Another One Bites the Dust

As we have been telling folks, another neighborhood supermarket has no officially gone by the wayside. As the NY Daily News reports this morning, a Key Food store in Bay Ridge will close its doors in June to, surprise, surprise, make way for another chain drug store: "A Bay Ridge supermarket will shut its doors in June - and most likely reopen as - what else? - a chain drugstore. As part of a citywide problem, the Key Food supermarket at Third Ave. and 94th St. will be replaced by a Walgreens, grocery union officials said they were told. "It's happening everywhere, and it's going to continue to happen; this is just the latest example," said Pat Purcell, president of the United Food and Commercial Workers Union."

If this trend continues than the only place that people will be able to buy their groceries will be from street vendors, or from higher priced small grocery stores. As Councilman Gentile tells the News: "My concern is that over the last 10 years, we've lost some major supermarkets in the community," Gentile said. "We have to rely on either the small convenience stores or drive."

The news of the store's closing was not greeted well by folks in the community: "This is the worst thing for me; I've been coming here for 15 years," said Lia Dizanis, 38, who lives a block away. "I have two little kids. I can't go far," she said. "There's already [a pharmacy] a block away. Do we really need another one?" There are about nine pharmacies within a 10-block radius of the Key Food, but only one supermarket - a Food Town Supermarket on 90th St."

As was mentioned, the store's closing represents a trend that the Department of City Planning has written about in a report that is slated to be issued in the next day or two: "A City Planning Commission study found that many New Yorkers drive to suburban supermarkets for better selection, causing smaller city markets to close. Bay Ridge shoppers said they worried about the strain on Food Town. "It's too small as it is," said John Walsh, 70, as he walked out of Food Town with a steak. "The lines are going to be terrible."

But the issue, we believe, is less about sales leakage to the suburbs than it is about the escalating cost of real estate a trend that we've seen taking place even in El Barrio. According to the East Harlem supermarket task force six markets have closed in the past couple of years, unable to cope with the rising rents.

East Harlemites are now forced to either walk for many blocks to shop, or settle for the higher priced bodegas. Clearly, we need dramatic and effective government intervention to stem the supermarket demise.

Cardwell Leaves a Void

As Azi reported yesterday, the NY Times' Diane Cardwell is leaving Room 9 to go to Stanford. But, as he points out, Cardwell will be missed because of her keen critical eye on the mayor's tenure-and particularly on his penchant for expanding the role of government. Here's one of her most trenchant critiques: "Mayor Michael R. Bloomberg has promoted himself as a model of fiscal restraint, issuing dire warnings about the slowing economy, recently asking agencies to limit hiring, and even listing “fiscal responsibility” as an interest on his MySpace page. At the same time, a review of the city’s budget since 1980 shows that Mr. Bloomberg has been presiding over one of the greatest expansions of city government since the John V. Lindsay administration, fueled by an extraordinary surge in real estate revenues, both from higher property taxes and transfer taxes from sales."

Which is, of course, a point that we've been making for over six years, even going so far as to compare the mayor and his administration to the Lindsay years. This guy has been profligate with the tax payers money, and we haven't gotten any real bang for the buck under his reign. As the Cardwell piece went on to point out: "Spending on schools jumped 14 percent, to $16 billion, driven by a 40 percent increase in teacher salaries favored by Mr. Bloomberg, among other expenses. And although the number of city workers has declined by about 1 percent since Mr. Bloomberg took office, he has been increasing the staff of late, adding nearly 10,000 workers since 2004, bringing the total up to 367,643."

Which is precisely the point of the NY Sun editorial that we commented on earlier. Where have the other editorialists been as the size and scope of government has been enlarged-with no discernible impact on the quality of life? Bloomberg is no reinventor of government; he's more of a renter of government-all for his own aggrandizement.

The Times captures this towards the end of the analysis: “He does look to the revenue side to meet needs,” said Charles Brecher, research director at the Citizens Budget Commission, a business-backed research group and a co-author of “Power Failure,” which studied New York politics and policy from 1960 to the early 1990s. “It’s not that he’s necessarily taken on new roles for government, but he’s put money into education, he’s paying people more, and there has been selected expansion in some services.”

All true, but to what good effect? We'll give the reliable Esther Fuchs the singing finale on all of this: "Ester R. Fuchs, a political science professor at Columbia University who was a special adviser to the mayor in his first term, said that Mr. Bloomberg’s spending pattern represents a new strategy for keeping cities healthy and competitive. “He was never antigovernment,” Ms. Fuchs said. “He actually viewed government as having a role, and by making government both more responsible and efficient, he made people more comfortable with the idea that government could spend the money effectively.”

Our advice? Don't let Dr. Fuchs write the history of this administration; we really don't need hagiography from sycophants.

Sun Shines as a Disinfectant

Yesterday's NY Sun editorial on the city council budget mess was a real first. For the first time there was an editorial focus on the over all budget problem-something that is systemic and does not relate exclusively to the malfeasance of the legislature. As the paper points out: "Lest the City Council slush fund be interpreted as just another dog-bites-man story about corrupt local government officials, the point needs to be made that this was a double default. Not only did the City Council create a slush fund by allocating funds to dummy organizations that did not even exist, but Mayor Bloomberg — the mayor with a reputation as a competent businessman manager — failed to exercise oversight over the money."

Exactly right; and that's not all, the Sun also takes a look at the opacity of mayoral spending, and the lack of any real oversight anywhere: "It was the inevitable consequence of a city budget process that is a sham. At the federal and state level, there's oversight and negotiation between the executive branch and the legislature over how much gets spent and on what. In New York City, there's no such negotiation. The entire budget "negotiation" is a talk about how much money the Council will get to spend itself, however the various members want."

What the Sun highlights, is the fact that the city council focus is a diversion from taking a hard look at a real reform of the entire budget-making process. The pea here is under the mayoral shell, and the mayor has failed in exercising the proper due diligence over, not only the council's spending, but his own.

So the Sun muses that the mayor's approval of the army of lawyers for the council is an effort to cover his own ass: "New York City's government spending consists of blank checks with no balances. In other words, the Council slush fund scandal isn't just about a few crooked Council members or Council staffers or even crooked Council speakers. What it is about is a default by both the Council and the mayor of their fundamental duties to act as a check on the other branch of government. It's no wonder that the mayor says he sees nothing wrong with spending taxpayer money on high-priced outside lawyers to protect the individual City Council members and their staff from federal and local prosecutors trying to get to the bottom of the matter. If the truth does come outs, it isn't going to leave anyone involved looking like responsible custodians of public funds."

It's time that everyone here gets a thorough good government enema; and it's high time for our guardians of the Fourth Estate to practice a more thorough vigilance, and not miss the forest for the trees.

Pot and the Kettle

As we've been highlighting constantly, the furor over the city council's discretionary spending masks the much greater allocation of no bid funds that are dispensed by the Bloombergistas. Now these chickens may be coming home to roost. As the NY Sun reports this morning: "Mayor Bloomberg is coming under fire from the members of the City Council, who are criticizing his distribution of taxpayer dollars just as the council is facing heightened scrutiny for its own allocation of public funds to local organizations."

And it's about time. If these spending patterns are examined, you'll find that the council misdeeds pale in comparison to the lack of oversight on executive spending. Will the editorialists who've been in a state of apoplexy over the member items have any outrage in reserve for St. Michael?

Maybe a state comptroller investigation will trigger a more equitable evaluation of the city's spending habits: "The state comptroller, Thomas DiNapoli, announced in January that he would audit the city Department of Education’s increasingly common practice of awarding noncompetitive contracts, which have totaled more than $270 million since 2002." Can't wait to see what he finds-after all, the educational success of the city is money well spent-right?

Update

The NY Times, once again exhibiting its unique brand of trained incapacity (courtesy of Liz), fails in its editorial to understand the bigger picture on this issue: "It is time to end these slush funds in the State Capitol and in City Hall. Instead, all projects should be financed through the regular budgeting process. That is the only way to ensure more transparency and that the public’s and not the politicians’ interests are served.

What would be a better fit to print is the suggestion that there be a full examination of how the no bid contracting at DOE served the Mayor's interests without achieving very much in educational advancement. We can't have greater transparency in one area of city government when the greater need for sunshine elsewhere is ignored.

NY Post on the Warpath

The NY Post editorializes today in favor of the governor taking strong action to insure that cigarette taxes are collected from Indian retailers: "Gov. Paterson says he's worried about Albany's deteriorating fiscal for tunes. Well, he could start collecting hundreds of millions in new revenue tomorrow by putting his foot down on Indian tribes' longstanding mockery of state cigarette-tax law. So what's taking so long?"

Indeed, what is the hang up? The Post sees timidity here in the face of potential Indian violence: "But the tribes, raking in dough from booming black-market sales, refuse to comply - and Govs. George Pataki and Eliot Spitzer each meekly acquiesced. Both no doubt feared a reprise of Pataki's enforcement effort, a 1997 crackdown that resulted in (among other acts of violence) Seneca Indians blocking a state highway with a giant tire fire. In other words, the govs chickened out."

What a sad scene. Millions of dollars being passed up because of the terrorist veto-and we're now on the third governor without the intestinal fortitude to simply enforce the law. Isn't it bad enough that the state's convenience stores and bodegas are getting the shaft? Do the tax payers also have to pay more so that a few Indian retailers can rake in the dough?

Let's get moving on this. No one should be above the law; and no one should be allowed, through the threat of violence, to intimidate. The average tax payer doesn't. The Post has the last word on this: "Contrast that with the hoops that state legislators jumped through in the recently passed state budget to squeeze every last drop of revenue from the tax code - most notoriously, a creative reinterpretation of the sales tax that would turn the screws on Web retailers for a measly $50 million. Maybe if Amazon.com shoppers built a tire fire on the Capitol lawn, Gov. Paterson would take notice? He needs to collect the cigarette tax now. It's not just the money - but also the principle of the thing."

East Harlem Supermarket Task Force

Or friends at Local 1500 of the UFCW have alerted us to the establishment of an East Harlem Supermarket task force; it seems that El Barrio is experiencing the same gentrification tsunami that have forced supermarkets out of other neighborhood. The task force is being spearheaded by Senator Serrano and Assemblyman Powell, but includes the Coalition Against Hunger, the DOH, WEACT, Mt. Sinai, Council member Viverito and of course Local 1500. We're taking the liberty of highlighting some of the task force's key focal points:

Challenges Faced by Supermarkets

(1)"The core problem is renewal of leases." As old leases expire, cost of rents so high that it becomes prohibitive to renew;

(2) Large corporate drug stores are often able to provide same products for lower prices than independent supermarkets;

(3) Supermarkets rep say that street vendors selling fresh produce cut into their profits. If healthy options are an integral part of protecting supermarkets, then we have to consider the profit margin of the healthy foods they sell;

(4) Traffic issues of major concern. Road work impedes deliveries.Loading docks needed. Apparently, wholesaler White Rose spent $750,000 in parking tickets last year alone;

(5) Examples like the new development at 135th Street across from Harlem Hospital. The landlords wants to keep C-Town but the new rent they offer is overwhelming. It's noted that many sites of priced-out supermarkets remain vacant for a long time. (Landlords go from wanting to make so much money to making no money at all;

(6) Overzealous inspectors will sometimes create headaches over relatively small violations at the supermarket.

We think that these issues are generic to neighborhoods all over the city, and as the task force points out, there are some important policy steps that need to be considered:

Possible Courses of Action and Related

(1)Developing an system whereby landlords receive property tax abatements if they invite supermarkets and then maintain affordable rents for them over time (to which we would add waiving the commercial real estate tax for supermarket space);

(2) Developing dedicated loading zones in back of markets, as well as dedicated off-hour loading times;

(3) Off-grade rental spaces still cost a lot, but are significant lower than street level. Could be an option in the new developments going up;

(4) Increase advocacy on food stamps. Food stamp participation has declined by 320,000 people in the last 12 years. Increasing this number will bring increased revenue at supermarkets in low-income neighborhoods. Also: we could look at ways of spacing out food stamp availability, to reduce the imbalance of supermarket profits over course of the month.

This is the kind of brainstorming that needs to be done on a city wide level, and we congratulate the East Harlem group. The combined grocery price rise with the disappearance of local supermarkets is reaching a crisis level. It needs to be addressed pronto if we're going to have a truly sustainable city.

Paper or Plastic?

In this morning's Newsday, there's an article dealing with the effectiveness of plastic bag recycling. As we've commented before, we're not persuaded that the voluntary measures will work-nor are we convinced that the environmental concerns are unassailable here. One thing we should all be aware of is the impact of unintended consequences; remember that the ethanol push and the current food shortages are connected-something that the global warmers need to be cognizant of.

Now NYC is about to implement its own voluntary recycling program for the bags, receptacles that are omnipresent in every city neighborhood litter basket, and are generally filled with dog poop. But will the folks recycle? As Newsday points out: "It's unclear how voluntary measures that rely on conscientious shoppers would reduce litter tossed by those who presumably care little for the environment. "When people recycle, they recognize a material has value and are, we believe, less likely to litter," said Keith Christman of the plastic bag industry group Progressive Bag Affiliates."

And the rates where voluntary programs are in place aren't a cause for celebration: "San Francisco, which banned nonbiodegradable bags last year, had voluntary recycling in place for decades, said Mark Westlund, spokesman for the city's Department of the Environment. "We found we were getting about a 1 percent recycling rate, which means that the program is about a 99 percent failure," he said."

The problem, unlike with the bottle law, is that absent any monetary incentive there's no compelling reason, other than an environmental consciousness, for customers to recycle: "There is really no incentive for bringing back the bags," said Mike McGuire of Huntington, after he redeemed two sacks of plastic soda bottles for their deposits at the store's bottle room."

Which means that the measure in the city is really a holding pattern orchestrated by the plastic bag group. The NRDC's Eric Goldstein's comments are to this point: "Eric Goldstein, a senior attorney with the Natural Resources Defense Council, supports the voluntary recycling laws but acknowledged that some backers have ulterior motives."I don't think it's a secret that some industry groups use voluntary recycling programs as a way of dissipating energy for more vigorous efforts to combat waste and litter," Goldstein said."

Which gets us right back to the efficacy question: "But will the programs work? "That's the $64,000 question," said Trottere, whose company sells disposable and reusable bags, and a recycling system that outfits retailers with bins and signs. "What is the average grocery shopper going to do? Are they going to inconvenience themselves, collect the bags and take them back to the mall?"

We'll all stay tuned. But let's not expect any great rush to the supermarket unless there's a significant deposit placed on the bags just as there is on soda and beer containers. The only certainty? Greater compliance costs for already hard pressed food retailers.

Indian Showdown?

As the NY Post reported yesterday, there may be a showdown that will force the Paterson administration to enforce the tax law on Indian smokes: "Tax-free cigarettes from Indian reservations will go up in smoke if some in Albany get their way. Lawyers for a state lawmaker and Gov. Paterson are scheduled to face off in an upstate courtroom tomorrow in a case aimed at forcing the state to follow the law and collect sales tax on every pack sold by the 200 or so reservation stores and via the Internet."

This is not insignificant by any means. Because of the high cigarette taxes in New York, one out of every three packs sold in the state are coming from tax evading Indian retailers, This is costing New York tax payers a fortune: "Last year, roughly 304 million packs of cigarettes were sold by New York's Indian tribes - and, as has been the practice for years, not a penny of tax was collected. As the state tax rises to $2.75 a pack - the highest in the nation - on June 3, New York would be forfeiting about $836 million in annual revenue by choosing not to collect taxes from reservations. In the city, the tax is $1.50 more."

So much for law and order. With budget shortfalls and tax hikes on the Albany agenda, you'd think that Governor Paterson and his advisers would be all over this. Think again: "Paterson has asked his staff to research the topic, and he wants to come to an agreement with the tribes, a statehouse spokesman told The Post. That is not sitting well with a host of critics. They are urging Paterson simply to follow the law." Shouldn't be that hard to do.

