What are some of your proudest achievements from the past year? In January, I took office as the first woman County Judge in Albany County history. While that is a proud achievement, it pales in comparison to the deep satisfaction I felt seeing troubled young defendants graduate from the U-CAN program I created.

I started U-CAN shortly after taking office in 2016 as a Cohoes City Court judge because I related to traumatized, abandoned, directionless youth, and I knew that with the right guidance and support from a mentor, and my own brand of tough-love justice, they could begin to reach their potential. I wanted to rescue young lives while at the same time making my community safer. Over the past year, approximately a half dozen young defendants fulfilled the year-long interim probation conditions that I had set, diligently met with their volunteer mentor an hour a week, and left my court with no criminal history, and a newly discovered confidence; their past is no longer an impenetrable to becoming a successful, law-abiding, tax-paying member of the community.