Green Party candidate touts 'New Deal' plan

Howie Hawkins campaigns during Apple Harvest Festival
By Marianne Dabir, Staff Writer, Ithaca Journal

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New York Green Party gubernatorial candidate Howie Hawkins visited Ithaca as part of his election campaign Saturday, meeting voters on the Commons during the Apple Harvest Festival.

Hawkins' platform includes job creation, fair wages and community-based health care. He believes that reducing what he termed welfare for the rich while institutionalizing a single-payer health care system will make communities stronger. Hawkins said single-payer, universal health care is something that the majority of citizens want, but that hasn't been achieved because of lawmakers' lack of interest in constituent well-being.

"If you look at the polls, the percentage of people in favor of a single-payer system, or at least another kind of universal health care, has never really been below 54 percent, and in some cases that percentage has gone as high as 70 percent," Hawkins said. "In order to make reforms like this happen, we need a party that represents the people, not corporate interests."

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