Joe Ferris, long-time Democrat activist, once from Park Slope and Windsor Terrace, dies of COVID-19

Joseph Ferris, who served in the New York State Assembly from 1975 to 1984, died June 20th from COVID-19, according to his son Joseph Ferris Jr.   ---   Joe was 85 years of age when he passed.

Assemblyman Ferris was a Reform Democrat, who represented a district, then called the 51st A.D. in Brooklyn, that spanned Park Slope, Windsor Terrace, Kensington, Sunset Park, and Borough Park, where he garnered a reputation as a fierce advocate against policies like "redlining" by banks and insurers — where certain Brooklyn communities were systematically denied equal treatment from some governmental and most private sector financial and insurance sources.

Joe Ferris got his beginnings in political activism during his days in Dorothy Day's Catholic Worker movement.....

After a protracted battle with the Regular Democratic Party machine in Park Slope, Joe took on the popular, populist Republican incumbent Vin  Riccio, whom he finally defeated in the post-Watergate election of 1974.

Some, including many Republicans, say that Joe was essentially decent and honest.  Others focus on the fact that he was open in his fight for racial justice, especially within his own district. However, still others, including a few fellow Democrat reformers and his most conservative opponents, pointed out that the principal beneficiaries of most of Joe Ferris' efforts were newcomer white liberal Park Slope gentrifiers, who were very like Joe Ferris himself.  

Not known by many of his political supporters, Joe owned multiple properties whose values went through the roof while their "friend,"  Mr. Ferris, was in the assembly pushing most of the white liberal agenda in Albany, while pushing the likes of Citibank and Brooklyn Union Gas to directly "invest" in the "revival" of Park Slope back home.