We have just been briefed by our good friend Jim Calvin concerning the details of the governor's proposal on the cigarette tax increase and the tax enforcement of Indian tobacco retailing-and it's much worse than we had imagined. In essence, Davis Paterson, by having the tax implemented on July the First, but delaying any enforcement until September, is giving the buttleggers a wonderful summer of love-an opportunity for the Indians to get really fattened up on the $16 a carton tax increase that goes into effect on July 1st.
In addition, as the following memo from Calvin details, the extender also gives the governor unilateral power to negotiate all enforcement issues with the Indians-without any legislative approval or oversight. A recipe for total disaster.
Here's Calvin's memo:
Dear Association Colleague:
Over the weekend it went from bad to worse on the tobacco tax front.
Included in the Governor's budget extender bill, to be acted on TODAY by the Legislature, is a $1.60-per-pack increase in the cigarette tax, an increase of the OTP tax from 46% of wholesale to 76% of wholesale, and reclassification of little cigars as cigarettes for tax purposes.
On the positive side, it does contain specifics of a plan to collect taxes on cigarettes sold by Indian tribes to non-Indians. But the effective date for that collection is September 1st, while the tax increases would be effective next week - July 1st. (There would be a floor tax on cigarettes in inventory at close of business June 30, payable September 20.)
Why would you launch an initiative to fix the cigarette tax evasion problem on a given date but deliberately make the tax evasion problem 56% worse two months before that?
The bill goes on to say that the Governor would have unilateral authority to enter into a permanent negotiated out-of-court settlement with Indian tribes on taxation issues WITHOUT getting it ratified by the Legislature -- that's really dangerous. The Legislature previously refused to give Governor Pataki this carte blanch authority, and with good reason, because he was ready to give away the farm.
I encourage you and your members to contact your state Senators THIS MORNING at their Albany offices to voice opposition to the tobacco tax increases as well as the carte blanch provision for the Governor. The extender bill will be acted on this afternoon.
Monday, June 21, 2010
We Smell a Rat
The Gotham Gazette has an interesting story on the city’s new rat control methodology-under the questionable premise of doing more with less. We say questionable because the city has never done what we believe is necessary to really control the rat epidemic-attack the rodents’ food source: Natalie Hunnicutt’s first assignment as a pest control aide for the city, was, she recalls, also her most memorable: crashing a party of dozens of rodents at a Queens supermarket. “There were rats scurrying left and right and I just thought ‘Oh my goodness,’” the Brooklyn resident said. The pests were leaping over her feet and into a mountain of trash, the result of people using the store’s parking lot as a garbage dump. By the end of the day, Hunnicutt said she and seven of her colleagues removed about 400 bags of garbage from the site.”
But GG tells us that the city is going to implement a smarter strategy-and we smile, knowing that this is simply a fig leaf for the fact that workers at the rat control unit had to be laid off: “The Department of Health and Mental Hygiene, where Pest Control Services resides, laid off Hunnicutt and 48 of her coworkers. That will save $1.5 million, according to the department. It will leave the department with 41 workers. Beyond saving money, however, the city says the layoffs are part of a plan to restructure the bureau’s rodent control program. Rather than cleaning lots in response to complaints, the health department has a new project called rodent indexing, which, it says, can control the rat population with fewer workers. Union leaders and some City Council members, though, remain skeptical and warn about a potential vermin crisis in New York.”
And their skepticism is well founded since the city has eschewed the most effective methodology available-the use of commercial food waste disposers. And it is, as they say, no accident that the Gazette leads its rat treatise with a supermarket anecdote; because it is in the city’s food stores and restaurants where organic food waste becomes-in the immortal words of Templeton the Rat-“a veritable smörgåsbord.”
And as we have pointed out, time and time again, the use of disposers has many useful public policy outcomes-from reducing food store disposal costs and increasing their profitability; to potentially enabling the system to shut down, or at least greatly modify commercial garbage transfer stations in low income areas of the city.
And, most importantly, this is a major public health issue-certainly more compelling than the amount of trans fats New Yorkers consume in their restaurants. As the Gazette highlights: “Rodents are preponderant, albeit unwelcome, residents of the city. New York has consistently been named the city most at risk for rodent infestation, according to several reports released over the years by d-Con. The two research scientists who coauthored the 2009 Rodent Risk Report said with New York’s aging infrastructure and high population density, it is no surprise rodents run rampant here.”
But the resistance to the use of food waste disposers continues owing to the resistance of the hidebound bureaucracy over at the DEP-and as we have said before, its opposition (and the unnecessary building of an East Side MTS) underscores Alasdair McIntyre’s observation that, “bureaucratic wisdom is one of the great moral fictions of our time.”
But GG tells us that the city is going to implement a smarter strategy-and we smile, knowing that this is simply a fig leaf for the fact that workers at the rat control unit had to be laid off: “The Department of Health and Mental Hygiene, where Pest Control Services resides, laid off Hunnicutt and 48 of her coworkers. That will save $1.5 million, according to the department. It will leave the department with 41 workers. Beyond saving money, however, the city says the layoffs are part of a plan to restructure the bureau’s rodent control program. Rather than cleaning lots in response to complaints, the health department has a new project called rodent indexing, which, it says, can control the rat population with fewer workers. Union leaders and some City Council members, though, remain skeptical and warn about a potential vermin crisis in New York.”
And their skepticism is well founded since the city has eschewed the most effective methodology available-the use of commercial food waste disposers. And it is, as they say, no accident that the Gazette leads its rat treatise with a supermarket anecdote; because it is in the city’s food stores and restaurants where organic food waste becomes-in the immortal words of Templeton the Rat-“a veritable smörgåsbord.”
And as we have pointed out, time and time again, the use of disposers has many useful public policy outcomes-from reducing food store disposal costs and increasing their profitability; to potentially enabling the system to shut down, or at least greatly modify commercial garbage transfer stations in low income areas of the city.
And, most importantly, this is a major public health issue-certainly more compelling than the amount of trans fats New Yorkers consume in their restaurants. As the Gazette highlights: “Rodents are preponderant, albeit unwelcome, residents of the city. New York has consistently been named the city most at risk for rodent infestation, according to several reports released over the years by d-Con. The two research scientists who coauthored the 2009 Rodent Risk Report said with New York’s aging infrastructure and high population density, it is no surprise rodents run rampant here.”
But the resistance to the use of food waste disposers continues owing to the resistance of the hidebound bureaucracy over at the DEP-and as we have said before, its opposition (and the unnecessary building of an East Side MTS) underscores Alasdair McIntyre’s observation that, “bureaucratic wisdom is one of the great moral fictions of our time.”
Misreading Port Chester
Last Friday we had the misfortune to be listening to John Gambling rant about the Federal court's intervention in the Port Chester local election. What the judge did-and he did so with the cooperation of the village itself, was to mandate a weighted voting system in order to redress the lack of Latino representation in the town board. As the NY Times explained: "The balloting, which began with early voting on Tuesday and ends this coming Tuesday, inaugurates a new electoral system that is meant to give Port Chester’s large Latino population a better chance of electing one of its own to the village’s Board of Trustees. No one is sure whether the complicated new process, which emerged from a bitter and expensive legal battle, will have the desired effect — or plunge the community into a new round of litigation."
Well, it did-and the Times goes on to report the results: "This village in Westchester County has elected a Hispanic member to its board of trustees for the first time, capping a bitter legal battle over giving its large Latino population a stronger voice in local government. That member, Luis Marino, a Peruvian immigrant who ran as a Democrat, was among the victors Tuesday in the first local election since a federal judge ordered Port Chester to adopt a new voting system to give Latinos a better shot at electing one of their own to the six-member board."
This didn't sit well with Gambling who just would not shut up about the violation of the principle of one man, one vote-and without any effort to get someone on to explain the other side. Yesterday, the NY Post's Michael Goodwin picks up where Gambling left off-and sees the Port Chester scheme as some kind of boost for illegal aliens: "Under the plan, imposed by a federal judge in response to a 2006 Justice Department civil-rights suit, each voter in the board of trustees election got six votes. A voter could give all six votes to one candidate, or divide them among several. The reason: No Latinos had ever been elected to any of the six at-large seats in the suburban town, even though they make up nearly half of the population of 28,000. That's because many of the Latinos are here illegally, so they can't vote. No matter. The cockeyed voting system was put in place to satisfy a claim of discrimination based on their total numbers, as though immigration status has no consequence to election results."
What Gambling and Goodwin miss-and they miss because it doesn't fit within their immigrant narrative-is that Port Chester has an ugly history of anti-Hispanic actions; something we witnessed first hand a decade ago when we tried to save the Port Chester plastics factory owned by Murray Nadel. The racist sentiment was palpable in the village-and its downtown redevelopment scheme was designed to remove some very visible Latino presence through the use of eminent domain.
Ironically, their actions ultimately led to the taking of Bart Didden's property (after Nadel through in the towel and sold his manufacturing facility to Mexican interests)-a decision that was upheld by, of all people, Sonya Sotomayor. But what goes around sometimes comes around, as the Times makes clear: "According to preliminary results provided by the mayor’s office, Mr. Marino, a volunteer firefighter who works in the maintenance department of the Scarsdale school system, received 1,962 votes, which put him in fourth place among 13 candidates on the ballot. The top vote-getter was Bart Didden, an independent, who had 2,576 votes."
But what the G&G boys miss is how sometimes an at large voting system does in fact discriminate-and they would only have to look to the elimination of the NYC Board of Estimate to understand why that is so-and why courts have intervened to contravene this type of voting. Now we don't know why as district system wasn't put in place in Port Chester, but we do know that the remedy had nothing to do with illegal or legal immigrants who, we hope, are still not voting in the village.
That's the story of Port Chester-but sometimes story telling needs to be place withing a preconceives world view, even if the facts don't fit the narrative.
Well, it did-and the Times goes on to report the results: "This village in Westchester County has elected a Hispanic member to its board of trustees for the first time, capping a bitter legal battle over giving its large Latino population a stronger voice in local government. That member, Luis Marino, a Peruvian immigrant who ran as a Democrat, was among the victors Tuesday in the first local election since a federal judge ordered Port Chester to adopt a new voting system to give Latinos a better shot at electing one of their own to the six-member board."
This didn't sit well with Gambling who just would not shut up about the violation of the principle of one man, one vote-and without any effort to get someone on to explain the other side. Yesterday, the NY Post's Michael Goodwin picks up where Gambling left off-and sees the Port Chester scheme as some kind of boost for illegal aliens: "Under the plan, imposed by a federal judge in response to a 2006 Justice Department civil-rights suit, each voter in the board of trustees election got six votes. A voter could give all six votes to one candidate, or divide them among several. The reason: No Latinos had ever been elected to any of the six at-large seats in the suburban town, even though they make up nearly half of the population of 28,000. That's because many of the Latinos are here illegally, so they can't vote. No matter. The cockeyed voting system was put in place to satisfy a claim of discrimination based on their total numbers, as though immigration status has no consequence to election results."
What Gambling and Goodwin miss-and they miss because it doesn't fit within their immigrant narrative-is that Port Chester has an ugly history of anti-Hispanic actions; something we witnessed first hand a decade ago when we tried to save the Port Chester plastics factory owned by Murray Nadel. The racist sentiment was palpable in the village-and its downtown redevelopment scheme was designed to remove some very visible Latino presence through the use of eminent domain.
Ironically, their actions ultimately led to the taking of Bart Didden's property (after Nadel through in the towel and sold his manufacturing facility to Mexican interests)-a decision that was upheld by, of all people, Sonya Sotomayor. But what goes around sometimes comes around, as the Times makes clear: "According to preliminary results provided by the mayor’s office, Mr. Marino, a volunteer firefighter who works in the maintenance department of the Scarsdale school system, received 1,962 votes, which put him in fourth place among 13 candidates on the ballot. The top vote-getter was Bart Didden, an independent, who had 2,576 votes."
But what the G&G boys miss is how sometimes an at large voting system does in fact discriminate-and they would only have to look to the elimination of the NYC Board of Estimate to understand why that is so-and why courts have intervened to contravene this type of voting. Now we don't know why as district system wasn't put in place in Port Chester, but we do know that the remedy had nothing to do with illegal or legal immigrants who, we hope, are still not voting in the village.
That's the story of Port Chester-but sometimes story telling needs to be place withing a preconceives world view, even if the facts don't fit the narrative.
Scalping the Buttleggers-and the Bodegas
As all the local papers are reporting, Governor Paterson will be sending a $1.6 a pack tax increase on cigarettes that, owing to the indefatigable efforts of Senator Carl Kruger-with strong help from Senator Klein-will also include an enforcement provision that will likely shut down the buttlegging that has come from the state's Indian reservations. As the NY Times tells us: "Cigarette taxes in New York would jump by $1.60 a pack under a tentative deal reached between Gov. David A. Paterson and legislative leaders, which would give New York the nation’s highest state cigarette taxes. The proposal, which officials said Mr. Paterson would include in an emergency budget bill due for a vote on Monday, would also raise wholesale taxes on other tobacco products like chewing tobacco, bringing the tax on those products closer in line with those of cigarettes...The legislation will also include a plan to begin collecting taxes on cigarettes sold off the reservation by Indian tribes in New York, an issue that has provoked confrontations between State Police officers and protesting tribe members in years past."
And it's music to our ears to hear the Senacas crying: "Representatives from the Seneca Nation were in Albany this week to express their concerns about any taxation proposal. “Certainly we are going to stand up and fight and do everything possible for that not to happen,” J. C. Seneca, a tribal councilor for the Seneca Nation and co-chairman of their foreign relations committee, said Friday. “We have to protect and honor the treaties that were made by our ancestors, and that’s what we’re going to do. “If the state wants to move in that direction, then really we have no choice but to defend our territory and our people’s rights.”
As the NY Post points out: "The tribes have resisted state regulation of tobacco sales despite growing complaints about illegal cigarette trafficking and hundreds of millions of dollars in lost tax revenue annually."
So far so good-but an important piece is missing. That piece is the proposal contained in legislation promoted by Klein that would, after many years of no increase, boost the allowable mark up for beleaguered retailers and the state's tax stamp agents-a vanishing breed because of the rampant smuggling that was aided and abetted by the misfeasance of a slew of NY governors.
From what we are hearing the governor-certainly feeling his oats with the new extender paradigm that gives the legislature a take it or leave it ultimatum (with the leave it being the shutdown of state government)-has been resisting including the mark up provision because it would, no we're not kidding, further induce smokers to buy in lower taxed venues. So, after failing to enforce the anti-smuggling legislation for years-and causing the loss of around 60% of the cigarette sales from the legitimate small business outlets-the governor now wants to deprive the store owners and stampers of an ability to become whole?
But, as the NY Daily News indicates, the governor has the upper hand: "By including the taxes in the emergency bills, Paterson has again effectively dared the Legislature to approve them or shut down the government. He used similar tactics in recent weeks to extract cuts in Medicaid, mental health programs and social services."
And is he not mindful of the fact that scores of tax stampers have gone out of business because of the buttlegging? The mark up would allow these agents of the state to have some liquidity as they perform their tax collection duties. Talk about adding injury-to insult-to injury. After having sucked wind for years, these businesses deserve a break-and it's now up to the legislature to stand up for them. But it will be hard given the new extender methodology.
Our observation is that if it's important for the state to get a nice raise on the sale of the product, it's equally as important that the corner bodega gets the same thing-particularly after taking such a beating for the past decade and a half. The question is: Who will stand up for the little guys?
