Rep. Gregory Meeks (D) Elected Feb. 1998, 3d term
Born:	Sept. 25, 1953, Harlem
Home:	Far Rockaway
Education:	Adelphi U., B.A., 1975, Howard U., J.D., 1978
Religion:	Baptist
Marital Status:	married (Simone-Marie)
Elected  Office:	NY Assembly, 1992-98.
Professional Career:	Asst. Dist. Atty., Queens Co., NY, 1978-84; NY St. Comm. of Investigations, 1984-85; Judge, NY St. Workers Compensation Bd., 1985-92.
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The eastern edge of Queens has been an important transportation hub for New York for almost 250 years. In the 1750s, the British laid out what is now Jamaica Avenue to help them defend Long Island. In the 1830s--nearly a century before most present-day commuters would have guessed--the Long Island Rail Road was built here. Today, this corner of Queens is sliced through by the Belt Parkway and the Van Wyck Expressway--two integral parts of Robert Moses' mid-century highway network--and is home to the bustling John F. Kennedy International Airport, one of the leading ports of entry for overseas air travelers entering the United States. Jamaica is so well situated with transportation links that officials have worked mightily to improve its commercial vitality, after a decline hastened by the construction of regional shopping centers in Queens and Long Island. Beginning in the 1970s, the old elevated subway line on Jamaica Avenue was removed and buried underground, so that shoppers could have a less claustrophobic experience.

This part of Queens--rather than Harlem or Brooklyn--is home to New York City's largest collection of middle-class black homeowners. The neighborhoods of Springfield Gardens and Laurelton, St. Albans and Rosedale, Cambria Heights and Queens Village consist of block upon block of low-rise, frame and brick houses built mostly from the 1920s to the 1950s. There was a small black community in South Jamaica half a century ago, and since then many black families have bought houses and raised their families in neighborhoods that fan out east from Jamaica. They fought to maintain the relatively spacious streets, relishing the light in their windows, the safe schools and the good neighborhood stores; these areas never experienced the kind of riots that damaged Harlem and parts of Brooklyn.

The 6th Congressional District contains all of these southeast Queens neighborhoods, plus others less affluent and orderly, in southern Queens. It is bounded on the north, more or less, by the Jackie Robinson Parkway, on the east by the Nassau County line and on the west by Cross Bay Boulevard; to the south it includes part of the Rockaway Peninsula across Jamaica Bay from the rest of Queens. Richmond Hill and Ozone Park, previously white ethnic neighborhoods, now have sizable numbers of Latinos and South Asians. South Ozone Park is home to many immigrants from Guyana, Jamaica, Haiti, the Dominican Republic and Trinidad and Tobago. The Rockaway portions of the district, despite being just a few blocks from the beach, are a relatively undeveloped backwater, leveled by urban renewal in the late 1960s but never rebuilt, and now home to half of Queens' nursing homes; a quarter of its residents on public assistance. As a whole, the 6th is 52% black, 17% Hispanic and 9% Asian; if there is a common denominator, it is the amount of time 6th District residents spend traveling to work. The district is ranked as the nation's worst for commuters--at 48 minutes of mean travel time to work. Politically, the district is again among the nation's leaders. George W. Bush won just 10 percent here in 2000; only four districts gave him a lower percentage of the vote. Democrats here regularly win by a 9-1 margin.

The congressman from the 6th District is Gregory Meeks, a Democrat elected in 1998 to replace 11-year incumbent Floyd Flake, who resigned to devote more time to his church. Meeks grew up in Harlem, in public housing projects. After graduating from college and law school, he moved to Far Rockaway and pursued a public sector career. He became an assistant district attorney in 1978, a staffer for the Committee on Investigations in 1984, a workmen's comp judge in 1985; after losing a race for City Council in 1991, he was elected assemblyman in 1992. He became an ally of Flake, an extraordinary minister whose Allen A.M.E. Church congregation grew from 1,400 members in 1976 to 12,000 in 2000, built community schools, hundreds of housing units and encouraged private sector investment in the community.

Flake supported Meeks to succeed him, though the party's initial favorite was state Senator Alton Waldon, who lost to Flake in the 1986 Democratic primary. At the January 1998 endorsement meetings Meeks won a bare majority of committeemen and this became the Democratic nominee. Waldon ran on the Conservative and Independence lines, and spent $100,000; Assemblywoman Barbara Clark ran an independent candidacy and Republicans had a candidate as well. But Meeks had support from Flake, City Controller (now state Comptroller) Alan Hevesi, Congressman Charles Rangel, Al Sharpton and Jesse Jackson. He won with 57%, to 21% for Waldon, 13% for Clark, and 9% for Republican Celestine Miller.