If higher cigarette taxes are the linchpin for reducing smoking rates, then it should be clear to one and all that tax evasion is allowing hundreds of thousands of smokers to keep feeding their addiction at a greatly reduced rate-not to mention the legitimate store owners who are getting shafted by the tobacco warriors: "It is driving hundreds of thousands of non-Indian customers away from licensed convenience stores, decimating their businesses," James Calvin, president of the New York Association of Convenience Stores, wrote in a recent letter to Paterson."

In NYC, where the state tax is seen and matched by an additional $1,50 per pack, the black market is flourishing, and no one is really taking this issue head on because of the fear of being politically incorrect. The mayor should get on his soapbox immediately-for the children, if not for the small store owners that he doesn't seem to give a fig about.

Food for Thought

The high cost of food is now impacting the area food banks, and other purveyors to the needy. As the NY Daily News points out: "Out-of-control food prices have risen so steeply that a charity feeding 1.3 million New Yorkers is in crisis. The numbers of hungry people relying on the Food Bank for New York City have risen by 24% in only one year as costs for basics - including bread, eggs and milk - have skyrocketed. Prices are so high that donors who give the bank food have had to cut back."

As we have commented, this food crisis will soon roil the political process, as government looks to address the skyrocketing cost of groceries. This issue does, of course, intersect with the problem of vanishing local supermarkets-the first exacerbating the second as the availability of healthy affordable food diminishes all around.

So we're gonna have to see some kind of political response to the crisis, and the increase in food stamp availability should be seen as a companion to the government assurance that local grocery stores can continue to operate profitably in the city's neighborhoods. Large supermarkets that are able to effectively discount are crucial, otherwise the only alternative are higher priced bodegas that are no substitute for large food discounters.

The crisis is real and, as the News points out: "U.S. Department of Agriculture figures show eggs cost 25% more now than they did a year ago. Milk and other dairy products jumped 13%. "We'll find ways of getting food," said Cabrera. "We'll just have to be very creative and find new ways to rescue food that would otherwise be wasted. "But if food prices keep rising like this, we're going to have to hope for more help from the government."

We're waiting for real political leadership here in the city. So far the mayor has been silent, but if he can focus his attention on this issue then perhaps we can get some action. Here's something that a tad more important than charging commuters a fee to enter the CBD.

Point-Counterpoint: Divide and Conquer

Eliot Brown has an intriguing post on the Observer web site on the possibility that the city may pursue a two-phased development strategy. He sites a portion of the EIS: "The alternative plan, studied in the draft environmental impact statement, calls for acquiring the land and building the project, in two phases. The plan includes acquiring the land on the western portions of the site first, where most of the smaller automotive-related businesses are based, while the owner-occupied businesses on the eastern portion would have more time before they sell their land. The plan would be the same in size, though the first half would be done by 2013, according to the plan studied, while the second half would be done by 2017."

If true, this would mean that the city was going to go after the most vulnerable of the smaller businesses, taking them out so that it could create a momentum that would eventually put the larger "owner-occupied" firms in an increasingly untenable position. A classic divide and conquer strategy that the smaller businesses need to be aware of if they're gonna survive this process.

Blight Fight

In spite of the high degree of opposition to the Willets Point ULURP application, an opposition that saw 29 city council signatories to a letter to EDC chastising the agency for moving the rezoning of the Point prematurely, some Queens officials aren't giving up. As the NY Sun reports: "Elected officials in Queens are calling for the city to move forward with a proposed development in Willets Point, despite strong objections from City Council members and local businesses. Yesterday, Queens President Helen Marshall led a rally outside of City Hall in support of the $3 billion plan, which would include a convention center and hotel."

Queens BP Helen Marshall told the city hall presser that the Iron Triangle area was, "blighted,” and said that the development was needed to remove environmental hazards." Talk about throwing the baby out with the bath water. The blight in question here is a self inflicted wound by a city that has neglected the area even while businesses have been contributing taxes and employment for decades.

Still, the pols in support here don't have the real say in the matter. As the Queens Chronicle reports (courtesy of Liz), even Speaker Quinn appears to be unwilling to grant the current ULURP application any legitimacy: " Council Speaker Christine Quinn was not happy that the plan is going forward despite such major opposition. “When a majority of council members signal their concern about a project, all parties should take notice,” she said. “While there is still time to work out any differences, I am disappointed that the plan was certified when there is clearly such adamant opposition in the council.”

The first land use hearing on this matter will be on May 5th at Community Board 7. Here's a synopsis of the review process: "Public hearings will begin on the community board level, proceed to the Borough President’s Office, the City Planning Commission and finally the City Council. Marilyn Bitterman, district manager of C.B. 7, said on Monday that the board’s Land Use Committee would hold its first Willets Point meeting on May 5. It will not be heard by the full community board until June." This one will really be interesting.

Community's Armory Challenge

As we've been saying, the effort by the coalition of community groups in the Northwest Bronx to negotiate a viable CBA will be a real challenge. As the NY Daily News reports this morning: "Deal with us or no deal, a coalition of community, unions and elected officials told the newly selected developer of the Kingsbridge Armory Thursday. The group said it wants The Related Cos. to agree to a community benefits agreement better than the one it now has at another one of its Bronx projects."

Oh yes, the other Bronx project referred to is the Bronx Terminal Market site, land that Related acquired for next to nothing and without the benefit of a public bid. The company's asthma-inducing mall is currently rising next to the Deegan, and the CBA that was "negotiated" was a creature of no real community input-a set up by BP Carrion and friends.

As history has proven, Related's not the easiest company to negotiate community friendly agreements with-and if they bring Jesse James Masyr into the discussions, hold fast to your community benefits wallets. So far, however, the community coalition's hanging tough: "Thursday, the Kingsbridge Armory Redevelopment Alliance (KARA) gathered on the steps of City Hall to demand the firm negotiate a binding benefits agreement before final project approval. "The Kingsbridge Armory was built to serve and protect our community," said Desiree Pilgrim-Hunter, a founding member of KARA. "Let's make it a beacon of hope once again."

The list of KARA's demands also presents a challenge. As The NY Times reported on yesterday's event: "Among the items on their wish list: an agreement for the jobs at the shopping center to meet the city’s “living wage” standard of $10 an hour, or $10.50 without benefits, instead of the $7.15-an-hour minimum wage; a hiring preference for local residents; community space in the project, including a recreation center; and a guarantee that the construction work will be done by union workers only, and that an apprenticeship program for local residents will be established."

For its part, Related is saying all of the right things: "A spokeswoman from Related, Joanna Rose, said in a statement,“Related looks forward to working with the community and all the stakeholders to redevelop the Kingsbridge Armory and continue the renaissance of the Bronx.” The devil, as usual, will be in the details.

We'll see how all of this transpires, particularly as the strength of the city council continues to erode in the face of the slush fund scandal. It may be that the current political constellation is aligned just right for the community to have maximum impact. KARA, for its part, is an impressive grass roots coalition: "KARA - which includes the Northwest Bronx Community and Clergy Coalition; the Retail, Wholesale and Department Store Union; building trade unions and local churches - is well positioned to influence the process."

Happy Hour at DOH

With the restaurant industry getting a stay in order to appeal the Judge Holwell decision on calorie posting, leave it to the Department of Health to give us a good laugh. Here, in the NY Sun, is the city's response to the appeal: “Each month its implementation is delayed, another 10 million meals are served at chain restaurants in New York City without point of purchase calorie information, further worsening the obesity epidemic and its related health risks...”

Leave it to the DOH to allege, with absolutely no evidence, that their regulation is crucial for the fight against obesity. Last we looked the Department's "study" was rejected by the CDC' Morbity and Mortality journal. Here's what we obseved a few weeks ago: ""City health officials ran into difficulties at the end of last year when they tried to get the report published. The editor at the Morbidity and Mortality Weekly Reports, published by the CDC, wrote in an e-mail message to Dr. Frieden that the “conclusions being drawn by the study, are of course, problematic.”

UFCW Pushes for Supermarket Development Plan

In response to the exodus of supermarkets in NYC neighborhoods, the UFCW Local 1500 has launched its own political effort to spur supermarket development and retention. As the latest issue of Supermarket News points out: "The United Food and Commercial Workers Local 1500 on Tuesday applauded a recent study by the city’s planning commission showing detrimental public health and economic effects of a lack of supermarkets in certain city neighborhoods and unveiled a 14-point statement of policy suggestions designed to assist communities gain greater access to food stores. The policy suggestions encourage the preservation and development of supermarkets in low-income communities by making economic incentives available to food retailers to build and operate stores, and to discourage supermarkets from being evicted."

Given the wave of losses, most recently in Bay Ridge where a Key Food store is being converted into a CVS, and also given the fact that the availability of affordable food is rapidly becoming an important political issue, the union's push here is a timely one. Where waiting to see just how sincere the Bloombergistas are on this; and how much resources they will be willing to commit to insure that low income New Yorkers especially have access to healthy foods.

Up until this point, the mayor and his health minions have relied on industry compliance-forcing changes on restaurants in the form of calorie posting on menus; and have looked to flood produce peddlers into neighborhoods where markets are struggling to make money. The supermarket program, however, would mean that the administration would have to use its own money (or rather the tax payers' cash) to effect change-always a more formidable barrier.

The real interesting scenario is whether Mike Bloomberg will intercede on behalf of the Soundview neighborhood to prevent the loss of the one major supermarket in the community; and in doing so confront Vornado, a real estate entity that has become engorged at the public trough. A real test case.

Vornado Watch

According to the Observer's real estate blog, our friends at Vornado, undeterred by their failure to outbid Jerry Speyer for the Far West Side property, are back in the game: "Vornado Realty Trust, led by CEO Steve Roth, has been selected to develop an expanded trade show facility on the far West Side, expanding a modest convention center on Pier 94 into Pier 92." And it appears from this report that the project will be subject to some kind of environmental review since Vornado has hired good old Philip Habib to do a traffic study.

What this means is that Vornado, intent upon evicting a neighborhood Key Food from a shopping center that it owns in the Bronx, needs to curry city favor in order to get approval for its latest real estate venture. It would be a perfect time for the city council and the mayor to use this discretionary opportunity to get the proper quid pro quo from the Distrusters at Vornado.

The project at Pier 94 will not be the last favor that Vornado seeks-and we'll be looking to see who's gonna step up. As the Sun reports this morning: "Along with the Related Companies, Vornado is involved in the plan to remake Pennsylvania Station and turn the surrounding area into a premier residential and office district. With the right public pressure we're sure that Roth will see the handwriting on the wall, as he did when he scrapped his Wal-Mart project in Rego Park.

The Price is Rice

With the city having lost over 1/3 of its supermarkets in the past five years, it will be increasing difficult for consumers-particularly those in low income neighborhoods-to find good modern food outlets. This problem will be exacerbated by the fact that food prices are rising all over the globe, and Americans are becoming really worried about the cost of groceries. As a Gallup survey found: "Rising food prices are a significant worry for Americans, with 73% of consumers in a new USA TODAY/Gallup Poll citing higher grocery bills as a concern, and nearly half saying food inflation has caused a hardship for their households."

In the city, one manifestation of this world wide crisis can be found in the scarcity of rice. As the NY Daily News reports this morning, "First we face a gas crisis. Now it's the price of rice that is hitting New Yorkers hard as the nation's shopkeepers confront shortages and several states have even started rationing." The scarcity of vital food staples, when coupled with a scarcity of supermarkets, could become a perfect storm in the city if policy makers don't start to address the problem right now.

And it looks as if the issue could become a major factor in this falls election, and in all likelihood. the next mayoral cycle here as well. As the NY Sun points out this morning: "When talking about the concerns that preoccupy voters in tough economic times, political analysts often turn to a well-worn phrase: bread-and-butter issues. It seems hard to dispute, then, that the cost of bread could end up playing a role in this year’s campaign for the White House."

And if we can help it, the shortage of supermarkets in NYC will be front and center for all of the city wide candidates for public office next year. Maybe then we can take all of those fruit peddlers and turn them into union workers at the local A&P, Key Food and Gristedes.

Community Armors Itself

As the Crain's Insider reports this morning, a coalition of community groups is gearing up to insure that a strong-community-based-benefits agreement is hammered out as part of the land use application for the redevelopment of the Kingsbridge Armory: "A day after the Bloomberg administration officially selected The Related Companies to redevelop the Kingsbridge Armory in the Bronx, a coalition of 20 groups said yesterday that it would press the firm for a community benefits agreement. The Kingsbridge Armory Redevelopment Alliance says it will not support the plan unless the agreement includes guarantees of union construction jobs, permanent living-wage retail jobs, and community space."

This shapes up to be a major battle since the Related Company is not known for its rapport with local communities-relying instead on cultivating support among Bronx electeds instead. And the community's biggest concern is about jobs, and not just any kind of jobs. As the NY Times pointed out yesterday: "“We have real needs here, and this building is an asset in the community that has not been used,” said Desiree Pilgrim-Hunter, a resident of the area for 25 years who supports the plan...“They have to provide jobs that pay, not low-paying jobs that continue the cycle of poverty,” said Father Joseph Girone of St. Nicholas of Tolentine Roman Catholic Church, which is a few blocks from the armory."

So expect that this will be an arduous process, one that will require vigilance so that the developer doesn't renege on its promises surrounding the tenanting of the facility-big box stores are an anathema to the community, and would cause gridlock in the Kingsbridge Road/Jerome Avenue corridor: "The retailers have not yet been chosen. Negotiations are continuing, which call for Related to buy the building, retain the exterior and rebuild the interior. The plan requires approval by the City Council, which officials said probably would not be granted until next year."

Yet it appears that EDC finally may have a clue about the importance of community support.
As the Times indicates, EDC President Seth Pinsky supports the local input: “The key to the success this time around was that from the very beginning of the process we’ve involved the local community,” Mr. Pinsky said." Vigilance is important here, because much can go wrong.

Supermarket Sayonara

As the NY Daily News reported yesterday, and as we've been saying for a while, the city is hemorrhaging supermarkets in almost every neighborhood. The News account concerns a Department of City Planning report (not yet available online) that finds: "A study discussed yesterday by the Planning Commission determined that virtually every neighborhood throughout the city lacks enough supermarkets, and the ones that exist are generally too small. That means that city shoppers flock to the suburbs to do much of their supermarket shopping, and the number of supermarkets is shrinking even as the city's population is growing."

What this means is that a comprehensive retention and promotion program for supermarkets is essential in order to meet the health and economic needs of the city's neighborhoods. The situation's so bad that many of the minority supermarket owners (around sixty according to our sources) have opened stores in North Carolina, Connecticut and Florida-an indication of how the cost of real estate is affecting both large and small food retailers.

The DCP study highlights the health issues that underlie this crisis: "Commenting on the study by her staff, Planning Commission Chairwoman Amanda Burden noted that the lack of supermarkets is most severe in areas of the city with high rates of obesity and diabetes. The study noted that diet-related diseases can be aggravated by the lack of availability to fresh fruits and vegetables." Which is why we have been saying that veggie peddlers are no substitute for good modern supermarkets.

An even more in-depth look at this market drain can be seen in the latest issue of City Limits. The magazine focuses on the city and state's efforts to emulate the Pennsylvania Supermarket Initiative: "Agriculture officials said they’re hoping to establish a program to boost supermarket development in underserved communities, basing the effort on a Pennsylvania program – the $120 million Fresh Food Financing Initiative – that’s been on the books since 2004. Widely considered a national model, Pennsylvania’s program has already helped to renovate or build 50 food stores statewide, all in underserved areas, since its inception."

The key here is to amalgamate various funding sources to make new market development not only feasible to the developer, but feasible in the ability of the market operator to offer food at prices deemed reasonable for the targeted neighborhood: "The Penn program encourages supermarket development by coordinating an array of funding sources, including the New Markets Tax Credit, private foundation grants, and municipal and state development funding. To receive funding assistance, stores must be located in low- or moderate-income census tracts; provide a full selection of fresh foods; and be located in areas where fresh food is lacking."

