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Bensonhurst City Councilman Sal Albanese got bounced as chairman of the council's Youth Services Committee because he wouldn't toe the line drawn by Council Speaker Peter Vallone. Vallone, the veteran Queens Democrat who doubles as majority leader, apparently is trying to impose party discipline on the newly-empowered council, which might seem a touch excessive on a body in which 34 of the 35 members - the exception being Staten Island Republican Fred Cerullo - are in the same party.
Albanese, whose final falling out with Vallone stemmed from disagreements over the plan to hire thousands of police officers, recalled a former council strongman from Brooklyn in damning Vallone with faint praise.
"I had the opportunity to serve under the leadership of {the late council leader} Tom Cuite," Albanese said. "While Tom rarely tolerated dissent, he never sought to give the impression that he would."
So there.
Albanese may have been pushed out, but several other Brooklyn council members were pushed up to chair committees, posts which come with salary lulus ranging...