It's (Almost) Official, Padavan Wins

Three months to the day after the 2008 election, we have finally determined that Frank Padavan won his re-election bid to represent Northeast Queens in the State Senate. The battle was drawn out after the initial close results, full of recounts, counting ballots that were initially declined and a whole lot of political drama in the press.

From The Daily Politics:

With all but 265 ballots fought over, counted and recounted, Republican Frank Padavan retains a 578-vote lead over his Democratic challenger, Councilman Jim Gennaro, according to a Queens GOP source who has been monitoring the situation.

That makes it arithmetically impossible for Gennaro to pull out a victory - even if those last remaining ballots all cut his way, which, of course, they wouldn't.

Ironically, that's not all that terribly far off from the unofficial results on election night last November when Padavan was up 723 votes.

Considering that the DSCC gave next to nothing in support for Gennaro and that Padavan has been in office for more than thirty years, the close race shows that this district is vulnerable to be flipped. As Liz notes, Gennaro is getting ready to contest the race again next year and with his numbers in 2008, there should be a big push to get him over the top and to make the very Democratic area represented by one from their own party.