New York City's 44th Council District seat special election is just days away. Republican Heshy Tischler is going up against Democrat state Sen. Simcha Felder for the seat vacated by former Council member Kalman Yeger, when he won election to the New York State Assembly in November 2024. The conservative Democratic district located in Borough Park has seen strong turnout in recent years, but an off-year special election could see lower turnout for election day on March 25. News 12's requests for an interview with Felder were unsuccessful, but his New York state Senate site touts his experience in the district as assemblyman in the past and the state level, including funding for school buses for students in his district and funding for parents to school their children. Felder is in effect doing the reverse of what Yeger did by winning his statewide seat, by looking to go from Albany back to his city district. Tischler however is looking to flip the conservative Democratic seat to the Republicans with a focus on quality-of-life issues in the community, including affordable housing development and opposition to proposed shelters coming to the district. "We have got rid of this red tape in zoning, we want people to be able to build more than they can now, but if you are renting, if you are taking a profit, we need 30% of that going to affordable housing," he said. As for proposed homeless shelters, he says he is responding to opposition he is hearing in the community, that is concerned about the safety of having them located in the community. "You're going to ruin our property values the crime goes up stores got robbed, we already have a shelter like this no more I want to stop this shelter," he said. Felder says he would also push for a parking lot to address the communities double parking issue, and push for more police patrols of places of worships amid rising antisemitism. Early voting for the election is set to begin on March 15.