Today Governor Andrew Cuomo named Tom Prendergast Chairman and CEO of the Metropolitan Transportation Authority. Prendergast had been serving as interim executive director of the agency for more than three months, since Joseph Lhota departed at the end of last year to run for mayor. Prendergast, like previous MTA chiefs Lee Sander and Jay Walder, brings deep experience in transit management to the job.
Claire Weisz, AIA, founding principal of WXY and a frequently cited expert source on waterfront design, will be speaking on the topic "Ecological Barriers: Holding Sea Levels at Bay" with a panel at 6:00pm on April 25 in New York City. A leading advocate for post-Hurricane Sandy infrastructure design, Weisz's firm is known for such waterfront projects as the East River Blueway, a planned reconstruction of miles of Manhattan water's edge, as well as Transmitter Park, Rockaway Park, Sherman Creek Waterfront, and Battery Park.
Dan Halloran, 41 — who is charged in a bribe scheme to get state state Sen. Smith into the mayoral race — repeatedly hooked up with Meaghan Mapes, then 21, in her Queens home between 2010 and 2011, sources said.
She served as his deputy chief of staff during that same period, earning $30,000.
The relationship was the final straw for Halloran's wife, Cynthia, and the two were locked in divorce proceedings by early 2011.
"A $300,000 late-model Ferrari bearing a police parking placard sat unattended in a No Standing Zone in Lower Manhattan yesterday afternoon, no doubt on official police business. Given that the placard is registered to the Sea Gate Police Department, a private police force wholly separate from the NYPD with full arrest powers that patrols a gated community in Coney Island, 12 miles from where the vehicle was parked, what official business do you think they were on?"
This isn't just a failure of an overly conservative AdministrationSpot on. Enough with these ridiculous, Rube Goldberg policy approaches
that has somehow bought into the austerity line. It's not just the
failure of a Washington culture dominated by corruption and neoliberal
economic theory.
It's also the failure of a crew of Ivy League technocratic wonks in
love with their ability to design complicated legislative contraptions
designed to cut costs by using abstruse measures to slice away fat
from people they think can take it, while leaving just enough meat on
the bone so no one completely starves.
The complexities of this Social Security "solution" remind one of the
Affordable Care Act. The answer to the healthcare crisis should have
been Medicare for All from the very beginning. Politically feasible?
Perhaps not. But that should have been the starting point for
negotiations.
And the answer to the Social Security non-crisis, such as it is,
should be to raise the payroll cap. It's that simple. Politically
feasible? Perhaps not. But that should be the starting point.
It's impossible to prove, of course, but one gets the sense that these
arcane machinations are being pursued not so much out of necessity, as
out of a wonkish belief that the new crew of preppy budget wonks can
rightsize the government to behave with greater efficiency and lower
cost without real damage to the system. It's as though the lean
company craze that overtook corporate America in the 1990s has finally
hit the government as well, with predictable results.
The Obama Administration promised a bloodless government that
abandoned ideology in order to reach across the aisle to do what is
"practical." The only problem is that trend-seeking Ivy League wonks
vastly overestimate their ability to cut efficiently and bloodlessly
without nicking an artery. "Practical" is usually in the eye of the
beholder. When all the beholders went to Harvard and make six figures,
their eyes tend to shaded.
By exempting motorists who live in the five boroughs, Liu's plan would not solve the city's transit funding problems — the next MTA capital program will still have a gaping hole. (Compare Liu's $410 million to the $2.8 billion projected net revenue from the Sam Schwartz plan.) While Liu suggested devoting revenue to "infrastructure," he also mentioned that it could be used for "offsetting increased city contributions to the MTA," which might just lead to tolls that pad other areas of the city budget.It's somewhat baffling why Liu would propose a non-starter like this. Exempting millions of motorists negates the value of tolls as a tool to meaningfully reduce congestion, and it undermines the notion that motorists should pay for using roads. Let's hope this idea doesn't infect the other campaigns.I guess it's good to hear someone talking about tolling the bridges at all, which is necessary. But this is not the way to do it.
"The questions though outweigh the answer. First, the report dispatches with the idea of any additional stations on the New Jersey side of the tunnel. It should at least contain a stop in Hoboken, if not a second prior to the Secaucus terminal. Second, the section on legal issues raises a number of concerns that warrant more than a few paragraphs in this feasibility study."