According to existing data cited by City Limits, the city has lost about 1/3 of its existing supermarkets. As we've remarked before, the loss can be attributed to rising rents: "In New York, the project is still in early discussion stages. Nonetheless, the effort could find a welcoming home here. City residents have lost one-third of their supermarkets in recent years, dropping from 1,312 in 2002 to 877 in 2008, according to a market analysis done by F&D Reports, a research group focused on food retail and distribution. That loss, said F&D’s Larry Sarf, is due to one thing: Skyrocketing rents."

City Limits also underscores the crucial health issue: "Losing markets can be more than just an inconvenience—it might well worsen residents' health. For every additional supermarket in a census tract, fruit and vegetable consumption increases by as much as 32 percent, according to an American Journal of Public Health study from 2002." The corollary question here is, what kind of health impact results from the loss of a large supermarket in a community that is determined to be lacking in decent access to things like fruits and vegetables?

All of this makes the decision of Vornado Realty and Distrust to evict a 30,000 sq. ft. Key Food from its location in Soundview all the more appalling. Soundview is precisely the kind of community that the DCP study is most concerned about. Vornado is simply not a good corporate citizen and we're planning-along with the 22,000 strong men and woman of Local 1500 of the UFCW- to inform the entire city about this until the mayor intercedes on behalf of the health of Bronxites.

Pie-in-the-Sky on the Menu

As the cockamamie scheme to use calorie posting to reduce obesity goes slowly forward we can always count on the editorialists at the NY Daily News for a huge dose of comic relief. Here's their take from today's editorial observation: "Talk about living off the fat of the land. Seven restaurant chains have begun posting calorie information in their outlets in the city - and the numbers are, to put it mildly, gut-popping...It's enough to make you think twice about ordering - and that's the point of Health Department efforts to enact calorie-posting rules starting this week."

Here's the rub. No one has been able, least of all the Department of Health, to demonstrate that this calorie information-information that will be confusing because of the complications of the fast food menus-will be utilized to make the customers choose healthier foods. And the idea that the restaurants are trying to avoid the loss of profits is silly: the private sector knows how to adapt to new demands from its customers.

The News ends with this flourish: "The industry should take its appeal and, pardon the pun, stuff it. Rather than worry about fat profits being nibbled away as customers realize what they've been eating, the chains should concentrate on meeting the potential new demand for, say, less whopping Whoppers." If the Daily News believes that this scheme will transform the fast food menus then we know what they've been consuming over at 33rd Street-pie-in-the-sky!

Might Makes Blight

With the Willets Point development ULURP moving sluggishly out of the planning gate, it is becoming increasingly clear that the 62 acre site, neglected by the city for decades, is suffering because of the city's announced plans to relocate the existing small auto-related businesses. As the NY Daily News reports this morning: "Though the Bloomberg administration's sweeping Willets Point redevelopment plan is far from a done deal, the bottom has already fallen out of the once-thriving auto repair business in the gritty industrial zone, store owners and managers said.
"Welcome to hell," Dennis Skeahan, 50, manager of Sunrise Auto Parts on Willets Point Blvd., said while waiting for customers under a hot sun last week. "It's not slumping - it's dead!"

This is part of a pattern wherever the threat of the use of eminent domain is in the air-as we've seen over in West Harlem where Columbia has bought up properties, allowed them to fall into disrepair, and has then asked that the development area in question be declared blighted. This has been, as the News makes clear, a thriving business destination before the development scheme was floated: "Working-class people used to come from all over the city to have their cars repaired. But with the city poised to swallow up the tangled industrial haven, managers said customers are looking elsewhere to fix their flat tires and busted windshields."

Well, good news may well be on the horizon, as the city council begins to question the entire development proposal. As the NY Sun points out: "The plan has drawn criticism for its possible use of eminent domain. Earlier this month, business owners around the Willets Point area filed a lawsuit against the city, accusing it of willingly neglecting the area to allow it to fall into disrepair.

In a letter to EDC, 29 council members outlined their skepticism: "This plan would displace more than 250 businesses, which employ 1,711 workers. The plan provides no guarantees that the displaced workers and small businesses will be treated fairly or compensated with meaningful benefits to the surrounding communities such as housing affordable to the average family," the letter said."

And now, according to Crains Insider, some of the plan's key backers are, well, looking to back out: "The city could be in danger of losing two key supporters of its proposed Willets Point overhaul. Queens Borough President Helen Marshall and Queens Chamber of Commerce Executive Vice President Jack Friedman are angered by potential alternatives that were revealed in the project’s environmental impact statement, which was released yesterday."

When it rains it pours-and the administration's plan appears to be all wet when it comes to getting the kind of political support needed to obtain approval. This is one land use review that has not begun auspiciously.

Pointing Over and Out

As Liz reported yesterday, and the NY Daily News reports this morning, it doesn't look good for the Bloomberg Nine in the Willets Point fray-and at the end of the ULURP process it appears to us that Mighty Michael will have (once again) struck out: "Twenty-nine Council members signed a letter sent today to Deputy Mayor Lieber and pledged to kill the Willets Point redevelopment plan unless it undergoes significant changes."

Here's the money quote from the Council letter: "Your decision to push the project forward into ULURP without public discussion indicates to us that you are not serious about ensuring that the project meets the basic standards of public benefit and fairness required for a redevelopment of this magnitude and this level of public investment."

And there's more on this development from the Observer's Eliot Brown, who first broke the ULURP certification story last week: "The letter seems to spell trouble for the Bloomberg administration on this project, which imagines a complete redevelopment of the manufacturing and car repair-intensive district. "As the plan currently stands, it has no chance of surviving the public review process. We urge you to come to the table and work with us," the letter reads."

It certainly appears to us that the Bloomberg administration is playing a high stakes game of chicken, but without a strong ally across city hall it's hard to see how this will go forward; there are still too many unresolved issues, and the fate of 250 businesses and over 2,000 mostly minority workers that Tom Angotti so eloquently has documented, cannot be left to the same folks who've, up until this point, only exhibited a contempt for small businesses. As Councilman Monseratte says: "As currently structured this plan cannot go forward..."

Not to be outdone yesterday, Azi also chimed in on the Willets Point matter, underscoring our concerns about displacement: "The redevelopment plans would take out all the auto shops and replace them with housing, office space, hotel rooms and possibly a convention center.
“The plan provides no guarantees that the displaced workers and small businesses will be treated fairly or compensated with meaningful benefits to the surrounding communities such as housing affordable to the average family,” says the letter."

Given the strength of the letter-and the fact that the Land Use Committee Chair Melinda Katz has already voiced her concerns-it does appear that the Blooombergistas are preparing for another land use crash and burn. And the mayor's legacy....?

Sun Shines on Bloomberg's Childishness

In a wonderfully on point editorial, the NY Sun chastises Mike Bloomberg for his "adult" in the White House comment: "For Mr. Bloomberg to turn around and suggest that Mr. Bush is somehow not an adult or that that he is lacking in leadership abilities displays just an uncharacteristic lack of graciousness by the mayor. It may be that Mr. Bloomberg is feeling frustrated by his own lack of leadership abilities — his inability to get a West Side stadium or congestion pricing past the legislature in Albany, the same legislature that has also blocked his plan to evaluate the city's public school teachers using test scores."

Petulance is not unexpected when you find rich folks stymied by their own inabilities in politics. It's just nice to see the press call it like it is as far as the great Bloomberg mayoral legacy is concerned.

Regimen at the Armory: Bait and Switch?

As the NY Post reports this morning, the redevelopment of the Kingsbridge Armory has been given over to the Related Company-which brings to mind the count the silver admonition when someone unsavory shows up at a dinner party. The stated plan is as follows: "Under Related's plan, the 575,000-square-foot site will become home to an "anchor" department store, up to 35 smaller shops, a number of restaurants and a movie multiplex. "It's going to be catalytic for the neighborhood," said Seth Pinsky, president of the city's Economic Development Corp."

Whether this is a catalyst or a death knell will depend on the vigilance of the elected officials and the good people over at the Northwest Bronx Community Clergy Coalition-the local community watchdogs on all of the doings at the armory. Put simply: Related can't be trusted and iron clad agreements need to be put into place to insure that there isn't any last minute "modifications" of the developers plans.

In particular before "anchors away," there needs to be a certainty about the kind of anchor store that will be sited at this complex-and with the Bronx's first supermarket, a MortonWilliams Associated, located right across the street we don't need to see any food use or a box store that doubles as a supermarket, a la Wal-Mart or Costco.

The access to the armory site is nowhere near ideal so that any unacceptable uses for the development will be hotly, and successfully contested, given the community's organized role in all of this. We'll be watching this one closely.

Food Fight at the Met

In what's rapidly becoming a common theme, there's a rent dispute threatening the continued existence of a Met Supermarket in the East Village; and like the other dispute we've been talking about in the Bronx, it all comes down to preserving affordable supermarkets as real estate values climb. As the NY post reports: "Negotiations between NYU and the Met Foodmarket - which occupies the ground floor of a university-owned building at 107 Second Ave. - came to an abrupt end earlier this month when the store was offered a three-year lease at triple the current rent, said owner Michael Schumacher."

Unlike the Soundview situation, however, where Vornado the landlord is playing the Marie Antoinette "Let them Eat Cake" refrain, NYU appears to have a soupcon more social responsibility that the Vornado folks: "Alicia Hurley, the NYU vice president for government and community affairs, said, "We're hopeful, as well. It is certainly our intention to keep him in the space."

The key issue, of course, is affordability-and what the mayor intends to do with these kinds of rapidly becoming typical situations. As the owner of the supermarket tells the Post: "It was outrageous," he said. "We couldn't operate at even double the rent. We'd have to close."
That would leave local residents - including budget-minded NYU students and the cash-strapped elderly - out of luck." And this is happening all over the city.

Cutting Council Members' Items

On Saturday the NY Times editorial board decided to give New Yorkers another civics lesson, and our only response: "physician heal thyself." It appears as if the Times doesn't like the way in which the city council distributes discretionary funds; and believes that this should be the sole prerogative of the executive branch: "Discretionary funds are always prone to abuse, and so it is with City Council earmarks...It is disappointing that Ms. Quinn is not calling for the elimination of the discretionary funds. Legislators are elected to pass laws and draw up budgets, not hand out money to favor-seekers."

Well now, let's examine this blanket assertion. All the legislatures that we know-from the Congress on down-appropriate monies through the use of earmarks, and there's little doubt that the practice can really be abused in a piggish fashion. At the same time, all of the monies that are appropriated must be funneled through an executive agency. And the scandal involving the Donna Reid Fund can be laid partially at the door of a mayoral agency that failed to do any proper due diligence.

So the NY Times, what a shock, is simply flat out wrong in its Poli Sci 101 lecture. The Times, in all of its resplendent ignorance, also ignores the long history of executive abuses-and it might have taken the time in this context to reference the prison jaunt being prepared by Newark Mayor Sharpe James; not to mention Governor Rowland's malfeasance over in Connecticut.

So we understand that corruption and politics are often coterminous, and the legislative venue for appropriations is no exception. That being said, the call for the elimination of the legislative role in discretionary funding furthers the imbalance between the branches of government in NYC; and assumes executive propriety where we find its absence.

The Times' take is wrongheaded; "The system’s defenders argue that it allows council members to direct money to worthy community groups that might be overlooked in the big-ticket budgetary process. That may be so, but it creates far more serious problems than it solves. It leaves taxpayer money vulnerable to misuse and theft. It also makes it far too tempting and far too easy for politicians to use these funds for political gain. Council members are allowed to run their districts like fiefdoms they control with a big bag of public money."

Some fiefdoms! Some "big bag" of money. Remember the old saying: "The law in all of its majesty, punishes the thief who steals the goose from off of the commons, but lets the greater felon loose, who steals the common from the goose." Mayor Bloomberg has given out millions of dollars in unbid contracts-and has let certain developers heist public lands with no RFPs in sight. The Times' myopia in all of this is telling.

Here's the Times' final bon mot: "We know that even by uttering the word reform, Ms. Quinn has infuriated many of her fellow council members who believe it is their right to hand out taxpayer dollars as they see fit. It should not take federal indictments to show members the serious flaws of that system. But now that those indictments have come, Ms. Quinn has all the evidence she needs to press for a complete overhaul."

A classic case of misdirection from a paper that has had lockjaw throughout the Bloomberg reign; and another example of how the paper doesn't really get the entire process of government. The speaker's elected by her colleagues-and serves at their pleasure. To advocate a "complete overhaul" is to advocate a leadership change since no speaker has carte blanche to do as she wishes.

Pointing in the Wrong Direction

According to Eliot Brown's post at the Observer's web site, the city is preparing to certify the Willets Point redevelopment today against the wishes of the City Council that has the job of approving the massive project. This appears to us as one really bad move. As Brown points out: "The Bloomberg administration is plowing forward on its plan to redevelop the industrial area next to Shea Stadium, as it intends to start the rezoning process on Monday despite objections from the City Council. “We have asked them not to certify Monday,” said Melinda Katz, chairwoman of the City Council’s land use committee. “My feeling is that there are a lot of outstanding issues.”

So what's going on with this? The council, embroiled in its own external and internal turmoil, doesn't appear to be amenable to letting this project move forward without any designated developer or any concrete development plan. It would be allowing the administration carte blanche in deciding what will go into the area; and with so many Queens polls running for new offices in the borough this appears to be a gigantic waste of time and resources.

As Brown points out: "The decision to jump into the seven-month approval process without the blessing of the Council suggests a rising anxiety among members of the Bloomberg administration, which has 18 months left in office and a slew of large development projects left to implement. The vast majority of rezonings that start the approval process make it to the conclusion with approval from the Council, and should the city ultimately see defeat on its Willets Point plan, it would surely be a high-profile rejection."

So why do it? Apparently because it believes that the pressure of ULURP will expedite the negotiations: "Thus the city seems to be of the mind that by pushing ahead, with a deadline of November before the City Council must approve or deny the plans, they can hasten a resolution of the outstanding issues. “The administration has taken the position that they just want to start the clock and get the progress moving,” said Councilman Hiram Monserrate, who represents the area."

Given a lame duck mayor, and a speaker who's seen her power eroded by the slush scandals, this approach is fraught with difficulty-and it appears to us that it will be added to the list of major Bloomberg development blunders: "Both Mr. Monserrate and Ms. Katz have a long list of concerns with the plan as it stands right now, and neither professed confidence that they could all be resolved in the next seven months. Chief among them, in addition to the use of eminent domain, is affordable housing—the city has committed to mandate that 20 percent of the apartments be affordable, though the Council and advocates want more. Also at issue is the selection of a private developer—by rezoning the area first, the Council allows the city to select a developer of its choosing, without any oversight from the Council."

Unlike the Bronx Terminal Market, where local pols abdicated their responsibilities to proclaim their obeisance to developer largess, Willets Point will be the mayor's swan song-an epitaph to his political skills and negotiating acumen. In the years to come, in order to examine the mayor's body of work we're gonna have to exhume it.

A Legacy Admission

In today's NY Post, the paper's Adam Brodsky takes a look a Mike Bloomberg's mayoral tenure; and he's looking for legacy in all the wrong places. After praising the mayor's "caretaker" role- things didn't go rapidly downhill after 9/11, he can't seem to find anything of any lasting merit. Which is not terribly shocking.

The mayor said that we should judge his mayoralty on the success or failure of his education policies-strike one; mayoral control without any real educational vision has led us into a cul de sac. After playing around with all of the progressive miseducators for a few years, Klein and company are floundering and the city's test scores are stagnant. No legacy here, unless you include a lingering distaste for mayoral control of the schools.

There is one area where Bloomberg stands out. As Brodsky tells us: "And, yes, there is more to do - like tending to the one festering sore that New York pols consistently ignore: exorbitant taxes. New Yorkers pay more than almost any other urbanites in America. Alas, Hizzoner just raised the city sales taxes again - this time, by a whopping 33 percent, from 3 to 4 cents on a dollar. (It's been four cents, but was scheduled to drop to 3 by summer - until Mike jacked it back up.) He's also talking about boosting property taxes as much as 7 percentage points, even though he already raised them once during his first term."

