We received a comment on our post on Intro 699 by someone who cleverly calls him/herself "George Washington Plunkitt." It seems that George, who clearly appears to be some twenty-something City Council staffer, feels that we are misinformed about the potential impacts of the bill on the city's green grocers. He tells us to, "Get your facts right (or at least read the law) before blathering about something you know nothing about."
Now there is something about someone who has such confidence in his judgments that he has to hide behind the cloak of anonymity. One thing about us, we've represented small businesses for over two decades and have never hid from publicly rebuking anyone (see Giuliani and his mega store plan). So George come out from under your desk and show your ignorant self publicly or refrain from speaking to us ever again.
As far as substance is concerned it is instructive to point out that GWP wrote a book called "Plunkitt of Tammany Hall," a book that Alliance Director Richard Lipsky had the pleasure to use quite often in teaching introductory courses in American politics. In criticizing our critique of Intro 699 GWP is quite well named, because it was Plunkitt who coined the term "honest graft."
And it is the whole regulatory scheme in this city that comes closest to replicating the Tammany world of GWP. For years inspectors have been shaking down frightened store owners using the city code as effectively as a 9 millimeter. In the case of stoop stands we've had inspectors who've issued violations to stores for exceeding the 5' rule without ever leaving their parked cars. Just this past year a hapless store owner was fined $2,000 because his displayed fruit extended over the stand and thereby exceeded the 5' rule!
As far as GWP's comment that "Only the Council can increase license fees," I would only advise him to join the real world. 699 is the Council's initiative and one thing we've learned about government is that lawmakers have a vested interest in demonstrating that the laws they've passed are being implemented to good effect. See Spot Run! See Spot Regulate! See Spot increase the Fine Structure!
The most precious comment of GWP's deals with the question, an accusation really, "Are you saying that storeowners have no regard for customer safety?” This in response to our accusation that Intro 699 was anti-business. This observation brings to mind the worldview of the city's most notorious regulator: former DCA Commissioner Gretchen Dykstra. In Dykstra's world anyone who opposed enhancing DCA's regulatory authority was "anti-consumer," and she invidiously juxtaposed these recalcitrant storeowners with their "law-abiding" non-complainers.
GWP not only needs to get a better understanding of the real world, the world where enforcement is arbitrary and adjudication lacks even a semblance of due process, he could also benefit from additional reading in political science. We'd suggest Murray Edelman's classic, "The Symbolic Uses of Politics". In this work Edelman depicts the gap between the expressed language of a statute (designed to appear to speak for some public good) and the actual impact of the implementation of the statute (something often totally at odds we the intent of the statute itself).
In the case of city regulators the intent of a code is always some undeniable good-like "pedestrian safety." The implementation, however, quickly devolves from its original meaning and is transformed into an arbitrarily enforced means for raising city revenues at the expense of storeowners. And GWP, if you are worried about storeowners failing to be concerned about customer safety please worry no more. Our trial lawyers are ever vigilant and the most innocent slip-and-fall can be expected to be conflated into the specter of a lifetime paralysis.
Oh, and by the way, if Intro 699 is such an impeccably drafted bill please do tell us just what the rush was. Couldn't the bill have been aged for more than two days? It would seem that the haste involved in this exercise indicates a reluctance to expose 699 to any form of comprehensive review, especially by the storeowners it targets.
One last point. GWP informs us that the bill is not "an additional layer of oversight" but is merely designed to force DOT inspectors to "get their butts out into the street before signing off on sidewalk safety." Trust us, everyone is safer if these folks find something more productive to do. How about actually intervening to tell the mayor that mega-developments like the Bronx Terminal Market are going to choke our city streets with vehicular traffic?
If inspectors don't start doing this than bills like Intro 699 will be moot. As the big box stores proliferate, the concern for pedestrian foot traffic will have vanished along with the customers shopping at the stores on the city's Main Streets.
Wednesday, October 19, 2005
Tuesday, October 18, 2005
NYC Comptroller Comes Out Against Wal-Mart
The Staten Island Advance is reporting that City Comptroller Bill Thompson, while still unsure about the proposed NASCAR track in Bloomfield, is opposed to Wal-Mart entering the city, including the two sites proposed for Staten Island. His major concerns are the company’s child labor abuses and poor health care benefits.
The article then goes to mention that the Comptroller will soon be auditing the Economic Development Corp. (EDC), the lead agency on the redevelopment of the Bronx Terminal Market. We suggest that Thompson pay special attention to the sweetheart deal that has led to the attempted eviction of the merchants and the shoehorning in of the politically-connected Related Companies. Specifically, he should be examining whether the City and EDC, by deciding to involve only one developer and then offer a lease agreement with outrageously low rents, is shortchanging New York City’s taxpayers. Also, considering that the Terminal Market is a prime candidate for a Wal-Mart/Sam’s Club the Comptroller should be especially interested in ensuring that the city's money is being used wisely.
The article then goes to mention that the Comptroller will soon be auditing the Economic Development Corp. (EDC), the lead agency on the redevelopment of the Bronx Terminal Market. We suggest that Thompson pay special attention to the sweetheart deal that has led to the attempted eviction of the merchants and the shoehorning in of the politically-connected Related Companies. Specifically, he should be examining whether the City and EDC, by deciding to involve only one developer and then offer a lease agreement with outrageously low rents, is shortchanging New York City’s taxpayers. Also, considering that the Terminal Market is a prime candidate for a Wal-Mart/Sam’s Club the Comptroller should be especially interested in ensuring that the city's money is being used wisely.
You Get What You Pay For
We mentioned a few months ago that Wal-Mart had conducted a survey demonstrating that 61% of Staten Islands wanted the retailer on the Island. At the time, we said that the report was obviously biased, Staten Islanders had yet to be satisfactorily educated about Wal-Mart and that the unwavering opposition from communities adjacent to the proposed site would outweigh the general approbation of those who wouldn’t have to deal with traffic and quality of life impacts.
Our original claim of bias was based on the fact that Wal-Mart had paid for the poll but now that we’ve received a copy of the survey all we can say is that the word “bias” isn’t strong enough. The questions asked to Staten Islands are so skewed that we’re honestly surprised only 61% of Staten islanders said "Yes" to the store.
The Wal-Mart portion of interview script begins with:
So the next time you see a Wal-Mart-sponsored poll demonstrating New York’s supposed love for the retailer, remember that the behemoth from Bentonville is expecting to get the results it pays for.
Our original claim of bias was based on the fact that Wal-Mart had paid for the poll but now that we’ve received a copy of the survey all we can say is that the word “bias” isn’t strong enough. The questions asked to Staten Islands are so skewed that we’re honestly surprised only 61% of Staten islanders said "Yes" to the store.
The Wal-Mart portion of interview script begins with:
There is a site in the Tottenville Section of the South Shore that would be suitable for a major retail development, such as a Wal-Mart store. I am going to mention some of the advantages of such a project, if it were to go forward. For each one, please tell me if it is very important, fairly important, only somewhat important, or not very important advantage.First, the question of whether this site is suitable for major retail development is questionable. The parcel requires considerable cleanup, is situated over wetlands and is accessed by local, narrow roads. Second and more importantly, of course Wal-Mart is going to get favorable results from this survey when it only mentions the putative benefits of the mega-box store. Looking at some of the actual “advantages” further confirms this:
43. The project would create about 350 permanent new jobs that would pay more than 10 dollars an hour, and provide good health benefits to both full and part time employees.Could the questions get any more ridiculous? Job creation is mentioned without discussing possible job loss from closing supermarkets and small businesses. The Staten Island Railroad stop is crumbling, may be torn down and won’t be used by any Wal-Mart shopper in this already car-dependent borough (plus who is going to lug hundreds of dollars of goods on the SIR anyway?). In terms of saving time, it will still be just as easy, if not easier, for people to shop at the Wal-Mart in Edison, NJ, only a few miles over the Outer Bridge. And lastly, if Wal-Mart thinks that the proposed site can easily handle automobile traffic, we’d like to know what and how much of it they’re smoking. An initial analysis that we’ve commissioned (it’ll be uploaded when complete) conclusively demonstrates that a proposed Wal-Mart, coupled with the soon-to-be-completed 680,000 sq. ft. Bricktown Mall up the road, will prove be a traffic nightmare for Tottenville and the surrounding communities.
46. The project site is next to a Staten Island Railroad stop, which would provide easy access for customers and employees.
48. The project would bring Wal-Mart to Staten Island, making it easier for customers who currently drive to New Jersey to shop at a Wal-Mart
49. Traffic studies show that the area around the store can easily handle increased automobile traffic, and the site has ample room for parking
So the next time you see a Wal-Mart-sponsored poll demonstrating New York’s supposed love for the retailer, remember that the behemoth from Bentonville is expecting to get the results it pays for.
Stoopid Is As Stoopid Does
Alec Magnet has a good story today in the NY Sun on the effort by Councilmember John Liu to pass a new law (Intro 731) that would ameliorate the impact of Intro 699, the original legislation aimed at regulating stoop stands sponsored by the Councilman and opposed by the KASBSC and the Alliance. According to Liu the opposition to 699 was generated by "scare tactics" initiated by the city's DOT.
