A man who may or may not have mob ties is gunned down seemingly while waiting for a bus:
A man was gunned down on a Staten Island street early today as he stood near a bus stop, authorities said.
. . .
A police source said they are looking into whether the murder is mob-related.
And proving once again that it’s always good to keep some holy water handy:
For the past two days, visitors to a park in Staten Island’s Fort Wadsworth section have stumbled upon a gory mystery — a mutilated animal, possibly a dog or a goat, wrapped in a white sheet.
Parkgoers found two such animals in Von Briesen Park yesterday and this morning, city Parks Department officials confirmed.
The discovery has sparked speculation of ritual sacrifice and cult activity, and has led one Port Richmond woman to douse part of the ground where one animal was found with holy water, in an attempt to ward off what she believes is an evil presence.
Several alluded to Santeria, which blends elements of Yoruba, an African religion, with Catholicism and involves animal sacrifice in some of its rituals.
. . .
“This is not good, doing this,” said Nancy Kelcho of Port Richmond, who was walking her Scottie, Tara Lynn, this morning when a friend pointed out the mutilated animal. “This is evil. I just pray to God to take away the evil spirits.”
Ms. Kelcho, a firm believer in the supernatural, chanted prayers this afternoon as she sprayed holy water on the ground, and at one point gasped, “Evil! Evil! Evil!”
Though Ms. Kelcho said she was certain the animal she saw was a dog, Parks spokesman Phil Abramson said both animals are believed to be goats.
Location Scout: Arthur von Briesen Park.
Wait . . . what if . . . ? No, can’t be . . . but then there it is, looking remarkably like something he might actually want:
The scripted scene under the chandeliers of the Tweed Courthouse, the headquarters of the city’s Department of Education, was not the chaos Mr. Bloomberg had predicted if mayoral control of the schools lapsed. The meeting was marked by “ayes” and raised hands, free of any of the verbal fireworks and political grandstanding that marred the old board, which ruled for three decades.
The board was reborn after a political stalemate prevented the State Senate from voting on a bill that would have extended the mayor’s control of the school system past June 30, 2009. The expiration date was set seven years ago, so when July 1 arrived at midnight, the schools reverted to the control of a Board of Education that did not exist.
Under the old system, two of the seven board members were mayoral appointees, and the borough presidents chose the rest, so Mr. Bloomberg invited the borough leaders to Gracie Mansion on Wednesday to create the new board over breakfast. Four of the leaders agreed to appoint members who would not alter the current leadership or overturn any of its policies. The Bronx president said he wanted his appointee to express some independence.
Packed with three deputy mayors and other allies of Mr. Bloomberg, the board of seven met shortly before 1 p.m., whisking through the agenda in eight minutes. They voted unanimously to retain Joel I. Klein as the city’s schools chancellor and delegate all decision-making power to him, including the right to approve contracts.
The board also elected a president, Deputy Mayor Dennis M. Walcott, the Queens appointee, and passed a resolution calling on Albany to renew mayoral control. Then it adjourned until Sept. 10.
He’s not that . . . wait . . . no! Must not believe . . . must not believe . . .
It’s good to see the mayor — especially after all that hyperventilating! — make another empty threat to lay off employees:
The Senate stalemate will cost New York at least $60 million a month, Mayor Bloomberg warned Wednesday — and the sudden budget hole may cost some city workers their jobs.
“Make no mistake about it, any less revenues mean fewer employees, because the city’s budget is basically hiring 300,000 of the best people that anybody’s ever put together and paying them,” Bloomberg said.
“If we don’t have that money, it’s going to hurt everybody.”
But seriously — “300,000 of the best people that anybody’s ever put together”? What’s with the sarcasm? Has the mayor beaten himself down, too?
Because croissants and cupcakes are exactly like hot dogs and soft-serve ice cream:
Monday was a routine day for Grant Di Mille and Samira Mahboubian, the owners of the Street Sweets food truck, a mobile trove of croissants, cupcakes and cookies that got rolling last month.
The couple loaded the truck by 6 a.m., parked in front of the Museum of Modern Art at 7, traded hostilities with other vendors from 9 a.m. to 1 p.m., and were surrounded by police officers by 2.
“The police told these guys that nobody owns the streets. But it sure doesn’t feel that way,” said Mr. Di Mille, who called the Midtown North precinct — not for the first time — when a jewelry vendor set up shop directly in front of his sales window.
