Frustration: Internet and Albany

Posting has been light as I've been choked off from internet access for much of the day and been working long hours. The Blackberry is a lifeline but only for keeping up (on delay) through RSS feeds.

So today was a roller coaster of disappointment, interspersed with peaks of hope before plunging once again into despair. I speak, of course, of congestion pricing. Streetsblog covered the unfolding events heavily throughout the day, and at times it looked like a deal might be pulled out. But it was not to be.

At least, for now. CP has been declared dead before, so we'll see. We'll see what alternatives are offered, because we are looking at a disaster for transit funding if we don't identify a replacement revenue stream, stat.

I commend Joan Millman for her last minute support of congestion pricing. I know Joan, and I know that her office wrestled mightily with this issue and sought the best solution for our district. And I say, thank you for listening and ultimately making the right call.

Ben Kabak reacts to this inexcusable failure of Albany over at Second Avenue Sagas.

The ball is in your court Mr. Silver. The city needs tens of billions of dollars in new transit infrastructure investment. This plan has died on your doorstep. Now it's up to you to FIND THE MONEY.

Congestion Pricing Passes City Council

A battle won! I am frankly disappointed with where Bill deBlasio ended up on this issue (voted no), though David Yassky, Tish James, Simcha Felder and Domenic Recchia deserve kudos for their votes. And you really have to admire the way that Speaker Christine Quinn wrangled the votes; I am truly impressed with her whip ability.

The war remains. We still need to get this measure passed at the state level. Contact your Assembly and Senate delegations . . . we still have a fight on our hands.

Remember: you catch more flies with honey than vinegar. Be civil and rational when stating your case. I know that my own Assemblymember, Joan Millman, has had concerns about aspects of the congestion pricing program. I am still hopeful that she can come to support this very necessary measure.

Gov. Siegelman Freed!

This is fantastic news. Don Siegelman, former governor of Alabama, was railroaded in a political prosecution orchestrated by the Bush administration. See my previous posts on this subject.

But first, see the full story at Harper's, TPM, and Emptywheel's digs. You'll see some concern trolls out there, who will warn you under their breath not to get to excited defending Siegelman, he's dirty. At first, I was wary myself. But after a lot of reading on the subject let me tell you: that's a crock.

This is the most clear case of political prosecution I've seen, and it is absolutely shocking that the GOP was so brazen. There's a lot of fireworks to come on this, and I suspect some of the prosecution team and/or the trial court judge will see the inside of a prison before we're through.

Murder in Carroll Gardens

Holy cow. CBS news reported last night guy was stabbed to death in his basement apartment at 326 Carroll Street.

CBS News Video

The Gowanus Lounge has more details, via the Times and Channel 7. Here's a snippet:

The Times provided this detail:

...Sanjeev Seekoomar, 34, was found on Tuesday morning stabbed to death in his basement apartment at 326 Carroll Street in Carroll Gardens, the police said. The door to the apartment was pushed in and the apartment ransacked, indicating a possible burglary or robbery, but motive was being investigated, the police said.

The Daily News adds the details that the victims throat was slashed and that he may have been killed by a possible sex partner. The Post opines that the victim may have known the killer.

Horrible.

Subway Plaza Trees In Peril

Katia and Barbara report that the developer Stein has applied for a permit to cut down the trees on the subway plaza.

It will be a shame to see the trees that are located o private property be removed. It is absolutely vital, however, that he not be allowed to remove the trees which are public property, on the public portion of the plaza.

For a sense of what portion of the plaza will be lost to the 360 Smith project, see Barbara's blog here. On the other hand, the portion of the currently empty, fenced in parking lot that corresponds to the courtyards on 2nd Place will become more open when the lot is developed. Not open to the public, but open in the sense that the fence obstructing the view down 2nd Place will be gone.

MUST READ: Definitive Spitzer Timeline

Looseheadprop has posted an exhaustive timeline of the Spitzer debacle over at FireDogLake.

As I suspected, it appears there is a lot of chicanery going on here behind the scenes . . . on the GOP side. This whole thing stinks. The apparent abuses of power here are far more scandalous than patronizing prostitutes. This is a GOP power play for the governorship, using dirty tricks and abuse of police powers.

February Existing Home Sales: A Bloodbath

For some reason, the AP and nearly all major media outlets still swallow the spin from the National Association of Realtors and their spokesperson, comedian Lawrence Yun.

And so we get headlines lauding the "improvement" in February, as sales were up 2.9% from January . . . "The first increase since July!" Further down the page is the other news, that average prices were down 8.2%.

Newsflash: this is a seasonal business. Sales ALWAYS increase from January to February. On top of that, there was an extra day in February this year due to leap year. The increase of 2.9% in February is absolutely meaningless. The real news, which was buried in most articles (presumably, because it was underplayed in the NAR's press release) was that year-over-year, February sales were DOWN 23.8%. There is not a more dishonest group of shills in all the land - the deceit of the NAR borders on criminal fraud.

For a more in depth and sober analysis of the February numbers, see this post and this post at Calculated Risk, the best economics blog in all the tubez. As CR makes clear, February is a relatively unimportant month for housing . . . you'll want to pay close attention to the March numbers when they come out next month. More from The Big Picture. And did I mention that prices are tumbling at record rates as well?

We're not immune here. I'd expect the tone on local real estate to get progressively more sour as 2008 wears on, continuing in 2009.