This is certainly news to the hundreds of fruit stand operators who rallied in front of City Hall last week in opposition to 699 (Perhaps brainwashed by the militant cadres at DOT). Their concerns, outlined in yesterday's post, was that the increased oversight would cost operators more in licensing fees and many would be forced out of business by arbitrary enforcement standards, standards that Mr. Kim of the KASBSC has shown to have no correlation to the protection of pedestrian safety or mobility.
As the Alliance's Richard Lipsky points out in the Sun today, the idea of a task force, the essence of the new Intro, is a good one but should precede any new enforcement regulations. The city should be armed with at least some data before embarking on a new regulatory scheme that will, like all others in the past, end up costing law-abiding shopkeepers millions of dollars.
This is certainly news to the hundreds of fruit stand operators who rallied in front of City Hall last week in opposition to 699 (Perhaps brainwashed by the militant cadres at DOT). Their concerns, outlined in yesterday's post, was that the increased oversight would cost operators more in licensing fees and many would be forced out of business by arbitrary enforcement standards, standards that Mr. Kim of the KASBSC has shown to have no correlation to the protection of pedestrian safety or mobility.
As the Alliance's Richard Lipsky points out in the Sun today, the idea of a task force, the essence of the new Intro, is a good one but should precede any new enforcement regulations. The city should be armed with at least some data before embarking on a new regulatory scheme that will, like all others in the past, end up costing law-abiding shopkeepers millions of dollars.
Entrepreneurship in Government: Bloomberg's Lack of Political Imagination
In previous posts on the entire question of the impact of the dreaded "special interests" we have emphasized the fact that being "above politics," something that the Citizens Union praises the mayor for in giving him the organization's "preferred" rating, doesn't automatically translate into astute policy making. The ability of the mayor to rise above the parochial interplay of interests doesn't imbue him with any special insights into what constitutes the public good.
No area of policy better exemplifies this than solid waste management. For the better part of four years Bloomberg has struggled to devise a solid waste management plan that tackles the knotty issues of export costs, recycling, transfer station siting and waste reduction. In this panoply of issues the mayor has only really addressed one: transfer station siting. And one could argue here that it is precisely in addressing this issue that the mayor exhibited parochial political instincts (He knocked out potential mayoral rival Gifford Miller on this front).
As far as recycling and waste reduction are concerned, however, the mayor's SWMP is totally lame. In fact when the recycling initiative was described in the report as "goundbreaking" we pointed out that this was only true if the mayor was going to be digging with a plastic spoon. There is simply nothing in the SWMP that even remotely gives any hope for meaningful waste reduction.
Waste Disposers
Which brings us to the issue of commercial waste disposers which has been languishing at the Council two years after Intro 220 was introduced, partly because of the opposition of the DEP. Disposers are the one initiative that holds promise for not only reducing waste but, concomitantly, increasing recycling as well.
In addition, the use of disposers would also go a long way towards improving the city's public health, since the quick and efficient removal of food waste will help reduce rodent and insect infestation. Remember that the mayor is fond of saying that when it comes to health money should be secondary. Not only that, disposers are a low impact and reasonably priced technology that the technocratic Bloomberg should have jumped on.
Instead the Bloomberg Administration has stalled while promoting a SWMP whose price tag, already astronomical, will only escalate as export costs go through the roof. At the same time, the mayor's pledge to reduce the 500,000 garbage export truck trips a year will unavoidably flounder as the city embarks on this export-dependent disposal methodology.
Hypocrisy at Full Blast
What's ironic in all this policy myopia is the hypocrisy of the administration's stance on disposers. You see, the city actually agrees with our position. We have just finished discussions with the good folks at NYCHA where we have learned that the housing agency has just finished installing 1200 disposers at the New Hope project in Bushwick. Do you know who paid for the units and their installation? The NYC Department of Health.
Not only that, the agency is letting its new kitchen installation contracts and plans to continue installing disposers until 18,000 units of public housing are equipped. No worry of sewer overflows or nitrogen loading here. And the people in the agency who are in charge of the Pilot Program report that garbage disposal has been reduced and the environment has been improved!
We are hopeful that the Council will be introducing its own pilot for commercial disposers next week. Just click on our grinders section for a detailed description of their solid waste reduction and public health benefits. Oh, and one more thing. Emily Lloyd, the new DEP commissioner was probably the biggest proponent of disposers when she served as Sanitation Commissioner in the early nineties. We look forward to an interesting discussion on all this after the pilot is introduced.
Postscript
It was Rudy Guiliani who pushed the original pilot on residential disposers over the objections of the DEP. The report pursuant to that pilot is still posted on the DEP website. It demonstrated conclusively that the installation of 25,000 residential units a year! for the next thirty years would have a de minimis impact on the city's waste water treatment infrastructure (while having a salutary impact on municipal garbage disposal).
No area of policy better exemplifies this than solid waste management. For the better part of four years Bloomberg has struggled to devise a solid waste management plan that tackles the knotty issues of export costs, recycling, transfer station siting and waste reduction. In this panoply of issues the mayor has only really addressed one: transfer station siting. And one could argue here that it is precisely in addressing this issue that the mayor exhibited parochial political instincts (He knocked out potential mayoral rival Gifford Miller on this front).
As far as recycling and waste reduction are concerned, however, the mayor's SWMP is totally lame. In fact when the recycling initiative was described in the report as "goundbreaking" we pointed out that this was only true if the mayor was going to be digging with a plastic spoon. There is simply nothing in the SWMP that even remotely gives any hope for meaningful waste reduction.
Waste Disposers
Which brings us to the issue of commercial waste disposers which has been languishing at the Council two years after Intro 220 was introduced, partly because of the opposition of the DEP. Disposers are the one initiative that holds promise for not only reducing waste but, concomitantly, increasing recycling as well.
In addition, the use of disposers would also go a long way towards improving the city's public health, since the quick and efficient removal of food waste will help reduce rodent and insect infestation. Remember that the mayor is fond of saying that when it comes to health money should be secondary. Not only that, disposers are a low impact and reasonably priced technology that the technocratic Bloomberg should have jumped on.
Instead the Bloomberg Administration has stalled while promoting a SWMP whose price tag, already astronomical, will only escalate as export costs go through the roof. At the same time, the mayor's pledge to reduce the 500,000 garbage export truck trips a year will unavoidably flounder as the city embarks on this export-dependent disposal methodology.
Hypocrisy at Full Blast
What's ironic in all this policy myopia is the hypocrisy of the administration's stance on disposers. You see, the city actually agrees with our position. We have just finished discussions with the good folks at NYCHA where we have learned that the housing agency has just finished installing 1200 disposers at the New Hope project in Bushwick. Do you know who paid for the units and their installation? The NYC Department of Health.
Not only that, the agency is letting its new kitchen installation contracts and plans to continue installing disposers until 18,000 units of public housing are equipped. No worry of sewer overflows or nitrogen loading here. And the people in the agency who are in charge of the Pilot Program report that garbage disposal has been reduced and the environment has been improved!
We are hopeful that the Council will be introducing its own pilot for commercial disposers next week. Just click on our grinders section for a detailed description of their solid waste reduction and public health benefits. Oh, and one more thing. Emily Lloyd, the new DEP commissioner was probably the biggest proponent of disposers when she served as Sanitation Commissioner in the early nineties. We look forward to an interesting discussion on all this after the pilot is introduced.
Postscript
It was Rudy Guiliani who pushed the original pilot on residential disposers over the objections of the DEP. The report pursuant to that pilot is still posted on the DEP website. It demonstrated conclusively that the installation of 25,000 residential units a year! for the next thirty years would have a de minimis impact on the city's waste water treatment infrastructure (while having a salutary impact on municipal garbage disposal).
Monday, October 17, 2005
Stooping So Low
The more we think about the implications of Intro 699, the bill that would add an additional layer of oversight to the regulation of fruit stands, the more we see the measure as at best irrelevant and at worst another example of how the city's neighborhood retailers get regulated to death. Apparently enough councilmembers are beginning to get the message since the bill's original sponsor, John Liu of Flushing, withdrew the bill last week just before the Council would have voted to sustain the mayor's veto of the measure.
In response Liu has introduced another bill (Intro 731) that is designed to not only soften the new regulatory scheme but allay the concerns of his colleagues that the city's predominately Korean green grocers will be unfairly targeted by Intro 699. The Transportation Committee will hold a hearing on this new bill today at 1:00. This measure would, among other things set up an advisory committee to catalogue the fruit stand sector and weigh the impact of 699.
This is not a bad idea but it really only makes sense if enacted before 699 is voted into law. It is important to inventory the fruit stand resources and the industry's concerns prior to the implementation of a new regulatory structure. The haste with which 699 was introduced and voted on only underscores the Council's failure in this regard.
The larger issue in all this is that 699 takes its place in a pantheon of seemingly well-meaning regulatory measures that all end up, not in benefiting the public, but in harassing neighborhood shopkeepers and raising revenues for the city at the retailer's expense. This is made plain in the testimony of the Korean-American Small Business Service Center.
