at least, is how things worked in the world of Sex & the City, where Carrie Bradshaw succumbed to the charms of silver-haired divorcé Bill Kelley, kissing him after stump speeches and bringing the rest of her famous foursome to a fundraiser (“Bill raised six grand that night,” she intones, “it really got him in the mood.”)

Not long after, Bradshaw and Kelley parted ways.

For Council Member James Oddo (R-Staten Island) and his girlfriend, Kim Petersen, an assistant district attorney in Queens, things have played out a little differently since they reconnected at a Queens County GOP event in 2004. Oddo asked his friend and colleague Dennis Gallagher to put in a good word for him. Not long after, a inter-borough romance was born, and has survived for four years.

These days, the seniors in his district are pressing him to get married, State Sen. Andrew Lanza is already calling her his fiancée and Council Member Vincent Ignizio presses his own newborn baby into her arms whenever the couple visits. But even without all that, Oddo said, dating would be tough. And even though his current relationship is much more solid than ones in his past, life as a single elected official has made dating tougher than most people understand.


There are more than 3.5 million single men and women in New York City. Some have never married. Some just have not married yet. Some are legally barred from getting married. Some are divorced. Some are widowed. Some have chosen long-term relationships over anything officiated.
Mayor Michael Bloomberg, who will make a cameo in the upcoming Sex & the City movie, is part of the last group. But the man who years ago was known to joke that there was nothing better than being a single billionaire in New York City has never really been a single elected official himself. For years, he has shared his life and townhouse with former State Banking Superintendent Diana Taylor.

Not that being a single mayor is anything new, of course. Just months before Bloomberg met Taylor in late 2000, his predecessor, Rudolph Giuliani, announced his own divorce from Donna Hanover at a Bryant Park press conference, implicitly acknowledging his own track record of dating in office. Then there was Ed Koch, who made Gracie Mansion his bachelor pad for three terms.

They are not alone. In the Council chamber or the Municipal Building, on the roads to Albany or the flights to D.C., New York has seen its fair share of people sacrifice romance for political success, despite the occasional love connection.

Married politicians often say they have it hard trying to find quality time for to spend with their spouses and children. But with Valentine’s Day on the horizon, single politicians say they have it even harder. They describe a number of obstacles—being knee-deep in constituent concerns, immersed in politicking and having raised profiles in their districts.

More than anything else, said Oddo, the problem is simply finding enough hours to be together.

“It’s almost impossible to maintain a relationship the way she works and the way I work,” he said. “It’s not a lot of time, relative to other relationships.”

Occasionally, Petersen comes with him to political events, though their most consistent dates are salvaged Saturday nights, armed with take-out and the remote control.

Those are good, he said. Sunday mornings together, however, can be more difficult, with his job inevitably intruding on their time together.

“Every Sunday morning, we go get bagels and go to the Perspectives section of the Staten Island Advance. And whether it’s letters to the editor, the political column,” he said, “my Sunday mornings are going to be filled with agita. And if my Sunday mornings are filled with agita, so are hers. And there’s no escaping it.”

Oddo tries to put up barriers, he said, though he knows he is in a losing battle. He is obsessed with his job, and he finds himself constantly relying not only on his girlfriend’s patience and understanding, but her ability to deal with his public arguments and struggles.

Most of the time, they make it work.  

But there have been problems.

Of all the legislation Oddo has been behind, nothing caused as much of a firestorm as his bill to ban metal bats. For months, his life was consumed by wrangling over the bill, in public and behind closed doors. Then last March, the Council approved the ban, and the next day, Oddo took off for his annual trip to Yankees spring training. His friends were with him for the first week. His girlfriend came for the second.

By then the story had gone national, and between innings, Oddo’s phone and BlackBerry were buzzing constantly.

She did not complain—at least until the night of her birthday.

They were out at their favorite Tampa restaurant, Pino’s. His phone rang. He let it go to voicemail, though as much as he tried to focus on her, his mind kept wandering back to the missed call.

He excused himself from the table to check the message.

“That,” he said, “was a really big mistake.”

Oddo spent 15 minutes pacing on the sidewalk, going back and forth with a reporter. When he returned, the date had soured.

“I lost the moment with her,” he recalled. “And she was right: birthday, romantic restaurant, beautiful woman—and I’m arguing with this dingbat.”
He learned from that experience, he said, though not enough to leave his BlackBerry at home when they go out to eat. She has come to accept that, he said.

“If Kim took my Blackberry away from me, I would start trembling at the table within like 35 seconds. There should be rules. God knows that I need rules. But there are no rules,” he said. “I probably don’t exercise a great deal of common sense when it comes to that. But it’s so omnipresent that it’s tough to say ‘I’m not going to let the job impact this moment.’”

Dating someone familiar with the political life helps, Oddo believes. Many political couples and several recent local political marriages seem to back that up: Council Members Eric Gioia (D-Queens), Joel Rivera (D-Bronx) and Erik Martin Dilan (D-Brooklyn), all said “I do” to women also working in or around government.

Dating someone familiar with the political life is one thing, said Council Member Helen Foster (D-Bronx). But for her, dating someone involved in politics himself would be out of the question.

“I’ve never dated anybody in politics,” she said. “And knowing how headstrong I am, I don’t know how that would work.”

Foster is also in a long term relationship, and has been since 2005, when she began dating an old friend from high school who came back into her life. He has made dealing with the stress of politicking and serving on the Council much easier to bear.

“When I didn’t have that person,” she said, “it could be a little overwhelming.”

But burrowed into the work of the job during her first campaign in 2001 and first term, she stopped paying attention to her dating situation, or lack of one. 