And if the mayor had his way we'd have had the congestion tax as well. So the legacy here is a simple one: when faced with the challenge to make government more efficient, and save the overburdened tax payers some of their hard earned money, the mayor simply opted out-proving that he has more John Lindsay in him than Rudy Giuliani.

That will be his enduring legacy, missing the opportunity to reform how the public sector does business; and more concerned with regulating the private behavior of New York's citizenry. When the post 9/11 history is written, he will not be remembered fondly.

The Operation was a Success but the Patient Died

The mayor, as per Azi, has come out in defense of the way in which his agencies vetted the now disgraced Donna Reid Fund. As we recall DFTA said no, but DYCD said yes. What DOI should be doing, instead of examining the actions of the City Council, is looking to determine just how Asquith Reid was allowed to head a group getting city funds even while he was a city employee.

You know, when you leave that relevant question blank on an application form it should raise at least one red flag. Was DYCD asleep, or was there something untoward going on? So when the mayor comes out with instructions on how the council should go about dispersing its funds, he'd be better served by examining his own house-the one headed by the putative "adult."

This Little Piggy...

Will wonders never cease. In the category of the kettle calling the pot black, the mayor's calling om the City Council to bid out more of its discretionary spending items. As the NY Post reports this morning, " Calling for a reforms in how the City Council doles out pork-barrel funds, Mayor Bloomberg said yesterday that large grants to nonprofit groups should be awarded only by competitive bidding."

What's that about people in glass houses? Maybe the mayor just wasn't paying all that much attention when Deputy Dan Doctoroff started to give away city property to his buddy Steve Ross at the Related Company-a process that actually began only two months into the mayor's first term when Doctoroff awarded the Bradhurst development to Related along with the public subsidy that the Giuliani folks wouldn't pony up because of the issue of fairness.

The continued aggrandizement of Mr. Ross was aided and abetted by a whitewashed DOI investigation of the potential conflict of interest between Doctoroff and Ross-old friends and former business partners; a whitewashing that continued even as Deputy Dan was leaving government to set up shop at Bloomberg LLP. The most egregious example of this favoritism is of course the Bronx Terminal Market give away.

It is useful to revisit this incredible use of personal favoritism to aggrandize a super wealthy developer. Here's our original post:

Tuesday, August 02, 2005

Immaculate Deception

The City’s EDC is still twisting, turning and spinning in its effort to explain the supposedly autonomous manner in which the Related Companies managed to, all on its own, wedge itself into a lucrative no-bid deal to develop the Bronx Terminal Market. In a press statement the City asserted the following. Our responses are listed under each item:

1) The City could not have a bidding process because it didn’t control the site The City could have quite easily and legally issued a Request for Expressions of Interests (REI) for the BTM site. By doing so it could have gauged what the level of interest was for the site, what kind of diverse visions existed for the site and, most importantly, the potential value of the site when bid for on an open market.

2) The City “engaged a mediator” who recommended that Buntzman (the old landlord) bring in a developer to “increase the property’s value” If the City engaged a mediator then there was a level of public involvement that clearly disproves that this was a private deal. In addition, the charge to see if and how the property’s value could be enhanced also suggests that the City, far from speculating, already had a decent idea of how this could be done.

3) Buntzman met with “several developers” (including Related) Who besides Related did Buntzman meet with? Can we ask these folks to step forward in order to discuss their views about “enhancing the property’s value?” Also, are they at all miffed at not being included in the development? If they could speak without fear of reprisal would they characterize the City’s role as neutral?

4) The City asked Related to assess this site’s potential. How did Related get picked to “assess the site’s value?” (It seems to us that some steps are missing here).

5) Related thought the site had potential for retail and began discussions with Buntzman that resulted in the following “private actions:” a) Related buys Buntzman’s lease and b) Buntzman drops legal action against the City. So the “private action” only became private after Related somehow got exclusivity and after some failrly public interventions by the City. The dropping of all legal actions could not have occurred without the acquiescence of the landlord and NYC and it is likely that Buntzman was made aware that Related’s offer would be the one sanctioned by the City. The question then becomes: Would Bunzman have taken $42 million from another developer?

6)The City cannot “speak to” the discrepancy between the value of the velodrome and property and the House of Detention (HOD). Here’s the one honest statement in the release. The City can’t speak to the discrepancy because, having foregone all standard real estate due diligence (like appraisals) they simply and cavalierly swap parcels using an unacknowledged or nonexistent standard of comparison.

7) Related paid Buntzman $42 million for its lease. Once again the negotiations leading to Buntzman agreeing to be bought out, as well as the City’s role in that process, remain shrouded in mystery.

8) Related will be paying ground lease rent to the City when the development lease is signed and base rate plus a percentage of the revenue when the retail development opens. Ah the lease. The press release doesn’t mention just how favorable this is and avoids pointing out that in year 99 of the final lease the Related Companies will be paying less money on 2,500,000 sq. ft (around $2,000,000 a year) than the market tenants are currently paying on 403,000 sq. ft (around $3,360,000 a year)

9) The House of Detention is not now part of the current development plan nor is the velodrome site but the City has until April 2006 to decide on the House of Detention and Related can exercise an option on the veledrome site at which time rent will be negotiated

As to the “uncertainty” involving the HOD and the velodrome this is pure hogwash. The city will transfer the jail and Related will exercise its option because all of this is contained in the Memorandum of Understanding (MOU) between Related and the City. All parties simply want to keep the more controversial aspects of the deal out of the current land use application.One last observation about how private this BTM deal is: In the documents gathered by the merchants’ lawyers a 2002 rendering was found that depicted the Olympic velodrome on the BTM site. This was a full year before the Related deal was finalized! Clearly, Deputy Dan and the City were involved from the very beginning in the effort to advance an Olympic venue and to do so with a developer who happened to be Dan’s former business partner and a stakeholder in NYC 2012.

So now we come full circle, and Mayor Mike wants to introduce an RFP process for the council's spending. And the D (umb) O I(ncompetent) is looking into the council member items. As the NY Daily News points out: "Department of Investigation probers are poring through thousands of documents bearing the names of politicians, dollar amounts and a roster of nonprofit groups - some real, some not."

DOI should get its own house in order-maybe starting at DOE; and the council, as an independent branch of government, should tell the mayor's lackeys to take a hike-and launch their own investigation with an outside independent investigator hired at the council's behest. Letting the Bloombergistas into all of this is taking hypocrisy to a new level. It's time that the city council asserted its independent authority.

Legally Blind

In a disappointing legal decision, Judge Richard Holwell has given the green light to the Department of Health's menu labeling scheme. As the NY Times reports this morning: "Under the rules, which the city’s health department revised after Judge Holwell struck down an earlier version last fall, any chain with at least 15 outlets nationwide would have to display calorie counts on menu boards, menus or food tags. The rules would apply to roughly 2,000 restaurants, or about 10 percent of the 23,000 in the city, the health department said."

In what is most discouraging, considering the legal evidence presented (outlined last week in the NY Sun), Judge Holwell apparently believes that the regulation will help to reduce obesity; "In a 27-page opinion, Judge Holwell accepted one of the city’s main arguments for posting calorie counts — that doing so would help reduce obesity, which city officials say has reached epidemic levels. “It seems reasonable to expect that some consumers will use the information” on menu boards and menus “to select lower-calorie meals,” the judge wrote. He added that “these choices will lead to a lower incidence of obesity.”

Which is why the FDA, when it looks to implement labeling requirements, employs much more rigorous standards-and looks to use a cost/benefit analysis to determine whether a rule's expense in implementation is worth the alleged health impact. As we remarked last week: "The problem lies with the fact that the health department is trying to use its own study, one that we excoriated ourselves last year, to establish that calorie posting will help people make better eating choices."

Holwell, however, believes that as long as some consumers use the info than the rule is good to go-and the fact that there's no evidence that the rule will have any scientifically reliable efficacy passes right over the judge's head. And he doesn't address any of the cost factors for local business. The really pertinent question here is: How much will compliance cost locally-owned fast food franchisees? And the companion query: How many people will actually read and use these calorie postings for healthier decisions? The two questions need to be examined and analyzed together in order to decide whether the rule makes good sense.

The court's ruling, which is being appealed, means that the DOH policy may be legal but the sheer legality doesn't mean that it makes good public policy sense. Anecdotally, it appears to be a good idea and, as the NY Daily News points out this morning. many fast food customers, unaware of the rule's byzantine details, believe that it will be a healthy policy: "Carol Dawson, 58, of Flushing, Queens called the plan "an excellent idea." Too often, she said, she orders by "the picture and my appetite. But this will raise my awareness."

Wait till she tries to decipher the calories when Taco Bell puts up a range of 400-2000 calories for twenty different kinds of burritos (since space makes a full item by item breakdown unfeasible). Wait till she waits and waits in line while confused customers ask some young counterperson about the hard to figure out calorie information.

This is a bad idea propagated by folks who haven't eaten in a fast food restaurant in twenty years and would be happy to see them all (along with the jobs ) disappear; and be replaced by fruit and vegetable peddlers. We can't wait to see the self-serving study that will emerge from all of this. One thing's for certain, it won't pass any peer review unless the peer in question is the peerless Judge Holwell.

Can't Fight out of a Paper Bag

In yesterday's NY Post, Jeff Stier of the American Council on Science and Health, ridicules the push away from plastic bags to the old paper stand-by. In particular, he focuses on the faux environmentalism of the Whole Foods grocery chain: "Unfortunately, paper has its own drawbacks, such as: it's preferred by cockroaches - like those contributing to New York City's asthma epidemic. Like other Earth Day initiatives, this move by Whole Foods reeks of a phenomenon known as "greenwashing" - when companies make lofty claims in an effort to profit from "environmentally concerned" shoppers."

And, of course, what Whole Foods is doing is what the greeniacs at the city council advocated when they passed their plastic bag recycling bill: huing and crying about the supposed dangers of plastic to the environment. Tell that to the roaches, and the kids with asthma: "Entymologists, including Coby Schal of North Carolina State University, have observed that cockroaches prefer paper to plastic. "They really like to live in the creases found in paper bags," said Schal, the nation's top expert on cockroaches. Many cockroach species chew into paper bags to lay their eggs - something they don't do with plastic...If Whole Foods' "green" move starts a trend among food stores, it may contribute to New York's asthma epidemic "

How nice; and not to mention the fact that plastic bags get re-used in most households. As Steir points out: "The move flies in the face of the enviro mantra to "reduce, reuse and recycle" - in that order. Almost everyone keeps a stash of plastic bags. We reuse them to line garbage cans, bring lunch to work and clean up after the dog - try doing that with paper. Plastic bags are easier to reuse and more efficient to recycle than paper."

The problem here is that Whole Foods is trying to attract the upscale and the guilt-ridden, the same folks who worshipped Rachel Carson as an environmental goddess; and we know how well that worked out: "Blindly following environmental extremists might make you feel good, but there is a dark side. Recall the millions of unnecessary malaria deaths that have resulted from Rachel Carson's "green" effort to ban DDT."

There is, however, one saving grace. Customers of Whole Foods can feel good about themselves even while spending ridiculous sums for arugula and endive. And that, as Martha Stewart might say, "Is a good thing."

Tax and Offend

It now appears as if the mayor believes that he had no choice in his sneak attax on NYC tax payers. According to the NY Post: "We have to pay the bills," Bloomberg said. "New York City must balance the budget on a cash basis by the end of the year, unlike Albany or Washington."

So what. That does not mean that you take a tax measure scheduled to sunset in June and sneak its extension through the state legislature. It doesn't mean that you don't examine the spending side of the ledger to see if you can do without some of the government programs and activities that may now be seen as too expensive given the revenue reductions ahead.

That kind of reasoning, however, would presuppose a mayor who actually believed that a leaner government apparatus was good for tax payers and the economy. Not Mayor Mike; clearly he doesn't spell relief as lower taxes, and views these levies as the price of all of the necessary services that good New Yorkers absolutely have to have. Give us a break from this form of rich man's burden.

Food Fright

Grocery prices are skyrocketing. According to the NY Post: "Supermarkets are again raising prices to cope with the worst food inflation the nation has seen in 17 years." All of which means that affordable healthy food has become an even more compelling issue; and that supermarket preservation and development must be put into the forefront.

It also means that companies like Vornado Realty and Distrust are a threat to the public interest when they want to eliminate local supermarkets for the sheer enhancement of corporate profits. It also means that Mayor Mike needs to become proactive on the preservation front, and that the health commissioner, instead of coming up with schemes that cost local businesses more money, needs to step up here and join the Soundview community in its effort to save its supermarket,

Mayor's Shotgun Wedding with Wal-Mart

As Liz is reporting the UFCW's Local 1500 has taken umbrage at the gun deal that the mayor has struck with our favorite retailer. As the union's press release, posted on the blog, points out: "If the Mayor is able to exert this type of influence over Wal-mart on gun control, imagine his ability to get them to start doing the right thing on dozens of other issues that are affecting hundreds of thousands of their workers every day, as well as others affected by their irresponsible business practices...”


Frankly we're thrilled to see that the mayor's got his negotiating mojo back; and the deal that he struck is sure to mean that, in the future, the mayor will be less likely to shoot himself in the foot. We also are sure that the prospects of the Walmonster in NYC are as good as, well, the chances that the mayor will be able to rid the streets of illegal weapons.

Water Torture

Water bills are going up-at a 14% rate. As the NY Post reported last week: "Homeowners expecting a modest water-rate hike this year are in for a shock today - the Water Board will propose a punishing 14.5 percent increase starting July 1, officials said." And the reason why the rate increase is so much larger than expected? "But sources said collections aren't meeting forecasts, leading to the request for the big jump."

What do you know? The DEP can't collect the money that it's owed. And why's that? Well, as the NY Daily News points out, "The city's crackdown on overdue water bills has run into a big problem - the most notorious deadbeats can't be forced to pay. Cash-strapped hospitals, apartment buildings and nursing homes collectively owe tens of millions of dollars, but they are immune to the threats that have persuaded smaller debtors to pay up. The Department of Environmental Protection can't threaten to shut off their water because so many innocent tenants and patients would suffer."

And not only that. As the Post follows up on this story, it now appears that homeowners are going to be soaked next year as well: "Property owners about to be slammed with a 14.5 percent water-rate hike got another pounding yesterday when city officials disclosed they may ask for a 14.5 percent increase next year as well."

This news, however, masks the bigger problem. These institutions can't pay what the city alleges they owe because the DEP is unable to justify the bills. We ran into this issue when the Water Group, a consulting firm dealing in helping institutions monitor the city's water billing procedures, was a client. The folks there were representing Columbia Presbyterian Hospital when the city was claiming that it owed millions in unpaid water bills.

The problem? No one could demonstrate that the bills were valid, and without justification, the hospital CFO was stuck-unable to allow payment for a bill that couldn't be backed up by the city because of the incompetency of the DEP's staff and procedures. What the Water Group did was conduct a professional audit that allowed the hospital to save big money, but at the same time helped the city to be paid.

What this shows us is that the entire DEP operation needs to be put into receivership; and outside auditors need to be brought in to straighten out the incompetency. No home owner should be held to account until the entire system is properly reconstituted.

Taxing Credulity

How does it happen that a $1.2 billion tax gets extended when it was set to sunset this June, and does so without any public debate? That's the question that former Finance Commissioner Joe Lhota asks this morning in the NY Post: "CAN you imagine a tax increase in New York City without a public debate? Not just any tax increase - but one that'll generate almost $1.2 billion annually? And it's a regressive tax paid by everyone - regardless of wealth or social status."

Yet that's exactly what happened when the Albany leadership slipped the sales tax extension through with absolutely no public discussion. Now we might have all been distracted by the hoo ha over the congestion tax. You know, the one that was going to give NYC $354 million in federal dollars. But an annual tax windfall that's more than double any of the projected revenues from the congestion tax scheme isn't even on the public radar.