The Center, led by Sung Soo Kim, has been fighting for small shopkeepers for the past two decades. In particular, KASBSC has highlighted the deleterious impact of out-of-control city enforcement and regulatory policy and the negative effects of the proliferation of big box stores. In the current fight over Intro 699 Mr. Kim points out that crowded city streets are caused more by street vendors and public facilities and structures. He rather kindly neglects to mention that John Liu is a sponsor of a bill to increase the number of peddlers on the street.
The most salient point made, however, addresses the cost of the proposed regulation. In the first place the bill's sponsors estimate that it will cost $ 1 million a year to enforce. Where do you suppose this money is going to come from? Exactly. It will be the struggling retailers who, through increased licensing fees, will bear this regulatory burden.
In addition, once legislation of this kind is passed it only encourages a more aggressive enforcement posture. Now many folks will say that this is only as it should be. According to this view, if you are breaking the law you should have to pay the price. This ignores, however, the totally subjective nature of enforcement and the arbitrary character of the adjudicatory process.
As KASBC points out, "A subjective analysis yields a mathematically determined one-dimensional rating that categorically disregards the ecology of specific neighborhoods."
Make no mistake about this: this Intro puts small store owners at peril. “A disapproval revocation of the license would directly mean a death sentence to the store. [Since 30% of its income derives from the stoop stand,] a green grocer absolutely cannot survive with this loss of 30% sales volume."
Given the potential nature of this catastrophe shouldn't the Council proceed with greater caution? We at the Alliance certainly think so. Let's mandate a fair and thorough review prior to enacting this kind of legislation. And while the Council is at it, the review should be expanded to include an examination of the proliferation of illegal street vendors whose presence, often directly in front of legitimate store owners, is robbing retailers of the sales needed to survive.
In response Liu has introduced another bill (Intro 731) that is designed to not only soften the new regulatory scheme but allay the concerns of his colleagues that the city's predominately Korean green grocers will be unfairly targeted by Intro 699. The Transportation Committee will hold a hearing on this new bill today at 1:00. This measure would, among other things set up an advisory committee to catalogue the fruit stand sector and weigh the impact of 699.
This is not a bad idea but it really only makes sense if enacted before 699 is voted into law. It is important to inventory the fruit stand resources and the industry's concerns prior to the implementation of a new regulatory structure. The haste with which 699 was introduced and voted on only underscores the Council's failure in this regard.
The larger issue in all this is that 699 takes its place in a pantheon of seemingly well-meaning regulatory measures that all end up, not in benefiting the public, but in harassing neighborhood shopkeepers and raising revenues for the city at the retailer's expense. This is made plain in the testimony of the Korean-American Small Business Service Center.
The Center, led by Sung Soo Kim, has been fighting for small shopkeepers for the past two decades. In particular, KASBSC has highlighted the deleterious impact of out-of-control city enforcement and regulatory policy and the negative effects of the proliferation of big box stores. In the current fight over Intro 699 Mr. Kim points out that crowded city streets are caused more by street vendors and public facilities and structures. He rather kindly neglects to mention that John Liu is a sponsor of a bill to increase the number of peddlers on the street.
The most salient point made, however, addresses the cost of the proposed regulation. In the first place the bill's sponsors estimate that it will cost $ 1 million a year to enforce. Where do you suppose this money is going to come from? Exactly. It will be the struggling retailers who, through increased licensing fees, will bear this regulatory burden.
In addition, once legislation of this kind is passed it only encourages a more aggressive enforcement posture. Now many folks will say that this is only as it should be. According to this view, if you are breaking the law you should have to pay the price. This ignores, however, the totally subjective nature of enforcement and the arbitrary character of the adjudicatory process.
As KASBC points out, "A subjective analysis yields a mathematically determined one-dimensional rating that categorically disregards the ecology of specific neighborhoods."
Make no mistake about this: this Intro puts small store owners at peril. “A disapproval revocation of the license would directly mean a death sentence to the store. [Since 30% of its income derives from the stoop stand,] a green grocer absolutely cannot survive with this loss of 30% sales volume."
Given the potential nature of this catastrophe shouldn't the Council proceed with greater caution? We at the Alliance certainly think so. Let's mandate a fair and thorough review prior to enacting this kind of legislation. And while the Council is at it, the review should be expanded to include an examination of the proliferation of illegal street vendors whose presence, often directly in front of legitimate store owners, is robbing retailers of the sales needed to survive.
Money Quotes
The press, apparently now at ease because the mayor appears on the way to an historic election victory, has begun to examine the Bloomberg Splurge. Joyce Purnick at the Times this morning looks ($$) at the level of mayoral spending and determines, well, it's not really clear what she is saying beyond, it seems, the People are to blame.
Anyway maybe others could get the gist of this analysis but Purnick misses what we believe is the essential point in the queasiness we feel about the mayor's campaign excesses: The spending differentials has all but cut off meaningful debate and any concomitant evaluation of the mayor's record that goes beyond his self-serving canned messages.
The lack of any serious analysis is of course somewhat a function of the under-funded nature of the Ferrer campaign and its own inability to find themes that critique the mayor while simultaneously resonating with the voters. The largest culprit, however, is the press itself. In the face of the mayoral barrage Errol Louis is right: the media needs to become a lot more thorough and tenacious in its evaluation of the mayor's tenure.
A case in point is the mayor's charitable donations, featured in a Ferrer charge in today's Daily News. The level of Bloomberg's charitable giving has risen from around $27 million in 1997 to around $139 million today. So there is a direct correlation between the mayor's political ambitions and his largesse (The Harlem Boys Choir for instance didn't receive a nickel until after Bloomberg was politicized, at which point they were apparently discovered as a worthy charitable donation). Ferrer pointing this out is not, in Bloomberg spokesman Stu Loeser’s view, a "cheap shot", but a serious accusation, one that deserves major scrutiny from the press.
The mayor, after all, didn't get rich all of a sudden so his $112 of excess giving can reasonably be traced to only one motive. Isn't time to trace all of these expenditures and expose them for what they are: a fancy way of bribing support not because of any newly found generosity. Or in Joyce Purnick's phrase, "because he can."
Anyway maybe others could get the gist of this analysis but Purnick misses what we believe is the essential point in the queasiness we feel about the mayor's campaign excesses: The spending differentials has all but cut off meaningful debate and any concomitant evaluation of the mayor's record that goes beyond his self-serving canned messages.
The lack of any serious analysis is of course somewhat a function of the under-funded nature of the Ferrer campaign and its own inability to find themes that critique the mayor while simultaneously resonating with the voters. The largest culprit, however, is the press itself. In the face of the mayoral barrage Errol Louis is right: the media needs to become a lot more thorough and tenacious in its evaluation of the mayor's tenure.
A case in point is the mayor's charitable donations, featured in a Ferrer charge in today's Daily News. The level of Bloomberg's charitable giving has risen from around $27 million in 1997 to around $139 million today. So there is a direct correlation between the mayor's political ambitions and his largesse (The Harlem Boys Choir for instance didn't receive a nickel until after Bloomberg was politicized, at which point they were apparently discovered as a worthy charitable donation). Ferrer pointing this out is not, in Bloomberg spokesman Stu Loeser’s view, a "cheap shot", but a serious accusation, one that deserves major scrutiny from the press.
The mayor, after all, didn't get rich all of a sudden so his $112 of excess giving can reasonably be traced to only one motive. Isn't time to trace all of these expenditures and expose them for what they are: a fancy way of bribing support not because of any newly found generosity. Or in Joyce Purnick's phrase, "because he can."
Goodwin Ignores the Elephant in the Room
In a column in yesterday’s Daily news, Michael Goodwin highlights a number of themes that we agree with. In particular, if Democrats continue to ignore mainstream middle-class New Yorkers, a great many of whom come from the city’s homeowner neighborhoods or own retail stores, they are going to be vulnerable to Republican challengers (with money) in any upcoming cycle.
That being said, it is absolutely essential when evaluating the current expected Bloomberg blowout to talk about the mayor’s ad blitz and its “carpet bomb” features. That’s just too big a variable to ignore and it effectively skews the kind of ideological analysis that Goodwin engages in.
It also obscures the fact that in many ways Bloomberg is governing in a classically liberal style. Remember his comments on how you could get better care at the city’s public hospitals? Would the more reformist anti-status quo Rudy Giuliani every have made such a remark? Goodwin should take a look at his paper’s exposé last week on these very same public hospitals. What does this say about the mayor’s approach to government?
The reality is that Bloomberg has done precious little to challenge the political culture (see Fred Siegal’s book on Giuliani and “reinventing government”). Mayor Mike, without the more pronounced left-wing social work biases, manages to resemble David Dinkins right down to the courtliness when it comes to governing philosophy.
Given the lack of political debate in the current election cycle and given the saturation of the airwaves by a monotonous barrage of political sedatives it is hard to see where the mayor will go when faced with a $4.6 billion deficit next tear. After all how much more can you raise taxes and close firehouses.