In four weeks of business, the couple has been threatened at the depot where they park the truck; cursed by a gyro vendor who said that he would set their truck on fire; told to stay off every corner in Midtown by ice cream truck drivers; and approached by countless others with advice — both friendly and menacing — on how to get along on the streets.
“I want to be a good neighbor,” Mr. Di Mille said. “But I am nobody’s fool, and nobody’s pushover, and I should not have to carry a baseball bat on my truck in order to sell cupcakes.”
In the last two years, upscale food trucks have swarmed the streets, entrancing New Yorkers with everything from artisanal Earl Grey ice cream to vegan tacos. These highly visible trucks, their outspoken owners and their followers on Twitter, Facebook and food blogs, have broken the code of the streets that has long kept a relative peace among food vendors.
Turf wars are nothing new for carts selling kebabs and cheap coffee. But the makers of thumbprint cookies, chicken-Thai basil dumplings, and crème anglaise are not happy about the sharp elbows that are part of the city’s sidewalk economy, or the murky bureaucracy that oversees the issuing of permits.
After ten inches of rain for the month of June (more than twice what is normal), the Seattle meme abounds:
The Seattle-New York weather seesaw was scarcely coincidental, Dr. Mass said. “It’s usual to have opposite weather,” he said. “There’s a wavelike pattern to the atmosphere. We are often 180 degrees different.”
So when Seattle turned nice, New Yorkers were almost destined to suffer. And suffer they did.
. . .
Actually, New York City averages more rainfall annually than Seattle, 49.69 inches to 37.07 inches, according to the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, but Seattle’s climate is damper, with more days of rain and mist.
Despite all the bluster about Stalinism and “looking oneself in the eye” (not the mirror?), somehow there are still schools today:
Mayor Michael R. Bloomberg was set to lose control of the New York City school system at midnight Tuesday, but despite dire predictions of chaos from the mayor and others, it appeared that the nation’s largest school district would continue to operate largely as usual.
The shift of power, from Mr. Bloomberg’s hands to the clutches of a yet-to-be-appointed Board of Education, came after an impasse between Republicans and Democrats in the State Senate thwarted attempts to renew mayoral control of schools, which the Legislature authorized in 2002. The law set June 30, 2009, as the day the mayor’s control would end if it was not renewed.
Now that the City appears moving towards regulating pedicabs — just weeks after a horrible pedicab accident on the Williamsburg Bridge — you kind of start to wonder whether the circumstances around the accident are a little fishy:
Although a law exists that prohibits pedicabs from traveling on bridges and in tunnels, the city does not enforce the ban because of a lawsuit challenging the law’s licensing provisions. The suit has been resolved, but the city must draft new rules and hold hearings before the law can be enforced.
Detectives from the 90th Precinct were investigating. No criminal charges had been filed by Wednesday evening.
Other pedicab operators said they did not understand why a pedicab would be operating so early in the morning, particularly in that neighborhood.
“This is a very unusual circumstance, a pedicab on that bridge at that time of the day,” said Peter Meitzler, who owns Manhattan Rickshaw in the West Village.
Seems like help is on the way.
Until you request an area code 718 Queens number to put in the newspaper so Little League execs and coaches can call to volunteer.
Then a Parks spokesperson tells you to have them call 311, so that your request to help the department can be screened by the Big Brother of the Mayor’s Office and then ground through the bureaucracy while the outfield grass grows another 6 inches.
This is a runaround and not helpful.
Maybe it was “inspired by Bogota” — Bogota being the place where all those exotic, sexy ideas come from — like Bus Rapid Transit! — but Mayor Lindsay also tried it out in 1970*, right when his political career was starting to implode. Hahahahahaha:
Traffic on Park Avenue may seem lighter in August than in much of the year, thanks to the summering habits of its well-to-do residents. But much of the boulevard will have no traffic at all on three Saturdays this summer, as the city shuts down 6.9 miles of Manhattan roadway in a reprise of last year’s Summer Streets program.
In its debut last August, the program attracted about 50,000 bicyclists and pedestrians on each of its three days to a path from the Brooklyn Bridge to East 72nd Street. This year’s events, announced on Monday by Mayor Michael R. Bloomberg, will take place on Aug. 8, 15 and 22, from 7 a.m. to 1 p.m.
