You Mean That Pleasant Jamaican Woman Is Not The Baby’s Mother?

1-800-HowsMyDriving for nannies:

While nanny is minding the baby, passersby now can rat out a Mary Poppins who’s less than practically perfect in every way.

Under a plan pushed by a New York City prosecutor, all they’ll have to do is take down the “license plate” on the tot’s stroller and send an e-mail to the parents.

The plates are registered to www.howsmynanny.com, a site where informants can plug in the tag’s unique number to alert parents to a nanny’s indiscretions.

Unlike the vague, gossipy “bad nanny” sightings that proliferate on mommy blogs but don’t necessarily reach a tots’ parents, “There’s no guesswork. You don’t have to say, ‘Is this my nanny?'” said Jill Starishevsky, the assistant district attorney hawking the plates.

Buyers pay $50 for a 4-inch-by-7-inch plate and private access to notes from tipsters, who can remain anonymous.

Then there’s 1-800-HowsMyParenting:

Starishevsky admitted the system isn’t perfect: Parents could find themselves in the position of receiving reports about themselves.

“So when my husband is doing pop-o-wheelies with the stroller, someone can tell me he’s doing an illegal act?” joked Jo-el Shea, who was jogging with her 14-week-old son in Central Park this week.

The Entire Budget Of Delaware Is Only About $3 Billion*

Met Life has sold Stuyvesant Town and Peter Cooper Village for $5.4 billion:

Jerry I. Speyer, who controls some of the city’s most prominent landmarks, from Rockefeller Center to the Chrysler Building, yesterday signed the largest American real estate deal ever, agreeing to pay $5.4 billion for Stuyvesant Town and Peter Cooper Village, a vast corridor of 110 apartment buildings along the East River.

Mr. Speyer, the chief executive of Tishman Speyer Properties, and his partner, the BlackRock investment bank, outmaneuvered more than a half-dozen other bidders, including a group aligned with tenants who had hoped to preserve the two adjoining complexes on First Avenue between 14th and 23rd Streets as enclaves of middle-class housing.

But these are not typical real estate trophies. Built by Metropolitan Life for returning veterans in 1947, with the help of tax breaks and the government’s powers of eminent domain, Stuyvesant Town and Peter Cooper Village have served as an affordable redoubt for generations of police officers, teachers, nurses and other middle-class New Yorkers.

The unremarkable brick buildings, with 25,000 people living in 11,232 units, are nestled among trees and fountains on 80 acres of some of the most valuable real estate in the world.

*Then again, 80 acres in Manhattan are probably worth more than all of Delaware. Budget figure here (.pdf). See also as a jumping off point.

See also: Peter Cooper Village And Stuyvesant Town To Replace Park Place And Broadway As Most Sought-After Real Estate Pieces.

Somewhere, A Smug Mark Ecko Shoots One More Rhinoceros . . . And Smiles

Why is the City wasting money defending laws they acknowledge are unconstitutional*? Not to paint too broad a brushstroke (ahem), but really now:

While defending the city’s anti-graffiti ordinance is necessary, a lawyer for the city conceded that the law was written so broadly that it conceivably could allow for a police officer to arrest students involved in set design for a theater production.

The city attorney, Scott Shorr, made the statement during a hearing yesterday regarding the constitutionality of the ordinance, which bans youths between the ages of 18 and 21 from purchasing wide-tipped markers or spray paint or carrying those items outside their homes.

The ordinance, which went into effect earlier this year, has been challenged by several art students who say it makes it very difficult for them to create art. Earlier, a federal judge, George Daniels of U.S. District Court in Manhattan, ordered the city not to enforce the ordinance while the lawsuit is going forward.

A panel of the 2nd Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals heard the city’s defense of the law yesterday.

One judge on the panel, Barrington Parker, seemed skeptical of the law after Mr. Shorr told him that, as written, it gave the police power to arrest not only graffiti vandals, but even artists whose creative pursuits involved spray paint.

“I’m a student at Tisch at NYU,” the 62-year-old judge hypothesized. “I’m doing set design. I’m in the studio doing set design for a production of ‘Twelfth Night.’ Can a police officer arrest me?”

“Yes,” Mr. Shorr said. “You are subject to arrest.”

That wouldn’t change even if a university dean told the officer that the student had permission to work on the set design, Mr. Shorr said when questioned further.

*Has anyone ever figured out which Councilmember has introduced the most expensive unconstitutional legislation?

And His Community Service Should Be Picking Up Trash At Christopher Street Pier . . . Around Midnight

A gay-bashing sting operation nabs surly dickhead in Union Square:

A Brooklyn man chose the wrong targets to gay-bash when he picked on two undercover cops pretending to be snuggling paramours in Union Square Park, authorities said yesterday.

Tyrone George, 20, was arrested on hate-crime charges at around 1:15 p.m. Monday after he threatened and spat at the officers, who were in the park on the lookout for gang activity, police said.

The cops, a sergeant and a police officer assigned to the Transit Borough Manhattan Task Force, were perched on a bench like lovebirds, with the sergeant’s arm wrapped around his subordinate’s shoulder, authorities said.

George approached them, screamed that he hated “homos,” told them to get out of his park, called them “faggots” and gave the sergeant the middle finger, according to a Criminal Court complaint.

Minutes later, George circled back and continued his anti-gay rant, threatened to assault them and spat on the sergeant’s foot, authorities said.

With that, the cops arrested George, who struggled and said he didn’t want “faggots touching him,” court papers state.

Choose your own snark:

• Sure they were “pretending” . . . sure.
• Posing as a drug buyer is one thing, but snuggling with your partner — now there’s an assignment.
• When this is ripped from the headlines, perhaps Jesse L. Martin will reprise his role in Rent?

Largest Connect Four Game Ever!

While in Midtown the United Nations debated sanctions on North Korea, in the Village NYU students participated in the largest Connect Four game ever (or at least we hope the largest ever):

Each decision was crucial. Nerves were high and the pressure was on. But it wasn’t the Superbowl or the World Series — no, this was far bigger. This was Weinstein’s version of Connect Four on Saturday in which event planners taped yellow paper to the windows of Weinstein residence hall facing University Place to replicate the board.

“It was definitely not good that they came and woke me up just to hang up things in my window,” CAS freshman Michael Bliss said of the RAs preparation for the event.

The windows in between represented the empty spaces the competitors chose where to place their “pieces” — or in this case, large sheets of red or black paper. Via cell phone, the two players chose where they wanted their pieces to fall by contacting RAs on each floor who then taped the appropriate team’s square on whoever’s window it happened to be.

“In terms of doing a good job, this is the kind of stuff we should be doing more of — using our buildings in creative ways,” Weinstein’s Community Development Educator Ryan Sylvester said. “Plus, it would be cool to say we had the largest game of Connect Four ever.”

The game started last week with the elimination of 43 players. During those rounds, games were played on traditional tabletop boards. Stern freshman Tommy Wong and CAS freshman Catherine Kelso emerged as Connect Four champions, and were then given the opportunity to rake in five million points for Weinstein’s Floor Wars, should they win the building-sized version of the game.

. . .

Trying to withstand the bitter wind across the street, Wong and Kelso battled it out with intense strategy as fellow residents cheered them on.

“This is the most exciting thing that’s happened to me this morning,” CAS freshman Gabriel Leinwand said.