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| A possible alignment. Parsons Brinckerhoff via nycedc.com |
A report commissioned by New York City, posted this morning on the city's Economic Development Corp. website, extols the benefits of the plan.
"The extension of the No. 7 Subway would result in the first trans-Hudson tunnel connection that would provide direct rail access from New Jersey, not only to the West Side of Manhattan, but also to the East Side and multiple locations in Queens," noted the report by the Parsons Brinckerhoff engineering firm. "It would provide needed capacity across the Hudson River and advance the broader goal of enhancing regional connectivity."The report, obtained Tuesday night by The Star-Ledger, noted the next step would be an advanced study on the feasibility of extending the No. 7 subway line — which runs from Queens to Times Square — into Secaucus Junction. Coordinated with the Federal Transit Administration, the study would include a cost benefit analysis, identification of financing opportunities and analysis of ridership and revenue."It's been a century since there was a new rail tunnel under the Hudson, and demand for travel between New Jersey and Manhattan is growing rapidly and quickly exceeding the capacity of existing transit infrastructure," New York Mayor Michael Bloomberg said today in a statement. "The lack of new transit investment is creating a serious and urgent threat to New York City's economic competitiveness. Extending the 7 train to Secaucus is a promising potential solution – it would leverage existing investments and be compatible with other proposed projects – and is deserving of serious consideration."
The explosive growth of neonicotinoids since 2005 has roughly tracked rising bee deaths.Neonics, as farmers call them, are applied in smaller doses than older pesticides. They are systemic pesticides, often embedded in seeds so that the plant itself carries the chemical that kills insects that feed on it.Older pesticides could kill bees and other beneficial insects. But while they quickly degraded — often in a matter of days — neonicotinoids persist for weeks and even months. Beekeepers worry that bees carry a summer's worth of contaminated pollen to hives, where ensuing generations dine on a steady dose of pesticide that, eaten once or twice, might not be dangerous.
On Thursday, April 4, 2013, Judge Swain of the U.S. District Court in Manhattan upheld key provisions of New York City's campaign finance laws, bringing the ongoing litigation concerning the constitutionality of the city's elections laws closer to an end. At issue in Judge Swain's order were two provisions: expenditure limit waivers for those candidates participating in the city's campaign finance program and the "sure winner" provisions, which were originally designed to prevent the overuse of public money in uncontested races.
Under the current system, a candidate running for city office may receive public funds, the exact amount of which is based on the office for which the candidate is running, and the amount the candidate raises privately from donors. If a candidate chooses to do this, the candidate is subject to an expenditure limit, which prevents the candidate from spending beyond a certain amount of money, counting both the public and private money the candidate has raised. However, if the candidate is running against a privately-funded candidate, and that privately funded candidate spends far beyond a certain threshold, the candidate who received the public money is no longer subject to the applicable expenditure limit and may spend additional money.
Someone apparently abandoned a tractor-trailer on a section of Flatbush Avenue near the Brooklyn Botanic Garden months ago — and no department in the city is taking responsibility for cleaning it up."I have seen this tractor-trailer abandoned since at least November," said Olgierd Bilanow, a Ditmas Park resident who passes the big rig frequently while walking through Prospect Park.And isn't this incredibly irresponsible? There could be radioactive toxic waste or a dead body on there for all we know.
The U.S. has historically collected less in taxes and spent less than the majority of its OECD counterparts, in part because it operates such a stingy social safety net that doesn't assist the least fortunate in society as well as programs in other countries do. Still, the chart shows that the U.S. is far from a high-tax country, and Democratic offers to raise modest amounts of revenues in the budget process would hardly send the nation's level of taxation through the roof.We need to fight the proposed Social Security cuts like our lives depend on it. Because they do.
Early this morning, The New York Times Magazine published an extensive, 8,400-word profile of former Congressman Anthony Weiner, his wife Huma Abedin and their life since an infamous social media-induced scandal destroyed his political career. The piece directly addressed the topic most political observers are interested in: "Weiner quickly put all the speculation to rest: he is eyeing the mayor's race."Is this a joke? I think Weiner would have an honest shot at Comptroller, Public Advocate or Borough President with that war chest. But a Mayoral run would just be a farce.