And it's music to our ears to hear the Senacas crying: "Representatives from the Seneca Nation were in Albany this week to express their concerns about any taxation proposal. “Certainly we are going to stand up and fight and do everything possible for that not to happen,” J. C. Seneca, a tribal councilor for the Seneca Nation and co-chairman of their foreign relations committee, said Friday. “We have to protect and honor the treaties that were made by our ancestors, and that’s what we’re going to do. “If the state wants to move in that direction, then really we have no choice but to defend our territory and our people’s rights.”
As the NY Post points out: "The tribes have resisted state regulation of tobacco sales despite growing complaints about illegal cigarette trafficking and hundreds of millions of dollars in lost tax revenue annually."
So far so good-but an important piece is missing. That piece is the proposal contained in legislation promoted by Klein that would, after many years of no increase, boost the allowable mark up for beleaguered retailers and the state's tax stamp agents-a vanishing breed because of the rampant smuggling that was aided and abetted by the misfeasance of a slew of NY governors.
From what we are hearing the governor-certainly feeling his oats with the new extender paradigm that gives the legislature a take it or leave it ultimatum (with the leave it being the shutdown of state government)-has been resisting including the mark up provision because it would, no we're not kidding, further induce smokers to buy in lower taxed venues. So, after failing to enforce the anti-smuggling legislation for years-and causing the loss of around 60% of the cigarette sales from the legitimate small business outlets-the governor now wants to deprive the store owners and stampers of an ability to become whole?
But, as the NY Daily News indicates, the governor has the upper hand: "By including the taxes in the emergency bills, Paterson has again effectively dared the Legislature to approve them or shut down the government. He used similar tactics in recent weeks to extract cuts in Medicaid, mental health programs and social services."
And is he not mindful of the fact that scores of tax stampers have gone out of business because of the buttlegging? The mark up would allow these agents of the state to have some liquidity as they perform their tax collection duties. Talk about adding injury-to insult-to injury. After having sucked wind for years, these businesses deserve a break-and it's now up to the legislature to stand up for them. But it will be hard given the new extender methodology.
Our observation is that if it's important for the state to get a nice raise on the sale of the product, it's equally as important that the corner bodega gets the same thing-particularly after taking such a beating for the past decade and a half. The question is: Who will stand up for the little guys?
Friday, June 18, 2010
Big Daddy
In the mid nineties, the Clinton administration and the Republican controlled congress passed landmark welfare reform legislation-and in New York Mayor Giuliani followed up with reforms of his own that have greatly reduced dependency. The lesson? Toughen up the eligibility rules, introduce work requirements, and disincentivize utilizing the state as daddy.
This brings us to the creative policy mind of NYC’s billionaire mayor. Mike Bloomberg, not unmindful of the harmful effects of fatherlessness, is creating a new position. The NY Post has the story, one that sounds as if it first appeared in the Onion: "Here comes Big Daddy. New York City is about to become the first in the United States to name an official in charge of fatherhood. The new post will oversee a wide variety of expanded services involving 13 city agencies, and it is aimed at encouraging men to become better dads. "Those of us lucky enough to have grown up with a father know how valuable that support can be," Mayor Bloomberg said yesterday, announcing the move at the Fortune Society in Queens."
You've heard of the overly intrusive Big Brother government-an apt description of the way in which Bloomberg loves to intrude into the intimacies of everyday life-but, Big Daddy? And, as usual, the political correct Mayor Mike misses the central point. Spending more government money to "teach" men to be better fathers, elides the fact that it is the existence of an extensive panoply of government programs that makes Dad in many cases irrelevant to the teen mothers who are having too many babies without the benefit of marriage.
Heather McDonald captured the tragedy over a decade ago-underscoring the original observations of Daniel Patrick Moynihan who wrote the seminal, "The Negro Family..." back in 1965 (for which he was excoriated by social welfare and civil rights advocates). As McDonald has pointed out, babies having babies is the root of the problem:
"Standing uncertainly in the middle of a lavish high school day-care center on Manhattan's Upper West Side is the future downfall of welfare reform. Eighteen-year-old Tamiesha has just dropped off her two-year-old and now watches impassively as the baby throws his bowl of Cheerios over his head. While a host of beaming day-care workers rush to clean up the child, Tamiesha, tall and so thin that her slacks hang from her hips in folds, distractedly pours a gold necklace from one hand to another. As usual, she has arrived late and is at that moment missing her second-period class, but no one seems in a hurry to get her on her way. The day-care director has tried to persuade her to come on time, without much of an impact. "I tell 'em I can't give them a 100 percent guarantee," Tamiesha explains. Tamiesha may not strike an observer as an overwhelmingly fit parent, but she has no intention of getting help from a husband. "I don't want to get married," she says emphatically. "My aunts 'n' stuff tell me what's going on, and it's, like, a hassle."
Nor does she have to as long as government can be in loco parentis. And the absence of a father is what's at the center of the problem-not the skill set of absent daddies that Mike Bloomberg is looking to upgrade. McDonald made this manifesto for our last mayor, one who at least understood what was going on: "By speaking clearly about the obligations of people receiving public assistance, Mayor Giuliani shifted the ethic of welfare and made work part of the equation in New York. He should now set a national precedent and do the same for illegitimacy—the other, and much more important, part of the welfare equation. He should announce unequivocally that the most pressing issue affecting child welfare is the breakdown of the family. The persistently lagging well-being of the city's black children, he should point out—from low birth weight to school failure—is inextricably linked to the prevalence among blacks of teen pregnancies and illegitimate births. More social services, the mayor should emphasize, can never compensate for the absence of a father."
What could be a better message as we approach Father's Day? But we hear nothing from our current mayor about the absent parent-only yet another government program when it is the expansive role of government and its misplaced empathy that is the underlying cause of the culture of poverty. As McDonald highlights, it is the public welfare ideology that needs to be deconstructed-something outside of Bloomberg's ken:
"Any defender of marriage can expect charges of racism and "classism." Emily Marks, head of the United Neighborhood Houses, a coalition of local settlement houses, accused me of bias against the poor when I asked if her organization was concerned about family breakdown. Then, displaying a favored debating tactic of the single-parent lobby, she established a precondition for marriage: "It all goes back to the job situation," she maintained. "Jobs are just not available."
This is doubly specious. First, plenty of poor people find jobs and marry. Second, Marks's reasoning presumes that children are an inevitability and marriage a mere add-on—when conditions permit. But if, as Marks claims, no jobs exist that would allow men to support a family, why are women having babies with them anyway? The question answers itself: because they expect the state to pick up the tab. Marks belongs to the right-to-have-a-baby school, which holds that regardless of the economic and emotional stability of the parents, a woman has a right to a baby at the government's expense. The question turns only on her rights, not the baby's fate."
We went through many of these arguments when we attended the Governor's Conference on the Family-in 1980! And there were many who didn't see any benefits in a two parent family-most famously the late Bella Abzug who we had the temerity to challenge; withstanding her foghorn-like admonitions. The reality is that it is government and its desire to replace the responsibilities of the citizens that is the main culprit-so the Bloomberg effort is as wrongheaded as anyone could imagine. It does underscore, however, the mayor's narrow world view and ideological limitations.
What we need are policies that strongly discourage the single parenthood that is so destructive to children: "But in addition to conducting a battle of ideas, the city should comb through its policies and eliminate all explicit or hidden encouragements for illegitimacy. To be blunt, rather than easing the way for single mothers, the city should restore the burden of having a child out of wedlock. Only in the last three decades did society facilitate illegitimacy, with predictable results. First to go should be the LYFE centers, as the high schools call their day-care centers. If there's any doubt that the centers have put an official stamp of approval on teen childbearing, just ask high school students what they think about them. A Brandeis ninth-grader, sauntering to class, summed up the prevailing attitude nicely: "Sure it's normal; schools are supposed to provide shit like that." Many of the nurseries are placed front and center; at Brandeis, the large, cheerful room is virtually the first classroom students encounter on entering the building. They are extravagantly funded at $10,000 a girl and boast lavish staffing ratios and employee perks. The obvious message is that the city considers teen parenthood a normal, highly valued part of school."
Now it's true that the McDonald observations may be a bit dated, but the proliferation of children out of wedlock continues apace; with no strong movement that would counteract the tend-let alone stigmatize it as McDonald suggests. So Mike Bloomberg's prattling about improving fathering skills-and his adding to the city bureaucracy to do it-is a part of this social welfare mindset; and is miles away from a constructive solution to the underlying problem that he purports to address.
This brings us to the creative policy mind of NYC’s billionaire mayor. Mike Bloomberg, not unmindful of the harmful effects of fatherlessness, is creating a new position. The NY Post has the story, one that sounds as if it first appeared in the Onion: "Here comes Big Daddy. New York City is about to become the first in the United States to name an official in charge of fatherhood. The new post will oversee a wide variety of expanded services involving 13 city agencies, and it is aimed at encouraging men to become better dads. "Those of us lucky enough to have grown up with a father know how valuable that support can be," Mayor Bloomberg said yesterday, announcing the move at the Fortune Society in Queens."
You've heard of the overly intrusive Big Brother government-an apt description of the way in which Bloomberg loves to intrude into the intimacies of everyday life-but, Big Daddy? And, as usual, the political correct Mayor Mike misses the central point. Spending more government money to "teach" men to be better fathers, elides the fact that it is the existence of an extensive panoply of government programs that makes Dad in many cases irrelevant to the teen mothers who are having too many babies without the benefit of marriage.
Heather McDonald captured the tragedy over a decade ago-underscoring the original observations of Daniel Patrick Moynihan who wrote the seminal, "The Negro Family..." back in 1965 (for which he was excoriated by social welfare and civil rights advocates). As McDonald has pointed out, babies having babies is the root of the problem:
"Standing uncertainly in the middle of a lavish high school day-care center on Manhattan's Upper West Side is the future downfall of welfare reform. Eighteen-year-old Tamiesha has just dropped off her two-year-old and now watches impassively as the baby throws his bowl of Cheerios over his head. While a host of beaming day-care workers rush to clean up the child, Tamiesha, tall and so thin that her slacks hang from her hips in folds, distractedly pours a gold necklace from one hand to another. As usual, she has arrived late and is at that moment missing her second-period class, but no one seems in a hurry to get her on her way. The day-care director has tried to persuade her to come on time, without much of an impact. "I tell 'em I can't give them a 100 percent guarantee," Tamiesha explains. Tamiesha may not strike an observer as an overwhelmingly fit parent, but she has no intention of getting help from a husband. "I don't want to get married," she says emphatically. "My aunts 'n' stuff tell me what's going on, and it's, like, a hassle."
Nor does she have to as long as government can be in loco parentis. And the absence of a father is what's at the center of the problem-not the skill set of absent daddies that Mike Bloomberg is looking to upgrade. McDonald made this manifesto for our last mayor, one who at least understood what was going on: "By speaking clearly about the obligations of people receiving public assistance, Mayor Giuliani shifted the ethic of welfare and made work part of the equation in New York. He should now set a national precedent and do the same for illegitimacy—the other, and much more important, part of the welfare equation. He should announce unequivocally that the most pressing issue affecting child welfare is the breakdown of the family. The persistently lagging well-being of the city's black children, he should point out—from low birth weight to school failure—is inextricably linked to the prevalence among blacks of teen pregnancies and illegitimate births. More social services, the mayor should emphasize, can never compensate for the absence of a father."
What could be a better message as we approach Father's Day? But we hear nothing from our current mayor about the absent parent-only yet another government program when it is the expansive role of government and its misplaced empathy that is the underlying cause of the culture of poverty. As McDonald highlights, it is the public welfare ideology that needs to be deconstructed-something outside of Bloomberg's ken:
"Any defender of marriage can expect charges of racism and "classism." Emily Marks, head of the United Neighborhood Houses, a coalition of local settlement houses, accused me of bias against the poor when I asked if her organization was concerned about family breakdown. Then, displaying a favored debating tactic of the single-parent lobby, she established a precondition for marriage: "It all goes back to the job situation," she maintained. "Jobs are just not available."
This is doubly specious. First, plenty of poor people find jobs and marry. Second, Marks's reasoning presumes that children are an inevitability and marriage a mere add-on—when conditions permit. But if, as Marks claims, no jobs exist that would allow men to support a family, why are women having babies with them anyway? The question answers itself: because they expect the state to pick up the tab. Marks belongs to the right-to-have-a-baby school, which holds that regardless of the economic and emotional stability of the parents, a woman has a right to a baby at the government's expense. The question turns only on her rights, not the baby's fate."
We went through many of these arguments when we attended the Governor's Conference on the Family-in 1980! And there were many who didn't see any benefits in a two parent family-most famously the late Bella Abzug who we had the temerity to challenge; withstanding her foghorn-like admonitions. The reality is that it is government and its desire to replace the responsibilities of the citizens that is the main culprit-so the Bloomberg effort is as wrongheaded as anyone could imagine. It does underscore, however, the mayor's narrow world view and ideological limitations.
What we need are policies that strongly discourage the single parenthood that is so destructive to children: "But in addition to conducting a battle of ideas, the city should comb through its policies and eliminate all explicit or hidden encouragements for illegitimacy. To be blunt, rather than easing the way for single mothers, the city should restore the burden of having a child out of wedlock. Only in the last three decades did society facilitate illegitimacy, with predictable results. First to go should be the LYFE centers, as the high schools call their day-care centers. If there's any doubt that the centers have put an official stamp of approval on teen childbearing, just ask high school students what they think about them. A Brandeis ninth-grader, sauntering to class, summed up the prevailing attitude nicely: "Sure it's normal; schools are supposed to provide shit like that." Many of the nurseries are placed front and center; at Brandeis, the large, cheerful room is virtually the first classroom students encounter on entering the building. They are extravagantly funded at $10,000 a girl and boast lavish staffing ratios and employee perks. The obvious message is that the city considers teen parenthood a normal, highly valued part of school."
Now it's true that the McDonald observations may be a bit dated, but the proliferation of children out of wedlock continues apace; with no strong movement that would counteract the tend-let alone stigmatize it as McDonald suggests. So Mike Bloomberg's prattling about improving fathering skills-and his adding to the city bureaucracy to do it-is a part of this social welfare mindset; and is miles away from a constructive solution to the underlying problem that he purports to address.
Thursday, June 17, 2010
Public Employee Benefits: Cui Bono?
There’s a compelling story about union greed in this morning’s NY Post-and you can add lust to the list of sins committed by this former labor leader: “A married, obese former president of a Port Authority union admitted yesterday in court to embezzling nearly $300,000 in member dues and using the cash for tawdry hook-ups with prostitutes, casino trips and lavish meals, sources told The Post. Daniel Hughes, 49, who resigned in disgrace from the local Field Supervisor Association, admitted to Judge Eric Vitaliano in Brooklyn federal court that he stole the cash from January 2005 to last December -- bankrupting the account for his 250 members. "This PA employee took advantage of his position as a president of a union and abused it in a calculated and egregious manner," said PA Inspector General Robert Van Etten.”
For which Mr. Hughes will be forced to pay big time at the bar of justice. But, what about the thousands of public employees-bosses and workers alike-who have legally gamed the system and are now the main culprits in the crisis of public governance? This even more serious situation is also featured in the Post, and calls to mind George Washington Plunkitt’s, famous definition of legal graft.”
