What's Your Take on This?

The Queens Chroncle believes that New Yorkers should just suck it up; and that the mayor should simply rescind those rebates: " But now, in the face of foreclosures, crumbling financial giants on Wall Street, and infrastructure that is centuries old in places, the city at large must face a harsh reality: the fiscal well has gone dry. Currently, Mayor Michael Bloomberg is exhorting city organizations to cut a total of $1.5 billion from the budget in an attempt to keep New York afloat. Closing budget gaps won’t be easy, but New York can’t operate in the red. Vital services, including police budgets, are now threatened. It’s for that reason that the $400 homeowner rebate should be rescinded and kept in the city’s rapidly dwindling coffers this year."

As if giving tax money back to its rightful owners was something that should be jettisoned before all of the city's other "essential" services." As the paper tells us: "Tax rebates are temporary for a reason. When times are good, and the city sees increased revenues from tourism, and throngs of shoppers crowding the streets, the government doesn’t need its people to subsidize things like police pay raises and infrastructure improvements so heavily."

What a load of crap! As if the folks weren't asked to fork over wagon loads full of tax cash even when "times are good." All of which leads us to ask: What prompts the Queens Chronicle to advocate such an asinine position? As a weekly read by Queens homeowners, the paper's take on the rebate issue is, well, counterintuitive.

So, as with most public policy isssues that revolve around the mayor, we're lead to speculate that somehow this Queens paper is another entity that's simply in the tank-because it's on the take, or angling to be. The following comment is almost an indictable offense: " Two-hundred fifty-six million dollars means more to New York City right now than $400 means to any one individual or family. Those millions can keep police on the street, and firemen in their stations at all hours of the night. That money can keep class sizes smaller in our schools, and can heat senior and community centers during the cold winter months ahead."

Mike Bloomberg couldn't have phrased it better-but we're wondering what the Queens Civic Congress-or our friend Rose Marie Poveromo of the United Community Civic Asociation-would say about this editorial outrage? Someone should challenge the Chronicle to justify why its views are so out of synch with its readers.