Ellen M. Lederer DeFrancesco for New York State Assembly 14th District

David G. McDonough has been a capable public servant since his election to the Assembly in 2002. As a member of the minority, the Merrick Republican has provided good constituent service and Newsday has supported past candidacies.

But the 14th District needs more vigorous representation than McDonough, 87, is now able to provide. McDonough has a tendency to talk about past accomplishments and answer questions by rehashing the issues  without offering his ideas about how to address them. His constituents would be better served by someone more oriented to the future.

Fortunately, they have a choice. Democrat Ellen M. Lederer DeFrancesco, 54, of Oceanside, is making her first run for public office. A former New York City teacher, she uses her mantra — "Saying 'I don't know' is a strength, not a weakness" — as a spur to dig deep into issues. When a would-be constituent complained about the $40 per day jury duty pay, her research found the figure dated to the late 1990s and she promised to push for a hike.

As befits her background, education is a passion. She supports efforts to revamp the Foundation Aid formula by which the state funds public schools; the metric must account for special education and English language learners, she says, and should reflect rising or falling enrollments. She backs universal pre-K as one answer to the affordability crisis. Other elements include building more affordable housing sustainably by converting zombie homes and empty buildings, which she says will help keep young people from moving away, and paying child care workers a living wage.

She supports the state's efforts to bring offshore wind energy to Long Island but deplores Equinor's strategy in trying to site a cable landing in Long Beach. Lederer DeFrancesco says she could back a different plan to land a cable on state land at Jones Beach if an alternative route to bring the power to the grid — perhaps up the Wantagh or Meadowbrook parkways — was devised. She also advocates for a different approach to congestion pricing in New York City: "Maybe make it incremental, maybe ease into it," she said.

Newsday's editorial board endorses Lederer DeFrancesco.