City aiming to burn us again on water
April 11, 2008
Get ready to swallow another soaking increase in water rates.
The city’s Water Board is set to propose a 14.5% rate hike Friday for the new fiscal year, which starts July 1.
If approved after public hearings, it would drain a collective $290 million from 825,000 ratepayers.
The Water Board, which is charged with raising the money to [...]
15th District: Democrats Prepare To Challenge Republican Seat
April 11, 2008
A sample of local and national headlines from two years ago reveals concerns about global warming, economists discussing the effects of a national housing bubble and a bald-white man moving out of the governor’s mansion in Albany.
Heard anything similar recently?
Perhaps the headlines of 2008 seem like a case of déjà vu, but the details differ.
South-Queens [...]
U.S. Official Chides Lawmakers On Defeat of Congestion Pricing
April 11, 2008
A Bush administration official is bemoaning the failure of Mayor Bloomberg’s congestion pricing push, calling it a “loss for the city” and the opponents “shortsighted.” During a New York City Building Congress breakfast yesterday, the federal transit administrator for the U.S. Department of Transportation, James Simpson, spoke repeatedly of his disappointment in Albany’s failure to [...]
Bogus Grants ok: Commish
April 11, 2008
The city’s finance commissioner yesterday defended phantom grants as no big deal.
Commissioner Martha Stark said using bogus accounts to reserve millions of dollars in government grants was nothing to be concerned about because all the money earmarked by the City Council eventually landed at legitimate organizations.
“It never seemed that a check was cut to a [...]
A Little Extra for Legislators to Hand Out
April 11, 2008
Times are tight in New York, state officials say. A recession is looming. Tax receipts are dwindling. Spending must be restrained.
But the Harness Racing Museum and Hall of Fame in Goshen will survive, thanks to $35,000 in taxpayer money from Republicans in the Senate.
For all the talk in Albany of a state budget crisis, lawmakers [...]
Democrats plan for Vallone’s exit
April 11, 2008
Queens Democrats have floated a plan that could usher Assemblyman Michael Gianaris into the City Council a year early and perhaps lead to his becoming speaker.
The plan envisions Councilman Peter Vallone Jr. resigning this year, forcing the mayor to call a special election.
Gianaris would then run for the seat and - if he wins - [...]
NY judge supports charge mentioned as possibility for Spitzer
April 11, 2008
A federal judge spoke supportively Thursday of a 1910 law used to combat prostitution and mentioned by legal experts as a charge prosecutors may consider bringing against former Gov. Eliot Spitzer in the escort scandal that cost him his job.
U.S. District Judge Alvin K. Hellerstein discussed the Mann Act as he sentenced a woman to [...]
Former City Council Candidates Fined
April 11, 2008
The city’s Campaign Finance Board is issuing fines to three former candidates for violating campaign finance laws, it announced yesterday.
Stephen Kauffman, who ran for City Council in the Bronx in 2005, was ordered to pay $21,152 for a variety of violations including exceeding the spending limit for the primary and failing to report expenditures in [...]
Quinn Urged To Resign Following Budget Disclosures
April 11, 2008
The speaker of the City Council, Christine Quinn, is facing calls to resign following disclosures that the council hid millions of budget dollars behind fictitious organizations to create a slush fund that could be used for political favors. Charles Barron, a council member of Brooklyn and a longtime critic of Ms. Quinn, said yesterday that [...]
Hudson Yards’s First Deadline Is Missed
April 11, 2008
The Metropolitan Transportation Authority and Tishman Speyer missed the first deadline under their tentative agreement to develop the West Side rail yards, a deal reached two weeks ago.
Yesterday was the deadline for the MTA to officially designate Tishman Speyer as the developer of the 26 acres that constitute the Hudson Rail Yards, which was part [...]
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