Citing a positive response to the program — an idea inspired by a recreational experiment in Bogotá, Colombia, that began in the 1970s — the city has expanded it to smaller stretches of the other boroughs on weekends throughout the summer. The program will reach 13 neighborhoods, although none of the additional street closings will match the size of the main Manhattan route.
*Back then it involved closing Fifth Avenue between 42nd and 57th Streets, and the idea was referred to as a “pedestrian shopping mall” — which, if you think about it, is basically what it amounts to.
But Critical Mass isn’t coming to Staten Island anytime soon:
When the DOT interposed them on Bay Street, critics cried that the meandering bike routes were, at best, a waste of money. The fact that it took only months for the pounding of traffic to just about wear away the paint in spots only compounded the skepticism.
Now the city is adding more routes, this time on North and South Railroad avenues, and the reaction is edging toward disbelief.
“Shared lanes” were installed on Bay Street last winter, to serve as a navigational aid to cyclists looking to connect to bike lanes on Capodanno Boulevard and Richmond Terrace. The chevrons and bike markings painted on the asphalt also are intended to keep cyclists a safe distance from car doors that open in the parking lane, and to remind motorists that must share the road with bike riders, who have an equal right to use the street.
. . .
City Councilman James Oddo (R-Mid-Island/Brooklyn) said he encourages cycling as a form of exercise and isn’t opposed to setting aside bike lanes and routes in theory.
“It’s not about bike lanes, per se,” he said. “It’s about misguided priorities.” He criticized the installation earlier this month of another bike route on Jefferson Avenue in Dongan Hills, which leads to the North and South Railroad facilities, because he believes the area’s narrow streets are too dangerous for cyclists. In addition, he continues to push for improved road conditions for cyclists and drivers alike.
“I’m not quite sure what the obsession is with bike lanes in this administration. I just wish they were obsessed with smooth streets,” Oddo said.
Police Commissioner Raymond W. Kelly said the money and drugs appeared to have been what the robbers were after when they burst into Special Moments Daycare in East Flatbush on Friday afternoon — while a dozen or so children were napping.
Three men were arrested at the scene, including a suspect who was shot by the police.
“It now appears the day care center was a drug haven, or where drugs in significant quantities were kept, primarily marijuana,” Mr. Kelly said . . .
Anecdotes from the New York City Transit Learning Center’s Track Safety class, mandatory for anyone working on New York City Transit proerty, including actors:
Kevin Bress, the senior director of Track Infrastructure and Maintenance Support Training for N.Y.C.T., said, the other day, at the agency’s headquarters, at 2 Broadway. The class, he explained, takes eight hours and is mandatory for anyone working on N.Y.C.T. property. Of the curriculum, he said, “The main theme of the class is teaching people how not to get hit by a train.”
René Corcino, a course instructor, added, “We also identify areas that the homeless may tend to get comfortable in before the police chase them out.” Other topics: the third rail, tripping hazards, how to scoot up the platform ladder from the tracks. “You have to kind of put your foot sideways,” another instructor, Joseph Lupo, said.
. . .
Lupo continued, “[Nicolas] Cage was especially interested in the third rail. He had this big thing about the mystical power of electricity.”
So many salient details in such a short story — which one do you focus on? Is it A) That honeybees are back? B) That they’re taking over the Upper East Side? C) That the police department has a beekeeper? or D) That the story comes out suspiciously close to a bill being floated by the Council to legalize beekeeping? Mind reels:
Some 8,000 to 10,000 honeybees had surreptitiously moved into the neighborhood sometime in the past month and managed to build a giant hive in a tree between 80th and 81st streets without anyone noticing.
The queen decided to bust out at around 4 p.m., and flew south for a half-block before returning home.
She was followed dutifully on her outing by all of her subjects.
“It was a three foot column of bees,” said Doug Becker, 40.
Police Officer Anthony Planakis, the NYPD’s resident beekeeper for 30 years, said it was “one of the biggest swarms I’ve ever seen.”
He took all the bees into custody as a crowd of onlookers applauded, and said he’d bring them “to a farm in Connecticut to pollinate.”
This bees got loose only days after a swarm of amateur beekeepers buzzed around City Hall in support of a bill to legalize their hobby.
