John Bonacic (R-Mount Hope) announced today that he will retire at the end of his current term.
In a release, Bonacic said that aside from being a husband and father, “serving in the State Senate has been the honor of my life. The twenty years I have spent in the Senate have been rewarding both personally and professionally, despite the frustrations that all of us experience in any career. Twenty years, though, is enough.”
He cited the passage of the Women’s Health and Wellness Act in his first year in the Senate, keeping rural hospitals open, and the law permitting game on non-Indian land among his proudest accomplishments.
He first joined state government in 1990 as an Assemblyman. He was elected to the Senate in 1998. The son of Croatian immigrants, he was born in New York City in 1942. “The fact that someone who grew up in the most urban area of the nation – Hell’s Kitchen – could be welcomed into dairy barns in Delhi, and small businesses in Monticello, and mix with today’s college students at New Paltz, while returning home at night to Orange County and being welcomed there also, is something that is a testament to the people of the 42nd Senate District,” said Bonacic. “As the grandson of immigrants, I could never have imagined that one day I would help approve the Judges of the State’s highest Court as Chairman of the Judiciary Committee, or work side by side with Governors on issues critical to the people of our community – healthcare, flood control, and of course, job creation.”
The 42nd district includes includes all or parts of Delaware,Sullivan, Orange, and Ulster Counties.
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