Here are some of the details: “They're living large at the expense of tapped-out taxpayers. About one out of every seven workers in the state Police and Fire Retirement System who retired last year is receiving a six-figure pension, data released yesterday show. With the state government broke and municipalities crying poverty, 13 percent of cops and firefighters from outside New York City retired last year with fat pensions exceeding $100,000 a year. That's a sixfold increase from 2000, when just 2 percent of cops and firefighters from the suburbs and upstate municipalities retired with a six-figure pension, according to new data compiled by the Empire Center for NY State Policy.”
And no one better symbolizes the incestuous government/labor relationship than the PA’s Louis Echevarria: “Louis Echavarria -- former president of the PA's Lieutenants Benevolent Association -- is No. 4 on the list. He retired last year with a $195,000 pension. As The Post previously reported, he was allowed to rack up tens of thousands of dollars in overtime even though his chief responsibility during his last 18 years was working for his union.”
But as egregious as some of the individual examples may be, it is the system itself-and its political abettors-that is really to blame. Both state and city officials lavished raises and benefits on their government employees with little or no regard for future costs-and now the emaciated chickens are coming home to roost; as Governor Paterson cuts social service and health programs to the bone, and mayor Bloomberg looks to slash libraries and firehouses.
And the phenomenon isn’t limited to New York-as E. J. Dionne chronicles: “While some claim the fiscal crisis in the states is exaggerated, Tuesday's edition of Stateline.org, the Web site that covers the 50 capitals, featured as its top 10 headlines reports from California, Colorado, Connecticut, Hawaii, Illinois and Louisiana, detailing how they are "still struggling" with reduced revenue, lowered credit ratings, employee furloughs and stubborn unemployment.”
Michael Barone-from the opposite side of the political spectrum-agrees with his more liberal colleague, and highlights the underlying problem: “It's a poorly kept secret that government is growing not only at the federal but also at the state and local levels. Especially in some of the biggest states, public employee unions have successfully pressed for higher pay and lavish pensions (one Illinois school superintendent's pension is valued at $26 million) to the point that public employees' salaries and benefits are higher than those of the private-sector taxpayers who pay for them. So while 8 million private-sector jobs have disappeared, the number of public-sector job losses is near zero.”
And he says it’s no wonder that Andrew Cuomo, championing fiscal restraint, is the only Democrat running for governor who has a statistically significant lead: “State governors can't resort to deficit spending without risky gimmicks, and what's more, as Andrew Cuomo's platform suggests, voters don't want them to. As a result, Republicans are leading or running even in governor races in seven of the eight largest states. In California, Democrat Jerry Brown -- at 72, seeking the office he first won at 36 -- is below 50 percent against eBay billionaire Meg Whitman. In Texas, Rick Perry leads Democrat Bill White, who had a moderate record as mayor of Houston.”
So if one of your favorite social program has been devastated by the governor’s cuts-or if your neighborhood firehouse is on the mayor’s chopping block-look to the philosophical underpinnings of the phenomenon; and to those elected leaders like Mike Bloomberg who, continually acting like the irresponsible grasshopper in the fable, saw no need to prepare for the winter to come.
But folks, the winter is surely here. And the next two or three years will not be either easy or pleasant. But if the current crisis isn’t met with the appropriate political response, our short term problems will become intractable-with the Greek crisis as our dystopian model.
For which Mr. Hughes will be forced to pay big time at the bar of justice. But, what about the thousands of public employees-bosses and workers alike-who have legally gamed the system and are now the main culprits in the crisis of public governance? This even more serious situation is also featured in the Post, and calls to mind George Washington Plunkitt’s, famous definition of legal graft.”
Here are some of the details: “They're living large at the expense of tapped-out taxpayers. About one out of every seven workers in the state Police and Fire Retirement System who retired last year is receiving a six-figure pension, data released yesterday show. With the state government broke and municipalities crying poverty, 13 percent of cops and firefighters from outside New York City retired last year with fat pensions exceeding $100,000 a year. That's a sixfold increase from 2000, when just 2 percent of cops and firefighters from the suburbs and upstate municipalities retired with a six-figure pension, according to new data compiled by the Empire Center for NY State Policy.”
And no one better symbolizes the incestuous government/labor relationship than the PA’s Louis Echevarria: “Louis Echavarria -- former president of the PA's Lieutenants Benevolent Association -- is No. 4 on the list. He retired last year with a $195,000 pension. As The Post previously reported, he was allowed to rack up tens of thousands of dollars in overtime even though his chief responsibility during his last 18 years was working for his union.”
But as egregious as some of the individual examples may be, it is the system itself-and its political abettors-that is really to blame. Both state and city officials lavished raises and benefits on their government employees with little or no regard for future costs-and now the emaciated chickens are coming home to roost; as Governor Paterson cuts social service and health programs to the bone, and mayor Bloomberg looks to slash libraries and firehouses.
And the phenomenon isn’t limited to New York-as E. J. Dionne chronicles: “While some claim the fiscal crisis in the states is exaggerated, Tuesday's edition of Stateline.org, the Web site that covers the 50 capitals, featured as its top 10 headlines reports from California, Colorado, Connecticut, Hawaii, Illinois and Louisiana, detailing how they are "still struggling" with reduced revenue, lowered credit ratings, employee furloughs and stubborn unemployment.”
Michael Barone-from the opposite side of the political spectrum-agrees with his more liberal colleague, and highlights the underlying problem: “It's a poorly kept secret that government is growing not only at the federal but also at the state and local levels. Especially in some of the biggest states, public employee unions have successfully pressed for higher pay and lavish pensions (one Illinois school superintendent's pension is valued at $26 million) to the point that public employees' salaries and benefits are higher than those of the private-sector taxpayers who pay for them. So while 8 million private-sector jobs have disappeared, the number of public-sector job losses is near zero.”
And he says it’s no wonder that Andrew Cuomo, championing fiscal restraint, is the only Democrat running for governor who has a statistically significant lead: “State governors can't resort to deficit spending without risky gimmicks, and what's more, as Andrew Cuomo's platform suggests, voters don't want them to. As a result, Republicans are leading or running even in governor races in seven of the eight largest states. In California, Democrat Jerry Brown -- at 72, seeking the office he first won at 36 -- is below 50 percent against eBay billionaire Meg Whitman. In Texas, Rick Perry leads Democrat Bill White, who had a moderate record as mayor of Houston.”
So if one of your favorite social program has been devastated by the governor’s cuts-or if your neighborhood firehouse is on the mayor’s chopping block-look to the philosophical underpinnings of the phenomenon; and to those elected leaders like Mike Bloomberg who, continually acting like the irresponsible grasshopper in the fable, saw no need to prepare for the winter to come.
But folks, the winter is surely here. And the next two or three years will not be either easy or pleasant. But if the current crisis isn’t met with the appropriate political response, our short term problems will become intractable-with the Greek crisis as our dystopian model.
Peddling More Small Business Tsuris
There was a city council hearing on a new proposed law that would crack down on vendors that illegally park their, "mobile," food trucks on the streets of our city-and once again the Bloomberg administration, along with a small business unfriendly NY Times, failed to step up for beleaguered store owners and community residents. As City Room reports: "Proposed legislation to revoke vendors’ licenses of food-truck operators who rack up too many parking violations drew outcries from foodies and food-truckers alike at a City Council hearing Wednesday. There are an estimated 300 such trucks in the city — both ice cream and hot dog purveyors and high-end vendors of waffles, schnitzel and the like. “It is clearly discriminatory that we get put out of business, while FedEx and U.P.S. pay millions in parking tickets as the cost of doing business,” one vendor said."
Sure it is. Fed EX, pal, is a legal taxpaying business and not a sidewalk hugging squatter like the peddlers are-and the delivery services are, well, servicing the local tax paying stores who pay rent and have other normal business overhead that the peddlers do not. But this just demonstrates how far we have sunk-when street intrusions can come out in droves to scream that they are being discriminated against when the legislature is looking to prevent New York from turning into Bangladesh!
The legislation is designed to prevent the hostile street takeover of these food vans: "The legislation — also sponsored by Karen Koslowitz, Democrat of Queens, the committee chairwoman — would amend city code to suspend Department of Health permits for food trucks that receive two parking tickets during the course of 12 months for feeding parking meters or idling engines. The measure would revoke the licenses of operators who receive three such tickets. “It is already against the law for food trucks to idle, and to feed the meter, but we hope that our legislation will improve enforcement,” said Ms. Lappin, a councilwoman from the Upper East Side, who said that her constituents had increasingly been complaining that food trucks were monopolizing parking spaces for entire days and even distributing menus listing their parking spots as addresses."
Nothing arrogant about that. But we can always count on the mayor to not stand up for the taxpaying store owners: "Midway through the session, Ms. Koslowitz announced she had learned that Mayor Michael R. Bloomberg opposed the legislation. The Bloomberg administration did not present testimony at the hearing, but Patrick A. Wehle, director of City Legislative Affairs, sent a letter to the Council’s Consumer Affairs Committee saying that the legislation was “well intentioned” but “too punitive for such routine” parking offenses."
This from the same pusillanimous pipsqueaks who have allowed peddlers to metastasize all over neighborhood streets-further putting struggling stores at risk. Punitive? How about just any enforcement from a crew that treat the plight of small business with malign neglect? And the vendor advocates prattle about lowered cost, with no cognizance of the rationale behind the ability to out compete those with legitimate overhead: "Sean Basinski, director of the nine-year-old Street Vendor Project, a nonprofit group that he said represented 1,100 dues-paying street vendors, estimated that there were some 300 food trucks in New York City, most offering ice cream. The number of non-ice-cream vehicles “has gone from zero to 50 to 100 in the last few years,” he said, adding that they had increased food diversity and convenience “and lowered prices for consumers.”
The irony here is that the mayor and his minions have no compunction in whacking small businesses with punitive regulations when it fits their ideological agenda-witness the gruesome anti-smoking signs that are being foisted on the bodegas. And the further irony is that, if you are just a poor shlub from the neighborhood, you will be pestered and set upon by the mayor's parking enforcement brigade-no worry about punitive in the neighborhoods of Throggs Neck, Bay Ridge or Forest Hills.
Now we have been all over this issue for the last eight years, but it's just too fatiguing to continually try to swim upstream against a billionaire mayor who doesn't give a fig about no account small businesses and the communities that they serve. And while council members Koslowitz and Lappin deserve kudos, where is the outrage from 30 or more of their colleagues-members who are quick to scream about budget cuts, but who get lockjaw when the store owners who pay the taxes that the city depends on are under siege by an army of freeloaders.
As one store owner told the council: "One merchant, Evan Xenopoulos, an owner of the Oxford Cafe pizza and sandwich shop on 591 Lexington Avenue at 57th Street, said that “it started with one, and now there are two or three in front of our cafe,” he said. “They block foot traffic to our store and the view of our entrance, and we’ve seen a drop-off in our revenues.”
How Orwellian has the whole situation become? Well, the complaint of the cafe owner was met with the following riposte: "To which another operator — Yasir Z’raouli, whose Bistro Truck advertises its Moroccan-themed menu as “gourmet street food” — responded: “When did competition become illegal in America?” Hey fella, it is, or should be, when you park for free on the streets and make the unlevel playing field a constitutional right.
We'll give our friend, the intrepid Michelle Birnbaum. the last word on this insanity: "But Michele Birnbaum, chairwoman of the vendor committee for the East 86th Street Association, said that “we get daily complaints from both residents and merchants, who say that these trucks are taking their parking spaces — and sometimes the trucks will take up multiple spots.” Maybe what the merchants and residents need are more Officer Chus-parking agents with a temper and a flair for a little vigilante justice?
Sure it is. Fed EX, pal, is a legal taxpaying business and not a sidewalk hugging squatter like the peddlers are-and the delivery services are, well, servicing the local tax paying stores who pay rent and have other normal business overhead that the peddlers do not. But this just demonstrates how far we have sunk-when street intrusions can come out in droves to scream that they are being discriminated against when the legislature is looking to prevent New York from turning into Bangladesh!
The legislation is designed to prevent the hostile street takeover of these food vans: "The legislation — also sponsored by Karen Koslowitz, Democrat of Queens, the committee chairwoman — would amend city code to suspend Department of Health permits for food trucks that receive two parking tickets during the course of 12 months for feeding parking meters or idling engines. The measure would revoke the licenses of operators who receive three such tickets. “It is already against the law for food trucks to idle, and to feed the meter, but we hope that our legislation will improve enforcement,” said Ms. Lappin, a councilwoman from the Upper East Side, who said that her constituents had increasingly been complaining that food trucks were monopolizing parking spaces for entire days and even distributing menus listing their parking spots as addresses."
Nothing arrogant about that. But we can always count on the mayor to not stand up for the taxpaying store owners: "Midway through the session, Ms. Koslowitz announced she had learned that Mayor Michael R. Bloomberg opposed the legislation. The Bloomberg administration did not present testimony at the hearing, but Patrick A. Wehle, director of City Legislative Affairs, sent a letter to the Council’s Consumer Affairs Committee saying that the legislation was “well intentioned” but “too punitive for such routine” parking offenses."
This from the same pusillanimous pipsqueaks who have allowed peddlers to metastasize all over neighborhood streets-further putting struggling stores at risk. Punitive? How about just any enforcement from a crew that treat the plight of small business with malign neglect? And the vendor advocates prattle about lowered cost, with no cognizance of the rationale behind the ability to out compete those with legitimate overhead: "Sean Basinski, director of the nine-year-old Street Vendor Project, a nonprofit group that he said represented 1,100 dues-paying street vendors, estimated that there were some 300 food trucks in New York City, most offering ice cream. The number of non-ice-cream vehicles “has gone from zero to 50 to 100 in the last few years,” he said, adding that they had increased food diversity and convenience “and lowered prices for consumers.”
The irony here is that the mayor and his minions have no compunction in whacking small businesses with punitive regulations when it fits their ideological agenda-witness the gruesome anti-smoking signs that are being foisted on the bodegas. And the further irony is that, if you are just a poor shlub from the neighborhood, you will be pestered and set upon by the mayor's parking enforcement brigade-no worry about punitive in the neighborhoods of Throggs Neck, Bay Ridge or Forest Hills.
Now we have been all over this issue for the last eight years, but it's just too fatiguing to continually try to swim upstream against a billionaire mayor who doesn't give a fig about no account small businesses and the communities that they serve. And while council members Koslowitz and Lappin deserve kudos, where is the outrage from 30 or more of their colleagues-members who are quick to scream about budget cuts, but who get lockjaw when the store owners who pay the taxes that the city depends on are under siege by an army of freeloaders.
As one store owner told the council: "One merchant, Evan Xenopoulos, an owner of the Oxford Cafe pizza and sandwich shop on 591 Lexington Avenue at 57th Street, said that “it started with one, and now there are two or three in front of our cafe,” he said. “They block foot traffic to our store and the view of our entrance, and we’ve seen a drop-off in our revenues.”
How Orwellian has the whole situation become? Well, the complaint of the cafe owner was met with the following riposte: "To which another operator — Yasir Z’raouli, whose Bistro Truck advertises its Moroccan-themed menu as “gourmet street food” — responded: “When did competition become illegal in America?” Hey fella, it is, or should be, when you park for free on the streets and make the unlevel playing field a constitutional right.
We'll give our friend, the intrepid Michelle Birnbaum. the last word on this insanity: "But Michele Birnbaum, chairwoman of the vendor committee for the East 86th Street Association, said that “we get daily complaints from both residents and merchants, who say that these trucks are taking their parking spaces — and sometimes the trucks will take up multiple spots.” Maybe what the merchants and residents need are more Officer Chus-parking agents with a temper and a flair for a little vigilante justice?
