Thank You For Not Snitching

The Times reports that “No Snitching” t-shirts are selling like hot cakes on 125th Street:

It started with a dozen T-shirts, emblazoned with bright red stop signs. Now the shirts come in eight colors and three styles, all with the same basic message: Stop snitching.

In Harlem, where the shirts are made, the slogan seems to resonate with some residents. “A lot of people tell the police something, it just creates more problems,” said Andrew Gonzalez, 17, explaining his oversize “No Snitching Anytime” shirt one recent afternoon.

Keashia Williams, 15, who was wearing a black baby-T and had just bought another in white, added, “Black people shouldn’t snitch on black people.”

Her younger sister, Teneshia, interpreted the message more bluntly: “You snitch, you die.”

That credo gained popularity late last year, when a “Stop Snitching” DVD hit the streets of Baltimore, with images of young men brandishing guns and threatening suspected police informants by name. The grainy video made the news thanks to a brief cameo by a young National Basketball Association star, Carmelo Anthony, who later apologized, and the arrest of three participants on drug charges. The Baltimore police were quick to denounce it, and countered with a DVD of their own, called “Keep Talking.”

Meanwhile, exact sales data is not yet available for “Thank You For Not Snitching” shirts, which head shops in suburban Tri-State communities have begun selling.

Rent Not Own

In cities like New York, renting is more cost efficient than owning. The Times explains why:

After five years in which rents have barely budged while house prices in New York, Washington, Los Angeles and elsewhere have doubled, renting has become a surprisingly smart option for many people who never would have considered it before.

Owning a home often ties up hundreds of thousands of dollars that might be invested more safely and more lucratively elsewhere over the next decade. And while real estate brokers may hate to acknowledge it, home ownership involves its own versions of throwing money away, like property taxes and the costs of borrowing.

Add it all up – which The New York Times did, in an analysis of the major costs and benefits of owning and renting, including tax breaks – and owning a home today is more expensive than renting in much of the Northeast, Florida and California. Only if prices rise well above their already lofty levels will home ownership turn out to be the good deal that it is widely assumed to be.

Rootless renters unite! Home ownership is overrated!

The Shakedown

The Times profiles one of the Department of Finance’s parking ticket adjudicators, whose job is to help you avoid your day — er, a day in court:

Mr. [William] Beaman works for the city’s Department of Finance as part of its parking settlement program, which was started this year in all five boroughs as a service to parking ticket recipients waiting to contest their summonses. Mr. Beaman offers a driver the option of pleading guilty immediately and paying a reduced fine – avoiding the wait for a hearing and the risk of a guilty ruling from the judge followed by the full fine.

Mr. Beaman offers a deal prescribed by the city for each violation. For example, the $115 penalty for double-parking or parking at a bus stop would be reduced to $95, he said, and the $35 for an expired parking meter would become $26. Some offenses, such as parking in front of a fire hydrant, in a crosswalk or on a pedestrian ramp, are not eligible for a deal.

“It’s a set price,” Mr. Beaman said. “If I could negotiate, I’d be here all day.” He estimates he sees about 100 tickets an hour. “It gets crazy out here and I’m sort of the triage,” he said.

The pitch is simple — you won’t win and you should quit wasting everyone’s time, including your own:

“Here’s the deal,” he told a woman wearing a “I Met My Sweetie in Tahiti” T-shirt and holding a double-parking summons. “You see the judge and win? You walk away owing nothing. You lose? You owe $115. I’m offering you $95 right here, right now. You with it? You feeling me?”

She paused and Mr. Beaman said, “Think about it, you got till 5 p.m.” She wound up accepting.

Often, people are geared up for a showdown with the judge and scoff at first at Mr. Beaman’s offer. He might nod and say something innocuous: “Well, if you think you can convince the judge . . .,” his voice trailing off. A woman walked up armed with a packet of photos and documents atop a thick law book. She sniffed at Mr. Beaman’s offer and strode into the hearing area. “Some people have stronger cases than others, but whether you are a contender or a pretender, I have to offer you a deal whether you want it or not,” he said.

Why Wait?

New York is great — great! — but the worst thing about it is that everyone has the same great idea. Friday evenings are free at MOMA! Just be prepared to wait in a line snaking around the block. Shakespeare in the Park is so cultural! And those lunchtime lines are so excruciating. Nathan’s at Coney Island is sublime! Dude, it’s a freakin’ hot dog . . .

So New York Magazine helps by waiting in some lines at some notable establishments. They cut to the chase: Yes for Shake Shack (“An emphatic yes for the best burger in town, extra-creamy custard, and half-bottles of highly drinkable wines.”) and DiPalo’s (“. . . the Parmigiano-Reggiano is top-notch, the ricotta divine . . .”); Tomoe (“. . . not even Masa would be worth a wait this long.”), Sarabeth’s (“For flapjacks with unripe strawberries and sliced bananas? We think not.”) and Magnolia (“Not if it were the last cupcake on Earth.”) are all no.

See also: Wait.

Fashion Week Hangover

Quick role-playing exercise: You’re the editor of the Sunday Styles Section — what cutting-edge phenomenon do you run with just after Fashion Week ends? How about a feature on the Spin Doctors? Why yes, of course! Of course:

“It sounds corny,” [“rubbery, cheerful frontman”] Mr. [Chris] Barron said. “But the music was calling out, saying, ‘Where have you been?'”