Since March 7, 2007, nearly 1,000 employees working 24 hours a day, five days a week, have completed more than 2,400 controlled blasts - all without affecting the nearby operations of MTA Metro-North Railroad or the New York City Subway. Approximately 857,000 cubic yards of rocky muck were excavated and removed, enough to cover the entirety of Central Park one foot deep.What's also cool is that a lot of this fill is finding it's way into the new parts of Brooklyn Bridge Park, building up the uplands and forming the bulk of the coming "sound-attenuating berm" that is intended to cut down on highway noise pollution.
“This is a very significant milestone for the East Side Access project,” said Dr. Michael Horodniceanu, President of MTA Capital Construction. “The caverns are essentially now fully excavated. Much work remains to be done to build the platforms and tracks, and finish what is currently raw, cave-like space. But we now have a fully built shell in which all future work will take place.”
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| Don't even think of doing this on 4th Avenue. |
The DOT has focused on reducing speed along the avenue, creating saferI'm looking forward to the results.
pedestrian crossings, simplifying turns, and generally improving
safety for all street users. The meeting is tonight from 6:30 to 8:30
pm at St. Thomas Aquinas Church at 249 9th Street.
Social Security's austere payments —averaging $1,262 per month — replace only about 33 to 40 percent of annual earnings, when most experts argue retirees need about 70 percent of their income to maintain their living standards in retirement. Sixty percent of Americans receive at least two-thirds of their retirement income from Social Security, with the bottom 40 percent receiving 84 percent of theirs from Social Security.Yes, we need to reform Social Security, but the reform should increase, not cut the income support that millions rely on. In an important political blueprintfor sensible reform released by the New American Foundation, Michael Lind, Steven Hill, Robert Hiltonsmith and Joshua Freedman call for adding a supplement to Social Security that would guarantee all retirees about 60 percent of their average wage in retirement (similar to that of most other developed nations).Seriously, everyone of our Senators and Representatives need to hear about this. It is insanity. Fortunately actual progressives are already organizing against this plan. All the information you need to get started is here.
Jindal's plan exploded because it was zero sum. It cut taxes on the rich and raised them on the poor. It had to be zero sum because states have to balance their budgets.But the federal budget doesn't have to balance, and this fact underpins the entire Republican policy strategy over the last three decades. Before Ronald Reagan, Republicans cared a great deal about controlling the budget deficit and very little about cutting taxes for the rich. In an environment where every dollar into one account had to come from another, giving a lot of the dollars to a tiny number of people is almost invariably unpopular.
That's why the GOP's makeover into a more plutocratic party occurred simultaneously with its abandonment of old-fashioned fiscal conservatism. Lower taxes for the rich can work politically only if you obscure the fact that eventually the money has to come from somewhere else.
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| Photo via Pardon Me For Asking |
Work on Union Sackett, the 32 unit condominium development on Court Street between Union and Sackett Streets has steadily progressed all through winter and finally, the 7-story building is getting its façade. Whereas the top floors of this Rogers Marvel-designed building are clad in glass, the lower floors are getting a 'brownstone' treatment. Large dark brown panels are currently being installed on the Union Street side as well as on the Sackett Street side. Just yesterday, the first such panels have gone up on the side facing Court Street.I love the lighting in this shot.
No doubt electoral politics can be an annoyance. But if the mayor is in the mood for honesty, he might acknowledge that his class has made a substantial contribution to our corrupt age. Mr. Savino stands accused of taking a $15,000 bribe in exchange for promising to help place State Senator Malcolm A. Smith on the mayoral ballot as a Republican. And two assemblymen in the Bronx may have brought dishonor on themselves.At the same time, in the last three months, the United States attorney in Manhattan has announced the arrest of two hedge-fund financiers, and the sentencing of six more. Each of these finely educated and newly minted felons engaged in corruption worth millions of dollars.Bloomberg and Malcolm Smith both sought to buy the GOP line. Bloomberg had the money to do it legally, as well as a modicum of common sense, intelligence, and discretion. All assets Malcolm Smith sorely lacked.
The Council for Community and Economic Research recently measured the cost of the professional standard of living in 307 urban areas, and for the 5th year in a row, found Brooklyn as the second most expensive city to live in in the United States, Yahoo News reports.
There's really no other way to boil down what Sen. Ruben Diaz is trying to get through in his latest "What You Should Know" email in which he insists he's not the next lawmaker about to be indicted for corruption other than to put in the rather stark terms of "I am not a crook."I'm a patient guy.
