Meet the City Council’s New Members: Daneek Miller

A union man by trade, Daneek Miller does not naturally connect with politics and government. In fact, when Councilman Leroy Comrie approached him to run for City Council as his successor, Miller was initially hesitant. As the president of Amalgamated Transit Union Local 1056 and co-chair of the MTA Labor Coalition, Miller told Comrie he was reluctant to leave his “comfort zone” and abandon his membership. It was only after some cajoling from other union and community leaders that Miller agreed to throw his hat in the race, determining that it was important for labor to have another strong voice in the Council to succeed Comrie.

“The things that matter most we weren’t able to accomplish because we always hit walls,” Miller said, referring to the ATU. “We hit walls because we don’t make policy and we don’t write legislation and, quite frankly, policy and legislation over the last few years have not been very favorable to working people. And so as I discussed potentially running with my contemporaries and others in the movement, it just became evident that someone had to do it.”

Miller has had a distinguished career leading his local—which represents the MTA’s Queens Bus Division’s drivers and mechanics— recently playing a role in restoring bus service in southeast Queens. Miller will take his transportation expertise with him to the Council. His district has one of the longest commutes in the entire city, he notes, in part because of the lack of an extensive transportation network. Miller will advocate for the construction of a new bus depot, which he says has been stuck in the planning phase for years. He also hopes to incorporate participatory budgeting in his district as a way to engage his community, although he confesses to being “behind the eight ball” in laying the groundwork for the process, which allows the community to decide what projects should be funded with Council discretionary funds.

“We’ve already put out feelers and done a lot of groundwork to hit the ground running on Jan. 1, and keeping in step with empowering members of the community,” said Miller. “[Participatory budgeting] is an important element of that.”