Wednesday, June 16, 2010
Biting Off More Than He Can Chu?
Council member Dan Halloran saw something that many New Yorkers witness on a daily basis-and NYPD traffic enforcement officer acting as both a bully and a jerk. But, unlike us mere mortals, Halloran swung into action, as the NY Daily News reports: "A city councilman who spotted a traffic cop blow through stop signs while yakking on the phone confronted the officer – and got slapped with a $165 ticket, the irate lawmaker said. Dan Halloran (R-Queens) wants his summons dismissed and is demanding a review of every ticket the Queens traffic agent has ever written."
But why stop there. It's not just this one officer, but the nature of the entire parking enforcement regime that needs to be examined-and eventually overhauled. The parking fine racket is another city boondoggle "gotcha?" that costs the tax payers big time. It is, especially in the city's neighborhood shopping strips, a direct assault on the ability of store owners to earn a living-and yet another example of the way in which municipal government taxes and regulates us into a brutal submission.
That being said, the parking enforcement jihad underscores the extent to which the city's municipal parking lots-treated as disposable razors by the Giuliani folks-are a vital public amenity; as we have pointed out in the case of Flushing Commons. The survival of local business is predicated on the ability of customers to be able to find suitable parking-in the vicinity of the stores, and not in some far off lot that few will opt to use.
The building of car dependent mega malls all over the city-when seen in the context of the charge of the parking enforcement brigade-erodes local business and makes entrepreneurship a real challenge-and we haven't even touched on the regulatory and tax brigade. In Flushing the proposed mall will not only compete with local business, but it will also eradicate any parking that could be used for the neighborhood stores.
Flushing Commons stands as a monument to the Bloombergistas total disdain for small business-and is, in addition, a mockery of the faux climate change mantra embedded in the Pulitzer Prize for fiction known as PlaNYC 2030. Mike Bloomberg tells us that his five best friends are all billionaires-and the way he makes public policy sure underscores where his class allegiances lie. As we have said ad infinitum, Bloomberg isn't above the special interests, he embodies them.
But kudos to Halloran for exposing what the store keepers all over the city know: the mayor couldn't give a rat's ass about their ability to survive since, when he's not raising parking fees, he's boosting the pensions of government workers expecting that all of the onerous revenue enhancement will foot the outsized bill.
But why stop there. It's not just this one officer, but the nature of the entire parking enforcement regime that needs to be examined-and eventually overhauled. The parking fine racket is another city boondoggle "gotcha?" that costs the tax payers big time. It is, especially in the city's neighborhood shopping strips, a direct assault on the ability of store owners to earn a living-and yet another example of the way in which municipal government taxes and regulates us into a brutal submission.
That being said, the parking enforcement jihad underscores the extent to which the city's municipal parking lots-treated as disposable razors by the Giuliani folks-are a vital public amenity; as we have pointed out in the case of Flushing Commons. The survival of local business is predicated on the ability of customers to be able to find suitable parking-in the vicinity of the stores, and not in some far off lot that few will opt to use.
The building of car dependent mega malls all over the city-when seen in the context of the charge of the parking enforcement brigade-erodes local business and makes entrepreneurship a real challenge-and we haven't even touched on the regulatory and tax brigade. In Flushing the proposed mall will not only compete with local business, but it will also eradicate any parking that could be used for the neighborhood stores.
Flushing Commons stands as a monument to the Bloombergistas total disdain for small business-and is, in addition, a mockery of the faux climate change mantra embedded in the Pulitzer Prize for fiction known as PlaNYC 2030. Mike Bloomberg tells us that his five best friends are all billionaires-and the way he makes public policy sure underscores where his class allegiances lie. As we have said ad infinitum, Bloomberg isn't above the special interests, he embodies them.
But kudos to Halloran for exposing what the store keepers all over the city know: the mayor couldn't give a rat's ass about their ability to survive since, when he's not raising parking fees, he's boosting the pensions of government workers expecting that all of the onerous revenue enhancement will foot the outsized bill.
Pro Bono
We have never really worked pro bono before, but now that we have Jake Bono has one of the leading figures in the Willets Point United group, we can get the chance to now say that we have finally gotten the chance-and Bono is now featured in a lengthy interview on Fox News' "This is Your Land."
We mention the Bono interview by way of introduction to the fact that it is now over five months since NYSDOT figured out that the EDC Van Wyck ramp report was seriously deficient-and we now have two contradictory documents that, aside from their effects on the fate of the ramps, have additional implications for other local developments that are relying on the Willets Point EIS for data on traffic coming from the proposed project. Case in point: Flushing Commons, where the developer has used the original traffic evaluation that claimed that 46% of the local car and truck trips would be diverted onto the Van Wyck.
Ah, but the subsequent ramp report-and shouldn't that document have a more timely cachet to it?-claimed that only 16% of the WP traffic would be diverted out from local roads. This friends is some serious skullduggery-reminiscent of the Columbia University collusion of consultants that is awaiting the Court of Appeals judgment. What we are beginning to understand is that the entire land use review process-as it is currently configured with the developer or EDC choosing the so-called experts-is hopelessly corrupt.
Which is why we will make the case at state senate hearings in a couple of weeks that there is a crying need-under the National Environmental Policy Act-for an independent study of the viability of the Van Wyck ramps. Willets Point, Flushing, College Point, and Corona are being inundated by unsustainable development that is putting unbearable pressure on the local road and highway infrastructure-while NYC DOT continues its quixotic quest to bicycle lane the entire city in the municipal equivalent of a psychotic break.
It's time to bell the Bloomberg cat or, to mix metaphors, point out how without clothes our local ruler really is when it comes to carbon emissions and sustainability. We await the awakening of the Rip Van Winkles in the environmental community to this obvious manifestation of hypocrisy. They shouldn't need an oil spill to come to their senses.
So Jake Bono fights on-in a fight that is not only about him. We need a greater accountability down at city hall-and a legislature that doesn't act as a wholly owned subsidiary of Bloomberg LLP. But for that to happen, the people of Queens need to come out of their somnabulence and speak truth to power. It's time to make Saul Alinsky proud.
We mention the Bono interview by way of introduction to the fact that it is now over five months since NYSDOT figured out that the EDC Van Wyck ramp report was seriously deficient-and we now have two contradictory documents that, aside from their effects on the fate of the ramps, have additional implications for other local developments that are relying on the Willets Point EIS for data on traffic coming from the proposed project. Case in point: Flushing Commons, where the developer has used the original traffic evaluation that claimed that 46% of the local car and truck trips would be diverted onto the Van Wyck.
Ah, but the subsequent ramp report-and shouldn't that document have a more timely cachet to it?-claimed that only 16% of the WP traffic would be diverted out from local roads. This friends is some serious skullduggery-reminiscent of the Columbia University collusion of consultants that is awaiting the Court of Appeals judgment. What we are beginning to understand is that the entire land use review process-as it is currently configured with the developer or EDC choosing the so-called experts-is hopelessly corrupt.
Which is why we will make the case at state senate hearings in a couple of weeks that there is a crying need-under the National Environmental Policy Act-for an independent study of the viability of the Van Wyck ramps. Willets Point, Flushing, College Point, and Corona are being inundated by unsustainable development that is putting unbearable pressure on the local road and highway infrastructure-while NYC DOT continues its quixotic quest to bicycle lane the entire city in the municipal equivalent of a psychotic break.
It's time to bell the Bloomberg cat or, to mix metaphors, point out how without clothes our local ruler really is when it comes to carbon emissions and sustainability. We await the awakening of the Rip Van Winkles in the environmental community to this obvious manifestation of hypocrisy. They shouldn't need an oil spill to come to their senses.
So Jake Bono fights on-in a fight that is not only about him. We need a greater accountability down at city hall-and a legislature that doesn't act as a wholly owned subsidiary of Bloomberg LLP. But for that to happen, the people of Queens need to come out of their somnabulence and speak truth to power. It's time to make Saul Alinsky proud.
Michael Myer(s) is a Real Life Horror
For many people Michael Myers is the frightening figure from the Halloween series of slasher films-first murdering his sister and then, fifteen years later, returning to kill some more teenagers. But Michael Myers the fictional destroyer has nothing on the real life destructive force that Michael Myer(s) the developer has turned out to be. This Myer(s) shuns the lighthearted work of individual homicides, and seeks to do in an entire Flushing community with his Flushing Commons project.
And the real life Myer(s) is also someone who isn't too low to resort to character assassination-more than willing to add insult to injury. This comes out in the last issue of the Queens Courier, as the local paper tries to sort out the meaning of the resignation of Jim Gerson from the Flushing BID: "While insisting that 400 more parking spaces, once promised, be restored to the project, Gerson is also quoted as saying, “I honestly think that the project could destroy the community.” Michael Meyer, both a member of the BID and a principal in the 1 million square-foot project, called Gerson’s accusations “nonsense.”
Nice to hear from an unbiased bystander. But Myer(s) isn't finished-and has his own unique opinion about the proper role of a BID: "The BID is not in the business of commissioning studies for businesses that aren’t even in its area,” Meyer said. “The business assistance plans are properly being taken care of by elected officials who have both the responsibility and the budget.”
Now the BID is just as its name says-and who's to say that improving business is the exclusive purview of some Lady Bird Myers? "Meyer also said that BIDS throughout the city are organized by local business, to keep the streets clean, do plantings and otherwise make their own blocks more attractive to shoppers. “BIDS don’t do lobbying,” he insisted." Isn't marketing and economic impact studies a proper concern of a local business group? In our view it certainly is-and anything that promotes such business-like an economic impact study-is totally within bounds; in spite of the learned rebuttal of Professor Myer(s).
But Myer(s) doesn't like the fact that Gerson is standing up for the 900 neighborhood merchants-and resorts to the ad hominen in order to demonstrate the paucity of his intellectual outlook: "Meyer also accused Gerson of “playing politics” and suggested ulterior motives.
“He owns a residential property with no parking, right there. He wants additional spaces so his tenants can use them for long term parking – and make his property more desirable,” Meyer said."
Well fancy that. Gerson, unlike Myer(s), has a vested interest in Flushing because he and his family have been an indigenous presence there for over fifty years! And, as one of the 900 Flushing businesses, he too needs the public parking that Flushing Commons will Bogart for itself. So what Myer(s) demonstrates with such great clarity is his carpetbagger and special interest status-in contrast to those who have Flushing's interest at heart.
Make no mistake about it. Flushing Commons-with Mike Myer(s) at the helm-will slash its way into the community and make Freddy Krueger look like a boy scout. It's no wonder that Myer(s) dropped the s from his name in order to try to differentiate himself from Halloween infamy. We, however, refuse to be fooled and know exactly who, and what, he is.
And the real life Myer(s) is also someone who isn't too low to resort to character assassination-more than willing to add insult to injury. This comes out in the last issue of the Queens Courier, as the local paper tries to sort out the meaning of the resignation of Jim Gerson from the Flushing BID: "While insisting that 400 more parking spaces, once promised, be restored to the project, Gerson is also quoted as saying, “I honestly think that the project could destroy the community.” Michael Meyer, both a member of the BID and a principal in the 1 million square-foot project, called Gerson’s accusations “nonsense.”
Nice to hear from an unbiased bystander. But Myer(s) isn't finished-and has his own unique opinion about the proper role of a BID: "The BID is not in the business of commissioning studies for businesses that aren’t even in its area,” Meyer said. “The business assistance plans are properly being taken care of by elected officials who have both the responsibility and the budget.”
Now the BID is just as its name says-and who's to say that improving business is the exclusive purview of some Lady Bird Myers? "Meyer also said that BIDS throughout the city are organized by local business, to keep the streets clean, do plantings and otherwise make their own blocks more attractive to shoppers. “BIDS don’t do lobbying,” he insisted." Isn't marketing and economic impact studies a proper concern of a local business group? In our view it certainly is-and anything that promotes such business-like an economic impact study-is totally within bounds; in spite of the learned rebuttal of Professor Myer(s).
But Myer(s) doesn't like the fact that Gerson is standing up for the 900 neighborhood merchants-and resorts to the ad hominen in order to demonstrate the paucity of his intellectual outlook: "Meyer also accused Gerson of “playing politics” and suggested ulterior motives.
“He owns a residential property with no parking, right there. He wants additional spaces so his tenants can use them for long term parking – and make his property more desirable,” Meyer said."
Well fancy that. Gerson, unlike Myer(s), has a vested interest in Flushing because he and his family have been an indigenous presence there for over fifty years! And, as one of the 900 Flushing businesses, he too needs the public parking that Flushing Commons will Bogart for itself. So what Myer(s) demonstrates with such great clarity is his carpetbagger and special interest status-in contrast to those who have Flushing's interest at heart.
Make no mistake about it. Flushing Commons-with Mike Myer(s) at the helm-will slash its way into the community and make Freddy Krueger look like a boy scout. It's no wonder that Myer(s) dropped the s from his name in order to try to differentiate himself from Halloween infamy. We, however, refuse to be fooled and know exactly who, and what, he is.
Tuesday, June 15, 2010
Still on Thin Ice
According to Fanhouse, the Wilpons are in a serious strategizing mode to bring the Islanders to Willets Point: "The owners of the New York Mets have begun discussions with a leading real estate firm to strategize for a potential arena in Queens that would house the NHL's New York Islanders, an industry source has told FanHouse. Jones Lang LaSalle, the project management company for the upcoming $775-850 million renovation of Madison Square Garden, has begun work on a feasibility study for an Islanders arena at Willets Point -- the property surrounding Citi Field, the second-year home of the Mets."
And this seems more than just blather for the Wilpons: "This is beyond the preliminary stage," said the source. "You don't bring in a big hitter like JLL unless you're serious. This tells me the Islanders and Mets have made progress in a partnership to take the hockey team to Queens. If Charles Wang and Nassau can't cut a deal, this will be a great option."
But will it? Make no mistake about it, an arena has never been part of the Willets Point development plan-and the benefits of a sports franchise, a hockey one at that, are fairly meager pickings compared to the extravagance that has been pie in the skied by the EDC flunkies for the 61 acre site. And since it hasn't been part of the plan, the idea that the city could simply parachute it in without a further review process, simply doesn't hold water.
Let the Wilpons bring it on, however, we'd welcome the mulligan. But, as for the Islander fans, we don't think they have a clear picture about the challenges of the site. As one fan commented: "This would be perfect it puts the Islanders 15 mins from my house... season ticket plan will be a go!" We don't know where the fella lives, but it will take fifteen minutes just to leave his driveway if the entire 9 million sq. ft. is built out. Some power play!
And this seems more than just blather for the Wilpons: "This is beyond the preliminary stage," said the source. "You don't bring in a big hitter like JLL unless you're serious. This tells me the Islanders and Mets have made progress in a partnership to take the hockey team to Queens. If Charles Wang and Nassau can't cut a deal, this will be a great option."
But will it? Make no mistake about it, an arena has never been part of the Willets Point development plan-and the benefits of a sports franchise, a hockey one at that, are fairly meager pickings compared to the extravagance that has been pie in the skied by the EDC flunkies for the 61 acre site. And since it hasn't been part of the plan, the idea that the city could simply parachute it in without a further review process, simply doesn't hold water.
Let the Wilpons bring it on, however, we'd welcome the mulligan. But, as for the Islander fans, we don't think they have a clear picture about the challenges of the site. As one fan commented: "This would be perfect it puts the Islanders 15 mins from my house... season ticket plan will be a go!" We don't know where the fella lives, but it will take fifteen minutes just to leave his driveway if the entire 9 million sq. ft. is built out. Some power play!