"She wants you to think that she's a progressive, but on the issues New Yorkers care most about, she is always on the wrong side," a male narrator intones. "All that's clear when the smoke lifts is her political ambition."As a succession of blurbs from newspaper articles suggest that she has waffled on key issues, the narrator concludes, "When Christine Quinn doesn't support our values, how can you support her for mayor?"So goes a commercial attacking Ms. Quinn that, starting on Monday, is scheduled to appear on cable television stations like MSNBC and Bravo for three weeks. The 30-second commercial, the first of the mayoral race, comes quite early in the primary season, underscoring the competitive nature of the contest to succeed Mayor Michael R. Bloomberg.The commercial is not the work of one of Ms. Quinn's opponents for the Democratic nomination, but of a coalition of left-leaning labor unions and Democratic activists who say they are not backing anyone in particular.The organizers have pledged more than $1 million to the campaign and are spending $250,000 for the initial television advertising, said Scott Levenson, president of the Advance Group, which produced the spot. Another commercial is to be released this week, followed by several mailers and radio ads.Readers of this blog know that I support Bill deBlasio. But I also pride myself on giving my honest opinion. I'm no professional political analyst, but my take is that Quinn's front runner status is illusory, and her name recognition will ultimately work against her, as her negatives will be driven sharply up over the next several months. This is just the start. I was not at all surprised to see this blurbed on NY1 this morning (neighbor's house). Everyone else in the race and their backers will be gunning for her.
But a dozen or so state legislatures have had a different reaction: They proposed or enacted bills that would make it illegal to covertly videotape livestock farms, or apply for a job at one without disclosing ties to animal rights groups. They have also drafted measures to require such videos to be given to the authorities almost immediately, which activists say would thwart any meaningful undercover investigation of large factory farms.Critics call them "Ag-Gag" bills.Some of the legislation appears inspired by the American Legislative Exchange Council, a business advocacy group with hundreds of state representatives from farm states as members. The group creates model bills, drafted by lobbyists and lawmakers, that in the past have included such things as "stand your ground" gun laws and tighter voter identification rules.Same guys that fund the "libertarian" Cato Institute. All they really care about is (1) cutting taxes for rich people and (2) protecting big business to the expense of everyone else.
Thatcher was among the best-known foreign politicians in the U.S., likely because of her close working relationship with Ronald Reagan, with whom she shared a reactionary worldview and utter lack of compassion. She was also similarly transformative: In the 11 years of her premiership, between 1979 and 1990, Thatcher sold off billions of pounds worth of government assets—privatizing even industries for which no real competitive market existed—used an unnecessary and avoidable war against Argentina to manufacture enough jingoistic sentiment to earn her re-election, and broke the power of British trade unions, calling the miners who participated in a 1984 strike directed against her politics "the enemy within." Modern Britons are still living within the social, political and economic structures she built, and suffering from the absence of the structures she disabled. Millions of people in England, Scotland, Ireland and Wales (and in South Africa and Cambodiaand Chile) will be celebrating tonight. (To be fair! Many will be mourning.) (Also celebrating: gay people!)
The records reviewed by The Post and ICIJ expose how havens in the South Pacific and Caribbean in some cases have become sanctuaries for individuals seeking to conceal their activities from investigators and investors.Among the 4,000 U.S. individuals listed in the records, at least 30 are American citizens accused in lawsuits or criminal cases of fraud, money laundering or other serious financial misconduct.They include billionaire hedge fund manager Raj Rajaratnam, who was convicted in 2011 in one of the biggest insider trading scandals in U.S. history, and Paul A. Bilzerian, one of the most famed corporate raiders of the 1980s, who was convicted of securities fraud.An attorney for TrustNet, which helped create the companies and trusts for the clients, declined to comment, referring questions to senior TrustNet officials who did not respond to requests to discuss their firm.Fraud experts say offshore bank accounts and companies are vital to the operation of complex financial crimes.Allen Stanford, who ran a $7 billion Ponzi scheme, used a bank he controlled in Antigua. Bernard Madoff, who ran the largest Ponzi scheme in U.S. history, used a series of offshore "feeder funds" to fuel the growth of his multibillion-dollar house of cards.Let's see some public shaming. Let's see some clawbacks, where taxes and judgements have been evaded. Let's see some jail time where crimes have been committed.
