Coming Down With The Flu? Call 311! Behind On Your Mortgage Payments? Call 311!

Simplify your life, call 311:

The city is launching an advertising campaign discouraging New Yorkers from giving money, food, and clothing to homeless people and asking well-wishers to call 311 for help instead.

“Giving money to a panhandler may seem like you’re being compassionate,” Mayor Bloomberg said yesterday at City Hall. “But you’re really not helping that person long-term, and just keeping that person going in a life that is probably going to continue to spiral out of control.”

You Know The Economy Is Hurting When . . .

. . . people physically attack each other over boxes filled with tomatoes and $29:

A money giveaway in Union Square by a company called Cashtomato.com turned rotten Friday when the impatient crowd bum-rushed the costumed organizers and ran off with the loot. One person was injured in the free-for-all.

“Make it rain!” and “Give me my money!” passersby shouted as the clock ticked down to the scheduled 2:29 p.m. publicity stunt, timed to mark Leap Day.

With five minutes to go, the antsy mob of 100 surged toward three workers dressed to resemble tomatoes and holding sacks and boxes of prizes up to $29.

“People grabbed and pulled on the bag,” said Jason Buzi, an executive at the fledgling video-sharing Internet company.

“I didn’t feel safe, so I let it go.”

As he fled across the street, his colleagues dropped their sacks and scattered across the park – and a wild grab for the booty ensued.

Scavengers dove to the ground and elbowed each other out of the way to get at cash-stuffed envelopes and balloons and flyers and fresh tomatoes with bills attached.

“I got pushed down and trampled, but instead of money, all I got were tomatoes,” said a dejected 29-year-old homeless woman who gave her name as Christine.

. . .

Buzi, who said he has organized giveaways in five other cities without incident, seemed dazed by the debacle.

“They grabbed all the bags and the money from us,” he said.

“I expected maybe a few homeless people, but it turned out to be a lot of aggressive people,” Buzi said.

More Candidates Than America’s Top Model, Top Chef, American Idol, Survivor, All 50 Iterations Of Road Rules And The Biggest Loser Combined!

Oh lord:

With 36 members of the City Council being forced out of office next year due to term limits, the election of 2009 could be the biggest and most expensive to hit New York.

At least 45 New Yorkers already are amassing campaign war chests to run for council seats and many more are expected to enter races in the coming months. One political consultant who is advising council candidates says he has identified more than 300 candidates he expects to run in 2009.

The early start to council campaigning and fund-raising efforts mirrors the early start to this year’s presidential race, with local candidates saying they want to put fund raising behind them so they can focus on campaigning as the city election nears.

. . .

A race to replace Council Member Alan Gerson in Lower Manhattan is providing political junkies with an early dose of campaign intrigue, with a fight over Internet domain names under way between a likely candidate who is chairwoman of Community Board 1, Julie Menin, and a retired firefighter and former police officer running for the open seat, Peter Gleason.

Mr. Gleason purchased the domain names juliemenin.com, juliemenin.net, and juliemenin.org and plans to post information about his anticipated opponent on them, prompting Ms. Menin to hire an attorney to help her get control of the sites. The dispute was first reported in the Villager newspaper.

“These kinds of things shouldn’t happen,” Ms. Menin said in an interview with The New York Sun. “It’s just not an honest way to do things.”

Mr. Gleason said Ms. Menin should have known to purchase her own domain names.

How To Make Your Ferry Terminal Look More Like A Russian Supper Club

Fish tanks, full of tropical fish:

Tanks packed with 20 tons of water — holding 400 tropical fish and costing $750,000 — were unveiled by Mayor Bloomberg at the Staten Island ferry terminal Tuesday.

And the mayor also showcased a very fishy sense of humor.

“I just have to say, ‘holy mackerel,'” he said as his audience groaned. “What’s the porpoise, you might ask? These are beautiful tanks that are destined to become a great new attraction on Staten Island.”

The 8-foot-high tanks hold fish usually found on colorful coral reefs — including powder blue tang, Pakistani butterfly and scribbled angel.

The tanks are so heavy, steel beams have had to be used to reinforce the terminal floor.

“The tanks will exert a calming influence on harried commuters,” said Staten Island Borough President James Molinaro, who was inspired after seeing similar aquariums at an airport in Sarasota, Fla.

Bloomberg is known to be a fish fan and installed tanks in his offices decades ago.

“I’ve been hooked ever since,” he said.

And Gene Russianoff is being ironic, right?

The cash for the project, which will be maintained by staff at the Staten Island Zoo, came from the borough’s capital fund.

“I really don’t think people have a reason to carp about this,” Bloomberg quipped.

Gene Russianoff, spokesman for the Straphangers Campaign, said his group had no problem with the money’s use.

Location Scout: St. George Ferry Terminal.

The Parks Department’s Version Of The Carnegie Hall Studio Towers

One way to get public school teachers to live in the community — let them dock their boats at Riverside Park:

Leslie Day flirted, dated, married, raised a family and found her life’s work in Manhattan — or rather, just off its shore.

Born on the Upper West Side, she moved to a 34-foot houseboat at the 79th Street Boat Basin when she was 30, single and a masseuse. She found her future husband, a biologist, on the 43-foot houseboat next door. After they were wed, they traded up to a 57-foot houseboat, and they raised a son. Now, as empty-nesters, the couple live on a 43-foot cruiser.

Dr. Day, 62, who is now an elementary school teacher, recently wrote “Field Guide to the Natural World of New York City.” When Mayor Michael R. Bloomberg honored her book last fall in a ceremony at Gracie Mansion, he reached the part of his script that noted where she lived and ad-libbed a reaction she had heard many times. “Do you really?” he said. “That’s amazing. Thirty-two years and it never sunk or anything like that?”

Since 1937, when Franklin Delano Roosevelt was president, the 79th Street Boat Basin has been an object of fascination off the island of Manhattan, part fishing village, part Monte Carlo and all floating opera all of the time.

The boat basin floats on five main docks on the banks of the Hudson River. For decades, there have been as many as 100 pleasure craft, some pristine, others slovenly — schooners, houseboats, yachts and trawlers — tethered just off the Riverside Park promenade, three blocks from Broadway and Zabar’s.

Critics have called the residents squatters on public property, in a high-end trailer park; even the city government, which owns the docks, has not always been comfortable with the arrangement.

But the boaters call themselves a community with rights like any other. Residents have ranged from millionaires to those between jobs. All seem to embrace self-expression. One man liked wearing a Superman sweatshirt as he bounced on a trampoline on the dock.

Location Scout: 79th Street Boat Basin.

For more on the Carnegie Hall squatters see here.