"Like most everyone, I love to be needed, to be useful. When I moved here from Albany in 1990, it soon became apparent that local injured workers needed an advocate. There were scads of lawyers representing insurance companies in workers compensation cases, but pitifully few on the workers side."
And so Mary Jo Long, who calls herself "a people's lawyer", found her calling and began to focus her law practice on injured workers and other disabled people who weren't getting their benefits. Long, who holds a Masters degree in political science from Washington University (1972) and a law degree from New York University (1977), had previously represented poor people in Brooklyn Legal Services (1977-79), taught at Case Western Reserve Law School (1980-83) and was a partner in the progressive Albany law firm of Walter, Thayer, Long & Mishler (1984-90).
Helping people navigate the shoals of worker's compensation law was satisfying in terms of helping people regain financial stability while dealing with their disabilities. But it was frustrating. "The work environment of the eighties and nineties ˜ the repetitive motions, the chemical stew, the shiftwork stress ˜ produced new kinds of injuries that insurance companies didn't want to pay for. And the system was slower in dealing with these problems as the insurance companies balked and the state compensation system grew more responsive to the concerns of the insurance companies instead of the needs of the injured workers. The enormous energies misspent on litigation were not being spent on medical care, neither prevention nor prompt treatment. I became convinced that a national universal health care system is the cheapest and most humane solution to the tragedy of disability and workplace injury."
But neither major party would advocate what was needed. "Even the 1992 Clinton plan was designed around the guaranteed profits of the insurance companies, a kind of cost plus plan. Only the Green Party has consistently stood for what every other industrialized country has. And that's why I'm giving my all to build the party here in New York State."
The current drive for workers compensation "reform", led by State Senate Republicans, aims not to improve outcomes for people injured at work, but to lower employer premiums without reducing insurance company profits. Like tort "reforms" that reduce corporate accountability for injurious products, bankruptcy "reforms" written by credit card companies, and regulatory "reforms" written by utilities, all the changes being implemented on state and federal levels seek to protect "investor" interests over the public good.
"A state government fixated on re-electing itself by servicing its corporate contributors has no time or money for the people's needs: health care, education, daycare, economic renewal, food safety, and environmental health," Long says. "And September 11th has become an excuse for more tax giveaways and more government secrecy."
Long is past president of the Chenango County Bar Association, has served on the Board of Broome Chenango Legal Assistance Corporation, sits on the Governing Council of the Northeast Organic Farming Association of New York, chairs the Management Committee of NOFA-NY Certified Organic LLC, and leads the Chenango County Green Party Organization. She leads a homestead life near Afton, where she lives in a house she helped build, and where she raises most of her food. She's a daughter, a mother, and a grandmother.
And she wants to be your Attorney General. Her campaign can be reached at:
Long 4 AG 2002
P.O. Box 169
Afton, NY 1730
607-967-8274