That being said, it is absolutely essential when evaluating the current expected Bloomberg blowout to talk about the mayor’s ad blitz and its “carpet bomb” features. That’s just too big a variable to ignore and it effectively skews the kind of ideological analysis that Goodwin engages in.
It also obscures the fact that in many ways Bloomberg is governing in a classically liberal style. Remember his comments on how you could get better care at the city’s public hospitals? Would the more reformist anti-status quo Rudy Giuliani every have made such a remark? Goodwin should take a look at his paper’s exposé last week on these very same public hospitals. What does this say about the mayor’s approach to government?
The reality is that Bloomberg has done precious little to challenge the political culture (see Fred Siegal’s book on Giuliani and “reinventing government”). Mayor Mike, without the more pronounced left-wing social work biases, manages to resemble David Dinkins right down to the courtliness when it comes to governing philosophy.
Given the lack of political debate in the current election cycle and given the saturation of the airwaves by a monotonous barrage of political sedatives it is hard to see where the mayor will go when faced with a $4.6 billion deficit next tear. After all how much more can you raise taxes and close firehouses.
Big Box Hypocrisy
The fight over the proliferation of big box store such as BJ’s and Wal-Mart is regularly portrayed by (mostly conservative) supporters of these retailers as a battle between labor and consumers. In this worldview the union "protectionists" are preventing NYC consumers from availing themselves of the lower prices offered by the mega-store. This dichotomy is thoroughly misleading.
The latest false dichotomy salvo in this battle comes from Adam Brodsky in yesterday's New York Post. Citing the Council's passage of the HCSA as a "stealth ban" on "Big Box" stores he observes that the health care bill "is only the latest drubbing New Yorkers have endured at the hands of Big Labor.
Brodsky goes on to say that the HCSA, "if it sticks," will force New Yorkers to "keep schlepping out to New Jersey or the Island if they want to enjoy bargains at stores like Wal-Mart and Sam's Club." Aside from Brodsky overstating the obstructing power of the law – Wal-Mart is after all pursuing two sites on Staten Island and BJ's is doing the same in the Bronx – he is also misconstruing the kind of opposition that these stores generate in conservative homeowner communities.
Brodsky will continue to do this so he can keep on beatin' up on the Big Labor bogeyman and avoid the cognitive dissonance of the facts on the ground. His ideological blinders are underscored in yesterday's NY Times story on Maspeth, Queens. This conservative homeowner community is supporting the mayor. Why? Because he intervened to prevent KeySpan from using a large vacant parcel that it owned for a Home Depot.
As two local leaders, Tony Nunziato and John Holden, tell the Times it is Bloomberg's support of efforts to defeat the mega-store, an effort that saw the community mobilize hundreds of residents into the streets in "a general rallying 'round on behalf of local shopping," that drives the community's support of the mayor's re-election. As Holden, head of the Juniper Civic Association says, "Most people in Maspeth can still walk to the store, and they want to keep it that way."
Which is precisely the point that the Alliance has been making all over the city. This conservative case against Wal-Mart has started to take hold in communities much like Maspeth. Just last week we met with civic leaders on the South Shore of Staten Island and many of the Maspeth arguments resonated here as well.
They are the kind of arguments that, because they emphasize local shopping, traffic and quality of life issues, are immune to the public relations campaign of Wal-Mart. The opposition, then, has nothing to do with how people feel about the store's quality. In fact the more popular the store the more opposition it will tend to generate in these communities, something that Steve Greenhouse highlighted in his story on Staten Island and Wal-Mart in the NY Times.
We don't think that the good folks of Maspeth harbor any intrinsic animus to Home Depot or any other box store. They may be the same people who are traveling to Long Island to shop at Home Depot or Wal-Mart there. They are, however, opposed to such stores contiguous to their homes and their neighborhood shopping strips.
That is why Bloomberg, in spite of his rhetorical support for mega-stores, intervened in Maspeth and why Giuliani, who also supported big boxes, killed projects in Bay Ridge, Mill Basin and Forest Hills. The debate, Mr. Brodsky, needs to transcend the tired dichotomy of consumers vs. Big Labor and enter into the realm of neighborhood economics and community quality-of-life.
The latest false dichotomy salvo in this battle comes from Adam Brodsky in yesterday's New York Post. Citing the Council's passage of the HCSA as a "stealth ban" on "Big Box" stores he observes that the health care bill "is only the latest drubbing New Yorkers have endured at the hands of Big Labor.
Brodsky goes on to say that the HCSA, "if it sticks," will force New Yorkers to "keep schlepping out to New Jersey or the Island if they want to enjoy bargains at stores like Wal-Mart and Sam's Club." Aside from Brodsky overstating the obstructing power of the law – Wal-Mart is after all pursuing two sites on Staten Island and BJ's is doing the same in the Bronx – he is also misconstruing the kind of opposition that these stores generate in conservative homeowner communities.
Brodsky will continue to do this so he can keep on beatin' up on the Big Labor bogeyman and avoid the cognitive dissonance of the facts on the ground. His ideological blinders are underscored in yesterday's NY Times story on Maspeth, Queens. This conservative homeowner community is supporting the mayor. Why? Because he intervened to prevent KeySpan from using a large vacant parcel that it owned for a Home Depot.
As two local leaders, Tony Nunziato and John Holden, tell the Times it is Bloomberg's support of efforts to defeat the mega-store, an effort that saw the community mobilize hundreds of residents into the streets in "a general rallying 'round on behalf of local shopping," that drives the community's support of the mayor's re-election. As Holden, head of the Juniper Civic Association says, "Most people in Maspeth can still walk to the store, and they want to keep it that way."
Which is precisely the point that the Alliance has been making all over the city. This conservative case against Wal-Mart has started to take hold in communities much like Maspeth. Just last week we met with civic leaders on the South Shore of Staten Island and many of the Maspeth arguments resonated here as well.
They are the kind of arguments that, because they emphasize local shopping, traffic and quality of life issues, are immune to the public relations campaign of Wal-Mart. The opposition, then, has nothing to do with how people feel about the store's quality. In fact the more popular the store the more opposition it will tend to generate in these communities, something that Steve Greenhouse highlighted in his story on Staten Island and Wal-Mart in the NY Times.
We don't think that the good folks of Maspeth harbor any intrinsic animus to Home Depot or any other box store. They may be the same people who are traveling to Long Island to shop at Home Depot or Wal-Mart there. They are, however, opposed to such stores contiguous to their homes and their neighborhood shopping strips.
That is why Bloomberg, in spite of his rhetorical support for mega-stores, intervened in Maspeth and why Giuliani, who also supported big boxes, killed projects in Bay Ridge, Mill Basin and Forest Hills. The debate, Mr. Brodsky, needs to transcend the tired dichotomy of consumers vs. Big Labor and enter into the realm of neighborhood economics and community quality-of-life.
Friday, October 14, 2005
Wal-Mart Spoof
We highly recommend checking out “Big Box Mart,” a hilarious animated spoof of the world’s largest retailer. The folks at Jib Jib always produce high quality stuff (who can forget John Kerry and George Bush signing “This Land is Your Land”) and this is no exception.
Daily News Weighs in on HCSA
The Daily News comments editorially today on the recently passed Health Care Securiy Act (HSCA). The paper cites objections from some of the city's supermarket owners. We're wondering, however, where the paper got its statistics from since it claims that only 300 of New York's markets are unionized and provide the requisite health care benefits to its employees. The rest, it says, "employ about 6,000 workers..."
Where exactly do these numbers come from? The News could have at least footnoted the citation so someone could have attempted verification. The fact is that the Council has been trying to gather data to do just that but certain members of the industry would rather pout than negotiate. There may very well be issues here that can and should be addressed. However, they can't be if store reps don't provide the legitimate info.
We are working with the bill's sponsor to see if we can make some adjustment to the thresholds in the legislation. The raising of the bill's thresholds does not mean, as the News alleges, that the bill will then accomplish nothing.
There are a number of well-known mega employers who feel that it is beyond their considerable means to provide workers with adequate health benefits. I think that they got the message even if the News hasn't. It is high time that the tax payers be given a break from subsidizing the health care costs of multi-billion dollar companies. As the News knows, this is the target, not struggling independent store owners.
Where exactly do these numbers come from? The News could have at least footnoted the citation so someone could have attempted verification. The fact is that the Council has been trying to gather data to do just that but certain members of the industry would rather pout than negotiate. There may very well be issues here that can and should be addressed. However, they can't be if store reps don't provide the legitimate info.
We are working with the bill's sponsor to see if we can make some adjustment to the thresholds in the legislation. The raising of the bill's thresholds does not mean, as the News alleges, that the bill will then accomplish nothing.
There are a number of well-known mega employers who feel that it is beyond their considerable means to provide workers with adequate health benefits. I think that they got the message even if the News hasn't. It is high time that the tax payers be given a break from subsidizing the health care costs of multi-billion dollar companies. As the News knows, this is the target, not struggling independent store owners.