After months of hype, Netflix has finally announced the release date for the new season of Arrested Development. In a post on Twitter, Netflix says the new season will debut on May 26th with 15 new episodes — one more than we were expecting.Now where the #@&! are my hard boiled eggs?
Fresh off of the arrests of State Senator Malcolm Smith, Councilman Dan Halloran, and four others in a bribery scheme that hoped to rig the mayoral ballot, the U.S. Attorneys office announced that Bronx Assemblyman Eric Stevenson was allegedly taking illegal payments of his own. "Stevenson is accused of taking bribes in exchange for official acts, which included drafting, proposing, and agreeing to enact legislation that would benefit the co-defendants' businesses," according to an announcement. And that's not all: Yet another anonymous-for-now assemblyman tied to the mess has been working with investigators and will resign as part of the deal.
In Bologna's case, Corporation Counsel Michael Cardozo said, "State law prohibits the city from representing or indemnifying city employees who are found to have violated agency rules and regulations." The NYPD has yet to discipline Cardona or accuse Like Bolgnahim of wrongdoing. NYPD spokesman Paul Browne initially said that Rivera-Pitre elbowed Cardona, and that the department was seeking his arrest, but those charges fizzled.
After the City refused to represent Bologna, NYPD Commissioner Ray Kelly expressed concern: "I think it can have a chilling effect on police officers taking action…And I'm concerned about an adverse effect on officers' willingness to engage."
According to police, a 40-year-old man was crossing in between cars inUPDATED:
the intersection near Barclays Center when he was hit by a tractor
trailer traveling northbound on Flatbush Avenue at around 12:29 p.m.
today, April 3.
But Ms. Quinn may ultimately be more vulnerable to attacks on a different issue: her vote in 2008 to overturn the city's term limits law and allow Mayor Michael R. Bloomberg to seek a third term.At a candidate forum on Wednesday, Mr. Thompson called the episode a disgrace; Mr. de Blasio said the speaker had "undermined the democratic process." Ms. Quinn, who defended her decision, was met with loud jeers from the left-leaning crowd. It was one of the most blistering receptions she has received on the campaign trail thus far.Bill deBlasio is going to be the Democratic candidate for mayor. And then he'll be the first Democratic mayor we've had in 20 years.
A man caught beating down a 56-year-old woman during a subway robberyI'm glad the victim is ok. And the alleged perpetrator should be
in Borough Park wore a college fraternity sweatshirt with his nickname
on it, law enforcement sources said.
Aidan Folan, 21, was caught on camera wearing his favorite Alpha Phi
Delta hoodie with custom lettering on the back that reads, "Stugotz
27," sources added. The Italian slang term roughly translates to
"testicles" and is so loved by the suspect he chose it and the number
"27" for his Facebook page, sources added.
A Carroll Gardens sidewalk is fully walk-able once again after workersOf course, I should have known that Katia has an even more thorough account, with a lot of pictures, at PMFA.
hauled away the remains of a massive Hurricane Sandy-toppled tree last
Friday
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| Good Food proprietor Mike Sale |
Sad news for Carroll Gardens. At the end of April, Good Food, the Italian Superette will be closing its doors for the final time. For 85 years, the storefront at 431 Court Street between 3rd and 4th Place has supplied the neighborhood with fresh mozzarella, Italian sausages, olives and other Italian delicacies. Besides the deli counter and meat counter, Good Food also carried everything from canned goods to cleaning products and everything in between.This is a neighborhood institution I will sadly miss. If you've never done so,
"For those in the PBA that think that this will get us to hire more cops, I don't know how to break this to you, but - No!" Bloomberg said. "That's just not going to happen."Bloomberg last week ripped into state law makers - calling by name Republican leader Dean Skelos and Brooklyn Senators Marty Golden and Simcha Felder - as "reckless and negligent" for blocking the cameras, and said they'll bear part of the blame when children are run down in the streets.
Beware the scam phone calls announcing, "You indicated you were interested in a position in a survey."
NEW YORK (WABC) -- Authorities say New York State Senator Malcolm Smith and New York City Councilman Dan Halloran were arrested Tuesday morning as part of an ongoing corruption case.
I've asked this question a few times, and never had an answer. It(It's bad enough I stole his whole post, but I'm also stealing from his
seems to involve a small amount of government money which can obtain
magical leverage (how?) from the free market ponies that then build
infrastructure and after stealing all of our underpants there is
profit.
At a time when the government can borrow for negative real interest rates.