Public Employee Crisis
The San Francisco Chronicle had an interesting analysis of how the growth of public employee political power is threatening the state's economic viability: "For public employee unions - those representing police, firefighters, teachers, prison guards and agency workers of all kinds at the state and local levels - these are the worst of times. Despite record high membership and dues, and years of unparalleled clout in state capitols, public-sector unions find themselves on the defensive, desperately trying to hold onto past gains in the face of a skeptical press and angry voters."
And the anger, of course, devolves from the fact that the fattening of the public work for is directly proportional to the shrinkage of the private sector-and the looting of the citizenry needed to pay for the government expansion: "The biggest blow to unions' public support has come from revelations about jaw-dropping compensation and pension benefits. Police have received unwelcome attention for budget-busting overtime and the manipulation of eligibility rules for "disability pensions," which provide higher benefits and tax advantages. Other government employees, particularly managers, have been called out for "pension spiking": using vacation time, sick pay and the like to boost income in the last years of employment, which are the basis for calculating retirement benefits."
And the public exposure of the abuses, dramatizes the disparities between what a government worker can expect to receive in retirement with the bleaker future of the private sector worker: "Such gaming of the system boosts starting pensions to levels that can approach, and even exceed, employees' salaries. Some examples from the reporting of the Contra Costa Times' Daniel Borenstein: A retired Northern California fire chief whose $185,000 salary morphed into a $241,000 annual pension; a county administrator whose $240,000 starting pension was 98 percent of final salary; and a sanitary district manager who qualified for a $217,000 pension on a salary of $234,000. At a time when most Californians anticipate an austere retirement (if they can afford to retire at all), government pensions are a source of real voter anger."
All of these revelations that are fueling widespread voter anger-and are the impetus behind the Tea Party phenomenon (a grass roots anger that is even being felt in New York State)-seems to have by passed the wunderkinds at the White House. How else to explain the fact that the president has called for an additional $50 billion in aid for propping up the public sector at the state and local levels? As the Washington Post reports: "President Obama urged reluctant lawmakers Saturday to quickly approve nearly $50 billion in emergency aid to state and local governments, saying the money is needed to avoid "massive layoffs of teachers, police and firefighters" and to support the still-fragile economic recovery."
Could there be a greater disconnect between all the president's men and women and what's going on in the rest of the country? As John Hinderaker comments on Powerline: "Increasingly, the central conflict in American politics is between the cash-strapped private sector and lavishly compensated public employees. With government workers now out-earning those in the private sector by something like two to one, many taxpayers are saying "enough." But President Obama, with his usual tone-deafness, is pressing ahead with plans to widen the gap between the lush public sector and the hard-hit private sector even more..."
This feeds into the questionable ideological presumption that propping up the public sector-all the so-called, "jobs bills," as well as the failed stimulus-is actually helping the economy: "The original "stimulus" bill was all about keeping state and local government spending, and the salaries it supports, sky-high. It doesn't appear that President Obama has a game plan to help the economy, other than continuing to feed the already-bloated public sector. This is consistent with his apparently complete ignorance of basic principles of economics. Democrats in Congress, however, can see the writing on the wall. It will be interesting to see whether they are willing to brave voter wrath by stimulating the public sector still further."
Foe New Yorkers, all of this has a Yogi Berra,"This is like deja vu all over again," quality to it. For those of us who lived through the Lindsay-Beame years in the city, we can see the handwriting on the wall. Lindsay, as Murray Kempton mused, was a, "splendid flop," precisely because of how he fueled the growth of government at the expense of the private economy in New York. Fred Siegel makes the point and reads the wall writing-he gets the last word: "In his second term, Lindsay allied himself with the rising public-sector unions, the same constituency that has been central to Obama’s unsustainable expansion of federal spending based on borrowing. Lindsay wasn’t solely responsible for the fiscal crisis that hit New York in 1975, but his policies of expanding government spending and employment and paying for it with debt made it all the harder for the city to recover...A similar fate may now await America at the hands of our Lindsay-like president."
And the anger, of course, devolves from the fact that the fattening of the public work for is directly proportional to the shrinkage of the private sector-and the looting of the citizenry needed to pay for the government expansion: "The biggest blow to unions' public support has come from revelations about jaw-dropping compensation and pension benefits. Police have received unwelcome attention for budget-busting overtime and the manipulation of eligibility rules for "disability pensions," which provide higher benefits and tax advantages. Other government employees, particularly managers, have been called out for "pension spiking": using vacation time, sick pay and the like to boost income in the last years of employment, which are the basis for calculating retirement benefits."
And the public exposure of the abuses, dramatizes the disparities between what a government worker can expect to receive in retirement with the bleaker future of the private sector worker: "Such gaming of the system boosts starting pensions to levels that can approach, and even exceed, employees' salaries. Some examples from the reporting of the Contra Costa Times' Daniel Borenstein: A retired Northern California fire chief whose $185,000 salary morphed into a $241,000 annual pension; a county administrator whose $240,000 starting pension was 98 percent of final salary; and a sanitary district manager who qualified for a $217,000 pension on a salary of $234,000. At a time when most Californians anticipate an austere retirement (if they can afford to retire at all), government pensions are a source of real voter anger."
All of these revelations that are fueling widespread voter anger-and are the impetus behind the Tea Party phenomenon (a grass roots anger that is even being felt in New York State)-seems to have by passed the wunderkinds at the White House. How else to explain the fact that the president has called for an additional $50 billion in aid for propping up the public sector at the state and local levels? As the Washington Post reports: "President Obama urged reluctant lawmakers Saturday to quickly approve nearly $50 billion in emergency aid to state and local governments, saying the money is needed to avoid "massive layoffs of teachers, police and firefighters" and to support the still-fragile economic recovery."
Could there be a greater disconnect between all the president's men and women and what's going on in the rest of the country? As John Hinderaker comments on Powerline: "Increasingly, the central conflict in American politics is between the cash-strapped private sector and lavishly compensated public employees. With government workers now out-earning those in the private sector by something like two to one, many taxpayers are saying "enough." But President Obama, with his usual tone-deafness, is pressing ahead with plans to widen the gap between the lush public sector and the hard-hit private sector even more..."
This feeds into the questionable ideological presumption that propping up the public sector-all the so-called, "jobs bills," as well as the failed stimulus-is actually helping the economy: "The original "stimulus" bill was all about keeping state and local government spending, and the salaries it supports, sky-high. It doesn't appear that President Obama has a game plan to help the economy, other than continuing to feed the already-bloated public sector. This is consistent with his apparently complete ignorance of basic principles of economics. Democrats in Congress, however, can see the writing on the wall. It will be interesting to see whether they are willing to brave voter wrath by stimulating the public sector still further."
Foe New Yorkers, all of this has a Yogi Berra,"This is like deja vu all over again," quality to it. For those of us who lived through the Lindsay-Beame years in the city, we can see the handwriting on the wall. Lindsay, as Murray Kempton mused, was a, "splendid flop," precisely because of how he fueled the growth of government at the expense of the private economy in New York. Fred Siegel makes the point and reads the wall writing-he gets the last word: "In his second term, Lindsay allied himself with the rising public-sector unions, the same constituency that has been central to Obama’s unsustainable expansion of federal spending based on borrowing. Lindsay wasn’t solely responsible for the fiscal crisis that hit New York in 1975, but his policies of expanding government spending and employment and paying for it with debt made it all the harder for the city to recover...A similar fate may now await America at the hands of our Lindsay-like president."
Two Sets of Books
The indictment of Republican/Independence Part operative John Haggerty for stealing over a million dollars of the mayor's money, dramatizes the extent to which Bloomberg's promiscuous spending totally corrupts the democratic process. As City Room reports: "A top Republican political operative was charged on Monday by the Manhattan district attorney’s office with grand larceny, money laundering and three other counts in connection with accusations that he stole $1.1 million from Mayor Michael R. Bloomberg during last year’s campaign."
The mayor, of course, comes off as Shaggy, singing his hit tune, "It Wasn't Me;" while, at the same time acting all high dudgeon that any one would have the temerity to question his lavish giving. As City Room tells us: "Mr. Bloomberg, though, was far pricklier when asked about the indictment at an event Monday morning at the Morgan Library and Museum, heralding the opening of a government initiative for new media innovation. Mr. Bloomberg first said that the district attorney had asked him not to speak about the case. “I have a right to make donations to parties that help this city and this state, and I’ll keep doing it,” he said."
But, as Wayne Barrett has already pointed out, the manner of his giving-at least in this regard-runs counter to the strict requirements of the election law. But why should these laws apply to him? As Barrett reported earlier in the year: ""Even Mike Bloomberg's lawyers say he broke election law when he gave $1.2 million to the Independence Party right before the November election. The mayor's media guru, Howard Wolfson, and his elections lawyer Ken Gross told the Daily News that Bloomberg's two, $600,000 personal checks to the party were used for poll-watchers, drivers, cellphones and food for election day. In their eagerness to account for the missing money -- most of which went to a mysterious, unincorporated firm now under investigation by Manhattan District Attorney Cy Vance -- the two unwittingly admitted to an apparent violation of city and state campaign finance laws."
City Room weighs in on this as well-although without Barrett's razor sharp claws: "Mr. Vance stressed during the news conference that neither Mr. Bloomberg nor the Independence Party had been targets of the investigation. But when asked how it was possible that Mr. Bloomberg’s sophisticated and experience campaign team might have been the victim of fraud, Mr. Vance hinted at the cozy relationship between the campaign and Mr. Haggerty, a longtime Republican activist who has worked for Gov. George E. Pataki and many other officials and candidates. “They trusted him,” Mr. Vance said. “He was a trusted team member.”
Well, kumbaya ya'll-but what about the mayor's campaign culpability, Mr. Vance? Being stupid or gullible isn't a legal defense, is it? And didn't Bloomberg have enouugh dough to get some advice from a good campaign lawyer? But when your laying out $109 million for your third term, how can he be expected to follow these silly arcane election rules?
This all sounds to us like the Leona Helsmsley defense-and it calls for a more thorough investigation of the housekeeping account loopholes that the mayor drives his Brink's truck through. We all appreciate the extent to which the mayor believes that he is only being public spirited; but his contributory forays have a distinct self interested hue-and he should be limited so that his fortune can't play such an outsized and corrupting role. After all, Bloomberg's last campaign outlay north of a hunderd mil, turned out to be greater than the money spent by all of the other candidates combined.
As the NY Daily News reported: "Mayor Bloomberg didn't just spend more money on politics last year than anyone else in New York - he spent more than everyone else in New York. Hizzoner spent $109.9 million to get re-elected, while all other New Yorkers combined donated just $90.7 million to candidates and parties."
So when the mayor bristles and says the following: "I have a right to make donations to support people and parties that I think will help this city and this country and this state, and I’ll continue to do it,” we have a right to respond that he shouldn't be given that kind of carte blanche to pursue what has aleways been in the interest, not of the country, the city, or the state, but of Bloomberg himself-the cynosure of the special interests that normally roil the good government people-and the NY Times editorialists; but not when performed with such sublime grace, as so often is the case with our municipal hegemonist.
The mayor, of course, comes off as Shaggy, singing his hit tune, "It Wasn't Me;" while, at the same time acting all high dudgeon that any one would have the temerity to question his lavish giving. As City Room tells us: "Mr. Bloomberg, though, was far pricklier when asked about the indictment at an event Monday morning at the Morgan Library and Museum, heralding the opening of a government initiative for new media innovation. Mr. Bloomberg first said that the district attorney had asked him not to speak about the case. “I have a right to make donations to parties that help this city and this state, and I’ll keep doing it,” he said."
But, as Wayne Barrett has already pointed out, the manner of his giving-at least in this regard-runs counter to the strict requirements of the election law. But why should these laws apply to him? As Barrett reported earlier in the year: ""Even Mike Bloomberg's lawyers say he broke election law when he gave $1.2 million to the Independence Party right before the November election. The mayor's media guru, Howard Wolfson, and his elections lawyer Ken Gross told the Daily News that Bloomberg's two, $600,000 personal checks to the party were used for poll-watchers, drivers, cellphones and food for election day. In their eagerness to account for the missing money -- most of which went to a mysterious, unincorporated firm now under investigation by Manhattan District Attorney Cy Vance -- the two unwittingly admitted to an apparent violation of city and state campaign finance laws."
City Room weighs in on this as well-although without Barrett's razor sharp claws: "Mr. Vance stressed during the news conference that neither Mr. Bloomberg nor the Independence Party had been targets of the investigation. But when asked how it was possible that Mr. Bloomberg’s sophisticated and experience campaign team might have been the victim of fraud, Mr. Vance hinted at the cozy relationship between the campaign and Mr. Haggerty, a longtime Republican activist who has worked for Gov. George E. Pataki and many other officials and candidates. “They trusted him,” Mr. Vance said. “He was a trusted team member.”
Well, kumbaya ya'll-but what about the mayor's campaign culpability, Mr. Vance? Being stupid or gullible isn't a legal defense, is it? And didn't Bloomberg have enouugh dough to get some advice from a good campaign lawyer? But when your laying out $109 million for your third term, how can he be expected to follow these silly arcane election rules?
This all sounds to us like the Leona Helsmsley defense-and it calls for a more thorough investigation of the housekeeping account loopholes that the mayor drives his Brink's truck through. We all appreciate the extent to which the mayor believes that he is only being public spirited; but his contributory forays have a distinct self interested hue-and he should be limited so that his fortune can't play such an outsized and corrupting role. After all, Bloomberg's last campaign outlay north of a hunderd mil, turned out to be greater than the money spent by all of the other candidates combined.
As the NY Daily News reported: "Mayor Bloomberg didn't just spend more money on politics last year than anyone else in New York - he spent more than everyone else in New York. Hizzoner spent $109.9 million to get re-elected, while all other New Yorkers combined donated just $90.7 million to candidates and parties."
So when the mayor bristles and says the following: "I have a right to make donations to support people and parties that I think will help this city and this country and this state, and I’ll continue to do it,” we have a right to respond that he shouldn't be given that kind of carte blanche to pursue what has aleways been in the interest, not of the country, the city, or the state, but of Bloomberg himself-the cynosure of the special interests that normally roil the good government people-and the NY Times editorialists; but not when performed with such sublime grace, as so often is the case with our municipal hegemonist.
Monday, June 14, 2010
A Tale of Two Cities?
The WSJ reports on the controversy surrounding planned development along Canal Street in NY's Chinatown-and we immediately saw some parallels with what's going on in Flushing: "A group of real-estate developers have commissioned a study to rethink Canal Street as they ratchet up a controversial effort to allow for taller buildings along Chinatown's main thoroughfare. The developers say that Canal Street's role as a major transit hub and commercial center means they should be allowed to build high-rise offices and apartments in place of the low-slung buildings that occupy much of the street. But they'll have to overcome concerns that their push would damage Chinatown's economy and heritage."
So, once again-as is the case with the Flushing Commons project-large real estate interests are proposing the kind of development that will put indigenous, and, yes, Asian, small business interests at risk: "But some Chinatown groups are pushing a competing plan for rezoning the neighborhood that would largely limit new development. Josephine Lee, a spokeswoman for Coalition to Protect Chinatown and the Lower East Side, argued that allowing more dense, high-rise development along Canal Street would destroy Chinatown's vitality. "Chinatown is a thriving economy—it's small-business driven," Ms. Lee said. "When those small businesses are gone and when those residents are gone, our economy is basically going to be dead."