New Jersey and Eminent Domain
A recent poll conducted by Monmouth University shows that people in New Jersey are quite attuned to the eminent domain issue and believe that it’s only acceptable in a few cases where the public good is obviously served. For example, according to the poll most Garden State residents (88%) feel it’s appropriate to take vacant buildings for a school but believe it’s unacceptable to take homes for a shopping center (4% support). Only 1 in 3 polled consider taking one’s business for the purpose of creating new business a suitable use of eminent domain.
We believe that Quinnipiac, Marist and Pace should be conducting similar polls in New York City to gauge the public’s feeling on this hot-button topic. We also believe that the merchants at Willet’s Point should pay special attention to the issue now that the Mayor, in his most recent policy pronouncement, has committed to rapidly redeveloping this "collection of auto body repair shops and salvage yards."
We believe that Quinnipiac, Marist and Pace should be conducting similar polls in New York City to gauge the public’s feeling on this hot-button topic. We also believe that the merchants at Willet’s Point should pay special attention to the issue now that the Mayor, in his most recent policy pronouncement, has committed to rapidly redeveloping this "collection of auto body repair shops and salvage yards."
Legal Issues at the BTM
The lawyers for the merchants at the Bronx Terminal Market have filed a motion, one that serves to justify the decision to withhold rent payments and seeks to enjoin the Related Companies from continuing its illegal construction on the site. The crux of the legal argument is that the redevelopment of the BTM as a suburban mall can only proceed after the ULURP process has been completed.
The point here is that the construction being done, besides disrupting the business activity of the wholesalers, presupposes an approval that the city has yet to grant. In addition, the fact that the so-called landlord is engaged in activities that is disruptive to the well-functioning of the market justifies the withholding of rent payments that are being used, in contravention to the existing 63 month lease (the one of questionable legality), in furtherance of the demise of the market itself. After all, the rent proceeds are being used by Related to amortize the loan it has taken out to purchase the property for redevelopment (with the concomitant elimination of the existing tenants).
The point here is that the construction being done, besides disrupting the business activity of the wholesalers, presupposes an approval that the city has yet to grant. In addition, the fact that the so-called landlord is engaged in activities that is disruptive to the well-functioning of the market justifies the withholding of rent payments that are being used, in contravention to the existing 63 month lease (the one of questionable legality), in furtherance of the demise of the market itself. After all, the rent proceeds are being used by Related to amortize the loan it has taken out to purchase the property for redevelopment (with the concomitant elimination of the existing tenants).
The Money Man
It's about time! With the mayor continuing to spend at a record pace we've been wondering when the press was going to start going after Bloomberg and the monetary disparity between the two candidates. Errol Louis and Juan Gonzales do just that in the Daily News yesterday.
Louis in particular reaches a level of passion on this topic that has heretofore been absent among the commentariat. As he points out, all of the giggling over the poll numbers "glide past the single most important number: $122 million", the total amount spent by Mayor Mike in the last two election cycles.
What the Mayor’s unprecedented spending does, as both Louis and Gonzales allude to, is to make a mockery of an election process where only one voice is being heard and little in the way of meaningful debate about the city's future is able to transcend the advertising din of the Bloomberg message.
Here is the money quote from Louis:
Which brings us to the question we've raised about the public interest, one we have alluded to in our post about the mayor's lack of any real political vision. Bloomberg projects himself as being "above politics" and by doing so reinforces the popular idea that politics is essentially tawdry. If, however, policy is not made in the interplay of "tawdry" interests how will it be made?
The response from the mayor and his campaign is that he is only beholden to the people and not to the "special interests." This simply begs the question of how the will of the people is translated into policy that somehow reflects it (remember the nettlesome issues raised by Rousseau in his discussion of the "general will").
The answer of course is that it is the mayor, and he alone, who will, unencumbered by unseemly obligations, decide where the public interest lies. Once again we refer everyone to Marx's observation about Plato's concept of the philosopher king: "Who will educate the educator?"
Louis in particular reaches a level of passion on this topic that has heretofore been absent among the commentariat. As he points out, all of the giggling over the poll numbers "glide past the single most important number: $122 million", the total amount spent by Mayor Mike in the last two election cycles.
What the Mayor’s unprecedented spending does, as both Louis and Gonzales allude to, is to make a mockery of an election process where only one voice is being heard and little in the way of meaningful debate about the city's future is able to transcend the advertising din of the Bloomberg message.
Here is the money quote from Louis:
In an earlier age, the city's monied elites would have blanched as the open purchase of the city's highest office by a rich man. The disengagement of those elites from civic life...has opened the door for this purchase of public office to go unremarked and unlamented.Not to be outdone Juan Gonzalez chimes in:
Our mayor claims he is a leader who can't be bought. Of course not-he's the one doing the buying.And as Juan points out, the city's good government groups are starting to take notice about how the mayor is "making a mockery of the city's campaign finance laws."
Which brings us to the question we've raised about the public interest, one we have alluded to in our post about the mayor's lack of any real political vision. Bloomberg projects himself as being "above politics" and by doing so reinforces the popular idea that politics is essentially tawdry. If, however, policy is not made in the interplay of "tawdry" interests how will it be made?
The response from the mayor and his campaign is that he is only beholden to the people and not to the "special interests." This simply begs the question of how the will of the people is translated into policy that somehow reflects it (remember the nettlesome issues raised by Rousseau in his discussion of the "general will").
The answer of course is that it is the mayor, and he alone, who will, unencumbered by unseemly obligations, decide where the public interest lies. Once again we refer everyone to Marx's observation about Plato's concept of the philosopher king: "Who will educate the educator?"
Mayor Discovers Small Business
In an announcement on Wednesday Mayor Bloomberg announced a broad plan to make NYC a more business "friendly" place for small business as well as "a more attractive hub for big business." While this does seem like welcome news you'll have to pardon us if we're remaining just a mite bit skeptical of the mayor's good intentions.
The reason for our skepticism derives from an examination of the mayor's record, specifically in regard to small business, over the course of his four year term. We have made this point on innumerable occasions: the mayor has largely ignored those factors that are essential to the growth of a healthy small business sector. In particular, entrepreneurism needs a tax and regulatory environment that allows it to grow through the inevitable growing pains associated with start-up enterprises. This is especially true of neighborhood store owners.
The mayor has been particularly tin-eared in these two crucial areas. His commercial real estate tax increase raised the rent of each and every one of the 186,000 mom and pop stores in the city, in some cases by as much as 25%. On top of this, the current administration unleashed a regulatory assault on the neighborhood stores and proceeded to brag about all the revenue that was brought in.
The lack of sensitivity to small stores has been compounded by the administration's obsession with mega-development. In particular, the case of the Bronx Terminal Market is symbolic of the Bloomberg team's approach in this area. In this case the development, a suburban-style mall, was not only sole-sourced but the recipient of the development rights is a close friend and business associate of the Deputy Mayor. Furthermore, the city's EDC, using questionable legal tactics, abrogated the leases of the Market's mostly minority wholesalers and proceeded to sanction their eviction with no plan for relocation.
In essence, the eviction was very similar to an eminent domain-style ejection, with the property rights of merchants – who are long-term lessees – being arrogantly ignored for that proverbial higher and better use. As bad as the BTM issue is, however, it may only be a dress rehearsal for the city's plan for Willets Point. In the mayor's Wednesday speech he reiterated his proposal to redevelop the Point where over 150 will have to be ejected for the plan to proceed. As Bloomberg has famously remarked, "The land is too valuable for the businesses that are on it."
Sun's Editorial On Point
Despite the mayor's claims that 50,000 more people are working in the city today than were a year ago, the fact remains that New York is lagging behind the rest of the country in job creation, as this lag is particularly pronounced in the small business sector. The NY Sun, citing the work of Ray Keating's Small Business and Entrepreneurial Council, makes the point that NY trails most of the rest of the country on those indices that measure an area's ability to promote entrepreneurism. As the paper indicates, "New York's infamous tax burden is once again a major culprit."
So while the mayor's plan to create an internet center and a 311 system in order to enable small businesses to get licenses and permits more easily is commendable, we still believe that he simply doesn't understand the core underlying issues in regard to nurturing this sector. His government-based approach for targeting neighborhoods plagued with "chronic unemployment" is a case in point.
From a small business perspective it is precisely government's expansion into this area that poses the greatest threat. Inevitably in these low-income areas the concern about unemployment gets transposed into mega-development schemes that end up hurting the existing small business base. Given the last four years we could benefit from a little benign neglect: less regulation, less taxes and less government in general.
Reinventing Government
Which brings us to another of the mayor's weaknesses: his complete lack of a creative vision when it comes to making government more efficient and, by extension, less costly. Inevitably the bloated bureaucracies that breed inefficiency and stifle entrepreneurial initiative within government lead to a tax and regulatory burden that reduces entrepreneurial competitiveness.
What has the mayor done in four years to address the efficiency of government? Indeed, has he ever said anything to even indicate that he sees this as a problem in need of addressing? The sad reality is that when it comes to innovation in government our extremely entrepreneurial mayor approaches the problem in the tradition of the very same old-style liberalism that has caused the city so much grief over the past thirty years.
