The New York State Assembly is the lower chamber of the New York State Legislature. Alongside the New York State Senate, it forms the legislative branch of the New York state government and works alongside the governor of New York to create laws and establish a state budget. Legislative authority and responsibilities of the New York State Assembly include passing bills on public policy matters, setting levels for state spending, raising and lowering taxes, and voting to uphold or override gubernatorial vetoes.The New York State Assembly meets in the state capitol building in Albany, New York.Assembly District 52 includes parts of Kings county (Brooklyn).
Experience and Qualifications
I’ve been a teacher of deaf and deaf-blind children, a disability civil rights attorney, and a progressive Assemblymember passing major laws to improve the lives of New Yorkers. I’ve spent my career fighting for historically marginalized communities, and I bring both that drive and that expertise to my work in Albany and in the district. I began my activism fighting for responsible and accountable government and continue to take an active role in local development, transit and transportation, environmental justice, and education issues.
Community Involvement
I have lived in my district since 1981. In the 1990's I chaired the community led effort to bury the Gowanus Exwy. Later I coordinated 10 neighborhood and community-based organizations to respond to the Downtown Brooklyn Plan. As president of the Boerum Hill Association, I created the community planning effort that led to the Hoyt-Schermerhorn plan for 6.5 acres of parking lots to become housing, 37.5% of which was low-to-moderate-income, achieving a city-wide model for community-based planning.
Education
BA. Speech Pathology, Iona University; MA. Education of the Deaf, Gallaudet University; JD, Fordham University School of Law; partial fulfillment of PhD studies in Clinical Psychology, Catholic University & Long Island University
Campaign Instagram
www.instagram.com/joannesimonforbrooklyn/
aLegislatively:
(1) Passing the EmPIRE Worker Protection Act to stop wage theft and raise over $200M annually for the NYS Department of Labor to enforce wage theft and other laws;
(2) Passing the Stop Polluter Handouts bill which would end $350M annually in tax credits to the fossil fuel industry;
(3) my bill to implement universal screening of children in Pre-K to 2 to determine if they are at risk of dyslexia or other reading difficulties.
Because of my experience fighting for environmental justice, I have been a leader in the Assembly on these issues. I
was named this year’s Assembly Environmental Champion by the NY League of Conservation Voters. I passed NY’s
major climate change and affordability bill in 2025: a repeal of the 100-foot rule that will save utility customers nearly $600M/yr. Going forward, we need to invest in the infrastructure needed to enable people to more easily convert to solar (quick and cheap to bring to scale), install heat pumps, and to support wind energy. We need to pass legislation to allow for virtual power plants, and end the obligation to serve natural gas.
While state elected officials have no authority in connection with the release of people illegally detained, we can use our collective strength in the state to bring public attention to these cases and pass legislation to hold ICE accountable for violations of state laws.
I also work with a group of legislators who collaborate to advance bills that will protect immigrants and their rights. Some of these are the NY for All, MELT, RADAR, and Access to Representation Act bills, as well as my bill to ban the use of tear gas and to enforce protections against wage theft which impacts immigrant workers (EmPIRE Worker Protection Act).
have been an active sponsor of the clean slate legislation, the Second Chance Act, Earned Time Act, Elder Parole, Marvin Mayfield Act, and others.
I have also been a staunch advocate for increasing funding for legal services across the state and locally including Brooklyn Legal Services, Brooklyn Defender Services’ Immigration Rapid Response, and others.
At the state level, we must do everything we can to ensure districts protect historically underrepresented groups, as laid out in the Voting Rights Act, which the Supreme Court just gutted in the Callais decision. I think we need to look seriously as how we redistrict in NYS. While I strongly supported the creation of an independent redistricting commission, it was too easily manipulated in 2022, resulting in litigation and re-drawing of certain lines in 2024. I am proud to have bee a sponsor of the John R. Lewis Voting Rights Act, which NY passed in 2022, the strongest state voting rights act in the country. We need to look at ways to further improve voter access and protections, including better funding our county Boards of Elections.
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