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If last week’s in-person Primary Election Day results provided a hazy depiction of the next City Council members to represent Queens, last Friday’s release of Ranked Choice Voting (RCV) results by the New York City Board of Elections secured the tallies of the frontrunners.

The block of Queens Boulevard between 65^th and 66^th Avenues in Rego Park has been an anomaly for decades, with its single-story storefronts rather than towers befitting of a major traffic artery. In the past year, one such business that will likely be replaced with a high-rise is Parkside Memorial Chapels, which has been serving the funeral needs of many Jews in Queens since 1961.

In contrast to the cabinet of outgoing President Donald Trump, which included many political supporters who previously served in Congress and prominent private enterprises, President-Elect Joe Biden has a more traditional cabinet that includes veterans of federal agencies with career and educational backgrounds relating to their nominated positions. The incoming cabinet also includes nominees with affiliations and backgrounds that connect to the Jewish community. The personal connection that comes from Biden’s Jewish grandchildren and Vice President-elect Kamala Harris’ husband is matched by the professional experiences of these individuals. While Trump leaned towards Orthodox and politically conservative Jews for support, Biden’s Jewish circle represents a wider denominational spectrum.

Since the onset of the coronavirus pandemic, Rabbi Dr. Aaron Glatt has been holding public online briefings on the latest developments concerning the virus. This past Sunday, he had a much larger audience in a presentation sponsored by Yeshiva University, where he made a solid case for vaccination alongside Rabbi Mordechai Willig, a rosh yeshivah at its rabbinical seminary. “We have to understand that it’s an incredible chesed from HaKadosh Baruch Hu that within one year we’ve been able to come up with two vaccines,” Rabbi Glatt said. “The Ebola vaccine took five years and most vaccines take 11 to develop.”

This past Saturday, November 14, the Democratic Socialists of America, via Zoom, endorsed six candidates for New York City Council seats in a daring bid to take over New York City. The NYC-DSA is a leading political force in both New York City and New York State politics. All five candidates on their New York State legislative slate won their respective races earlier this month. Jabari Brisport in the New York State Senate, and Phara Souffrant Forrest, Marcela Mitaynes, Zohran Mamdani, and Emily Gallagher in the New York State Assembly.

The ongoing coronavirus pandemic has shaken many long-held assumptions about the Jewish community as it confronts a crisis of leadership, finance, and faith. In Queens, the divisions within the Jewish community were laid bare last Monday when Governor Andrew Cuomo declared in a press conference, “We’re going to close the schools in those areas tomorrow, and that’s that.”