New York City Progressive activists are looking beyond the five boroughs to winnable legislative races around the state. The reason for this is simply the enormous local disparity between the resources available and the small number of targets.

One such winnable race is in the 19th Congressional district, currently represented by Sue Kelly.

Kelly is vulnerable on a number of fronts. The 19th district, when it was drawn in 2000, was already trending Democratic; today, the republican registration advantage has shrunk to under five percent, due in part to an influx of new voters from the City and to general disaffection with republican rule. On that issue, Kelly is perhaps most vulnerable: her votes are cast in lockstep with Tom DeLay's in 90% of cases, and she has taken $12,020 from ARMPAC, the indicted Texan's primary fundraising vehicle. Kelly's race, along with those of the other downstate House republicans being targeted – Fossella and King – is a prime candidate for issues nationalization.

One leading indicator of winnability for this race is the number of contestants on the Democratic side. There are presently five candidates in the primary:

- Judy Aydelott
- John Hall
- Jim Martorano
- Darren Rigger
- Ben Shuldiner

The 19th district race is going to be interesting on several levels. The local Progressive coalition has established a blog dedicated solely to this race, Take 19, which will make it a test case for the use of grassroots blogs as information and activism platforms in local races. On another level, Kelly's district overlaps with other districts featuring vulnerable, targeted incumbents – "Landslide Nick" Spano comes to mind – which in turn likely will create synergy effects between the various campaigns being run in the area in 2006.

Stay tuned.