Which gets us to the issue of the mayor's lack of policy expertise and political vision. Clearly he is not someone who comes to politics imbued with any particular reformist world view. Even after four years it still isn't clear what drove him, aside from boredom, to seek political office. It is, however, precisely this lack of vision that, when combined with his pragmatic technocratic governing style, so endears him to the city's traditional media and business elites.
These are clearly the same folks who are comfortable within the confines of NYC's traditional political culture and who probably had some misgivings about Rudy Giuliani’s crash and burn approach to the politically correct style of governance. Mike Bloomberg, then, exudes a certain impression that makes the political and cultural elite comfortable indeed. It is the kind of elite pleasing style that could be described as David Dinkins with competence.
Unfortunately it is, with certain concessions to technological advances at the margins, a status quo approach to government. There is no indication that Mike Bloomberg will ever read the City Journal and feel impelled forward to changing the way the city is governed. Without any real vision, the next four years of a Bloomberg administration are unlikely to address any of the city's systemic problems.
This expected failure is not only bad for small business but is a bad situation that will leave whoever takes office in 2009 with some daunting challenges. The real tragedy here is that Bloomberg, precisely because he is not beholden to the traditional hidebound structures and elites, could move boldly to tackle some of the intrinsic problems that have plagued NYC politics for the better part of the last half century. Intellectually and temperamentally, however, the mayor sadly appears ill-suited for the daunting task.
NY Post Postscript
In today's NY Post, with an editorial entitled, "Mayor Mike's Nice Try", the paper hits on some of the themes outlined above. In particular, it cites the mayor's failure to connect lower taxes and less regulation with business growth. As the Post says, "the city is arguably less business-friendly than it was four years ago."
The reason for our skepticism derives from an examination of the mayor's record, specifically in regard to small business, over the course of his four year term. We have made this point on innumerable occasions: the mayor has largely ignored those factors that are essential to the growth of a healthy small business sector. In particular, entrepreneurism needs a tax and regulatory environment that allows it to grow through the inevitable growing pains associated with start-up enterprises. This is especially true of neighborhood store owners.
The mayor has been particularly tin-eared in these two crucial areas. His commercial real estate tax increase raised the rent of each and every one of the 186,000 mom and pop stores in the city, in some cases by as much as 25%. On top of this, the current administration unleashed a regulatory assault on the neighborhood stores and proceeded to brag about all the revenue that was brought in.
The lack of sensitivity to small stores has been compounded by the administration's obsession with mega-development. In particular, the case of the Bronx Terminal Market is symbolic of the Bloomberg team's approach in this area. In this case the development, a suburban-style mall, was not only sole-sourced but the recipient of the development rights is a close friend and business associate of the Deputy Mayor. Furthermore, the city's EDC, using questionable legal tactics, abrogated the leases of the Market's mostly minority wholesalers and proceeded to sanction their eviction with no plan for relocation.
In essence, the eviction was very similar to an eminent domain-style ejection, with the property rights of merchants – who are long-term lessees – being arrogantly ignored for that proverbial higher and better use. As bad as the BTM issue is, however, it may only be a dress rehearsal for the city's plan for Willets Point. In the mayor's Wednesday speech he reiterated his proposal to redevelop the Point where over 150 will have to be ejected for the plan to proceed. As Bloomberg has famously remarked, "The land is too valuable for the businesses that are on it."
Sun's Editorial On Point
Despite the mayor's claims that 50,000 more people are working in the city today than were a year ago, the fact remains that New York is lagging behind the rest of the country in job creation, as this lag is particularly pronounced in the small business sector. The NY Sun, citing the work of Ray Keating's Small Business and Entrepreneurial Council, makes the point that NY trails most of the rest of the country on those indices that measure an area's ability to promote entrepreneurism. As the paper indicates, "New York's infamous tax burden is once again a major culprit."
So while the mayor's plan to create an internet center and a 311 system in order to enable small businesses to get licenses and permits more easily is commendable, we still believe that he simply doesn't understand the core underlying issues in regard to nurturing this sector. His government-based approach for targeting neighborhoods plagued with "chronic unemployment" is a case in point.
From a small business perspective it is precisely government's expansion into this area that poses the greatest threat. Inevitably in these low-income areas the concern about unemployment gets transposed into mega-development schemes that end up hurting the existing small business base. Given the last four years we could benefit from a little benign neglect: less regulation, less taxes and less government in general.
Reinventing Government
Which brings us to another of the mayor's weaknesses: his complete lack of a creative vision when it comes to making government more efficient and, by extension, less costly. Inevitably the bloated bureaucracies that breed inefficiency and stifle entrepreneurial initiative within government lead to a tax and regulatory burden that reduces entrepreneurial competitiveness.
What has the mayor done in four years to address the efficiency of government? Indeed, has he ever said anything to even indicate that he sees this as a problem in need of addressing? The sad reality is that when it comes to innovation in government our extremely entrepreneurial mayor approaches the problem in the tradition of the very same old-style liberalism that has caused the city so much grief over the past thirty years.
Which gets us to the issue of the mayor's lack of policy expertise and political vision. Clearly he is not someone who comes to politics imbued with any particular reformist world view. Even after four years it still isn't clear what drove him, aside from boredom, to seek political office. It is, however, precisely this lack of vision that, when combined with his pragmatic technocratic governing style, so endears him to the city's traditional media and business elites.
These are clearly the same folks who are comfortable within the confines of NYC's traditional political culture and who probably had some misgivings about Rudy Giuliani’s crash and burn approach to the politically correct style of governance. Mike Bloomberg, then, exudes a certain impression that makes the political and cultural elite comfortable indeed. It is the kind of elite pleasing style that could be described as David Dinkins with competence.
Unfortunately it is, with certain concessions to technological advances at the margins, a status quo approach to government. There is no indication that Mike Bloomberg will ever read the City Journal and feel impelled forward to changing the way the city is governed. Without any real vision, the next four years of a Bloomberg administration are unlikely to address any of the city's systemic problems.
This expected failure is not only bad for small business but is a bad situation that will leave whoever takes office in 2009 with some daunting challenges. The real tragedy here is that Bloomberg, precisely because he is not beholden to the traditional hidebound structures and elites, could move boldly to tackle some of the intrinsic problems that have plagued NYC politics for the better part of the last half century. Intellectually and temperamentally, however, the mayor sadly appears ill-suited for the daunting task.
NY Post Postscript
In today's NY Post, with an editorial entitled, "Mayor Mike's Nice Try", the paper hits on some of the themes outlined above. In particular, it cites the mayor's failure to connect lower taxes and less regulation with business growth. As the Post says, "the city is arguably less business-friendly than it was four years ago."
Wednesday, October 12, 2005
BTM Hearing: Parties Meet With Judge Cahn
The ongoing fight over the attempted eviction of the wholesalers at the Bronx Terminal Market got more heated yesterday as lawyers for the Related Companies, facing a refusal of the merchants to pay rent to a company that is derelict in its landlord responsibilities, urged Judge Cahn to eject the tenants. In turn, the lawyers for the merchants defended their clients’ refusal to pay the rent and cited Related's illegal construction work and the city's unwillingness to negotiate in good faith about relocation in defense of their tenant's refusal.
The core of the battle, however, remains the contention by Related that the Commissioner of Small Business Services, as the sole authority over the so-called Public Markets, has the absolute right under the City Charter (Sec.1303) to abrogate the leases of the market's wholesalers. In other words, the argument is that the Commissioner's authority over the Markets extends to actions that effectively lead to the elimination of the Markets under his control.
That's quite a leap. Remember that when Mayor Giuliani decided to rid the Markets of organized crime and place the unions under city authority he proposed legislation (that led to Local Law 28) to so empower the Commissioner. Given the city's current eviction action it now appears that if the same measure had been proposed under Mayor Bloomberg's watch he would have felt it unnecessary to enact any enabling legislation. That's how broad EDC is interpreting Commissioner Walsh's power under Sec.1301.
In addition, it should also be pointed out that the only document with Commissioner Walsh's name on it is a city 63 month lease entered into with Related-- TO RUN THE BTM! There is no existing documentation that Walsh has ordered the evictions of the tenants in the Public Market under his jurisdiction.
Without such an edict there isn't even a pretext to evict anyone (even if one agrees that such an audacious authority rests with the Commissioner). The fact that Related isn't even pretending to run the market as the lease states, and is using the tenant's rent money to amortize its loan used to purchase the property at a below market price, only exacerbates the abuse of power here.
The core of the battle, however, remains the contention by Related that the Commissioner of Small Business Services, as the sole authority over the so-called Public Markets, has the absolute right under the City Charter (Sec.1303) to abrogate the leases of the market's wholesalers. In other words, the argument is that the Commissioner's authority over the Markets extends to actions that effectively lead to the elimination of the Markets under his control.
That's quite a leap. Remember that when Mayor Giuliani decided to rid the Markets of organized crime and place the unions under city authority he proposed legislation (that led to Local Law 28) to so empower the Commissioner. Given the city's current eviction action it now appears that if the same measure had been proposed under Mayor Bloomberg's watch he would have felt it unnecessary to enact any enabling legislation. That's how broad EDC is interpreting Commissioner Walsh's power under Sec.1301.