Shame on the press, and on our elected officials-and the greatest shame on the hypocritical mayor who slammed Shelly Silver for not allowing public discussion and a vote on the Bloomberg congestion tax. And it was Mayor Mike who engineered this secret tax hike deal, when the sales tax that was enacted to retire Municipal Assistance Corporation bonds floated during the city's fiscal crisis in the 1970s was slated to sunset: "Well, the MAC debt ended; the 1 percent sales tax was to sunset on July 1, 2008. Mayor Bloomberg, however, asked Albany to halt the sunset and reimpose the sales tax so that it could be used for general city operating expenses."

How about a Knucklehead Award for the mayor? Here's the NY Post's 's editorial take on the tax heist: "Bloomberg, while bemoaning the loss of the congestion-pricing tax but not mentioning the sales-tax double-cross at all, called the budget agreement "good news for the city." Some good news. It's not just the $1.2 billion, by the way - though that's a lot of money. Equally important is the erosion of trust embodied in the stealth tax hike."

So what we have in all of this is a mayor who pretends to democratic transparency while he buys votes for his congestion tax just like he's at a public auction; while at the same time quietly socking tax payers without the benefit of any public notice. And just think, there are folks who are concerned about the $20 million that the council speaker doles out to local groups. Talk about misplaced priorities.

Development Dilemmas: Vornado and the Public Interest

In this morning's NY Times, the paper's Charles Bagli looks at the shaky planning initiatives over at the Far West Side: "For three years, it has been one of Mayor Michael R. Bloomberg’s abiding ambitions: to transform the warehouses, factories, parking lots and railroad tracks between Pennsylvania Station and the Hudson River into a glimmering high-rise business district...Today, those plans are in disarray. Because of the economic downturn, logistical problems and, critics say, design flaws, the expansion of the Javits Center has died, the plan to rebuild Penn Station and the area around it is in jeopardy and there are deep questions about financing, public and private, to extend the subway or build over the railyards."

Just goes to show you, even when the best and the brightest are involved, it ain't easy planning things properly-and it sheds light on the less than stellar record of the "Bloomberg miracle." In fact, when political scientists go to examine the mayor's body of work, they're going to have to exhume it. When Mayor Mike goes for the gold, he just lacks the political skills to attain it.

Which brings us to our friends over at Vornado Realty and Distrust-the folks who we last saw looking to close one of the few modern supermarkets in the Soundview section of the Bronx. Vornado, and its partner in high end heisting, the Related Company, are looking to develop the Moynihan train station. They're going to need a lot of city help in doing so.

Here's Bagli's take: "The Penn Station plan, spearheaded by Stephen M. Ross of Related Companies and Steven Roth of Vornado Realty Trust, calls for rebuilding Pennsylvania Station and moving Madison Square Garden one block west to the nearly vacant Farley post office building, which would also serve as an annex to what would be called Moynihan Station. In return, the developers would get the rights to build a half-dozen office towers nearby."

The two companies, receiving favored nation status for the entire Bloomberg term (that's okay News and Post?), were designated by the Bloombergistas for this task by the former Deputy Mayor Dan Doctoroff-you know the fella who was also Steve Ross' friend and former business partner. Ross' company also got a no bid contract for the development of the Bronx Terminal Market (no "Knucklehead Award" for Dan here?).

The project, however, is going to need a lot of public support: "The Penn Station project is facing its own problems. The Garden is balking at the move, potentially killing the entire endeavor. If Vornado and Related Companies cannot lure the Garden back, they plan to revive an earlier plan to build a $900 million train station annex at the Farley building, an office tower across the street and improvements at Penn Station in return for more development rights. Vornado also plans to demolish the nearby Pennsylvania Hotel to make way for a large office project."

Could this be the same Vornado that wants to spit in the face of the health needs of South Bronx residents by evicting the Key Food on Bruckner Boulevard? It seems to us, that this would be an appropriate moment for all of the city's elected officials-from the mayor on down-to draw a line in the sand for these pork barrel billionaires. As the old saying goes; "No ticket, no laundry."

If Vornado wants the city to pony up for Moynihan, than a quid pro quo is needed for Bruckner. If Bruckner is private property, than the development rights around Moynihan are public property and belong to the city. It's that simple.

Nailing the Pig to the Post

The NY Post, following the News' piggish apoplexy on Saturday, has called for the elimination of all pork barrel discretionary spending: "City Council Speaker Christine Quinn thinks she's found the right tweaks to fix the council's pork woes. Sorry, but pork is pork. And if ever there was a time to ban it - in Albany and at City Hall - this is it."

And just why must this be the logical progression from the council's latest phantom menace? Well because, according to the Post, "Why should millions of dollars be ladled out at the council's discretion? The grants are virtually always targeted to advance the personal and political interests of incumbents - while insurgents and outsiders need not apply."

So what? All political appropriations, no matter the methodology of disbursement, are targeted for the advancement of the interests of incumbents. And guess what? Incumbents are advantaged in any democratic system. The nuance here, lost in the editorial obsession with legislative misfeasance, is that all legislators are elected locally and are-and should be responsible to their districts.

Why should anyone be upset with the fact that spending is politicized? What's the alternative if it isn't? What system would replace it? Who would decide? Certainly we've seen the extent to which the wisdom of Mayor Mike's decision-making, unencumbered by the spoils system of political payback, has come to some disastrous endings. And we've seen how he's used political pork in the interests of some really questionable goals. But that's his right. He was elected and his discretion comes with the territory.

And so do legislative initiatives. That doesn't mean that the destination for some public funds shouldn't be criticized, but to question the wisdom of legislative initiatives per se, is to misread the essence of the system of checks and balances that keeps democracy vibrant.

So when the NY Post says, "Let's face it: The system reeks. If Quinn was a true reformer, she'd just abolish member items," it fails to do justice to the full scope of democratic practice in NYC politics. And by doing so, leaves the mayor in a much more powerful position than a mayoral-centric city charter already does.

Pig-Headed Editorial

In an editorial on Saturday, The NY Daily News exhibited an ignorance about city governance as well as a wrong-headedness about what reform means in a democratic political system. Commenting on the speaker's decision to send about half of the council's discretionary money over to the mayor for vetting, the News opined: "Sure, there will be more openness, with all items in a database searchable by the public. And groups wanting money will have to provide fuller information, including disclosure of possible conflicts of interest. But the fact is there should be no member items. No more pork-barrel spending. No more oinking at the public trough."

Is the News serious? Does it really believe that issuing RFP's through city agencies will protect the funding process and remove favoritism? Won't the mayor-whoever that will be-make determinations based on his or her conceptions, friendships and political relationships? And will the local little league or senior center have the wherewith all to compete with well-funded not-for-profits for the outlays?

The News' argument is reminiscent of the fight by the progressives over patronage in the late 19th century, a fight that the historian Richard Hofstadter demonstrated to be a class-based and retrograde battle against empowering new immigrants; and something that was less than democratic. Let's state our position clearly: there's nothing wrong-certainly nothing anti-democratic-with patronage; and the dispensing of money for local projects, as long as properly monitored, allows local council members to take care of groups in their districts that have supported them. If there are other locals that get slighted there's term limits and democratic elections as a useful antidote for abuse.

The News' outrage is also selective when it comes to the abuse of power. For instance, when Deputy Mayor Doctoroff chose his friend Steve Ross' company to redevelop the Bronx Terminal Market without the benefit of a competitive bid, the paper was silent. This case of journalistic lockjaw was in the face of the fact that the sweetheart deal that was "negotiated," was so lucrative that it will reap the Related Company more in windfall profits than the entire council discretionary spending for scores of budget years.

In addition, as we have already commented on, the pork barrel vote trading that characterized the lead-up to the congestion tax vote at the City Council was hardly an exercise in the kind of transparent democratic practices that the Daily News wants us to believe is their bedrock principle. Perhaps the paper's silence in that episode was reflective of its totally unreflective and shameless cheer leading for another middle class tax. If that's true, than moral outrage is certainly a selective exercise at the paper's editorial office.

And the porking of the congestion tax vote is from a mayor who portrays himself as above the tawdry wheeling and dealing of the political process, someone for whom favoritism is as foreign as ethics is to an old Tammany ward healer. Mayor's wield great power in this city. It is important for the city council to retain as much of its power as necessary in order to counterbalance this mayoral muscle. The NY Daily News is one of the last places to find good advice for reforming NYC politics.

Congestion Confusion

In a blog post today at the Daily Politics, Liz outlines a dispute-courtesy of the Downtown Express-between Councilman Alan Gerson and the Bloomberg administration over what was, or wasn't, promised in exchange for support for the failed congeation tax: "Gerson thought he had extracted a series of pledges from the Bloomberg administration in exchange for his support for congestion pricing and conditional on the plan passing Albany, but John Gallagher, a Bloomberg spokesperson said last week - when the proposal was still alive - that the city had made none of the promises for Lower Manhattan that Gerson claimed."

To us, this will be just the beginning, as disappointed elected officials start to publicly grouse over the reneging by the Bloombergistas. It will also start to shed light over the extent of the hose trading that went on before the vote. It certainly won't be a pretty picture for elected officials who claim to be above politics and good government aficionados.

Some glimpse of the wheeling and dealing can be seen from the following comments that Gerson gave to the paper: “I spoke directly to [police] commissioner Ray Kelly,” Gerson said. “I spoke directly to D.O.T. - commissioner Janette Sadik-Khan. I spoke directly to the mayor at Gracie Mansion - although at that point we had not worked out the details of the commitments.”

It sounds to us a lot light a "Paradise by the Dashboard Light" scenario; with Gerson as the unrequited love object. How many others will fit into this category?

Sitt Does BJ's

In an article in the NY Post earlier this week it was announced that Joe Sitt, the Sitt of Coney Island fame, was planning to build a large shopping center off of the Belt parkway. The center is to be anchored by a BJ's Warehouse Club which brings to mind a Yiddish expression that Joe might know; "Man plans and God laughs."

As the Post describes it: "An internal document from Sitt's Thor Equities estimates "200,000 square feet of big-box retail use" at the shopping center, with project construction kicking off next year and ending in 2010. Sitt will need to go through the city's land use review process for a zoning change and esplanade approval. But the Bloomberg administration is more receptive to this plan than megaprojects that the developer is being blocked by the city from building in Coney Island and Red Hook."

The receptivity of the Bloombergistas may be a substantially less important than the reactions from area elected officials-particularly Councilman Recchia, and Senators Kruger, Savino and Assemblyman Colton. The non-union box store has run into considerable opposition elsewhere, and was roundly sent packing in the Bronx three years ago. There's no reason to believe that this particular development won't meet with the same level of opposition.

It's too bad that Sitt didn't consider the possibility of a full-service supermarket on the site instead of the limited selection BJ's. It just might be the case, however, that, after this project goes down in flames, a supermarket will look real good to everyone on both sides of the battle.

Wither the Point

The lawsuit filed against the city by Willets Point property owners highlights another problem that the city faces-and this one is political. As Eliot Brown points out in the Observer's real estate blog: " The city was days away from starting that process in February when local council members, led by Hiram Monserrate, became vocal in opposition to the project as planned. The city then backed away from its late February start date and now it’s been almost two months since the council members spoke out, with no new date set to start the rezoning. Yesterday, even more council members climbed into the criticism camp. David Weprin, Diana Reyna, Eric Gioia, Leroy Comrie Jr. and James Sanders Jr. joined Mr. Monserrate and Tony Avella at a press conference yesterday to criticize the plan for its effects on the business and landowners, with many expressing outright opposition to any plan that included the use of eminent domain (Mayor Bloomberg has strongly supported the potential use of eminent domain in the project.)"

What this looks like to us is the fact that, due to recent political circumstances surrounding the mayor and the speaker, more council members are being emboldened to stake out a position on eminent domain issues. We've gone beyond the usual suspects (or perhaps the enlightened few) to what is beginning to look like a groundswell. Let the lame duckery begin!

Point-Counterpoint

The business owners at Willets Point are suing the city for-well, theft of services sounds about right. As the NY Times reports this morning: "Business owners in Willets Point — the district near Shea Stadium known mostly for its auto repair shops and potholes — filed a federal lawsuit on Wednesday accusing the city of depriving the neighborhood of services so property values would fall, easing the way for the land to be taken through eminent domain."

This situation is similar to the one up in West Harlem where Columbia University has bought properties and allowed them to deteriorate, as a ploy to get the state to label the expansion area as "blighted." The Willets situation is actually exponentially worse since it is the city itself that is culpable for the blighting-and now wants to penalize the businesses for its own misfeasance and neglect.

As the NY Daily News points out this morning: "The suit says the city has withheld services such as trash and snow removal and police surveillance; refused to maintain drainage, roadways and sanitary sewerage lines, and allowed curbs, gutters and fire hydrants to deteriorate beyond repair." There's an old anecdote about two Germans passing a Jewish ghetto in the late 1930s that's illustrative of this outrage. One of the Germans says to his companion; "Boy, don't those Jews smell." To which his companion replies; "That's not the Jews who smell, that's the stench of Nazism."

Sure the Iron Triangle is blighted, but in spite of the blight, and just as it was in West Harlem, businesses are thriving and employing lots of folks. In the Point the numbers are in the thousands. As Tom Angotti's study has underscored: "While the Economic Development Corporation claims there are 80 businesses in this 48-acre area, a recent survey I conducted through the Hunter College Center for Community Planning & Development instead found 225 businesses that provide an estimated 1,300 jobs. The business survey was part of a land use study, including maps prepared by the CUNY Mapping Service, commissioned by Council Member Hiram Monseratte, who has questioned the city’s plans to relocate area businesses from his district."


And what's the view of EDC on all of this? "Janel Patterson, a spokeswoman for the city Economic Development Corp., called Willets Point "a blighted and seriously contaminated site that has developed haphazardly into a hodgepodge of small businesses...It requires a comprehensive remediation and redevelopment plan to clean up the mess and provide infrastructure for future sustainable growth," added Patterson, who did not address the property owners' allegations of neglect."

So now the city is going to throw out the hundreds of businesses and the thousands of workers so that a few real estate companies can reap the benefits of the city's belated investment in infrastructure? This is seriously messed up, and cries out for a new approach to eminent domain that allows for greater scrutiny of blight claims-and yes my friends the undeveloped acreage around Atlantic Yards is different from the living, breathing businesses in West Harlem and on the Point.

Albany's Smuggler Compact

The just concluded state budget has given the black marketeers a big reason to rejoice. As the NY Daily News reports this morning: "As part of the new state budget, the little cigars - which look just like cigarettes, except they are wrapped in brown paper that is partly made from tobacco - will be classified as cigarettes in New York starting June 3. That's the same day the state tax on a pack of cigarettes shoots up to $2.75, from $1.50 - making New York's levy on cigarettes the highest in the nation."

So now the incentives have escalated without any relief for the smuggling that has become endemic in New York-something that the former governor had promised to address but never did. The convenience stores that operate around or near the upstate Indian reservations-where untaxed smokes are sold with impunity-have been given a dagger to the heart of their businesses.

And downstate, where back-packed street corner salespeople proliferate in the city's poorer neighborhoods. the smuggling margins have been raised to windfall status. All of which leaves the anti-smoking advocates in a state of stupefied glee: "New York State is now the national public health leader in tobacco taxation," said Michael Seilback, policy director for the American Lung Association's state chapter."

Once again, those who say that they stand for the health of New Yorkers, fail to stand for the health of the neighborhood stores; businesses that provide for the sustenance of the people whose health would certainly be in jeopardy without real employment opportunities. Watch out for another spike in street violence as smugglers (really street vendors; maybe the mayor will license them?) fight for territory.

Scapegoating Shelly

There are two pieces in this morning's papers that go along way towards balancing the one-sided attack on Speaker Silver Silver for his failure to shepherd the mayor's traffic tax through the assembly. The first, an editorial headline in the NY Post makes this telling point: "BLAME MIKE, NOT SHELLY."

The Post goes on to point out that; "We're not shy about bashing Silver; his reputation for putting his own personal interests above those of average New Yorkers is surely well-earned...But in this case, Mayor Bloomberg couldn't sell a flawed plan. Lawmakers couldn't bear to be blamed for what many, particularly in the outer boroughs, saw (with good reason) as a new tax on the middle class. They regarded the fee as an elitist levy on the average Joe and Jane. They failed to trust Mike's vow that revenues would go to mass transit. And they disliked Hizzoner's heavy-handed ways."