Meeks got Flake's seat on the Financial Services Committee and developed a liberal voting record, though a bit more moderate on economic issues. In 2000, Meeks emerged as a player. As one of the final undecideds on PNTR with China, both sides lobbied him furiously. Various factors finally convinced him to support the deal: vigorous lobbying by Rangel and Bill Clinton; support by United Parcel Service, a major employer at Kennedy airport; a White House-sponsored trip to China where he met with senior officials and saw first-hand the economic growth; plus a last-minute agreement by the White House and Speaker Dennis Hastert to extend tax breaks and public investment to distressed urban and rural areas. But he opposed trade promotion authority, and he opposed the Iraq war resolution.

When it became clear that several party leadership positions would come up after the 2002 election, he campaigned to be vice-chairman of the Democratic Caucus. His initial approach was to claim a base among minority members, but he was forced to abandon that strategy when James Clyburn of South Carolina, the former chairman of the Congressional Black Caucus, entered the contest. Meeks then emphasized his youth and openness to a variety of viewpoints within the Caucus. But on the first ballot, Clyburn won 95 votes to 56 for Meeks and 53 for Zoe Lofgren of California. Meeks could have forced a second ballot but he decided to bow to the inevitable and avoid further divisiveness.

At home, Meeks helped to secure public and private support for a new aeronautics trade school in Far Rockaway to prepare workers for jobs at Kennedy Airport. He also worked with local officials to encourage investment in downtown Jamaica. Meeks has been reelected three times without major-party opposition, and redistricting appears to have left him in strong shape in this district. Some expect him to run for mayor some day.

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DC Office
1710 LHOB 20515, 202-225-3461; Fax: 202-226-4169; Web site: www.house.gov/meeks

State Offices
Far Rockaway, 718-327-9791; Richmond Hill, 718-738-4200; St. Albans, 718-949-5600.

Committees

• Financial Services (12th of 32 D): Capital Markets, Insurance & Government Sponsored Enterprises; Financial Institutions & Consumer Credit.
• International Relations (12th of 23 D): Africa; Asia & the Pacific.

Group Ratings (More Info)
	ADA	ACLU	AFS	LCV	CON	ITIC	NTU	COC	ACU	NTLC	CHC
2002	85	83	100	88	43	38	24	45	4	8	0
2001	85	--	100	86	--	--	13	36	5	--	--

National Journal Ratings (More Info)
	2001 LIB	--	2001 CONS		2002 LIB	--	2002 CONS
Economic	76%	--	24%		63%	--	36%
Social	90%	--	0%		81%	--	18%
Foreign	85%	--	15%		93%	--	6%
For National Journal's complete 2002 Vote Ratings, as well as previous ratings dating back to 1995, please click here.

Key Votes Of The 107th Congress (More Info)
1. Approve Bush Tax Cuts N 2. Limit Patients' Bill of Rights N 3. Campaign Finance Reform Y 4. Ban ANWR Development Y 5. Faith-Based Charities N 6. Bar Gays in the Boy Scouts *		7. Ban Partial-Birth Abortion N  8. Arm Commercial Pilots Y  9. Trade Promotion Authority N 10. Bar Funds for Intl. Court N 11. Authorize Force in Iraq N 12. Deny Home. Sec. Dept. Union N

Election Results (More Info)
	Candidate	Total Votes	Percent	Expenditures
2002 general	Gregory Meeks (D-L-WF)	72,799	97%	$502,178
	Other	2,632	3%
2002 primary	Gregory Meeks (D)	unopposed
2000 general	Gregory Meeks (D-WF)	unopposed
Prior winning percentages: 1998 (100%); 1998 (57%)

2000 presidential
	Gore (D)	145,684	87%
	Bush (R)	17,632	10%
	Other	4,874	3%
For 1992 and 1996 presidential results in the Sixth District, please see the Almanac 2000 online. Please note that these older returns reflect district lines as they existed prior to 2002 redistricting.

• Cook Partisan Voting Index: D +39
• District Size: 46 square miles
• Population in 2000: 654,361; 100.0% urban; 0.0% rural
• Median Household Income: $43,546; 14.5% are below the poverty line
• Occupation: 20.5% blue collar; 57.4% white collar; 22.1% gray collar; 6.2% military veterans
• Race/Ethnic Origin: 12.8% White, 52.1% Black, 8.9% Asian, 0.5% Amer. Indian, 0.1% Hawaiian, 6.1% Two+ races, 2.6% Other, 16.9% Hispanic origin
• Ancestry: 15.9% West Indian, 3.4% Italian, 3.0% USA
• Click here for statewide demographic data.