In addition, it should also be pointed out that the only document with Commissioner Walsh's name on it is a city 63 month lease entered into with Related-- TO RUN THE BTM! There is no existing documentation that Walsh has ordered the evictions of the tenants in the Public Market under his jurisdiction.
Without such an edict there isn't even a pretext to evict anyone (even if one agrees that such an audacious authority rests with the Commissioner). The fact that Related isn't even pretending to run the market as the lease states, and is using the tenant's rent money to amortize its loan used to purchase the property at a below market price, only exacerbates the abuse of power here.
HCSA Override: The Cost and Lessons of Political Apathy
It was certainly no surprise that the City Council overrode the mayor's veto of the Health Care Security Act (HCSA), although it was a surprise that only two members voted to sustain the veto (40-2). The size of the vote did demonstrate that the UFCW and its lobbyist on the bill, Evan Stavisky, did a great job and that the late charging opponents just were too late to do much to effect the outcome.
That being said, it is important to emphasize that the independent supermarkets that opposed the bill, including the National Supermarket Association (NSA), a group of independent grocers, need to become more involved in the political process. The Alliance has, over the past decade, represented this sector on a number of key issues, from defeating the Giuliani megastore plan to the derailing of the Bloomberg attempts to enhance the regulatory power of the Department of Consumer Affairs. All of this work, however, was done without the financial backing of any member of the NSA.
The work of the Alliance on these issues, as well as on the various successful box store battles, was supported by other independent stores, food wholesalers and a handful of chain stores concerned about non-union warehouse clubs. Even the historic battle over the East Harlem Pathmark, a fight that we led but that Al Rodriguez and Luis Salcedo (NSA members at the time) made substantial contributions to, was never financially supported by independent store owners (the very folks who would have directly benefited from a Pathmark defeat).
On the other hand when we defeated a similar Pathmark proposal in Astoria we did get strong support from a number of independents, in this case mostly Key Food operators and a number of independents who were not affiliated with the NSA. All of which is to point out that the NSA and its members have been benefiting from our work for the better part of ten years without having any commensurate financial burden.
Perhaps the greatest benefit these retailers received was generated from the East Harlem struggle. The fight in this case involved the need to defend the store owners against a vicious public relations assault that had labeled these retailers as substandard bodegas and East Harlem as a retail desert with a total absence of quality food stores.
The counterattack that we waged was extremely successful. For the first time these hard-working minority entrepreneurs were given recognition for their achievements. Editorial boards started to back-off on the character assassination and we personally wrote a score of Op-Ed pieces that literally put the independent supermarkets on the map. And you know what? They deserved it. Their risk-taking and hard work demanded recognition and not denigration.
In addition, the new found recognition was accompanied by something even more important. Up until this point the independents had been redlined by mainstream banking institutions, with many operators forced to borrow money at usurious rates. As their achievements began to be recognized, however, Governor Pataki's office, through the intervention of the Alliance, set up a series of meetings between the independents and banks such as Chase and Citibank. Loan programs were set up that for the first time put these stores in a much more advantageous financial situation.
Over the years we have approached the NSA and suggested that the organization use its considerable economic clout to better its political advantage. Yes, we have also proposed a working relationship. None of these discussions came to fruition for a variety of reasons, most related to NSA's own internal issues. Our continual emphasis has always been something Richard Lipsky use to say to his political science classes at Queens College: "You may not be interested in politics, but politics is surely interested in you."
Unfortunately the advice wasn't heeded and the HCSA became a confirmation of Dr. Lipsky's observation. The NSA's head-in-the-sand approach came back to bite the group but that's not the full story. You see the Alliance has to share the blame here. For ten years we advocated on issues that hit at the heart of the bottom line concerns of independent supermarkets. We did this without the active support of the NSA and we were successful in a great many instances in protecting the industry's interests.
Having a guardian angel has its cost. It allowed the group to procrastinate at what it should have done years ago: set up an organized lobbying effort. If the HCSA accomplishes this it will have served a useful purpose as a wake-up call for NSA. In observing the group's reactions to the bill's passage however – strident threats and a walkout of a meeting with Council staff – it looks that emotional posturing is displacing the kind of rational self-criticism and re-organization that the bill's passage should have generated.
Postscript
Jill Gardiner in today's NY Sun does a good job at outlining some of the independent supermarkets' objections to the HCSA. Our old friend Luis Salcedo, the group's executive director, argues that the law will put between 40% and 50% of its members will be put out of business. While this seems a bit high it underscores the seriousness of the group's failure to engage in the process leading up to the bill's passage.
The most curious aspect of the article, however was Gardiner, citing Chris Quinn the bill's sponsor, saying that there had been a breakdown of communication between NSA and the Council. She reports the Quinn said that her staff had been talking with a "government affairs professional"(allegedly representing the group) who told them that the NSA had expressed "no concerns" with the legislation.
This is very strange indeed. The only possible such person would have been the Alliance's Richard Lipsky and as our preceding post points out neither Lipsky in person or the Alliance as an organization took any position on the bill. In fact since we work with the UFCW and Lipsky represents Gristedes (John Castimitidis was a supporter of the bill), we at no time either took a position on the bill or talked to anyone about the bill's impact on mid-sized markets.
This allegation then is part of a face-saving effort on everyone's part. The NSA should have been more proactive in defense of the group's interests and certain councilmembers who are close to the NSA and its member stores should have done more outreach. In the absence of this needed "communication" finger-pointing replaces healthy self-criticism.
The Sun also weighs in once again editorially on the impacts of the HCSA. Picking up on Gardiner's reporting the paper shifts from its previous pro-Wal-Mart rant and starts to worry about the plight of the inner city supermarkets.
This concern is a lot more well deserved than the Sun's sympathy for Wal-Mart and the paper's failure to accurately depict the scandal of the world's largest retailer sending its employees to access public health benefits at the tax payers expense. It also avoids confronting the inconsistency of worrying about the inner city entrepreneurs while championing the entry of a retail octopus that will put the investments of these minority business people directly at risk.
That being said, it is important to emphasize that the independent supermarkets that opposed the bill, including the National Supermarket Association (NSA), a group of independent grocers, need to become more involved in the political process. The Alliance has, over the past decade, represented this sector on a number of key issues, from defeating the Giuliani megastore plan to the derailing of the Bloomberg attempts to enhance the regulatory power of the Department of Consumer Affairs. All of this work, however, was done without the financial backing of any member of the NSA.
The work of the Alliance on these issues, as well as on the various successful box store battles, was supported by other independent stores, food wholesalers and a handful of chain stores concerned about non-union warehouse clubs. Even the historic battle over the East Harlem Pathmark, a fight that we led but that Al Rodriguez and Luis Salcedo (NSA members at the time) made substantial contributions to, was never financially supported by independent store owners (the very folks who would have directly benefited from a Pathmark defeat).
On the other hand when we defeated a similar Pathmark proposal in Astoria we did get strong support from a number of independents, in this case mostly Key Food operators and a number of independents who were not affiliated with the NSA. All of which is to point out that the NSA and its members have been benefiting from our work for the better part of ten years without having any commensurate financial burden.
Perhaps the greatest benefit these retailers received was generated from the East Harlem struggle. The fight in this case involved the need to defend the store owners against a vicious public relations assault that had labeled these retailers as substandard bodegas and East Harlem as a retail desert with a total absence of quality food stores.
The counterattack that we waged was extremely successful. For the first time these hard-working minority entrepreneurs were given recognition for their achievements. Editorial boards started to back-off on the character assassination and we personally wrote a score of Op-Ed pieces that literally put the independent supermarkets on the map. And you know what? They deserved it. Their risk-taking and hard work demanded recognition and not denigration.
In addition, the new found recognition was accompanied by something even more important. Up until this point the independents had been redlined by mainstream banking institutions, with many operators forced to borrow money at usurious rates. As their achievements began to be recognized, however, Governor Pataki's office, through the intervention of the Alliance, set up a series of meetings between the independents and banks such as Chase and Citibank. Loan programs were set up that for the first time put these stores in a much more advantageous financial situation.
Over the years we have approached the NSA and suggested that the organization use its considerable economic clout to better its political advantage. Yes, we have also proposed a working relationship. None of these discussions came to fruition for a variety of reasons, most related to NSA's own internal issues. Our continual emphasis has always been something Richard Lipsky use to say to his political science classes at Queens College: "You may not be interested in politics, but politics is surely interested in you."
Unfortunately the advice wasn't heeded and the HCSA became a confirmation of Dr. Lipsky's observation. The NSA's head-in-the-sand approach came back to bite the group but that's not the full story. You see the Alliance has to share the blame here. For ten years we advocated on issues that hit at the heart of the bottom line concerns of independent supermarkets. We did this without the active support of the NSA and we were successful in a great many instances in protecting the industry's interests.