Which is what we've been saying all along since we first were asked to lend a hand to the anti-congestion tax coalition-and the tax mantra, honed by McCaffrey and Bearak and hollered from the rooftops by Barrison, was a non-stop message until the final bell tolled on the mayor's scheme. Here's the NY Sun's take in its editorial from yesterday: "Someday a rising Ph.D. student is going to make a name for himself or herself by illuminating the Sheldon Silver story. The way in which he outmaneuvered the mayor on congestion pricing was just a classic. And we say that as an editorial page that was open to the idea when it first began to be mooted and came gradually to understand what the Assembly saw, which is that it was a tax, after all, and an impediment, a restriction on us."

So the theme here is simple: the idea was an elitist tax; and the salesman of the idea was a bumbling billionaire whose haughty demeanor and lack of political skills made him the perfect foil for the speaker. There's an old story told by Tom Lehrer that epitomizes this situation: "My dog was run over the other day, but the driver did it with such skill that the bystanders awarded him both ears and the tail."

The congestion tax was Bloomberg's dog. And the skillful driver was Shelly Silver, someone who should be lionized and not vilified. Which is just what Juan Gonzales does this morning in the NY Daily News: "Shelly Silver of Grand St. on the lower East Side is a New York hero.
If you listen to the ravings of Michael Bloomberg and his powerful friends, Assembly Speaker Silver trampled democracy, promoted pollution and crippled the future of our transit system by killing the mayor's congestion tax. Don't swallow such nonsense. Taxpayers should erect a statue to Silver for standing up - once again - to Bloomberg's relentless bullying and vote-buying."

And Gonzales goes further by pointing out how absurd some critics are for seeing the Silver scenario as somehow undemocratic: "Silver, on the other hand, actually practiced some real democracy. Even though he favored congestion pricing, the speaker carefully listened to each of his members in eight hours of emotional debate in the Assembly's Democratic caucus.
"Everyone had a shot to speak in the debate," said Assemblyman Adriano Espaillat of Washington Heights, a supporter of congestion pricing. "The votes just weren't there. The opposition was overwhelming. What can you do?" "Five weeks ago, I told the mayor's people that between last June and now there was no change - it was still 5 to 1 against," said Assemblyman James Brennan of Brooklyn, another backer of the mayor's plan."

Compare this, as Gonzales does, to the pork barrel horse trading that went on prior to the vote in the city council-an accounting that still needs to be done. And we haven't even seen the bill on the exercise of democracy that went into the purchase of all of the astro turf environmental groups. Here's Gonzales on the mayor: "This is a mayor, for those who have forgotten, who practically bought the state Republican Party's support for congestion pricing with a $500,000 donation earlier this year. He then turned City Hall into "Let's Make a Deal" in an effort to overcome the opposition of City Council members last week to his controversial, $8-per-day tax on cars coming into Manhattan."

Yet the mayor, still in the political fog that he can't seem to escape, sees all of this as unfair and undemocratic, As the Daily News points out elsewhere: "Bloomberg - backer of both the stadium and congestion pricing - was still steaming Tuesday. "I do not think that any one person should decide what is right," he said in Washington. "The results would have been there. It would have passed."

Which part of this statement is sillier? The belief that one man shouldn't be able to make unilateral decisions? Or the supposition that if Silver had brought this to a vote it would have passed? Either one by itself would be a sign of political dementia; but together they make out-of-touch seem like real intimacy.

Speaking of out-of-touch, the final silliness in all of this belongs to the recently escaped figure of Darren Dopp-the man who was last seen sneaking out of the executive mansion before the cave-in. Dopp now works for Pat Lynch and he reacts this morning in Crain's Insider to the idea that his new boss was a loser in all of this: "Lynch spokesman Darren Dopp says: “No one gave it a shot when it was first proposed last year. It got as far as it did because of Pat Lynch Associates.”
That statement's silliness speaks volumes for itself; Lynch wasn't responsible for the loss, everything else is pure spin.

"Wisdom" from Transportation Alternatives

Liz is posting on the rationale being put forward by congestion tax supporter Charles Komanoff of Transportation Alternatives and Streetsblog fame. Komanoff lays out ten reasons for the plan's failure but leaves out one really important one: the obnoxious arrogance of his own cohort in gratuitously and viciously (not to mention self-defeating) attacking legislators who disagreed with their self-righteousness. The lesson: Beware of lobbyists who are ideologues.

The much more insightful post mortem is in the NY Times this morning, and the paper's headline captures the essence of the reason for the plan's demise: "Bloomberg Tactics Were Highhanded on Traffic Plan, Lawmakers Say." Not, as Komanoff says, that the mayor was "not personally engaged enough," but that he was if anything-given his personality-much too engaged.

In the Times piece the focus is also on Sadik-Kahn, Parsons-Brinckerhoff's transportation commissioner: "In Albany, the commissioner, Janette Sadik-Khan, expressed the mayor’s sentiments, saying: “You are either for this historic change in New York or you’re against it. And if you’re against it, you’re going to have a lot of explaining to do.” Ms. Sadik-Khan’s remarks were widely noted by Albany lawmakers, with some viewing her tone as condescending. So when it was revealed that the state police had pulled her over for speeding and improperly using her lights and sirens on her way to the Capitol, it only underscored what the legislators saw as the Bloomberg administration’s imperious attitude."

Exactly so! And the Times story could have been simply a re-write of the stadium post mortem: "Given the New York City Council’s limited powers, and its habit of deferring to the mayor, Mr. Bloomberg has sometimes found himself at a loss for how to persuade a resistant State Legislature to embrace his plans." Once again, we say " "Once burnt, twice learnt." Not so apparently with the imperial mayoralty.

NY Times Boosts Silver on Congestion

The NY Times, always looking out for the interests of average New Yorkers, give an unwitting boost to Assembly Speaker Silver today in its editorial: "After weeks of dithering as a deadline for the federal grant neared and then expired, Mr. Silver has now ensured the uncertain future of an already strained mass transit system and the continued growing problems of gridlock and tailpipe emissions. Thank you, Mr. Speaker."

Not content to end there, the Times then proceeds to show Silver the door: "The congestion-pricing plan was not perfect, but it improved over time. Mr. Silver did not seem to put any effort into addressing the concerns of its opponents or into moving his members to do the right thing.
He failed to put New Yorkers’ needs before his personal agenda. That makes him unworthy of his office."

If there's any one thing that can underscore the importance and public necessity of Shelly Silver's leadership, its condemnation from the paper that sees government as benign, and tax hikes on New Yorkers as salutary. The Times now forgets all of its condemnation of the MTA and the only thing it can think of is revenue enhancement.

As Metro points out today; "Yet yesterday’s real loser is the MTA, which stood to receive the toll revenue and will now likely face leaner times ahead. Even with congestion pricing, the MTA had a $9.5 billion hole in its five-year capital plan. Bonds backed by the fee would have provided $4.5 billion, while another $4 billion in bonds would be supported by new state funding and a local match." Or, as we would say, even with the latest fare hike the agency's profligate ways continue to lead to hemorrhaging money.

The congestion tax was a diversion from the real issue: MTA misfeasance; in fact, the tax would have postponed what should be the inevitable-a total reformulation of a public authority that doesn't understand the meaning of the word "public."

Three Card Mayor

If, as the NY Daily News and the NY Post suggest, the defeat of the congestion tax was a Shel game, than it appears that Mayor Mike's lack of street smarts prevented him from seeing where the pea was hidden. And a frustrated mayor lashed out at what he saw as a rigged game. As the News points out: "Mayor Bloomberg's congestion-pricing dream died Monday without even a vote, and the mayor unleashed his white-hot fury at the man he blamed the most, Assembly Speaker Sheldon Silver. Bloomberg - said by aides to be too angry to be out in front of the cameras after the defeat - issued a statement that all but called Silver a coward."

Someone needs to take a chill pill, the fact remains that Mike Bloomberg didn't know how to play this game-and it's mayor culpa, mayor culpa, mayor maxima culpa. As the NY Post points out: "Assembly Speaker Sheldon Silver delivered another painful civics lesson to Mayor Bloomberg yesterday, although this time - unlike Silver's humiliation of the mayor in the bitter West Side stadium battle three years ago - rejecting his congestion-pricing plan was anything but personal.
The lesson was that it is extremely dangerous for a legislative leader to - as they say in the Legislature - "get out ahead of his members" - a lesson Silver learned in 2000 when he was nearly ousted in a coup."

So our friend Bill Hammond gets it wrong this morning when he tells his readers: "Bloomberg and his team of experts took on some of the biggest challenges facing the city - paralyzing traffic, choking smog and overcrowded mass transit. They spent months developing a coherent plan based on solid reasoning and hard evidence. They amassed a huge coalition of civic groups. They held 14 public hearings and, responding to critics, made dozens of changes to their
proposal...Overall, they ran a campaign that belongs in political science textbooks, in the chapter called, "How to Do Things Right."

Sorry Bill, that's just plain wrong. The mayor set up what amounts to the biggest faux grass roots effort this city has ever seen-a coalition of the greedy looking for development payoffs, elitist bicycle brigades who held the city's car commuters in contempt, and the Daily News itself-a one man amen chorus. It didn't, however, have any of the folks who told survey after survey that they thought the idea stunk.

Bloomberg also unleashed a stealth payoff program that enticed environmental groups to abandon their long held beliefs in the sanctity of environmental review. The "coherent plan" was never properly vetted for its environmental impact, and critics like ourselves were ignored when we pointed this hypocrisy out. Hammond's final take? "Bloomberg, though defeated, has no reason to be ashamed. He took the high road. He argued his case on the merits. Short of ordering spine transplants for the entire Legislature, there wasn't anything more Hizzoner could have done."

What exactly was meritorious about the about the vote changing in the City Council when it came time to count heads? What about the $500,000 check to the senate majority? What about the threats to lawmakers from the League of Conservation Voters, or whatever this "grass roots" group is called?

The reality here is that, as the NY Times points out, no support for the plan existed in the assembly: "Democratic members of the State Assembly held one final meeting to debate the merits of Mr. Bloomberg’s plan and found overwhelming and persistent opposition." So the News' Michael Daley is flat out wrong when he says: "So much for democracy.One guy says "no" to the West Side stadium and the project is dead. The same guy says "no" to congestion pricing and that's dead, too. Without a vote. Without a single public hearing. Without even a moment's open debate. Just this one guy with the demeanor of an undertaker saying one word.
"No." However you stand on congestion pricing, whatever you felt about the stadium, you should be outraged. Assembly Speaker Sheldon Silver has once again ignored the principles we are all supposed to believe in."

This was more democratic than the suborned city council process, and a public vote that so many disappointed supporters are making a big deal over wouldn't have made any difference. As the Time puts it: "“The congestion pricing bill did not have anywhere near a majority of the Democratic conference, and will not be on the floor of the Assembly,” Sheldon Silver, the Assembly speaker, said after the meeting."

All of which is a giant blow to the mayor's legacy, particularly his recently garnered environmental consciousness. As we told the NY Sun: "Richard Lipsky, a lobbyist for the Neighborhood Retail Alliance, a coalition of small businesses, said the mayor may have made a tactical error by focusing his energy on "the most contentious item" in his environmental plan, congestion pricing, and suggested that the approach would make it harder to push through the rest of his sustainability agenda."He's got a difficult job ahead in the next 18 months to generate the enthusiasm for the sustainability that winning this fight would have given him," he said. "It will be a real challenge for the mayor to do that. I'm not sure he'll be able to achieve it."

DOH's Research Firm: Dewey, Cheatum and Howe

As the NY Sun is reporting, the city's attempt to overcome a legal challenge to its calorie posting rule may be running afoul of the total lack of scientific evidence supporting the efficacy of the rule in reducing obesity. The problem lies with the fact that the health department is trying to use its own study, one that we excoriated ourselves last year, to establish that calorie posting will help people make better eating choices.

Here's what we said about the DOH survey last spring: "First of all, the department didn't do any research-certainly none that would survive peer review. It did some self-serving questionnaires that failed to demonstrate much last summer, and the commissioners prescience about how the industry will respond to his cockamamie rules beggars credulity. If left to their own devices the team of Frieden and Bloomberg would be dictating everything that New Yorkers put into their mouths."

Now it turns out that we weren't alone in our skepticism. As the Sun tells us: "City health officials ran into difficulties at the end of last year when they tried to get the report published. The editor at the Morbidity and Mortality Weekly Reports, published by the CDC, wrote in an e-mail message to Dr. Frieden that the “conclusions being drawn by the study, are of course, problematic.”

Now why was that? Well. because, "One problem identified by the editor, Frederic Shaw, was the focus on Subway, which uses an ad campaign about weight loss and may attract a more calorie-conscious clientele, according to an e-mail sent by Dr. Shaw to Dr. Frieden. More broadly, Dr. Shaw suggested that there was “a lurking probability that people who look at caloric information are much different from everybody else.” In other words, many people may not change their eating habits despite being confronted with data."

As we pointed out last year, "The answer is in a survey that, as far as we know, no one has seen and almost certainly was not scientifically designed and peer-reviewed. According to this survey, the customers at Subways are being informed about calorie counts and because they are, better nutritional choices are being made." Subway? The typical fast food joint? Once again, the department is trying to mark its own test.

Not only was all of this scientifically shabby-shouldn't we go back and review the telephony survey that DOH did for its green cart initiative?-but the lead department author of the study tried to rig the review process: "The lawyer, Kent Yalowitz of the firm Arnold & Porter, also suggested that Dr. Bassett, the deputy commissioner, should have disclosed “her personal involvement in recruiting peer reviewers to review the study of which she was the lead author.”
Mr. Yalowitz never explicitly accuses Dr. Bassett of a conflict of interest, but does suggest that the city was in a rush to get the study published so that it could cite it in the current litigation."

The whole thing is a charade-one that the NY Times bought hook, line and sinker: "The big chains fighting the city might take a cue from Subway. The sandwich maker is using calorie counts as a marketing tool and a way to build on its reputation as a more healthful fast-food alternative. It has voluntarily posted calories where customers can easily see them, usually on the menu board." So, the Times' answer is for all fast food outlets become health food restaurants.

All of this will hopefully lead to the court's rejection of this stupidity-and the scientific sleight-of-hand by folks who don't mind fudging things in the name of self-righteousness. All eyes are on Judge Holwell.

The Billion Dollar Bust

The Bloomberg congestion tax went down in flames-in rather a spectacular fashion don't you think? Out spent by millions, the opposition effectively organized and stayed on message while the mayor and his minions flopped around, continually tinkering with a flawed idea. Kudos to Walter McCaffrey and Corey Bearak who led the valiant effort (we did help out for the first six months, but the credit really goes to these two.

And let's not forget our friend Steve Barrison, who single handily led a strong grass roots effort. And the heroes gallery of electeds include intrepid Richard Brodsky, David Weprin, Carl Kruger (who led a contingent of seniors in protest early on), Ruben Diaz Sr., Rory Lancman and Lew Fidler-the latter councilman who did a masterful job highlighting the inadequacy of the plan down at City Hall.

So now, as the blogs are pointing out today-here, here, and here-and more to be said tomorrow, the mayor's legacy may be in tatters. As the NY Times puts it: "The collapse of the plan, which would have charged drivers $8 to enter parts of Manhattan during peak hours, was a huge blow to Mr. Bloomberg’s environmental agenda and political legacy, and his second major defeat at the hands of Mr. Silver and the state Assembly, which in 2005 blocked the mayor’s plan to redevelop the West Side railyards and allow a big sports stadium to be built there."

As we used to say in the street; "Once burnt, twice learnt." Yet the mayor seems to have missed this bit of street corner wisdom growing up in Waltham. Why else would he repeat the same stadium mistakes in dealing with Shelly Silver. Does everyone remember how Bloomberg spit in Silver's face on the Gansevoort recycling center? And isn't the definition of crazy doing the same thing over and over, expecting different results?

