06-07-09 – 7:30 p.m. - His predecessor Kirsten Gillibrand may have invented the tradition of “Congress on Your Corner,” but Scott Murphy did Gillibrand one better by establishing a regional office for the southern counties of the 20th Congressional District on a corner—the corner of Seventh and Warren streets in Hudson—a location even more visible (it’s a storefront with plate glass windows) and more accessible (there are no stairs to climb) than Gillibrand’s former Hudson headquarters at 446 Warren Street.

On Monday, June 1, the Democratic Party faithful and a few curious passers-by gathered to welcome Scott Murphy to his new office at 621 Warren Street. Murphy was running late, but although people roamed around, shifted conversation groups, and showed some impatience about taking time out of the middle of a workday, no one left before Murphy made his appearance. As Murphy talked to those gathered on the sidewalk, it became very easy to understand why it might be hard for him to maintain a schedule. He ignored suggestions from his aides that he go inside for a photo-op and an interview for TV news, in favor of staying outside and inviting questions and comments from his constituents.

Murphy, who was sworn in on April 29, began by telling what he’d been up to in the thirty-two days since taking office, alluding to the lull in media attention after the intense coverage that the previous twenty-nine days of his political life had gotten as reporters and analysts delivered blow-by-blow accounts of the agonizing review of the absentee ballots and the legal maneuvers that followed the March 31 Special Election.

Murphy reported that he had spent his first month as a Congressman working on legislation to aid veterans and create jobs—job creation and small business development being the main enterprise of Murphy’s career before politics and the main theme of his political campaign. On May 20, he introduced his first amendment on the House floor—an amendment to the Job Creation Through Entrepreneurship Act of 2009 (H.R. 2352). The amendment increases funding for a new Veterans Business Center program to provide entrepreneurial training and counseling to veterans seeking to develop small businesses in their communities.