Councilmember Domenic Recchia, who loves children and would never want to see one harmed by a Tic Tac, is out in front of the pack in paying his respects to two of his childhood favorites:
“As chairman of the City Council’s Committee on Cultural Affairs, I would like to express my thanks, for the impact they’ve had on their respective fields and the cultural community at large, as well as offer my prayers to their families, their friends and their legions of fans.”
I almost want John Sampson to win this battle:
Mayor Bloomberg accused the deadlocked Senate of trying to “destroy” the city’s school system — and said weakening mayoral control would be like reviving the Soviet Union.
Bloomberg, whose control over city schools will expire next week if Albany doesn’t act, warned of pending chaos.
“You want to talk about what would happen; just take a look at what happens when no one is in charge,” said Bloomberg, calling for the Senate to pass the bill the Assembly has approved.
“If the Senate passes something that differs by one word or more it is saying to the city: We want to resurrect the Soviet Union, we want to bring back chaos.” Bloomberg fumed.
“What [the senators] are doing is just saying to the parents, the students and the future of our city — ‘We’re going to destroy you.’ That’s the only possible explanation.”
On track for another record-setting year:
“Agents are acting in order to maximize revenue to fill the city coffers, rather than doing their job correctly, which is to ensure turnover to help small businesses,” the letter read. “We, along with the business owners, want traffic agents to perform their job of enforcing the traffic laws to ensure turnover so that parking spots are made available. Unfortunately, the only way to describe the situation on New Dorp Lane — where tickets are handed out within seconds of a meter expiring — is harassment, pure and simple, the letter read.
Here’s Public Advocate Betsy Gotbaum’s community van — complete with heavy-metal lettering, breakdance-era graffiti tags and superhero color choices.
Here’s something else about Councilman Tony Avella you may not have noticed: his mayoral campaign hired a director of communications.
Her name is Katie Wang. She’s a former Star-Ledger reporter who covered Cory Booker, enterprisingly, in Newark.
Her name started popping up on Avella mayoral press releases around the time Richard Simmons compared Avella’s lips to those of Julia Roberts.
As if losing Hiram Monserrate wasn’t bad enough, now there’s this:
Rumors have been going around lately that Tom Cruise and Katie Holmes are making a big move to New York. We heard it for the first time from Nat Hentoff, who told us a few weeks ago that he’d heard it from doormen on his block of west 12th Street in the Village.
. . .
During another visit we talked to a doorman in the neighborhood who said: “Can’t tell you who lives there. I would lose my job. But you know, we doormen know everything that goes on around here. I can tell you the owner won’t be there much because he’ll be filming in LA a lot, and I can tell you he bought the house for his wife, who was in a Broadway show.” The doorman smiled, “But I can’t tell you who it is. I could lose my job.”
I have no idea how heavy 37 bundles of cardboard is — but $5,000 isn’t bad:
Cops arrested Toure Mahamadou, 25, Sadabe Sekou, 39, and Latil Serge, 21, all of Newark, whose truck allegedly continued 37 bundles worth $5,550 when sold to recycling centers.
“I wasn’t scared when they pulled the knife,” [Milton Williams Supermarket manager Milton] Rivera said.
Because then he’d have to suck up to unions and other special interests in order to get elected:
Mayor Michael R. Bloomberg is sounding the alarm over New York City’s pension system these days, calling it “out of control.”
Costs have ballooned, he says, threatening to bankrupt the city. Municipal unions and lawmakers in Albany created the crisis, he suggests, and left the city holding the bag.
But interviews and budget records show that the Bloomberg administration itself is responsible for much of the growth in city pension costs over the last eight years, and has repeatedly missed opportunities to rein in the spending.
Since Mr. Bloomberg took office, city contributions to the pension system have jumped nearly five-fold to $6.3 billion, from $1.4 billion, and they now account for one out of every 10 dollars in the city’s budget.
A major reason: the mayor has given the city’s 300,000 workers generous pay increases, guaranteeing that they retire with bigger pensions, which are typically 50 percent of salary. Such raises force the city to make heftier payments to the pension system now.
Salary increases approved by Mr. Bloomberg are responsible for nearly 30 percent of the growth in city pension costs from the 2002 through 2008 fiscal years — about $1.2 billion, according to the administration’s Office of Management and Budget. That figure is projected to rise to $1.7 billion by next year. At the same time, the mayor has offered support for legislation, passed in Albany, that has made pensions even more lucrative for many workers, costing the city tens of millions of dollars.
