The Bishop and the Butterfly: Murder, Politics, and the End of the Jazz Age

    THIS IS WHY WE CAN'T HAVE NICE THINGS IN NYC, PART IV

    By artappraiser on Fri, 04/19/2019 - 11:09pm |

    Part III is here.

    First, ICYMI in the news feed, hack Dem mayor doing the Boss Tweed thing:

    EXCLUSIVE: @NYCMayor violated conflict of interest rules after being warned repeatedly not to solicit donations from individuals actively seeking favors from his administration, says a DOI report obtained by @THECITYNY’s @Gregbsmithnyc.https://t.co/JSTK1IPctK

    — THE CITY (@THECITYNY) April 17, 2019

    Next:

    Subway Chief May Quit Over Tensions With Cuomo, Colleagues Fear

    • Andy Byford, the executive hired to rescue New York City’s floundering subway, has clashed with Gov. Andrew M. Cuomo over management of the system.
    • If Mr. Byford were to step down, it would be a major blow to improvement efforts.

    By Emma G. Fitzsimmons @ NYTimes.com, 2 hrs ago

    [....] The two men did not speak between January and April, even as Mr. Byford was seeking to move forward on a sweeping $40 billion plan to overhaul the subway in the next decade [....]

    Mr. Byford’s colleagues said he was troubled that he did not have the support that he believes he needs from Mr. Cuomo to carry out ambitious plans for the system.

    Mr. Cuomo, a Democrat, in turn has felt that Mr. Byford has been reluctant to embrace new technology and needed to understand the governor’s role as the elected official most responsible for the performance of the subways [....]

    Mr. Byford is president of New York City Transit, an arm of the authority that runs the subway and buses. Mr. Cuomo, who controls the authority, interviewed Mr. Byford and helped hire him for the job. Only a year ago, the pair were photographed on the subway tracks together showcasing a new “magnetic wand” that removes steel dust from the tracks.

    Mr. Byford, who is British, had received accolades for leading the Toronto transit system, where he won an award for transit system of the year from the American Public Transportation Association. He has also worked on both London and Sydney’s transit networks [....]

     

    To be continued in comments....

    Comments


    by artappraiser on Sun, 04/21/2019 - 5:48pm

    Dare I say things look so Trumpian?

    MAYOR DE ​BLASIO’S DEFUNCT FUNDRAISING GROUP FACES ONGOING STATE ETHICS PROBE

    By Greg B. Smith & Yoav Gonen @ TheCity.nyc, April 19

    Mayor Bill de Blasio’s defunct nonprofit fundraising group is the subject of an ongoing investigation by the state’s ethics watchdog, THE CITY has learned.

    The Campaign for One New York, which raised millions from individuals doing business with de Blasio’s administration, began operations as the mayor arrived at City Hall in 2014. It took in $4.3 million for his pet causes before shutting down in early 2016.

    But during its brief life, the campaign inspired multiple investigations — including a long-running probe by the state Joint Commission on Public Ethics (JCOPE) [.....]

    On Wednesday, THE CITY revealed that the city Department of Investigation determined in October that de Blasio had violated city conflict-of-interest rules by soliciting donations from multiple individuals actively seeking favors from City Hall. The report found that the mayor had been warned not to seek donations in such cases.

    The DOI report, released under a Freedom of Information Law request from THE CITY filed in January, marked the first official finding that the mayor had violated the ethics rules that apply to all city workers [....]


    by artappraiser on Sun, 04/21/2019 - 5:55pm

    By The Editorial Board @ NYTimes.com, April 21, including "like President Trump..."

    Who’s Running New York City? Good Question. Key city roles sit vacant as Mayor de Blasio hits the campaign trail.

    [....] Before Mayor Bill de Blasio indulges his presidential hopes with another trip to Iowa or Nevada, he has some pressing business closer to home.

    There are more than a dozen key positions unfilled in New York City government. Agencies throughout the city’s $92 billion bureaucracy are without permanent leadership, or are being led by officials with substantial responsibilities elsewhere. Plus, like President Trump, Mr. de Blasio appears comfortable filling high-profile roles with acting officials [....]


    by artappraiser on Sun, 04/21/2019 - 9:47pm

    "Tens of millions". Enough to like: fix a subway section or two or three?