That is precisely the argument being made by the Flushing Coalition for Responsible Development, whose leader Jim Gerson made the following point about the loss of vital municipal parking that would be an inevitable part of the Flushing Commons plan:
"I believe the impact of Flushing Commons as presently proposed will be devastating to local businesses especially during the evening hours. Just as in most other metropolitan areas or neighborhoods, there is a core focus which draws people and supports the non-core businesses. In the case of Flushing I believe the core is the quantity and variety of reasonably priced ethnic food (not unlike other "Chinatowns" around the world). These restaurants depend heavily on affordable parking. Affordable parking is the most important key to keeping Flushing vibrant.
During the day Flushing will lose their customers in one of two ways. Gridlock will frustrate some. Others will go to shop in nearby malls or other areas where parking is free. Flushing Commons, as now conceived by TDC, is as unsustainable a project as anyone could imagine. It needs to be thoroughly altered so that the interests of the small businesses of Flushing and its neighboring communities are maintained."
And as with Flushing, the opponents are seeking to downscale the size and scope of development-and have enlisted our good friend Tom Angotti's help: "The coalition that's trying to limit growth is working with Tom Angotti, an urban affairs and planning professor at Hunter College, to develop its proposal. "The Coalition to Protect Chinatown's priority is to support a different kind of development that's more in line with incremental, organic development within the community," Mr. Angotti said."
But while the Flushing issue is moving rapidly ahead, Chinatown plans are not as immediate: "Any rezoning of Canal Street would take several years. A recommended rezoning would have to go through the city's exhaustive land-use review process. It also would be subject to approval by City Council, who likely face would pressure from both sides."
What we are once again witnessing is the disdain for neighborhood retail-and the further unfolding of the Bloomberg mega-development model. It is time for the city council to pace greater restrictions on this kind of unsustainable building; and look to champion the small businesses that are crucial to the city's economic recovery.
So, once again-as is the case with the Flushing Commons project-large real estate interests are proposing the kind of development that will put indigenous, and, yes, Asian, small business interests at risk: "But some Chinatown groups are pushing a competing plan for rezoning the neighborhood that would largely limit new development. Josephine Lee, a spokeswoman for Coalition to Protect Chinatown and the Lower East Side, argued that allowing more dense, high-rise development along Canal Street would destroy Chinatown's vitality. "Chinatown is a thriving economy—it's small-business driven," Ms. Lee said. "When those small businesses are gone and when those residents are gone, our economy is basically going to be dead."
That is precisely the argument being made by the Flushing Coalition for Responsible Development, whose leader Jim Gerson made the following point about the loss of vital municipal parking that would be an inevitable part of the Flushing Commons plan:
"I believe the impact of Flushing Commons as presently proposed will be devastating to local businesses especially during the evening hours. Just as in most other metropolitan areas or neighborhoods, there is a core focus which draws people and supports the non-core businesses. In the case of Flushing I believe the core is the quantity and variety of reasonably priced ethnic food (not unlike other "Chinatowns" around the world). These restaurants depend heavily on affordable parking. Affordable parking is the most important key to keeping Flushing vibrant.
During the day Flushing will lose their customers in one of two ways. Gridlock will frustrate some. Others will go to shop in nearby malls or other areas where parking is free. Flushing Commons, as now conceived by TDC, is as unsustainable a project as anyone could imagine. It needs to be thoroughly altered so that the interests of the small businesses of Flushing and its neighboring communities are maintained."
And as with Flushing, the opponents are seeking to downscale the size and scope of development-and have enlisted our good friend Tom Angotti's help: "The coalition that's trying to limit growth is working with Tom Angotti, an urban affairs and planning professor at Hunter College, to develop its proposal. "The Coalition to Protect Chinatown's priority is to support a different kind of development that's more in line with incremental, organic development within the community," Mr. Angotti said."
But while the Flushing issue is moving rapidly ahead, Chinatown plans are not as immediate: "Any rezoning of Canal Street would take several years. A recommended rezoning would have to go through the city's exhaustive land-use review process. It also would be subject to approval by City Council, who likely face would pressure from both sides."
What we are once again witnessing is the disdain for neighborhood retail-and the further unfolding of the Bloomberg mega-development model. It is time for the city council to pace greater restrictions on this kind of unsustainable building; and look to champion the small businesses that are crucial to the city's economic recovery.
Repressive Tolerance
We have been commenting on the liberal counterattack against those who, in Paul Revere fashion, have been sounding the alarm about the dangers that a militant Islam-what has been properly labeled as Islamism-poses for any democratic society. The counterattack is couched in all of the liberal pieties about tolerance, and by doing so, clearly tar babies the alarm sounders as bigots.
But it isn’t bigotry that animates those who have focused our attention on the dangers of Islamism-it is the genuine fear that the values of this virulent branch of one religion are not only inimical to those of our free society, but that they at the same time are a clear and present danger-something that we are witnessing with greater clarity in Europe (see Bruce Bawer’s, While Europe Slept and Melanie Phillips’ Londonistan) where the Muslim population, unassimilated, is a lot larger than our own.
But in spite of the nature of the threat-and the misogynist and homophobic ideology that sustains it-Western liberals continue to apologize and equivocate, preferring to target the conservative backlash against the phenomenon.
In an interview with Maclean’s of Canada Aayan Hirsi Ali explains the paradox of this unholy alliance: “The liberal psyche wants to protect minorities, to apologize for imperialism, colonialism, slavery, and the appalling treatment of black people during the civil rights movement. At the same time, they want to continue to defend the rights of individuals. They’ve convinced themselves that the best way to do that in general is to defend the cultures that are non-white. But what they forget, and what they’re being confronted with, is that non-white cultures contain misogynistic, collectivist, tribal, gay-unfriendly and female-hostile traditions. And so they’re confused: on the one hand, they’re looking at minorities as groups they need to save and speak up for, and on the other hand, they’re confronted with the ideas and practices of individuals within those minorities that are very undemocratic and appalling, really.”
And it may also be true that in their paradoxical defense of what liberals should find indefensible, they are also pusillanimous-afraid of becoming the targets of the terror that they refuse to call out by name. What could be more exemplary of this two faced fraud than the entire censorship effort over at Comedy Central-where a South Park episode was bowdlerized because of the fear of an Islamist backlash.
As Outside the Beltway explains: “Quite bizarre and gutless. Not to mention hypocritical, given that “South Park” continually does vicious parodies of other sensitive topics, apparently without censorship from the network. They will apparently make fun of Christians and Scientologists but yet they are afraid to incur the wrath of intolerant Islamists. Which, again, was the very topic of this two-part episode?”
And in the same cowardly and hypocritical vein, how about the vitriol spewed against Elton John for daring to perform at Rush Limbaugh’s wedding. As Deroy Murdock points out, the venom unleashed stands in sharp contrast with the silence from the liberal echo chamber over the cancelling of John’s Egyptian concert appearance: “Elton's just a whore," the Village Voice's Michael Musto told MSNBC. "We're experiencing greed, a lot of greed, and people doing things for money," Joy Behar noted on June 7's "The View." "I wonder if it would be OK with everybody if Elton or somebody had gone down to perform during apartheid South Africa, you know, or the Ku Klux Klan, if they had a lot of money."
But as Murdock goes on to point out, “Compared to today's clamor, the whole world was napping as John faced not a seven-figure check, but rejection when he tried to play a private May 18 concert in Egypt. "How do we allow a homosexual, who wants to ban religions, claimed that the prophet Issa [Jesus] was gay, and calls for Middle Eastern countries to allow gays to have sexual freedom?" huffed Mounir al-Wasimi, boss of the Egyptian Musician Union. He then scotched the gig by John, whom he called "a symbol of homosexuals in the world." (For his part, John told Parade Magazine last February: "Try being a gay woman in the Middle East. You're as good as dead.")
Murdock is dotting the I’s and crossing the T’s of Ali’s point about how liberals don’t know how to handle antidemocratic impulses that emerge from groups they have designated as, “oppressed.” And Ali raises another point about the claim that the extremists don’t represent the entire religion.
As she points out: “I haven’t heard anybody say they’re horrified. Just to compare, many Americans, Canadians and Europeans protested the war on Iraq; they gathered themselves, they sent lots of emails, there was a lot of activism, they marched against this war. I haven’t seen that kind of thing from Muslims saying, “We’re against the numerous terrorist attacks all over the world carried out in the name of Islam.” No marches, no organizations, nothing. There are individuals, like Irshad Manji, like me, born into Islam, who stand up and say, “Hey, we don’t like this.” But we haven’t seen any kind of institutionalized protest by Muslims. That is the big question mark: are Muslims silent because they agree with the terrorist attacks? Or because they don’t know how to express themselves?”
Or, like the Comedy Central cowards, because they are so afraid that they have submitted to the terrorist veto? But, in our view, until this supposed silent majority gains its voice, we are all entitled to remain suspicious-and be extremely cautious about giving the mosque builders carte blanche.
Andrea Peyser in the NY Post captures this sentiment: “One type of new construction is exploding: The creation of brand-new mosques all over the city. In addition to the 13-story mega-mosque and cultural center planned to tower over Ground Zero, and a four-story mosque set to climb over a residential street in Sheepshead Bay, Brooklyn, property has been purchased for a mosque in The Bronx, plus a shuttered Staten Island convent is in the process of being procured by the Muslim American Society for use as a religious center. Evidently, free speech does not extend to people who disagree. Neighbors who wake up to the reality that a large mosque is coming -- often with shady financing and possible calls to prayer broadcast five times a day -- are uniformly shut up by the PC police and branded as bigots. "If I wasn't afraid before, I am terrified now," said Gerri Owens of Staten Island, who fears the moderate Muslim American Society's historical ties to the radical Muslim Brotherhood...
Nearly nine years after 9/11, those in power are too quick to wave away legitimate fears. The people have a right to know who's moving in next door.”
What we are facing is truly a crossroads for the survival of our democratic society, and the values that are its foundation. If, in the name of tolerance, we allow these anti-democratic forces to metastasize without any response from us, we will be sowing the seeds of a homegrown terrorism that will-through the fear it generates-lead inevitably to the kind of systemic changes that liberals rightly abhor. But if that happens, they will have only themselves to blame.
But it isn’t bigotry that animates those who have focused our attention on the dangers of Islamism-it is the genuine fear that the values of this virulent branch of one religion are not only inimical to those of our free society, but that they at the same time are a clear and present danger-something that we are witnessing with greater clarity in Europe (see Bruce Bawer’s, While Europe Slept and Melanie Phillips’ Londonistan) where the Muslim population, unassimilated, is a lot larger than our own.
But in spite of the nature of the threat-and the misogynist and homophobic ideology that sustains it-Western liberals continue to apologize and equivocate, preferring to target the conservative backlash against the phenomenon.
In an interview with Maclean’s of Canada Aayan Hirsi Ali explains the paradox of this unholy alliance: “The liberal psyche wants to protect minorities, to apologize for imperialism, colonialism, slavery, and the appalling treatment of black people during the civil rights movement. At the same time, they want to continue to defend the rights of individuals. They’ve convinced themselves that the best way to do that in general is to defend the cultures that are non-white. But what they forget, and what they’re being confronted with, is that non-white cultures contain misogynistic, collectivist, tribal, gay-unfriendly and female-hostile traditions. And so they’re confused: on the one hand, they’re looking at minorities as groups they need to save and speak up for, and on the other hand, they’re confronted with the ideas and practices of individuals within those minorities that are very undemocratic and appalling, really.”
And it may also be true that in their paradoxical defense of what liberals should find indefensible, they are also pusillanimous-afraid of becoming the targets of the terror that they refuse to call out by name. What could be more exemplary of this two faced fraud than the entire censorship effort over at Comedy Central-where a South Park episode was bowdlerized because of the fear of an Islamist backlash.
As Outside the Beltway explains: “Quite bizarre and gutless. Not to mention hypocritical, given that “South Park” continually does vicious parodies of other sensitive topics, apparently without censorship from the network. They will apparently make fun of Christians and Scientologists but yet they are afraid to incur the wrath of intolerant Islamists. Which, again, was the very topic of this two-part episode?”
And in the same cowardly and hypocritical vein, how about the vitriol spewed against Elton John for daring to perform at Rush Limbaugh’s wedding. As Deroy Murdock points out, the venom unleashed stands in sharp contrast with the silence from the liberal echo chamber over the cancelling of John’s Egyptian concert appearance: “Elton's just a whore," the Village Voice's Michael Musto told MSNBC. "We're experiencing greed, a lot of greed, and people doing things for money," Joy Behar noted on June 7's "The View." "I wonder if it would be OK with everybody if Elton or somebody had gone down to perform during apartheid South Africa, you know, or the Ku Klux Klan, if they had a lot of money."
But as Murdock goes on to point out, “Compared to today's clamor, the whole world was napping as John faced not a seven-figure check, but rejection when he tried to play a private May 18 concert in Egypt. "How do we allow a homosexual, who wants to ban religions, claimed that the prophet Issa [Jesus] was gay, and calls for Middle Eastern countries to allow gays to have sexual freedom?" huffed Mounir al-Wasimi, boss of the Egyptian Musician Union. He then scotched the gig by John, whom he called "a symbol of homosexuals in the world." (For his part, John told Parade Magazine last February: "Try being a gay woman in the Middle East. You're as good as dead.")
Murdock is dotting the I’s and crossing the T’s of Ali’s point about how liberals don’t know how to handle antidemocratic impulses that emerge from groups they have designated as, “oppressed.” And Ali raises another point about the claim that the extremists don’t represent the entire religion.
As she points out: “I haven’t heard anybody say they’re horrified. Just to compare, many Americans, Canadians and Europeans protested the war on Iraq; they gathered themselves, they sent lots of emails, there was a lot of activism, they marched against this war. I haven’t seen that kind of thing from Muslims saying, “We’re against the numerous terrorist attacks all over the world carried out in the name of Islam.” No marches, no organizations, nothing. There are individuals, like Irshad Manji, like me, born into Islam, who stand up and say, “Hey, we don’t like this.” But we haven’t seen any kind of institutionalized protest by Muslims. That is the big question mark: are Muslims silent because they agree with the terrorist attacks? Or because they don’t know how to express themselves?”
Or, like the Comedy Central cowards, because they are so afraid that they have submitted to the terrorist veto? But, in our view, until this supposed silent majority gains its voice, we are all entitled to remain suspicious-and be extremely cautious about giving the mosque builders carte blanche.
Andrea Peyser in the NY Post captures this sentiment: “One type of new construction is exploding: The creation of brand-new mosques all over the city. In addition to the 13-story mega-mosque and cultural center planned to tower over Ground Zero, and a four-story mosque set to climb over a residential street in Sheepshead Bay, Brooklyn, property has been purchased for a mosque in The Bronx, plus a shuttered Staten Island convent is in the process of being procured by the Muslim American Society for use as a religious center. Evidently, free speech does not extend to people who disagree. Neighbors who wake up to the reality that a large mosque is coming -- often with shady financing and possible calls to prayer broadcast five times a day -- are uniformly shut up by the PC police and branded as bigots. "If I wasn't afraid before, I am terrified now," said Gerri Owens of Staten Island, who fears the moderate Muslim American Society's historical ties to the radical Muslim Brotherhood...
Nearly nine years after 9/11, those in power are too quick to wave away legitimate fears. The people have a right to know who's moving in next door.”