Mr. Bloomberg presents himself as a model of financial restraint who has stood up to special interests, like unions, in order to hold down city spending — a claim that is at the heart of his bid for a third term.
“We need just one brave Senate Democrat to come to the session so we can pass these and other important bills and move the session forward,” Senate President Pedro Espada said. “It is time for them to end their boycott of the session, come to work and get the people’s business done.” These important bills include but are not limited to:
. . . the idea that pedicab drivers are getting payola in the form of lap dances:
A Midtown strip club has made raunchy rickshaws out of the three-wheeled rides — and management is plying the three-wheeler drivers with free meals and private tours to help promote the hot spot.
In the latest move in its ongoing ad campaign, Rick’s Cabaret has outfitted at least 50 pedicabs with its posters.
Club owners have asked drivers to hand out free passes and are giving them firsthand knowledge of the club’s offerings.
“The drivers always ask when the next ‘orientation’ will be,” said a taxi driver.
. . . is it just me or is the mayor/city council .5 percent sales tax increase not listed on Governor Paterson’s special session to-do list?
Then again, if the city is continually cooking books (”Surprise, here is a half billion!”), then they won’t really have to worry about it until after November 3 at least:
In May, the mayor hoped to generate $1.5 billion in revenue by raising the sales tax, doing away with a sales tax exemption for clothing and negotiating with the city’s unions on both health care costs and pensions.
He was partly victorious: The City Council signed off on hiking the sales tax to 8.875 percent from 8.375 percent and agreed to do away with the exemption for clothing selling for more than $110. The city’s unions also went along with contributing to some of their health benefits.
Elsewhere, the mayor was not so persuasive. He was unable to secure the creation of a fifth pension tier for new city employees in Albany, and the City Council refused to endorse a five-cent tax on plastic bags. In the end, the fiscal year 2010 budget agreement came up $359 million short.
This also doesn’t factor in the uncertain situation in Albany, where the legislature must approve all of the mayor’s tax proposals. The state will have to OK the sales tax increase, among other revenue measures, by July 1.
An administration spokesperson said the city will make up the revenue shortfall elsewhere. Conveniently, the city’s budget department reported last week that an additional $438 million to help fill the gap was generated thanks to “conservative” revenue projections.
But what some see as faulty revenue projections, others caution is a misleading budget process.
“It amazes me that they find a half a billion dollars,” said Councilmember Lewis Fidler. “Surprise, here is a half billion.”
“They are not playing all the cards on the deck,” added Fidler, who says the administration squirrels away funding to keep the City Council out of the budget process.
Some advocates also question whether the administration is being completely open about its revenue projections.
“If they are not being transparent about where the money comes from it makes me nervous for New Yorkers who rely on programs that are less politically popular, like AIDS housing programs,” said Barry. “We aren’t firehouses.”
Others wonder about the politics and whether the entire budget process represents an attempt to make the city’s fiscal situation appear OK for now, until after the city elections. In an analysis of the mayor’s budget, the city’s Independent Budget Office not only predicted far higher deficits in future years — climbing to $5.8 billion in fiscal year 2012 — but also observed, “Given that this a municipal election year, the difficult decisions about spending cuts and tax increases that lie ahead are unlikely to be addressed until November.”
Some advocates fearfully agree.
“People expect these cuts to be back on the table in the November financial plan after the city elections,” said Barry.
It’s not just Staten Island — everyone seems to dislike the “Triboro” label:
For decades, stamps on letters mailed in New York City have generally been canceled with squiggly lines of ink and the name of the sender’s home borough. But this tradition may itself soon be canceled, at least in Brooklyn and Queens and on Staten Island.
Under the Postal Service’s plan, most mail from the three boroughs would be sent to a central processing center in East New York, Brooklyn, where it would be branded with a new emblem:
“TRIBORO, NY
BKLYN-QNS-STATEN ISL.”
The plan was spawned because of a 29 percent decline in the volume of first-class mail over the past decade. Officials say the change would save $6.7 million annually.
This is where a bureaucratic transaction gets personal.