So now expect the sour grapes from the mayor and all of his faux bicycle riding buddies. As Liz cites the mayoral mouthpiece: "John Gallagher, who sent out the following and noted that it should be attributed to him, not the mayor himself; "What we are witnessing today is one of the biggest cop-outs in New York's history. After insisting on the formation of a commission to make recommendations for a bill, and then for the City Council to vote to endorse that bill, the Assembly needs to stand up and be counted. They owe it to the majority of New Yorkers who support this plan, the scores of environmental groups, public health organizations, business leaders, unions, and the public at large, to put this proposal to a public vote.”

What part of, the votes weren't there, doesn't Gallagher get? And when does the mayoral spokesman get to speak ex cathedra for himself? And as we said this morning, the mayor himself foreclosed compromise with his "eleventh hour" admonition in church yesterday, something that Silver himself referenced after the assembly decision.

So now what? Can we can expect the League of Woman Voters to launch its electoral jihad? Maybe the League should start in Ruben Diaz's South Bronx district, or in Carl Kruger's South Brooklyn district. The League will soon find themselves in the position of all of those voters who couldn't understand how Nixon won. As Pauline Kael remarked at the time: ""I don’t understand how Nixon won; I don’t know a soul who voted for him."

So we'll leave this delicious outcome for more on the mayoral legacy (or lack thereof) tomorrow. Just remember what we've been saying all along about hubris and the singular lack of political skills, not to mention charisma. The plan was flawed, but the only flair the mayor showed was in his nostrils.

Dr. Oz and the HealthCorps

In today's NY Sun, the paper focuses on the health education work of Dr. Mehmet Oz: "Fueled by the operating room experience, Dr. Oz has made it his mission to educate people on ways to avoid cardiovascular disease. “When I see foods, I see drugs,” he said, referring to the processed foods many people consume."

As part of this educational mission Dr. Oz founded the HealthCorps seven years ago. Now, thanks to a grant of over $2 million that City Council Health Chair Joel Rivera and his colleagues provided last year, the HealthCorps is operating in twenty eight NYC high schools: "Targeting children represents a specific strategy. “When you teach high school kids something, you get a multiplier benefit. They audit their refrigerators,” he said, describing a teenager foraging for a snack. “I recognized that these kids, not only do they get it, they talk about it.”

The key aspect of the HC strategy is to generate the kind of health activism that will help to transform the communal as well as the individual life styles and behaviors that are leading to all of the city's health problems. It's a lot more cost-effective to change the behaviors that lead to disease, than to have to intervene medically later on. As Dr. Oz has said, the country can't afford to utilize his cardiac surgical services on a mass scale-people need to change or the current health care crisis will really mushroom out of control.

Mayor Culpa

With the mayor facing traffic tax doom today it looks as if his patience is wearing thin. As the NY Times is reporting today, he's warning legislators that they will be facing a voter backlash if they don't approve his tax plan: "As the plan remained in limbo in Albany, Mr. Bloomberg publicly appealed for it on Sunday. Before speaking at the Cornerstone Baptist Church in Brooklyn, the mayor warned that legislators who voted against the plan would have to explain their actions to the public. “They’re going to be responsible to their constituents as to why they don’t have buses,” Mr. Bloomberg said to reporters. “When we stop work on the Second Avenue subway, they’re the ones that are going to have to answer.”

We suppose that he really hasn't looked carefully at the polls on this. For all of the supposed support for the plan if the money gets earmarked for mass transit, there is a comparable skepticism that the bucks will ever be used properly. And the impact on the middle class car commuter is driving a great deal of the opposition. As the NY Daily News tells us this morning: "The plan's opponents say it will hurt less affluent drivers without mass transit options, while providing no guarantee that the proceeds will make trains, buses and subways better."

Some of this is driven home in a companion story in the News today that focuses on the difficulty of one commuter living in a two fare zone: "Dan Tubridy, a Manhattan bar owner who lives in Rockaway Park, Queens, knows exactly what congestion pricing will cost him: an additional hour and six minutes. If Mayor Bloomberg gets his way in Albany to charge drivers $8 to enter Manhattan, the 31-year-old newlywed expects his commute to more than triple as he trades his Pontiac Aztek for the train. What was a 35-to-40-minute drive into Manhattan will be replaced by nearly two hours on the subway — with three transfers."

Maybe we will sit down after this fiasco ends, and really truly develop a sensible and comprehensive traffic congestion plan. That is, after the mayor and his bicycle riding buddies are sent packing.

For Whom the Bell Doesn't Toll

It looks as if the Mike Bloomberg congestion tax will die an ignominious death in Albany today; and as we would say in the South Bronx, "Que lastima!" As the NY Post is reporting this morning, some of the last minute changes forwarded in the Assembly have been given the cold shoulder by His Petulance: "The city's congestion-pricing proposal is effectively dead - short of a "miracle" - after Mayor Bloomberg yesterday said he was done making changes to it.
Bloomberg has been pushing for passage of the plan by today's deadline for $354 million in federal transportation money. But Assembly Democrats have warned in recent days that they would not support congestion pricing without significant changes. "If the mayor is saying take it or leave it, my guess is we're going to leave it because we've raised substantial questions that haven't been addressed," said Assemblyman Richard Brodsky, the Westchester Democrat who has led the opposition."

If this transpires, than we'll have another example of how the mayor's political skills have fallen short as he travels up past the Tappan Zee Bridge. In his defiance, the mayor did let loose this funny line: "The time for changes has long come and passed," the mayor said. "You can't write complex legislation that has enormous impact on the city for generations [in the 11th hour]. "I'm not going to be a part of that kind of legislation, and I don't think the Assembly or the Senate or the governor wants to be," the mayor said."

This from someone who originally tried to bum rush everyone with a deadline that turned out to be not so much of one, and someone who tried to do so without giving his colleagues in government any real chance to vet the proposal. Payback is, as they say, a bitch. Which is not to say that the plan that passed the city council is any good. As the old saying goes, the mayor and his allies sought synthesis, but all they achieved is composite error.

As the Post says in its editorial this morning, moving rapidly away from its earlier support of the concept; "Indeed, the proposal that emerged from a contentious City Council vote last week would create what's plainly an unworkably complex and often inequitable system...The plain fact is that congestion pricing would amount to a serious new tax on city residents and businesses. Such a tax isn't always ill advised, but it requires public confidence that it will both be levied fairly and serve a compelling public purpose. Without that certainty, the best intentions only serve to undermine confidence in government. Sadly, congestion pricing as it now stands doesn't cut it. Mike's lofty vision may or may not have been an idea whose time has come.
But this plan deserves to die."

London: Congestion Tax Exemplar?

In yesterday's NY Daily News the paper took another look at the impact that congestion taxing is having on the city of London and found not surprisingly, as its headlline points out-"Congestion fee hasn't stopped snarls." (We actually thought that the headline in the print addition was better, something about the results being more a public relations success than a real world triumph).

As the paper points out, citing an economist at the London School of Economics: "It has proven you can introduce a major tax on car use and the city's economy will keep growing," said Tony Travers, director of the Greater London Group at the London School of Economics. But Travers says the charge hasn't radically altered traffic patterns and is mostly a public-relations triumph: "It's helped convey the idea of London as a modern, forward-looking city." Doesn't this fit right in with the posturing and puffery of Mayor Mke?

And while the higher end stores and tourist attractions haven't been negatively impacted, smaller and independent stores have: "Business experts are not bullish on the charge.
"We would argue the current London scheme is not one you would want to export," says James Ford, spokesman for the London Chamber of Commerce. Ford's research found that since congestion charging began, retail chains have experienced a 22% drop in profitability while independent stores saw a 53% dip."

In a companion story in the paper there is a focus on the clean air effects of the tax. We got an especially good chuckle out of the mayor's sustainability maven: "The reductions in the outer boroughs would be concentrated along expressways and "have a significant benefit," insisted Rohit Aggarwala, the city's director of long-term planning and sustainability. "In the Bronx, some of the worst neighborhoods in terms of asthma hospitalizations are those clustered around the highways. We will see traffic on those roads decrease disproportionately," he argued. "You will see localized benefits there, just like you will see localized benefits on 125th St. and on Houston St."

What an absolute load of crap! Where's the EIS Rohit? And what about the mayor's approvals of the Gateway Mall along "Asthma Alley," and the Yankee Stadium reconstruction (not to mentioon the loss of all of that parkland). The Gateway project alone will generate an additional 125,000 cars and trucks a week; but all of this was before the mayor's environmmental epiphany, when he decided he wanted to follow in the footsteps of London's Ken the Red.

And speaking of the absent EIS, where's the hue and cry from all of our environmental special pleaders-those hypocrtical hollerers when the habitat of the snail darters may possibly be altered? We're going to call this whole charade, the Silence of the Shams. Please, let's just from now on, when a large project is being forwarded, stipulate that whatever the city or the developer says, will be taken as the emmis-with the EIS to be done after the project's completed.

So now this congestion tax mess is in the hands of the "Shadow Governor." Who knows what danger lurks? The Shadow do.

Wolf Tickets for the Mayor

In this morning's NY Sun, the paper's Andrew Wolf advises Shelly Silver to hold firm in his opposition to the congestion tax, reminding us that for all of the excoriation Shelly received on hid stadium opposition, his decision now holds up pretty well-particularly since congestion has been magically elevated into the major policy issue: "At lot of people were fit to be tied when the speaker quashed the stadium plan, but today the Speaker looks smart for that decision. I believe that a similarly bold move on congestion pricing will ultimately be celebrated in the same way"

At the same time Wolf takes a shot at the Bronx Council delegation, and county leader Rivera, for flouting the will of the borough: "Congestion pricing is wildly unpopular in the Bronx, but a deal was struck with the county Democratic boss, Jose Rivera, that saved the day.
The last time the mayor made a deal with Mr. Rivera, it cost taxpayers $250-million in increased water taxes to lure Bronx officials with park project pork, so that they would drop their opposition to a controversial multi-billion dollar water filtration plant. Before Monday there were only two supporters among the Bronx ."

Wolf also goes over some of the details of the congestion taxing scheme, rightly pointing out the outrageous administrative costs involved, as well as the elaborate fining mechanism that will undoubtedly metastasize at the expense of the poorest auto commuters: " The London fees are now around $16. Unless we can somehow be wildly more efficient than they are, and no municipal project here that I'm familiar with ever is, our $8 fee will quickly be eaten up by cost overruns. And there's a dirty secret about the revenues. It isn't the $8 that will bring in the revenue that we are promised will "revolutionize" mass transit, but, as with the quarters put in parking meters, the fines levied against those who didn't pay. In London, these account for about a third of all gross revenue."

So the ball is in Silver's court, and we're hopeful that Shelly will continue the 256 year tradition of free travel between the Bronx and Manhattan: "That is why the speaker of the Assembly, Sheldon Silver, has such a big choice to make on congestion pricing. He can, once again, be a giant killer and quash the congestion tax scheme being advanced by Mayor Bloomberg, as he did with the Olympic/Jets Stadium plan, another pet project of the mayor's." Monday is D-Day.

Hammond's Political Atlas: No Guide to Democratic Practice

Bill Hammond of the NY Daily News is outraged by the power and control exercised by Assembly Speaker Shelly Silver over the Bloomberg congestion tax. He's shocked that one man can stymie what he sees as the will of the people: "Never mind that the welfare of millions of New Yorkers hangs in the balance. Silver will determine behind closed doors whether Mayor Bloomberg's plan lives or dies. Never mind that the City Council and civic leaders agree congestion pricing is the right way to relieve traffic, clean the air and funnel billions into mass transit. Silver could declare the plan DOA with no public debate."

Please Bill, save your indignation for another issue; this one defies the attempt to Tar Baby Shelly after the display of arm twisting and hubris at the City Council this week. As for the welfare of millions of New Yorkers hanging in the balance, we think it's best to consult these folks directly before giving the mayor and the speaker the right to arrogate to themselves the definition of what's in the public interest.

Does Hammond believe that this tax would pass a city referendum (even one where the mayor money would impact the results)? Check out the NY Post letters section today-"Congestion Indigestion;" a better expression of the popular will than the suborned vote on Monday down in the council chambers. After all, there wasn't a single City Council nay vote from the Bronx where public opinion polls have shown the greatest skepticism and opposition to the mayor's tax plan exists.

So what we have here is one speaker who exercises her political clout in one direction, and another wilier speaker who does the opposite. It's not as if Shelly is doing what Quinn did-reverse the judgment of opponents through time-honored pork barrel politics. In fact, as the NY Sun reports this morning, Assembly Dems are overwhelmingly opposed to the Bloomberg tax: "Yesterday, Assembly Democrats resumed discussions of the bill in a private conference meeting at which the overwhelming majority expressed opposition."

In this morning's NY Post the level of Assembly discontent was expressed: "There are a number of members who have serious concerns about who will be paying the fees, how they will be paying the fees, and whether this is, among other things, a regressive tax," Silver said.
At a closed-door meeting, only 17 of 73 Assembly Democrats supported the plan, sources said."

And of course Bill Hammond fails to adequately-and/or critically-go into the details of the mayor's $500,000 contribution to the Senate Republicans. Here's how he describes the Good Joe's actions: "Senate Majority Leader Joe Bruno exercises pretty much the same dictatorial control in his house. Bruno and his Republican majority - eager to stay on the good side of Bloomberg, one of their biggest political donors - have already gone on record in favor of congestion pricing.

Doesn't this, however, seriously undermine the argument against Shelly? It all comes down to whose ox is being gored-and Hammond likes the congestion tax so its Silver who becomes the undemocratic bad dude.

We'll leave all this with a comment from the Vox Popular in the Post. As Malcom MacKinnon of Woodside wrote: "The City Council passed the congestion pricing plan, and what does Bloomberg say? "The people of New York City have spoken." Bloomberg misspoke. The residents of New York City didn't vote; 50 well-paid City Council members did. New Yorkers are adamantly opposed to this plan, which amounts to nothing more than another tax on the middle class - a huge financial burden as we slide into a recession. Once again, the mayor demonstrates how clueless he is about what real life is like in the city..."

Congestive Traffic Failure in Albany?

Well it looks as if the will of the people may be getting a radical readjustment as the congestion tax plan gets reviewed by the NYS Assembly. As the NY Post eloquently puts it, the plan is "wheezing:" "Mayor Bloomberg's congestion-pricing plan was "on life support" last night after a contentious closed-door meeting of Assembly Democrats in Albany... Of 36 lawmakers who spoke on the proposal to charge drivers $8 to enter Manhattan south of 60th Street during business hours, only about seven were in favor, sources said. "Congestion pricing is not dead but it's on life support," said Assemblyman opponent Hakeem Jeffries (D-Brooklyn)."

Some of the opposition in the Democratic conference is so severe that it appears unlikely that the measure will even be brought to the floor for a vote-although we did get a kick out of the fact that, according to the Post: "Some elected officials said they could be convinced to support it - but only if some very difficult amendments were added, such as launching a time-consuming environmental review and imposing a charge on New Jersey drivers now exempt from paying a fee." The good old time-consuming EIS, nice to hoist the EDF on its own petard. No?

The NY Times underscores the bleak prospects of the little engine that couldn't: "Assembly Democrats, who were weighing in on the proposal for the first time since the City Council handed the mayor a major victory by approving it on Monday night, appeared to be leaning heavily against the plan. Opponents who spoke during a four-hour, closed-door conference in the Capitol on Wednesday night outnumbered supporters by about five to one, according to Democrats who attended."

Maybe the mayor has simply run out of goodies to give away. Or perhaps the Albany law makers don't quite see the historic nature of all this, something the city's traffic commissioner-that once and future partner of the congestion tax promoting firm of Parsons-Brinckerhoff-tried to get across to the assembly: "“It’s like the mayor said: You are either for this historic change in New York or you’re against it, and if you’re against it, you’re going to have a lot of explaining to do,” Ms. Sadik-Khan said."