What we are facing is truly a crossroads for the survival of our democratic society, and the values that are its foundation. If, in the name of tolerance, we allow these anti-democratic forces to metastasize without any response from us, we will be sowing the seeds of a homegrown terrorism that will-through the fear it generates-lead inevitably to the kind of systemic changes that liberals rightly abhor. But if that happens, they will have only themselves to blame.
Terms of Endearment?
Council Speaker Chris Quinn has waded right into the term limits debate as the Charter Commission mulls over what to do with the controversial question. As the WSJ reports: “Any attempt to punish the council for using its legislative powers and approving an unpopular measure introduced by the mayor would set a very dangerous and chilling precedent," Ms. Quinn told the Charter Revision Commission in testimony Thursday night. "Such an action would damage our system of representative democracy."
Robert Kennedy was once asked about a certain policy question, whether he was supporting the measure because it was good politics-i.e. good for his own interests-or because it was in the public interest. He supposedly replied, “It’s always nice when the two of these goods come together.”
Sadly, in the case of Chris Quinn and term limits, never the twain shall meet-and her attempt to conflate her own usurpation of the popular will with the high principles of representative democracy doesn’t pass the smell test. Advocate de Blasio makes the point: “Public Advocate Bill de Blasio, a potential rival to Ms. Quinn for mayor in 2013, said he firmly disagrees with the speaker's stance on overturning referendums.”Only the people can decide that issue," he said, referring to term limits. "Unfortunately what we saw two years ago was incredibly undemocratic." Mr. de Blasio accused Mr. Quinn and others of looking out for their own careers instead of focusing on what's best for the city.”
Indeed so; but the issue for democratic theory here-as long as Quinn has waxed philosophical-is the tension between indirect representation and the popular will, something that Quinn had recognized a couple of years before the controversial vote: “In December 2007, Ms. Quinn said she would "not support the repeal or change of term limits through any mechanism, and I will oppose aggressively any attempt by anyone to make any changes in the term limits law. The voters have made their will very, very clear."
But that was then. In the intervening period, the speaker immersed herself in the writings of Edmund Burke, a conservative icon whose writings evinced a healthy suspicion of direct democracy and mob rule. From Burke, Quinn went on to peruse the Federalist Papers (especially #10) and become more understanding of the concept of majority faction. It’s always nice to know the erudition of our elected leaders.
Still, it’s hard to see how she will be able to avoid being tar babied by the issue if she decides to run city wide in 2013-especially since the overthrow of term limits is an especially sensitive issue for voters in a Democratic primary. We’ll give our friend Doug Muzzio the last word-although he’s more circumspect than we would be: “Doug Muzzio, a professor of public affairs at Baruch College, said the term-limits issue is going to be with her for the "rest of her political career. Whether it is a significant factor or a minor factor is the question," he said.”
Robert Kennedy was once asked about a certain policy question, whether he was supporting the measure because it was good politics-i.e. good for his own interests-or because it was in the public interest. He supposedly replied, “It’s always nice when the two of these goods come together.”
Sadly, in the case of Chris Quinn and term limits, never the twain shall meet-and her attempt to conflate her own usurpation of the popular will with the high principles of representative democracy doesn’t pass the smell test. Advocate de Blasio makes the point: “Public Advocate Bill de Blasio, a potential rival to Ms. Quinn for mayor in 2013, said he firmly disagrees with the speaker's stance on overturning referendums.”Only the people can decide that issue," he said, referring to term limits. "Unfortunately what we saw two years ago was incredibly undemocratic." Mr. de Blasio accused Mr. Quinn and others of looking out for their own careers instead of focusing on what's best for the city.”
Indeed so; but the issue for democratic theory here-as long as Quinn has waxed philosophical-is the tension between indirect representation and the popular will, something that Quinn had recognized a couple of years before the controversial vote: “In December 2007, Ms. Quinn said she would "not support the repeal or change of term limits through any mechanism, and I will oppose aggressively any attempt by anyone to make any changes in the term limits law. The voters have made their will very, very clear."
But that was then. In the intervening period, the speaker immersed herself in the writings of Edmund Burke, a conservative icon whose writings evinced a healthy suspicion of direct democracy and mob rule. From Burke, Quinn went on to peruse the Federalist Papers (especially #10) and become more understanding of the concept of majority faction. It’s always nice to know the erudition of our elected leaders.
Still, it’s hard to see how she will be able to avoid being tar babied by the issue if she decides to run city wide in 2013-especially since the overthrow of term limits is an especially sensitive issue for voters in a Democratic primary. We’ll give our friend Doug Muzzio the last word-although he’s more circumspect than we would be: “Doug Muzzio, a professor of public affairs at Baruch College, said the term-limits issue is going to be with her for the "rest of her political career. Whether it is a significant factor or a minor factor is the question," he said.”
Four Flushing
We have been focusing on the mendacity over at EDC-an agency that is so self serving that they should be looking to bring back Horn and Hardart’s as part of its economic development mission. Put simply, they feel no compunction about presenting completely contradictory data-and often do so in the same document. So it goes with the Flushing Commons DEIS.
As we began to outline last week: “When we come to the Flushing Commons project, the litany of misrepresentations continues with a certain savoir faire. In the first instance, the project needs to account for the Willets Point traffic overflow-and therefore, as would be expected, it utilizes the Willets Point EIS study that maximized the diversion of cars onto the Van Wyck. If it had relied on the second ramp report, an extra 1,000 car trips for peak PM hours would have had to be accounted for.”
So EDC begins by cherry picking the most favorable data-no matter that this data is itself under a cloud because of the agency’s sleight of hand with the Van Wyck ramp report. But then things really get interesting-with traffic consultants looking to garner some literary prize for fiction.
As we already explained: “When examining the Flushing Commons EIS we find there is a built in contradiction: We reviewed the DEIS with regard to the types of retail space used in the traffic analysis and the socioeconomic impact analysis. Page 14-40 of Chapter 14 (Traffic and Parking) along with the rest of this Chapter assumes 36,225 sq. ft of "Destination Retail" Page 3-35 of Chapter 3 (Socioeconomic Impacts) along with the rest of this Chapter assumes 120,750 sq. ft. of "Destination Retail"
By using two different assumptions, the DEIS underestimates the already unacceptable traffic impact; and then proceeds to deliberately underestimate the projects harmful effects on local businesses. With such a bold-faced self-contradiction, how can we rely on any of their assumptions?”
It’s as if they know that no one will read these très expensive exercises in fraud-reports that the Bar Association of New York mistakenly believes are sacrosanct for the land use review process. And let’s not forget that the DEIS is already on shaky ground since DOT has jettisoned the plan-the traffic mitigation linchpin of the DEIS-to make Main and Union Streets one way.
But, as Meatloaf’s Paradise by the Dashboard Light song asks, “What’ll it be boy?” Can the city council ignore the blatant discrepancies and fatal contradictory assertions-leaving it to the struggling small businesses to try to overturn this potential injustice in the courts?
Given all this misdirection and confusion, it is hard to see how the city council can accurately and fairly gauge the impacts of the Flushing Commons project. The only equitable thing for the council to do is to send the developer back to the drawing board so that the true traffic and business impacts of the development can be fully understood.
As we began to outline last week: “When we come to the Flushing Commons project, the litany of misrepresentations continues with a certain savoir faire. In the first instance, the project needs to account for the Willets Point traffic overflow-and therefore, as would be expected, it utilizes the Willets Point EIS study that maximized the diversion of cars onto the Van Wyck. If it had relied on the second ramp report, an extra 1,000 car trips for peak PM hours would have had to be accounted for.”
So EDC begins by cherry picking the most favorable data-no matter that this data is itself under a cloud because of the agency’s sleight of hand with the Van Wyck ramp report. But then things really get interesting-with traffic consultants looking to garner some literary prize for fiction.
As we already explained: “When examining the Flushing Commons EIS we find there is a built in contradiction: We reviewed the DEIS with regard to the types of retail space used in the traffic analysis and the socioeconomic impact analysis. Page 14-40 of Chapter 14 (Traffic and Parking) along with the rest of this Chapter assumes 36,225 sq. ft of "Destination Retail" Page 3-35 of Chapter 3 (Socioeconomic Impacts) along with the rest of this Chapter assumes 120,750 sq. ft. of "Destination Retail"
By using two different assumptions, the DEIS underestimates the already unacceptable traffic impact; and then proceeds to deliberately underestimate the projects harmful effects on local businesses. With such a bold-faced self-contradiction, how can we rely on any of their assumptions?”
It’s as if they know that no one will read these très expensive exercises in fraud-reports that the Bar Association of New York mistakenly believes are sacrosanct for the land use review process. And let’s not forget that the DEIS is already on shaky ground since DOT has jettisoned the plan-the traffic mitigation linchpin of the DEIS-to make Main and Union Streets one way.
But, as Meatloaf’s Paradise by the Dashboard Light song asks, “What’ll it be boy?” Can the city council ignore the blatant discrepancies and fatal contradictory assertions-leaving it to the struggling small businesses to try to overturn this potential injustice in the courts?
Given all this misdirection and confusion, it is hard to see how the city council can accurately and fairly gauge the impacts of the Flushing Commons project. The only equitable thing for the council to do is to send the developer back to the drawing board so that the true traffic and business impacts of the development can be fully understood.
Friday, June 11, 2010
More EDC Mendacity
We commented earlier today about the fact that we believe that EDC is operating outside of the NYS not for profit law-but it is also true that, however it operates, it does so we a complete lack of integrity. After all, what agency-governmental or quasi-governmental-could submit two absolutely contradictory traffic reports on Willets Point?
And in that case, the discrepancies are fully transparent-for the goal of the original EIS was to mitigate the project's impact on local streets, and therefore the traffic report claimed that 46% of all the cars and trucks would be diverted to the proposed Van Wyck ramps. But in order to get state and federal approval for the ramps, the goal was to minimize the traffic impacts on the arterial-so the subsequent report submitted for that purpose told those overseeing agencies that only 14% of the Willets Point traffic would be diverted onto the highway.
But EDC's mendacity is the gift that keeps on giving. When we come to the Flushing Commons project, the litany of misrepresentations continues with a certain savoir faire. In the first instance, the project needs to account for the Willets Point traffic overflow-and therefore, as would be expected, it utilizes the Willets Point EIS study that maximized the diversion of cars onto the Van Wyck. If it had relied on the second ramp report an extra 1,000 car trips for peak PM hours would have had to be accounted for; a no no when even with this sleight of hand the project's consultants predict severe gridlock for downtown Flushing.
As our consultant Brian Ketcham told the planning commission: ""The Flushing Commons EIS estimates project impacts at 30 intersections in and around Downtown Flushing. It assumes two-thirds of the Willets Point traffic impacts for No Build conditions by simply proportioning the trip assignments from the Final Generic Environmental Impact Statement (FGEIS). However, because the FGEIS assumes approximately half the Willets Point traffic would use the Van Wyck ramps, no correction is made for the change reported in the AMR, that just 16% of Willets Point traffic would use the ramps, leaving the rest, about 1,900 car and truck trips in the weekday PM peak hour, to find other routes to gain access to or egress from the Willets Point site. This is a 60% increase in local and nearby expressway traffic that was not accounted for in the AMR or in the EIS for Flushing Commons. Flushing Commons therefore only accounted for approximately a third of Willets Point traffic ultimately assigned to Downtown Flushing. The result of this oversight would add 200 more auto trips to Northern Blvd. and 100 more trips to Roosevelt Avenue in the PM peak hour further adding to the reported gridlocked conditions described in the DEIS."
But that's not the end of this lack of integrity. When examining the Flushing Commons EIS we find there is a built in contradiction: We reviewed the DEIS with regard to the types of retail space used in the traffic analysis and the socioeconomic impact analysis. Page 14-40 of Chapter 4 (Traffic and Parking) along with the rest of this Chapter assumes 36,225 sq. ft of "Destination Retail" Page 3-35 of Chapter 3 (Socioeconomic Impacts) along with the rest of this Chapter assumes 120,750 sq. ft. of "Destination Retail" By using two different assumptions the DEIS underestimates the already unacceptable traffic impact and then deliberately underestimates the effects on our local businesses. With such a bold-faced self-contradiction, how can we rely on any of their assumptions?
At the same time, by employing dishonest methods EDC also gets to minimize the key parking impacts; Destination retail will eat up 1,000 or so spaces-or 62% of the available spots. Local retail has a less intensive utilization and it's no accident that the bait and switch is used here. Lest we forget, it's also important to point out that the change of zoning (this is a spot zoning development) to C4-4 (an R7 equivalent) means that the developer gets to provide about 900 less spaces than what would be required under the current zoning! The 1.9 million sq. ft. under existing zoning needs over 2500 parking spaces-a more realistic provision given the demands of both the project and the Flushing small businesses.
And let's also not forget that the entire traffic report for the development assumes a new one way traffic pattern for downtown-a change that DOT has already invalidated; making the current traffic projections in the DEIS null and void in our view. What this all underscores is the fact that Flushing Commons is way too dense, and will generate a great deal more traffic than even the gridlock predicting consultants for the developer envision.
But in order to sell this tainted product, the last thing that EDC wants is honest data. What can be gleaned from this dishonesty is that Flushing Commons, far from being sustainable development, is a dagger in the heart of Flushing-and EDC should be ashamed of putting this development forward for approval.
And in that case, the discrepancies are fully transparent-for the goal of the original EIS was to mitigate the project's impact on local streets, and therefore the traffic report claimed that 46% of all the cars and trucks would be diverted to the proposed Van Wyck ramps. But in order to get state and federal approval for the ramps, the goal was to minimize the traffic impacts on the arterial-so the subsequent report submitted for that purpose told those overseeing agencies that only 14% of the Willets Point traffic would be diverted onto the highway.
But EDC's mendacity is the gift that keeps on giving. When we come to the Flushing Commons project, the litany of misrepresentations continues with a certain savoir faire. In the first instance, the project needs to account for the Willets Point traffic overflow-and therefore, as would be expected, it utilizes the Willets Point EIS study that maximized the diversion of cars onto the Van Wyck. If it had relied on the second ramp report an extra 1,000 car trips for peak PM hours would have had to be accounted for; a no no when even with this sleight of hand the project's consultants predict severe gridlock for downtown Flushing.
As our consultant Brian Ketcham told the planning commission: ""The Flushing Commons EIS estimates project impacts at 30 intersections in and around Downtown Flushing. It assumes two-thirds of the Willets Point traffic impacts for No Build conditions by simply proportioning the trip assignments from the Final Generic Environmental Impact Statement (FGEIS). However, because the FGEIS assumes approximately half the Willets Point traffic would use the Van Wyck ramps, no correction is made for the change reported in the AMR, that just 16% of Willets Point traffic would use the ramps, leaving the rest, about 1,900 car and truck trips in the weekday PM peak hour, to find other routes to gain access to or egress from the Willets Point site. This is a 60% increase in local and nearby expressway traffic that was not accounted for in the AMR or in the EIS for Flushing Commons. Flushing Commons therefore only accounted for approximately a third of Willets Point traffic ultimately assigned to Downtown Flushing. The result of this oversight would add 200 more auto trips to Northern Blvd. and 100 more trips to Roosevelt Avenue in the PM peak hour further adding to the reported gridlocked conditions described in the DEIS."