Having a guardian angel has its cost. It allowed the group to procrastinate at what it should have done years ago: set up an organized lobbying effort. If the HCSA accomplishes this it will have served a useful purpose as a wake-up call for NSA. In observing the group's reactions to the bill's passage however – strident threats and a walkout of a meeting with Council staff – it looks that emotional posturing is displacing the kind of rational self-criticism and re-organization that the bill's passage should have generated.
Postscript
Jill Gardiner in today's NY Sun does a good job at outlining some of the independent supermarkets' objections to the HCSA. Our old friend Luis Salcedo, the group's executive director, argues that the law will put between 40% and 50% of its members will be put out of business. While this seems a bit high it underscores the seriousness of the group's failure to engage in the process leading up to the bill's passage.
The most curious aspect of the article, however was Gardiner, citing Chris Quinn the bill's sponsor, saying that there had been a breakdown of communication between NSA and the Council. She reports the Quinn said that her staff had been talking with a "government affairs professional"(allegedly representing the group) who told them that the NSA had expressed "no concerns" with the legislation.
This is very strange indeed. The only possible such person would have been the Alliance's Richard Lipsky and as our preceding post points out neither Lipsky in person or the Alliance as an organization took any position on the bill. In fact since we work with the UFCW and Lipsky represents Gristedes (John Castimitidis was a supporter of the bill), we at no time either took a position on the bill or talked to anyone about the bill's impact on mid-sized markets.
This allegation then is part of a face-saving effort on everyone's part. The NSA should have been more proactive in defense of the group's interests and certain councilmembers who are close to the NSA and its member stores should have done more outreach. In the absence of this needed "communication" finger-pointing replaces healthy self-criticism.
The Sun also weighs in once again editorially on the impacts of the HCSA. Picking up on Gardiner's reporting the paper shifts from its previous pro-Wal-Mart rant and starts to worry about the plight of the inner city supermarkets.
This concern is a lot more well deserved than the Sun's sympathy for Wal-Mart and the paper's failure to accurately depict the scandal of the world's largest retailer sending its employees to access public health benefits at the tax payers expense. It also avoids confronting the inconsistency of worrying about the inner city entrepreneurs while championing the entry of a retail octopus that will put the investments of these minority business people directly at risk.
Fruit Stand Bill Victory: Hail Sung Soo Kim
It was truly gratifying to see the outpouring of support from the Korean and Chinese business communities yesterday in support of sustaining the mayor's veto of Intro 699, a measure that would make it more onerous to operate a fruit stand in town. The bill was expected to get overridden but was unexpectedly laid over until October 27th. Mr. Sung Soo Kim certainly out did himself with the turnout and now we'll have to wait and see if this is a commutation or simply a two week stay of execution.
Our take on the bill is that it is another example of regulatory overreach. It was a product of Councilmember John Liu's concern about overcrowding on Flushing streets and was transformed into a city wide measure without any real due diligence about its potential harm to some of the city's smallest retailers.
Remember that the Council had a hearing on the bill the morning before a Stated Council meeting and the measure was passed that very day, a highly unusual procedural move that smacked of unfairness. We believe that the bill deserves more time to age and get the kind of in-depth study that the fruit stand operators deserve. Let's hope that Kim and his crew get their due.
Our take on the bill is that it is another example of regulatory overreach. It was a product of Councilmember John Liu's concern about overcrowding on Flushing streets and was transformed into a city wide measure without any real due diligence about its potential harm to some of the city's smallest retailers.
Remember that the Council had a hearing on the bill the morning before a Stated Council meeting and the measure was passed that very day, a highly unusual procedural move that smacked of unfairness. We believe that the bill deserves more time to age and get the kind of in-depth study that the fruit stand operators deserve. Let's hope that Kim and his crew get their due.
Tuesday, October 11, 2005
Veto Override on HCSA
Today the City Council, to the chagrin of the editorial board of the New York Sun (The NY Post soon to follow) will override the mayor's veto of the Health Care Security Act (HSCA) in spite of some last minute efforts to amend the bill in order to afford some additional protection for some of the predominately minority-owned supermarkets. There is still support, however, for amending the law after tomorrow’s vote. There just wasn't enough time to get a consensus so amendments could be drafted.
That being said there is still a great deal of disarray among various industry factions with some, particularly the National Supermarket Association (NSA), looking to perhaps sue to have the law overturned. Needless to say that posture doesn't help persuade the Council to amend the law.
The larger problem that the NSA has is its lack of any well-developed political operation. The HCSA was incubating at the Council for over a year and a half but the NSA either wasn't aware of its existence or had underestimated the bill's potential impact on its members. In addition, since a number of supermarket chains had joined forces with labor to support the HCSA, the Neighborhood Retail Alliance, the usual defender of the markets' interests, remained on the sidelines (something we have been taking a good deal of heat for).
The rejectionist posture is not without risk however. In tackling the Council (and labor we might add), in a direct and personal way the NSA is in danger of making it difficult to achieve any of its other legislative goals. This is even more so since the group's support for councilmembers has never been commensurate with its economic clout. Right now the organization is in need of more sophisticated political advice.
Higher Grocery Price Argument
The economic opposition to the bill comes from fiscal conservatives, like those at the NY Sun, who argue that the bill, by mandating that employers provide health benefits to their workers, will lead to higher food prices. They have a point, one that we have been making all along: The fact that Wal-Mart does not provide adequate health coverage does give the retail giant a competitive edge over those unionized stores that do.
In fact labor costs account for around 60% of a store's overall overhead. Wal-Mart began in the South and its employee base was predominately female. These workers, particularly in the more chauvinistic South, were viewed as supplemental income earners to their male spouses. Since the company's inception, however, the face of retail employment has changed dramatically. The decline of manufacturing has made retail employment family-supporting out of necessity.
The other point is that the largest retailer in the world should not be forcing the government to cover their employees' health care needs. That is precisely what Wal-Mart is doing and the company has been cited as the leading corporate recipient of government hand-outs in state after state. The failure to mention this makes the opposition to the HCSA short-sighted indeed.
That being said there is still a great deal of disarray among various industry factions with some, particularly the National Supermarket Association (NSA), looking to perhaps sue to have the law overturned. Needless to say that posture doesn't help persuade the Council to amend the law.
The larger problem that the NSA has is its lack of any well-developed political operation. The HCSA was incubating at the Council for over a year and a half but the NSA either wasn't aware of its existence or had underestimated the bill's potential impact on its members. In addition, since a number of supermarket chains had joined forces with labor to support the HCSA, the Neighborhood Retail Alliance, the usual defender of the markets' interests, remained on the sidelines (something we have been taking a good deal of heat for).
The rejectionist posture is not without risk however. In tackling the Council (and labor we might add), in a direct and personal way the NSA is in danger of making it difficult to achieve any of its other legislative goals. This is even more so since the group's support for councilmembers has never been commensurate with its economic clout. Right now the organization is in need of more sophisticated political advice.
Higher Grocery Price Argument
The economic opposition to the bill comes from fiscal conservatives, like those at the NY Sun, who argue that the bill, by mandating that employers provide health benefits to their workers, will lead to higher food prices. They have a point, one that we have been making all along: The fact that Wal-Mart does not provide adequate health coverage does give the retail giant a competitive edge over those unionized stores that do.
In fact labor costs account for around 60% of a store's overall overhead. Wal-Mart began in the South and its employee base was predominately female. These workers, particularly in the more chauvinistic South, were viewed as supplemental income earners to their male spouses. Since the company's inception, however, the face of retail employment has changed dramatically. The decline of manufacturing has made retail employment family-supporting out of necessity.
The other point is that the largest retailer in the world should not be forcing the government to cover their employees' health care needs. That is precisely what Wal-Mart is doing and the company has been cited as the leading corporate recipient of government hand-outs in state after state. The failure to mention this makes the opposition to the HCSA short-sighted indeed.
Oddo and Gallagher and Wal-Mart
The ongoing frost between Republican Councilmembers Oddo and Gallagher and the Bloomberg administration is highlighted in the Sun yesterday. Gallagher's position can be partly attributed to his close relationship with Tom Ognibene but an even greater reason may lie with the disconnect he sees between his conservative principles and the mayor's lack thereof.
Oddo's reasons are probably derived from the four years of disregard from the mayor and his minions. As he now says, he is more concerned with who the next speaker will be and doesn't expect that the mayor will pursue him with any real ardor between now and Nov. 8th.
All of this can only help the Alliance's efforts to develop a strong city-wide coalition against Wal-Mart. It is important that we cultivate the city's more conservative homeowner constituencies and the help of Gallagher and Oddo would be appreciated indeed. In this context, the mayor's continued support for the retail giant will only work in our favor.
Oddo's reasons are probably derived from the four years of disregard from the mayor and his minions. As he now says, he is more concerned with who the next speaker will be and doesn't expect that the mayor will pursue him with any real ardor between now and Nov. 8th.
All of this can only help the Alliance's efforts to develop a strong city-wide coalition against Wal-Mart. It is important that we cultivate the city's more conservative homeowner constituencies and the help of Gallagher and Oddo would be appreciated indeed. In this context, the mayor's continued support for the retail giant will only work in our favor.
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