Nothing like being on the wrong side of history here. All of which, as the NY Sun reports, puts the mayor and Speaker Silver on a collision course: "A defeat of congestion pricing in the Assembly may irrevocably rupture the relationship between Speaker Sheldon Silver and Mayor Bloomberg and provoke an open conflict between the two city leaders...Mr. Bloomberg, who has said repeatedly that he supports politicians who back his policies, might be tempted to do the opposite if his plan to charge motorists a fee to drive into the busy parts of Manhattan collapses in the Assembly, on which Mr. Silver wields tremendous influence."

Wouldn't that be fun to watch? Then we'd get to see the naked power posturing of the mayor exposed for what it is-the untoward exercise of big money in the corruption of the democratic process. Oh, maybe that's overstating it a bit, but it's hard to resist the observation when the mayor and the speaker are in their holier than thou modes-posturing about the evil influence of money while the mayor continues his droit du seigneur purchase of legislative influence.

Lewe Fidler, who has done more than any one to shed light on this double standard, gets the last word in this morning's Crain's Insider: "Councilman Lew Fidler, D-Brooklyn, a leading congestion pricing opponent, won’t knock his colleagues for making deals. “That’s politics,” he says. “But I’m
criticizing the hypocrisy of Bloomberg. He plays by rules that he condemns others for.”

Bodegas Be Damned

As the NY Sun is reporting today, the NYS legislature has agreed to raise the state cigarette tax by $1.25, and by doing so is sticking another knife in the back of the state's C-stores and bodegas. As the Sun tells us: "A state budget office spokesman, Jeffrey Gordon, says the tax would raise $265 million for the budget, much of which would be used for health programs. The hike will bring the tax to $2.75."

No mention from the state about the shouts of glee from organized crime and terrorists who have been feasting on the black market in bootlegged smokes. Last year the NY Daily News did an undercover investigation and found: ""The bootlegging undermines the purpose of the tax increase, which is to get people to quit," said Dr. Donna Shelley of Columbia University's Mailman School of Public Health, who published a study on the phenomenon. "They're on the streets, in the subways, in the hospital, so even if you were thinking about quitting, they serve as a trigger to smoke," said Shelley, who published her findings in the American Journal of Public Health. One recent day, hustlers on 125th St. and Lenox Ave. tried to hook passersby with shouts of "Newports!" and "Loosies!" Packs were selling for $4 to $5, and single cigarettes were going for 50 cents. In some parts of Manhattan, one pack at a retail outlet can cost $9 after the $1.50 city tax and $1.50 state tax are tacked on.

As we told the NY Daily News last year: "Bootleggers also troll Fordham Road in the Bronx and parts of East New York and Bushwick in Brooklyn, said Richard Lipsky, a spokesman for the Neighborhood Retail Alliance." So what we have is a direct assault on small business with the only profitable side of the sale of tobacco being criminals and the government-and it's increasingly difficult to distinguish one from the other.

Recongestion Tax: Mayor's Ferry Tale

The NY Daily News continues its campaign for a congestion tax, and does so with such vigor that one could expect that Mort Zuckerman holds the contract on all of the street cameras. In today's editorial the paper tells us; "In voting to endorse congestion pricing, the City Council recognized the plan for what it is: the biggest boost for New York mass transit in decades. The Legislature must show the same wisdom. Albany lawmakers - notably Speaker Sheldon Silver and Assembly Democrats - should approve pouring the billions of dollars that would flow from congestion pricing into transportation improvements."

What is the News saying? Wisdom at the city council? Stop the presses! Seriously, this is the paper that hands out knucklehead awards to council members. As for the "biggest boost" for mass transit, the News should show more Missouri than it does-you know, "Show me!" Never has so many promissory notes been issued by a billionaire with so little chance for redemption at anything nearing face value.

Listen to the litany in the paper's editorial: ferries in Brooklyn and the Bronx; express buses for Throggs Neck, improvements on the G line yadda, yadda, yadda. All of Wimpy's hamburgers to be paid for at a later date. Here's the take on Domenick Recchia: "With congestion pricing, we are going to have ferry service from 58th St. in Sunset Park, and they'll look at a new ferry from Coney Island," Recchia said. "There will be express buses from Gravesend and Bensonhurst. The subway stations are going to be renovated. They will study ways to bring express subway trains into Coney Island."

And the lions will lie down with the lamb. What a wonderful example of wishful thinking-and from an agency that has already demonstrated with its fare hike for transit improvements reneg that it simply can't be trusted. In the midst of all of this pie-in-the sky, the NY Times chimes in in this morning's editorial exhorting Speaker Silver to do the right thing with this tax in Albany: "Now it is Mr. Silver’s turn. He needs to schedule congestion pricing for a floor vote this week while there is still time to meet the federal deadline. Congestion pricing is primarily viewed as a way to reduce traffic and pollution, but the fees it would produce are also vital to the state-run Metropolitan Transportation Authority, which has found its existing revenue stream undependable and inadequate. If congestion pricing is defeated, New Yorkers can look forward to higher taxes, higher fares and worse transit service."

This is the same paper that told us this summer that the MTA simply can't be trusted. Talk about a collective willing suspension of disbelief; it reminds us of a mass psychosis if all of the motivation behind this wasn't so tawdry and mundane. Arm twisting and political pork barrel politics at its best. As Metro points out this morning: "Last Friday, Brooklyn Council member Lewis Fidler believed the plan couldn’t pass — he counted 29 votes against it.
Horse-trading is expected, he said. “The ‘we’ll do a project in your district,’ that’s politics,” Fidler said. “But without these deals, there were not 26 votes in favor of this plan. Albany understands that, too.” Fidler claimed Bloom­berg had offered to hold a fund-raiser for one Council member in exchange for switching sides. “If other people did that, the U.S. attorney would be called,” he said. “I’m not suggesting it’s criminal, but it’s hypocrisy that can't be waved off with a Bloomberg-esque wave of the hand.”

Which brings us back to the mayor and the influence of money-mainly his-in politics. Here's someone who wants to limit what folks can give to candidates while he himself spends like a drunken sailor. And when it comes to congestion taxes the mayor had some interesting allies among those who voted for the council home rule and some who will support the measure in Albany-not including the $500,000 check to the Senate majority. As we said before, all roads lead to 79th Street.

All of this is captured clearly in Juan Gonzales' column this morning: "No one could recall such a naked combination of arm-twisting and pork-barrel handouts to pressure City Council members to approve the huge tax increase known as congestion pricing."City Hall offered more in goodies this week to get this tax passed than the federal government is giving us to do it," said Brooklyn Councilman Lewis Fidler, a leading opponent of the plan that passed by a 30-to-20 vote."

All that's left here is for some enterprising reporter to do the accounting; and the full accounting needs to include all of the money spent on ads for poverty stricken environmental groups suddenly awash in cash. So much for the will of the people hypocrisy on display at the city hall press conference the other day, And they called the Bush-led Iraq coalition, "Bribed, bullied and blind,"

All of which makes the continual chatter about getting money out of politics quite disingenuous, don't you think? When we let billionaires dictate campaign finance laws that make it easier for billionaires to run successfully, and when we let these same kinds of folks utilize their economic power to dictate policy through check writing on an order we've never seen in NYC politics, what we've done is turn good government on its head and let one man's private obsession dominate the political system-with the help of scores of check-cashing enablers and an editorial amen choir.

Focus on Bruckner Boulevard Key Food

In yesterday's NY Daily News' Bronx edition, the paper focused on the possible loss of a Key Food supermarket in that South Bronx neighborhood: "A supermarket that has called the Bronx home for more than 40 years may go out of business in December because of skyrocketing rents. The News highlighted just what a tragedy the store's closing would be for a community that doesn't have that many large modern supermarkets.

As usual, the issue is rising rent that would make it unprofitable for the supermarket to continue to operate and service this low and moderate income community: "There is no way any supermarket in the South Bronx can pay $50 a square foot," said Richard Lipsky, spokesman for Jules Levine, the owner of Pick Quick Foods, which runs the Key Food. "The only way to cover the rent is to raise the prices, but the people in the community cannot afford to pay the prices."

As we have been commenting, this is a crucial health issue since the city has identified Soundview as a community that lacks decent access to fresh fruits and vegetables. As the News reports, we're calling on the mayor to hold Vornado Realty's hands to the fire since the real estate conglomerate is an active bidder on a number of city projects: "Lipsky is asking that Mayor Bloomberg step up to preserve supermarkets in the same way he is installing fruit and vegetable street vendors in the city's neediest neighborhoods - including Soundview, one of the city's targeted areas. He is angered that Vornado can push out a supermarket that serves 850,000 customers, accepts $2 million in food stamps and sells more than $2.3 million of fresh produce, and still be considered as a project bidder. "If you are not going to be a company concerned with the health of New Yorkers, why should the mayor help the company with his business?" Lipsky asked."

The community really wants to keep its Key Food and Council member Palma is actively working to insure that this happens. But as one commenter to the News puts it: "That's INSANE! Isn't there some type of law to prohibit him from raising rent 400%? NOBODY could in 2008 afford to pay such an increase, so clearly he must want them out! And that really does NOTHING for the neighborhood, as whoever could afford to pay that kind of rent, is clearly going to OVERCHARGE for EVERYTHING that they sell. If the new entity is even a supermarket...

The grass roots effort is being aided by Local 1500 of the UFCW and its able political director Pat Purcell. As the News points out: "The store also has the backing of United Food and Commercial Workers Local 1500, which represents the store's 100 employees.
"There is nothing they can do with this land that will benefit the community more than this," said union spokesman Patrick Purcell."

Council woman Palma is talking directly to Vornado and we're hopeful that the company will be reasonable and negotiate a settlement to this in good faith. If not, we're prepared to ratchet up the pressure on them so that they understand the urgency of the situation. Stay tuned.

Fostering Doubt

Liz has an interesting item on the Daily Politics blog today about Helen Foster, the absent council member who would have been the 21st negative vote against the congestion tax: "Foster, who is considering a run for Bronx borough president in 2009, told Danis that she would have "definitely voted no," adding: " I was definitely against congestion pricing. I have always been against congestion pricing." Foster added she finds it “pretty interesting” that when the vote for a new Yankee Stadium came up, she didn’t hear City Hall worrying about air quality and traffic congestion."

Which is exactly what we've been saying all along about the total hypocrisy of those who have been promoting the congestion tax in order to help the poor Black and Latino kids in areas such as the South Bronx. As Foster points out, the concern with air quality is certainly selective-and we would add to this the fact that the Gateway Mall, supported by all of the same folks who're bringing us the congestion tax, will generate an additional 125,000 cars and trucks a week right along what's known as "Asthma Alley." And by the way, Foster voted against that congester as well.

Cigarette Taxes Up, Bodegas Down

As the NY Sun is reporting this morning, the proposed cigarette tax hike by NY State will be another bonanza for the black market: "The proposed tax hike on cigarettes in the state budget would create a "black market gold mine" for smugglers and force New York smokers to pay the highest taxes in the nation, experts warn."

When the city raised this tax in 2002-by a whopping 1800%-the cigarette revenues in local bodegas and newsstands dropped by about 60%; with most of the lost sales going to street vendors and the internet. The biggest loophole in the law, as the Sun points out, is the sale of smokes from Indian reservations: "A 2007 report by the Independent Budget Office, a nonpartisan city agency that analyzes the city's finances, found that 27% of city smokers and 34% of upstate smokers sometimes bought "under-taxed" cigarettes in 2006. These smokers avoided the tax by buying cigarettes from other states, ordering cigarettes over the Internet, and purchasing cigarettes at Indian reservations."

If you remember, then Governor Spitzer had promised to close this loophole once elected, but almost immediately reneged on the promise-guess he was too busy elsewhere to concentrate on living up to his election obligations. Absent some real enforcement here, the tax hike will really put the nail in the coffin for upstate C-stores, especially those in close proximity to the reservations-the differentials are simply too great for the legitimate retailer to compete with the tax dodgers.

Which doesn't worry the smoke0free crowd: "Despite any smuggling or tax evasion going on, the state or local governments still make a big chunk of money from increasing their tax rates on cigarettes," the director for policy research at Campaign for Tobacco-Free Kids, Eric Lindblom, said. "That's not to say there isn't any smuggling or tax evasion. There is." And of course the black market on the street corners of NYC has no age restrictions to prevent children from easily getting their hands on the product.

Lindblom recognizes the Indian issue and says; "Sales at Indian reservations pose a greater problem in New York State, Mr. Lindblom added, but can be addressed by better legislation and enforcement." But why put the tax cart before the enforcement horse. Sales of tobacco have already plummeted. What about the health of NY business Mr. Lindblom?

The Will of the People Congested

We observed with some degree of amused detachment the chaos surrounding yesterday's 30-20 City Council vote in favor of the mayor's congestion taxing plan. Detachment because our professional involvement with the opposition ended at the close of last year; amusement because of not only the speaker's silly pronouncement that the vote heralded the "will of the people," but because of the fate that awaits the likes of Dominick Recchia, Eric Gioia and Mike Mcmahon-three council members with larger political ambitions who made their futures a bit more murky with their decision to side with the mayor on this sticky issue.

First to the speaker. As the NY Post reports this morning, she had this to say at the news conference after the vote: "In a press conference with Council Speaker Christine Quinn after the vote, the mayor declared that "the people of New York City have spoken." As the NY Daily News reports, "Council Speaker Christine Quinn (D-Manhattan), who worked with Bloomberg to wrangle votes for the plan, said the vote showed broad support, with 20 of the 30 yes votes coming from council members who represent areas outside Manhattan."

Ah, the two levels of politics in action. Pay close attention to the word wrangle in that Daily News quote. Never has the will of the people been subjected to such a difficult berthing process; and isn't it interesting that the Bronx, the borough where public opinion against the congestion tax ran the highest, couldn't manage a single no vote.

All of which reminds us of the title of the Jack Newfield book on New York politics: City for Sale. Let's be clear, this is a measure that couldn't have gotten ten votes on its own, a proposal for environmental change that failed to provide any environmental review, and a piece of legislation put forward by an "above politics" mayor and a liberal city council speaker that brought forth more good old fashion political horse trading than anything seen since the good old days of Tammany Hall control.

Here's how the NY Times describes the process: "Although the administration and the Council’s leadership were able to gain support with promises of programs, projects and political aid in upcoming campaigns — as well as threats of taking those things away — opposition remained strong. Several council members argued that it was unfair to essentially tax residents to move around their own city, that even after they voted to support the proposal, the Legislature could approve a different version, and that revenues would not necessarily go toward the promised transit improvements."

And of course there's the time-honored Wimpy nature of the proposal, at least as far as it pertains to all of those mass transit improvements. Wimpy, as in Popeye's Wimpy, who always said; "I'd gladly pay you Tuesday for a hamburger today." We loved the statement on this from Mike McMahon: "It was a very close decision," said Councilman Mike McMahon (D-SI), who voted in favor - admitting he was taking a "leap of faith" that the revenue generated would be used for mass transit." Indeed, a politician with faith, what an unusual thing to see.

All of which, of course, may well be for nought. As we've said from the very beginning of this process there was little chance that this city council could stand up to the combined political muscle of the mayor and the speaker; and the closeness of the vote really belies all of Chris Quinn's happy talk about the people and its supposed will. Now the scene shifts to Albany where the only real legislative checks actually existed.

It does, as we imagined all along, all come down to Shelly Silver, someone who can't be cajoled and/or threatened by the mayor and his money. After forcing her members to take a stand on this issue, Quinn may have left them hanging out to dry-particularly all of those outer borough leap of faithers who went with the mayor and the speaker on this new tax. Here's a funny from the Times on this: "But other council members took the vote as a sign that Mr. Silver would ultimately back the plan, since Ms. Quinn had said privately that she would not call for a vote until she had an indication that it would gain approval from the state."

We'll see about that pretty soon; but we think that Silver's support, much like the promise of mass transit aid has as much chance of success as anyone getting paid back for giving Wimpy money for his hamburger. We'll give the end quote to Leroy Comrie, someone who stood up on this as well as anyone: "Queens Democrat Leroy Comrie was skeptical that commuters would see any of the promised $354 million in federal funds that would come along with the plan.
"I have absolutely no faith in the MTA being honest with New Yorkers," said Comrie."