“There are certain things you don’t mess with,” said Audrey Hecht-Stewart, 54, a teacher from Brighton Beach, Brooklyn, who was standing in line last week at the Cadman Plaza Post Office in Downtown Brooklyn. “The postmark on your letter should represent where you live, like caller ID on your phone.
“You can’t throw Brooklyn in the same pot with Queens and Staten Island,” Ms. Hecht-Stewart added. “When you go and lump us in with those other two boroughs, you take away our individuality.”
A host of elected officials, from the relevant borough presidents to New York’s two United States senators, has decried the proposal, along with postal union officials who translate a consolidated postmark into lost jobs. And dismay is rippling across this proposed new land called “Triboro,” where many who know about the plan resent the prospect of being stripped of their envelope identifier.
*Think about it — it could look cool on a T-shirt!
267 new jobs! Give or take:
“Public officials’ estimates of jobs created from these kinds of programs are often exaggerated,” said Paul Wachtel, an economics professor at NYU’s Stern School of Business.
“They put out a big headline number, but there’s a great deal of uncertainty with such estimates — you should take them with a grain of salt.”
Mayor Bloomberg’s spokesman Marc LaVorgna said the city calculated jobs with widely used federal formulas, including a US Transportation Department equation which projects 27,800 jobs created for every $1 billion in construction contracts.
So far, only 1 percent of the $1 billion in Big Apple stimulus funds slated for capital projects has trickled out — about $10 million. And jobs produced so far are few.
The city’s Economic Development Corp. recently gave Hunter Roberts Construction Group $7 million in contracts — $3.7 million to start — to install utilities and interior walls for future stores at the ferry terminals in lower Manhattan and Staten Island.
A company official told The Post it will put about 30 people in various trades to work.
But the city’s estimate is much bigger — predicting 167 jobs, plus 100 more expected to work in the new stores.
Something to keep in mind when you read exciting campaign literature, e.g, “Under Mike, the City is creating jobs by investing more than $10 billion this fiscal year in critical infrastructure projects, and Mike is using additional federal stimulus money on other transportation projects like the rehabilitations of the St. George Ferry Terminal and Brooklyn Bridge.”
Looks innocent now, but get a couple more examples* and you’ll have a real story:
Mayor Bloomberg got some free publicity on the state-created English Regents exam this month, scoring a positive mention in a reading-comprehension passage.
“New York’s Mayor Michael Bloomberg has spearheaded an ambitious plan, unveiled in 2002, to ring Manhattan with recreational, multi-use paths and greenways to make the entire waterfront accessible to walkers and cyclists,” gushed paragraph 14 of the mandatory passage, read by about 150,000 high school sophomores and juniors across the state this month.
After students — all too young to vote for Bloomberg, who is running for a third term — read the passage, an excerpt from a September 2006 Environmental Defense Fund article, they had to answer nine multiple-choice questions and write an essay.
*Not sure if this counts or not.
Scary thought of the day: What if instead of mayoral control, the big New York City test score gains are due to George Bush’s No Child Left Behind, as studies seem to indicate?
Democratic candidate William Thompson can opt to pursue this line of argument as need be but maybe it’s safer at this point to rehabilitate Bush than it is to prop up Bloomberg’s juggernautical campaign . . .
[Eduwonk and Education Week links via.]
No, literally! And there is data:
Still, the prime time for murder is clear: summertime. Indeed, it is close to a constant, one hammered home painfully from June to September across the decades. And the breakdown of deadly brutality can get even more specific. September Saturdays around 10 p.m. were the most likely moments for a murder in the city.
The summer spike in killings is just one of several findings unearthed in an analysis by The New York Times of multiyear homicide trends. The information — detailing homicides during the years 2003 to 2008 — was compiled mainly from open-records requests with the New York Police Department, and a searchable database of details on homicides in the city during those years is available online for readers to explore at nytimes.com/nyregion.
. . .
Summer is when people get together. More specifically, casual drinkers and drug users are more likely to go to bars or parties on weekends and evenings, as opposed to a Tuesday morning. These people in the social mix, flooding the city’s streets and neighborhood bars, feed the peak times for murder, experts say.
And the trend occurs in other cities, in places like Chicago, Boston and Newark, according to criminologists.
Some of the same trends are on display around Christmastime and are believed to be behind the slight increases in murder that occur then, criminologists say.