“I’d kind of resolved that I had a good life,” she said.

The thought of starting to go on blind dates again, especially with the added attention and pressure of being a member of the Council, helped solidify her decision to stay single.

“I definitely wouldn’t have done the whole dating circuit as an elected official,” she said. “The thought of it—no.”

Her free time was spent at home, with a close group of friends or with her sister, or just playing with her dog.

That did not help her love life either.

“I am so not a go out, cool person,” she said. “Unless someone was going to drop a man in, I definitely wasn’t going to run into him.”

When she was at events where she might meet people, she found that introducing herself as a member of the City Council was far from the best conversation opener.

“I look relatively young. So when people hear what I do—they expect that it would be an old white man saying he’s on the New York City Council more so than a relatively young black woman,” she said.

Even mentioning being in Congress, said Rep. Anthony Weiner (D-Brooklyn/Queens), does not make the best pick-up line.

“Doesn’t work,” he said, shaking his head.

Weiner, whom rumors have linked to more than one woman over the years, insisted that contrary to the speculation, he finds dating difficult, especially with the commute back and forth to Washington. Though that is not the only reason he has stayed single, he said.

“It’s like the line that Woody Allen uses,” he joked. “‘He uses oral contraception—women say no.’ It’s kind of that way with me.”

Weiner shied away from discussing details. City Council Member Vincent Gentile (D-Brooklyn) did not. But that, he said, is because there is nothing to tell.

These days, he said, his romantic life is “pretty boring.”

Between his job on the Council and all the events he goes to in his district, his schedule is constantly packed, “whether it’s January, February, August or November,” he said, “and that includes Friday nights and Saturdays.”

Unlike most of his colleagues on the Council, Gentile is not term limited next year. He plans to run for re-election. Whether that would mean putting off a serious love life until at least 2013, Gentile did not want to speculate.

“What’s the expression?” he said. “‘Hope springs eternal.’”


Maybe Gentile is right, said Council Member Peter Vallone Jr. (D-Queens). But after six years of single life since a divorce which coincided with his first months on the Council, then again, maybe not.
The man whom The Queens Tribune named Queens’ most eligible bachelor is not currently seeing anyone, and has not been for some time. This is the result, he says, of both personal and professional circumstances.

“Not only do I have a very time consuming job, I’m divorced with kids,” he said. “So I’m sure those are not three qualities that any woman has at the top of her list when looking for a date.”

With all the events on his schedule and the responsibility he feels to his two daughters, available slots to see women are few and far between. And he knows that he is not at his most enticing when he tells prospective dates, “‘I’m free between 7:36 and 8:12 if you want to grab a quick drink,’” he said. “But that’s what ends up happening.”

Perhaps, he admitted, he was just using that as an excuse.

“I’m sure I’ve been dumped for just about every reason in the book. But I’ve rationalized to myself that it’s all because of my schedule,” he laughed.

His relationships over the past few years have had their fair share of pitfalls, he said. A job that makes him known in the district and constantly at events can be a great way to meet lots of new people with similar interests. The risk, though, is that their interest in him only purports to be romantic.

“It’s a double-edged sword,” he said. “It allows you to meet a certain number of people, but you also have to worry about someone that perceives you have a job that carries with it some power. That happens. I’m sure it’s happened to every single Council member. And it’s something you have to be aware of.”

Meanwhile, many of his constituents have taken to the role of matchmaker.

“I can’t go to a meeting without someone saying, ‘Here’s a picture of my daughter or granddaughter,’” he said.

He does not think this is the most promising way to meet people he said, and he does his best to politely shrug off these offers.

“I still haven’t figured out the best way,” he said. “I just usually mumble something.”

Vallone, who will be term limited out of office next year, is rapidly raising money in anticipation of a race for Queens borough president. The time that would necessarily go into a campaign will leave him even fewer chances for romance, he knows, and campaigning as a single man, without a wife to pose with him at rallies and on leaflets, may have its downfalls.

“I think typically it helps the candidate to have a nuclear family behind him or her,” he said. “But unfortunately, it doesn’t always work out that way. Being divorced is never something I intended when I got married. But you have to play with the cards you’re dealt.”
Like Oddo and Foster and Gentile, Vallone believes most voters have no problems pulling the lever for candidates just because they lack rings on their fingers.

Comptroller William Thompson (D), who has been divorced twice and won citywide twice, agreed.

Thompson is hoping so for his own sake, at least, as he prepares for a long-expected run for mayor next year, as an unmarried man.

After Koch, Giuliani and Bloomberg, that will not be a problem, Thompson said.

“New Yorkers haven’t cared for a while,” he said. “It doesn’t matter like it used to 30, 40, 50 years ago.”

The facts seem to bear him out: like so many millions of potential voters, one-fifth of the Council members are unmarried, two of the borough presidents and two of the city’s 13 congressional representatives are unmarried, as are many of the city’s representatives in the Assembly and State Senate.

“Right now,” Thompson said, marriage “isn’t one of the prerequisites.”

Thompson is not the only expected mayoral candidate without a spouse in the traditional sense. Neither of his major prospective opponents are married either: not Weiner, and not Council Speaker Christine Quinn (D-Manhattan)—though she is in a seven-year committed relationship with her live-in partner and unable to marry under state law.

Romantically, at least, the three have much more in common with Carrie Bradshaw than Ozzie and Harriet.

But, Thompson said, so do New Yorkers.

“There are states and certain cities where it may matter more. It doesn’t in New York,” he said. “They don’t want to necessarily see the ideal image. They’re interested in who’s going to move things forward.”