But that's not the end of this lack of integrity. When examining the Flushing Commons EIS we find there is a built in contradiction: We reviewed the DEIS with regard to the types of retail space used in the traffic analysis and the socioeconomic impact analysis. Page 14-40 of Chapter 4 (Traffic and Parking) along with the rest of this Chapter assumes 36,225 sq. ft of "Destination Retail" Page 3-35 of Chapter 3 (Socioeconomic Impacts) along with the rest of this Chapter assumes 120,750 sq. ft. of "Destination Retail" By using two different assumptions the DEIS underestimates the already unacceptable traffic impact and then deliberately underestimates the effects on our local businesses. With such a bold-faced self-contradiction, how can we rely on any of their assumptions?
At the same time, by employing dishonest methods EDC also gets to minimize the key parking impacts; Destination retail will eat up 1,000 or so spaces-or 62% of the available spots. Local retail has a less intensive utilization and it's no accident that the bait and switch is used here. Lest we forget, it's also important to point out that the change of zoning (this is a spot zoning development) to C4-4 (an R7 equivalent) means that the developer gets to provide about 900 less spaces than what would be required under the current zoning! The 1.9 million sq. ft. under existing zoning needs over 2500 parking spaces-a more realistic provision given the demands of both the project and the Flushing small businesses.
And let's also not forget that the entire traffic report for the development assumes a new one way traffic pattern for downtown-a change that DOT has already invalidated; making the current traffic projections in the DEIS null and void in our view. What this all underscores is the fact that Flushing Commons is way too dense, and will generate a great deal more traffic than even the gridlock predicting consultants for the developer envision.
But in order to sell this tainted product, the last thing that EDC wants is honest data. What can be gleaned from this dishonesty is that Flushing Commons, far from being sustainable development, is a dagger in the heart of Flushing-and EDC should be ashamed of putting this development forward for approval.
EDC, Criminal Enterprise?
We have been inveighing against the illegal lobbying activity done by the Claire Shulman-led local development corporation on behalf of the Willets Point project. As we have pointed out: "We have been arguing-one could say vociferously-that the political activities of the Flushing/Willets Point/Corona LDC were in fact a blatant violation of its not for profit status. We are only belaboring the point because it feels as if the authorities charged with investigating the charge-the NYS AG, and the IRS-are dragging their feet. But we could be wrong, and there may be ongoing investigations that are being done in a time consuming but judicious manner."
Well, it's been close to a year now, and still no word from the attorney general. But the law is clear-as we have also highlighted: "But we have been giving this question some thought-and really examining the relevant IRS statute even further. Here's what it says:
From Instructions to Form 1023 (the application for 501c3 status):
"You are attempting to 'influence legislation' if you directly contact or urge the public to contact members of a legislative body for the purpose of proposing, supporting or opposing legislation. You are also attempting to influence legislation if you advocate the adoption or rejection of legislation...
Organizations described in section 501(c)(3) are prohibited from engaging in a substantial amount of legislative activities. Whether you are engaged in substantial legislative activities depends on all of the facts and circumstances"
And the evidence couldn't be clearer (so why the delay?): "Well the facts and circumstances here leave little wiggle room-especially since LDC head Shulman herself has helpfully explicated her role and that of her group. As the NY Times pointed out: "In late 2006, as the Bloomberg administration girded for what promised to be a bruising rezoning fight over the Willets Point section of Queens, it enlisted the help of Claire Shulman, the former Queens borough president. At a meeting in City Hall that December, Ms. Shulman and Daniel L. Doctoroff, then a deputy mayor, agreed to form a nonprofit group with city and private money. Its primary purpose, Ms. Shulman said, would be to lobby on behalf of the mayor’s plan to turn the long-neglected area near the New York Mets stadium into a thriving hub of shops, hotels, condominiums and a convention center."
But in all of this controversy, one thing has been left unsaid. The NYC EDC, just like the FWPCLDC, is in fact incorporated under Section 1411 of the NY State Not for Profit law-and it too is prohibited from lobbying under the IRS statute cited above. But its even more serious than that because Section 1411, unlike the federal code, actually leaves an LDC no wiggle room-lobbying is totally banned. And it describes the duties permitted and proscribed: "to enter into covenants and agreements and to comply with all the terms, conditions and provisions thereof, and otherwise to carry out its corporate purposes and to foster and encourage the location or expansion of industrial or manufacturing plants in the territory in which the operations of such corporation are principally to be conducted, provided, however, that no such corporation shall attempt to influence legislation by propaganda or otherwise, or participate or intervene, directly or indirectly, in any political campaign on behalf of or in opposition to any candidate for public office."
So in the case of Claire's illegal lobbying activities, EDC is just as culpable for violating the law since it funded the group to lobby on its behalf. Just as it is with the Coney Island LDC that is also supposedly under investigation. But we don't have to focus on this proxy activity to determine that EDC has consistently violated the law by illegally attempting, "to influence legislation by propaganda or otherwise..."
It had no proxy when it lobbied directly on behalf of the Related Gateway Mall project in the Bronx-or on the Kingsbridge Armory as well. In fact, if an investigation was done of its activities over the past eight years under this mayor, we would probably be able to say that EDC is operating in many ways as a criminal enterprise-constantly breaking the LDC law with impunity. So if the AG is really looking at the smaller LDCs, he should expand the scope of the investigation to include the parent whose own illegal activities dwarf those of its smaller progeny.
Well, it's been close to a year now, and still no word from the attorney general. But the law is clear-as we have also highlighted: "But we have been giving this question some thought-and really examining the relevant IRS statute even further. Here's what it says:
From Instructions to Form 1023 (the application for 501c3 status):
"You are attempting to 'influence legislation' if you directly contact or urge the public to contact members of a legislative body for the purpose of proposing, supporting or opposing legislation. You are also attempting to influence legislation if you advocate the adoption or rejection of legislation...
Organizations described in section 501(c)(3) are prohibited from engaging in a substantial amount of legislative activities. Whether you are engaged in substantial legislative activities depends on all of the facts and circumstances"
And the evidence couldn't be clearer (so why the delay?): "Well the facts and circumstances here leave little wiggle room-especially since LDC head Shulman herself has helpfully explicated her role and that of her group. As the NY Times pointed out: "In late 2006, as the Bloomberg administration girded for what promised to be a bruising rezoning fight over the Willets Point section of Queens, it enlisted the help of Claire Shulman, the former Queens borough president. At a meeting in City Hall that December, Ms. Shulman and Daniel L. Doctoroff, then a deputy mayor, agreed to form a nonprofit group with city and private money. Its primary purpose, Ms. Shulman said, would be to lobby on behalf of the mayor’s plan to turn the long-neglected area near the New York Mets stadium into a thriving hub of shops, hotels, condominiums and a convention center."
But in all of this controversy, one thing has been left unsaid. The NYC EDC, just like the FWPCLDC, is in fact incorporated under Section 1411 of the NY State Not for Profit law-and it too is prohibited from lobbying under the IRS statute cited above. But its even more serious than that because Section 1411, unlike the federal code, actually leaves an LDC no wiggle room-lobbying is totally banned. And it describes the duties permitted and proscribed: "to enter into covenants and agreements and to comply with all the terms, conditions and provisions thereof, and otherwise to carry out its corporate purposes and to foster and encourage the location or expansion of industrial or manufacturing plants in the territory in which the operations of such corporation are principally to be conducted, provided, however, that no such corporation shall attempt to influence legislation by propaganda or otherwise, or participate or intervene, directly or indirectly, in any political campaign on behalf of or in opposition to any candidate for public office."
So in the case of Claire's illegal lobbying activities, EDC is just as culpable for violating the law since it funded the group to lobby on its behalf. Just as it is with the Coney Island LDC that is also supposedly under investigation. But we don't have to focus on this proxy activity to determine that EDC has consistently violated the law by illegally attempting, "to influence legislation by propaganda or otherwise..."
It had no proxy when it lobbied directly on behalf of the Related Gateway Mall project in the Bronx-or on the Kingsbridge Armory as well. In fact, if an investigation was done of its activities over the past eight years under this mayor, we would probably be able to say that EDC is operating in many ways as a criminal enterprise-constantly breaking the LDC law with impunity. So if the AG is really looking at the smaller LDCs, he should expand the scope of the investigation to include the parent whose own illegal activities dwarf those of its smaller progeny.
Update on Islamophobia
There's an intriguing article in the Globe and Mail that cites the heroic Aayan Hirsi Ali on this issue of Islamic fascism: "Ms. Hirsi Ali’s admirers call her the bravest woman of our time. Critics (and they are legion) dismiss her as naive, simplistic, a dupe of the neo-cons, “a willing darling for Western chauvinists” and a convert to the cult of “Randian individualism.” New York Times reporter Nicholas Kristoff attacked her for “feeding religious bigotry” and ignoring Islam’s good side, such as its tradition of “warm hospitality toward guests, especially Christians and Jews.”
Kind of like some responses we got to our previous blog post on this subject-although we wouldn't dare put ourselves in Ali's exalted company. She does go on, however, to put the whole, "religion of peace" thing into its proper perspective: "Warm hospitality does not exactly capture the feeling toward Jews in such places as Saudi Arabia, Jordan, Syria and Egypt, or toward Christians in places like Nigeria. For that matter, Muslims don’t always feel warm hospitality toward each other (Sunni versus Shia, the firebombing of Ahmadi mosques in Pakistan, etc.). By her reckoning, the death toll of Muslims killed by other Muslims amounts to around 2,000 in recent months. “I want to see the other face of Islam,” she says. “But first I’d have to dig through all the bodies.”
And then the article's author, Margaret Wendt, goes on to convey Ali's take on why the intellectuals seem to always gravitate towards totalitarian movements-whose first response once in power is to kill or marginalize its intellectual cheerleaders: "Why are so many liberal intellectuals, social democrats and feminists so silent on the more noxious features of Islam – the fierce intolerance toward unbelievers, the repression of individual freedom, the routine abuse of children, the misogyny, the forced subservience of women? “It’s the seduction of totalitarianism,” she says. In her view, Western defenders of Islam are the intellectual heirs of those highly intelligent men and women who used to heap praise on Comrade Stalin. “It’s a blind spot that left-wing intellectuals have always had.”
This is what Pam Geller is trying to expose-and what we were called out for defending as, "sheer bigotry." The bigots, however, are all amassed at the gates of our own citadel of freedom. The attackers of Geller are the welcome camouflage that are used by the vandals to insinuate themselves into our midst-the proverbial nose of the camel. if you will. It's time that these fools start digging through the bodies.
Update
Some of the fears about the underbelly of the Muslim faith are being played out in opposition to a number of new mosques all over the city. The NY Times captures the vitriol in Staten Island: "A church may be a church, and a temple a temple, but through the prism of emotion that still grips many New Yorkers almost a decade after 9/11, a mosque can apparently represent a lot of things. In the last few months, Muslim groups have encountered unexpectedly intense opposition to their plans for opening mosques in Lower Manhattan, in Brooklyn and most recently in an empty convent on Staten Island. Some opponents have cited traffic and parking concerns. But the objections have focused overwhelmingly on more intangible and volatile issues: fear of terrorism, distrust of Islam and a linkage of the two in opponents’ minds."
And the fact that mosques have been conduits for terrorist activity in a number of instances-and the Saudi Arabian cash pipeline has funded the terrorist activity as well: "Recent cases of so-called homegrown terrorism, like the Times Square car bomb episode, have increased anxieties, experts say."
It is also true, as Paul Berman has underscored-along with Mark Steyn's seminal work on the expansion of Islamism in Europe-that the more militant strain of Islam is antithetical to Western values-as some of the questions in Staten Island highlighted: "But for the near term, Wednesday night’s meeting indicated that the questions of neighborhood residents may take some time to answer. Among them: “Is Sharia law better than democracy in your view?” “How do you feel about the role of women in society?” “What are your views on Israel?” “Can you point to any single statement in the Koran that you would consider to be incorrect?”
But in spite of all of the evidence of the irresolvable tension between Islamism and American democracy-and the need to carefully winnow out the Muslims whose faith has become politicized-the effort to do so will strike many liberals as rank bigotry. But, in our view, scrutiny and tough questions are merited given all we have seen from the militant wing of the religion. Tolerance is fine, but tolerance of intolerance will not only erode our core values, it will also permit the growth of a breeding ground for terrorist activity.
Kind of like some responses we got to our previous blog post on this subject-although we wouldn't dare put ourselves in Ali's exalted company. She does go on, however, to put the whole, "religion of peace" thing into its proper perspective: "Warm hospitality does not exactly capture the feeling toward Jews in such places as Saudi Arabia, Jordan, Syria and Egypt, or toward Christians in places like Nigeria. For that matter, Muslims don’t always feel warm hospitality toward each other (Sunni versus Shia, the firebombing of Ahmadi mosques in Pakistan, etc.). By her reckoning, the death toll of Muslims killed by other Muslims amounts to around 2,000 in recent months. “I want to see the other face of Islam,” she says. “But first I’d have to dig through all the bodies.”
And then the article's author, Margaret Wendt, goes on to convey Ali's take on why the intellectuals seem to always gravitate towards totalitarian movements-whose first response once in power is to kill or marginalize its intellectual cheerleaders: "Why are so many liberal intellectuals, social democrats and feminists so silent on the more noxious features of Islam – the fierce intolerance toward unbelievers, the repression of individual freedom, the routine abuse of children, the misogyny, the forced subservience of women? “It’s the seduction of totalitarianism,” she says. In her view, Western defenders of Islam are the intellectual heirs of those highly intelligent men and women who used to heap praise on Comrade Stalin. “It’s a blind spot that left-wing intellectuals have always had.”
This is what Pam Geller is trying to expose-and what we were called out for defending as, "sheer bigotry." The bigots, however, are all amassed at the gates of our own citadel of freedom. The attackers of Geller are the welcome camouflage that are used by the vandals to insinuate themselves into our midst-the proverbial nose of the camel. if you will. It's time that these fools start digging through the bodies.
Update
Some of the fears about the underbelly of the Muslim faith are being played out in opposition to a number of new mosques all over the city. The NY Times captures the vitriol in Staten Island: "A church may be a church, and a temple a temple, but through the prism of emotion that still grips many New Yorkers almost a decade after 9/11, a mosque can apparently represent a lot of things. In the last few months, Muslim groups have encountered unexpectedly intense opposition to their plans for opening mosques in Lower Manhattan, in Brooklyn and most recently in an empty convent on Staten Island. Some opponents have cited traffic and parking concerns. But the objections have focused overwhelmingly on more intangible and volatile issues: fear of terrorism, distrust of Islam and a linkage of the two in opponents’ minds."
And the fact that mosques have been conduits for terrorist activity in a number of instances-and the Saudi Arabian cash pipeline has funded the terrorist activity as well: "Recent cases of so-called homegrown terrorism, like the Times Square car bomb episode, have increased anxieties, experts say."
It is also true, as Paul Berman has underscored-along with Mark Steyn's seminal work on the expansion of Islamism in Europe-that the more militant strain of Islam is antithetical to Western values-as some of the questions in Staten Island highlighted: "But for the near term, Wednesday night’s meeting indicated that the questions of neighborhood residents may take some time to answer. Among them: “Is Sharia law better than democracy in your view?” “How do you feel about the role of women in society?” “What are your views on Israel?” “Can you point to any single statement in the Koran that you would consider to be incorrect?”
But in spite of all of the evidence of the irresolvable tension between Islamism and American democracy-and the need to carefully winnow out the Muslims whose faith has become politicized-the effort to do so will strike many liberals as rank bigotry. But, in our view, scrutiny and tough questions are merited given all we have seen from the militant wing of the religion. Tolerance is fine, but tolerance of intolerance will not only erode our core values, it will also permit the growth of a breeding ground for terrorist activity.
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