Upper West Side Election Season: Is There A Neighborhood Race?

UPPER WEST SIDE, NY — The short answer? There is no Upper West Side election this coming week.

Election Day is Tuesday in New York City and while there are a variety of City Council primary races across the five boroughs, you will not find any Upper West Side contests.

The Upper West Side is represented by District 6 Council Member Gale Brewer and District 7 Council Member Shaun Abreu, and neither saw a Democratic candidate decide to challenge them in this summer's primary.

Brewer's district includes the majority of the Upper West Side from roughly West 59th to 106th streets, while Abreu's District 7 runs up through the rest of the Upper West Side into Morningside Heights and then Harlem and Washington Heights.

For a period, it appeared that Keith Harris, who challenged for the District 7 seat in 2021 would run again against Abreu on Tuesday, but he did not end up making the ballot.

There is also currently no Republican candidate on the ballot for District 7 in the November general election.

In terms of District 6, there was no other Democratic candidate who debated challenging Brewer in the primary, but Republican Diane Stasio will challenge her in the November general election.

Both Brewer and Abreu were elected in 2021, but only for a term of two years due to a rarely discussed provision in New York City's charter that changes the term length in the City Council every 20 years to allow new challengers under new parties.