    The largest pharmacy benefits manager in the U.S. is accused of costing the New York City Transit Authority tens of millions of dollars by failing to police “fraudulent, abusive or excessive” claims for compounded medication prescriptions.https://t.co/naxGSlAbOV

    — THE CITY (@THECITYNY) May 21, 2019

    by artappraiser on Mon, 05/20/2019 - 10:53pm


    by artappraiser on Sat, 05/25/2019 - 8:43pm

    Chirlane spent $560 million and here are her results:

    The Department of Health reports that the mayor’s signature mental-health initiative has been a failure when it comes to helping seriously mentally-ill New Yorkers. https://t.co/Lu2KyXe1MJ

    — The Beat (@TheBeatMI) May 27, 2019

    by artappraiser on Mon, 05/27/2019 - 4:44pm


    by artappraiser on Tue, 05/28/2019 - 6:50pm


    by artappraiser on Thu, 05/30/2019 - 2:13pm

    It's a simple fact that as long as we continue repairing roads and constructing new ones we'll never have good quality mass transportation. That's why I belong to a group protesting repairing or constructing roads. We're more powerful than most suspect. I doubt that there's any road construction project in the US without at least one of our protest signs. Here's a typical example of one of our protest signs.


    by ocean-kat on Thu, 05/30/2019 - 2:43pm

    Except here, no matter which the powers that be choose to tend to, mass transit or roads, a lot of the money always gets grifted away and the project takes eons and causes much misery to the users (and the slow walk of the project is usually part of the grift, all sides collect money for as long as possible while as little as possible gets done).


    by artappraiser on Thu, 05/30/2019 - 9:47pm

    The crooked Dem machine endures in the judicial system:

    Brooklyn lawyers deciding Democratic ballot line for judicial seats get guardian, referee jobs from judges they review, records show

    By Michael Gartland @ NYDailyNews.com, June 10

    Brooklyn lawyers who decide who can get the crucial Democratic ballot line to run for prized judicial seats are getting jobs as legal guardians and referees from the very judges they’re charged with reviewing — and their law firms are appearing before those same judges in active cases.

    Of the 25 attorneys listed as serving on the Brooklyn Democratic Party’s judicial screening panel in 2019, at least five have been given jobs as court-appointed lawyers by the judges they’re tasked with reviewing, the Daily News has learned.

    Judicial screening panel members Helene Blank, Mark Longo, Betty Lugo, Melissa Bonaldes and Steven Finkelstein all took work in the last year from judges they’ve reviewed or could review in the future, an analysis of state court records shows.

    Alex Camarda, a senior policy analyst at the good-government group Reinvent Albany, described that dynamic as problematic [....]


    by artappraiser on Tue, 06/11/2019 - 2:35am


    by artappraiser on Tue, 06/11/2019 - 9:12pm

    Because something like this is considered a feature and not a bug:


    by artappraiser on Sun, 06/30/2019 - 5:09pm


    by artappraiser on Mon, 07/15/2019 - 6:27am

    ok now that he's done with interim of being partly responsible for the deaths of many New Yorkers and devastation of its economy, I come back to this thread. Because we have a situation sort of back to status quo where taxpayers pay a lot of money for workers who don't produce anything anyone in power uses:


    by artappraiser on Sat, 07/18/2020 - 1:11am

    With mayoral election campaigns upon us, it's time to remind my fellow citizens of NYC why we usually elect a non-Dem machine politician as mayor after trying it out just one more time and then dejas vus allover again. WILL NO ONE EVER RID US OF THIS DAMN CROOKED NYC Democratic party machine? Thank god for our tough Feds at SDNY. This is damn egregious:

    CEO of NYC non-profit charged in bribery and kickbacks scheme involving publicly funded housing and social serviceshttps://t.co/suvE4Ea1ne@NYC_DOI

    — US Attorney SDNY (@SDNYnews) March 24, 2021

    by artappraiser on Sat, 03/27/2021 - 1:25am