The Republican primary for the state Senate in the newly redrawn 15th District got nasty in its final days.

The campaign of Forest Hills lawyer Juan Reyes, who is backed by the Queens GOP leadership, sent out a number of mailers in the last week accusing his opponent, Councilman Eric Ulrich (R-Ozone Park) of being a flip-flopper with ties to liberal politicians and the LGBT community and also blasting his support from the state Senate GOP leadership.

The Republican primary for the state Senate in the newly redrawn 15th District got nasty in its final days.

The Republican primary for the state Senate in the newly redrawn 15th District is getting nasty in the final days.

It’s been three and a half years since Councilman Eric Ulrich (R-Ozone Park) won a special election to replace Joe Addabbo Jr. after the latter’s ascension to the state Senate. Now, the 27-year-old Ozone Park native is running against his predecessor for the seat in Albany.

The district — which includes Glendale, Howard Beach, Maspeth, Middle Village and Ozone Park — was in Republican hands for decades before Addabbo won it in 2008. It was redrawn to include conservative-leaning neighborhoods like Kew Gardens Hills, home to a large bloc of Orthodox Jews, and Breezy Point. The new lines make the district more competitive, and that attracted Ulrich, who had been lobbied to run for the seat in 2010 and also for the seat vacated by former Rep. Anthony Weiner in 2011, which was won by Rep. Bob Turner (R-Middle Village).

The race for New York’s 15th Senate District took a turn for the nasty on Monday with an exchange of insults and candidates questioning each other’s judgment.

And this is just for the Republican Primary, which is pitting GOP-endorsed Juan Reyes, a Forest Hills attorney, against City Councilman Eric Ulrich (R-Ozone Park).

As a key Republican Party nomination battle for state Senate shapes up between Councilman Eric Ulrich (R-Ozone Park) and Forest Hills attorney Juan Reyes, the Queens Conservative Party today gave Ulrich an ideological boost by throwing him its support.

The release of the Environmental Scorecard of the City Council shows that all five boroughs are heading in the right direction to sustain the environment in New York City.

Out of the 50 City Council members from each district in the five boroughs, and from both political parties that voted, 22 had a perfect score on the scale from one to 100 for voting in support of the 11 bills covering various environmental issues that the city faces now, and in the future.

Capt. Thomas Pascale, commanding officer of the 106th Precinct, was honored by Lindenwood Alliance members with their first award since the group was established in 2010 for being supportive of the civic organization.

“We would like to thank him for being a part of our community and making it a safe place to live,” Christina Gold, Lindenwood Alliance co-president, said as she presented the award to Pascale during the Lindenwood Alliance meeting on Monday night.

While petty crime has jumped in the 106th Precinct since the casino opened in South Ozone Park, legislators and civic leaders say they don’t blame the gambling site but instead are pointing their fingers at a lack of police presence and are calling on NYPD brass to ship out more officers to the area.

“We’ve been asking and asking and asking for more police for a long time,” said 106th Precinct Community Council President Frank Dardani. “We needed more police before the casino opened, and we definitely need more police now.”

The war within the Queens Republican Party flared up this week when Councilman Eric Ulrich (R-Ozone Park) accused some members of the leadership of corrupt behavior, and his targets responded by slamming the lawmaker’s own ethics.

The party has long been divided between the group that supports the leadership of Chairman Phil Ragusa and an insurgent faction, in which Ulrich has become a leader since his election to the City Council. Other prominent figures in the rebel group include Bart Haggerty, Ulrich’s chief of staff, and his brother, the political operative John Haggerty, who was recently found guilty of stealing nearly a million dollars from the 2009 re-election campaign of Mayor Bloomberg.

John Haggerty, a Republican political operative from Forest Hills Gardens who had been accused of stealing more than $1 million from Mayor Bloomberg’s re-election campaign, was sentenced on Monday to one and one-third to four years in state prison after a jury found him guilty of grand larceny and money laundering, Manhattan District Attorney Cyrus Vance Jr. said.

John Haggerty, a Republican political operative from Forest Hills, was sentenced on Monday to one and one-third to four years in state prison after a jury found him guilty of stealing more than $1 million from Mayor Bloomberg’s 2009 re-election campaign, Manhattan District Attorney Cyrus Vance Jr. said.

Parents are once again sounding the battle cry against the middle school choice program that the city has proposed to implement in southern Queens and are planning to express their ire over the move at the Community Education Council District 27 meeting this coming Monday.

“We really don’t want middle school choice at all,” said Theresa Fonal, the president of the Parent Teacher Association at PS 146 in Howard Beach, who organized a rally against the proposed program in August. “Our PTA contacted most of the schools in District 27, and a lot of them had no clue about middle school choice at all. No one told us they’re in favor.”

While a Queens judge has ruled that Phil Ragusa is the chairman of the borough’s Republican Party, there appears to be no truce between the two factions that have waged verbal assaults against each other, lobbing criticisms that each side has done nothing but obstruct Queens’ minority party from being able to function without internal strife.

Former Middle Village Councilman Tom Ognibene said he was considering appealing last week’s decision by Queens Supreme Court Justice Phyllis Flug. The ruling came after rival sections of the Queens GOP each nominated a new party leader at the end of September.

John Haggerty, the Republican activist accused of stealing more than $1 million from Mayor Bloomberg's re-election campaign, was found guilty of second-degree grand larceny today, Oct. 21, NY1 reports.

It’s deja vu all over again for the Queens Republican Party as one faction tries to wrest power from the other.

With Democrats greatly outnumbering Republicans in Queens, the one thing the GOP leadership doesn’t need is disunity. But that’s just what’s happening as one dissatisfied faction continues its attempt to take over the leadership.

Those supporting GOP Chairman Phil Ragusa say the attempt is illegal and will not be successful. They also point to an article in capitalnewyork.com about the possibility of Republican Councilman Peter Koo of Flushing defecting, saying it is not true and was another attempt to split the county party.

   Can’t find a cab in Queens?

   That should soon change.

Can’t find a cab in Queens?

A Queens political consultant Monday was indicted for allegedly stealing more than a million dollars from Mayor Mike Bloomberg during Bloomberg’s reelection campaign last year.

A state Supreme Court judge ended a challenge to State Sen. Serphin Maltese’s leadership of the Queens Republican Party last month.

As curtains begin to rise on stages throughout the borough, it appears that the second half of the 2005-2006 local theatrical season will be marked not by any clear-cut trend among the plays that have been slated for production (as has often been the case in the past), but rather by the unusually high number of performers who will become particularly familiar to audiences through multiple appearances over the next few months.

Questions about the signatures Middle Village mayoral candidate Thomas Ognibene filed to get on the September primary ballot turned into accusations that Mayor Bloomberg’s campaign was attacking the Queens County Republican Party.

When the Gingerbread Players’ production of “The Fantasticks” opened this past bone-chilling, rain-swept Friday night, the hot cider and trademark baked goods warmed the body, but it was the love-kissed performance that warmed the heart.

First up is Theatre Time’s production of the rarely-performed “Splendor In The Grass,” a coming-of-age love story by William Inge that made quite an impact in its filmed version starring Natalie Wood and Warren Beatty. Here, their roles are entrusted to Sarah Marcisak and Michael Weems, with support from Kevin Ryan and Donna Marcus.