Two Terms Good, Three Terms Bad

Charter Commission Weighs

Permission for Incumbents

To Run for an Extra Term,

Ignoring Public Referenda



The Charter Revision Commission will meet Monday evening to decide what amendments to the City Charter will be placed on the ballot in November. The Commission's recommendations are generally beneficial and should not arouse much public controversy, except from diehards who want the political process to be as arduous and arcane as possible.

The Commission was appointed in March 2010. Its primary mission was to settle the issue of term limits, which had been approved by the voters in 1993 and 1996. In September 2008, when it was too late for anyone else place a charter amendment on the ballot, Mayor Bloomberg proposed, and the Council approved, a charter amendment overriding the public referenda in the '90s, and providing third-term eligibility for themselves. To make amends for this last-minute power play, the mayor promised to appoint a charter commission in 2010, with the expectation that the term limits issue would be resolved.

The Commission did agree to send the issue to a referendum in November, but unfortunately there is a catch. The issue of when term limits as approved by the public will go into effect is in dispute. Logically, the effective date should be the next election for councilmembers, scheduled for 2013. In a strong editorial today, the Daily News made this point convincingly.

However, an effort is being made to 'grandfather' only those councilmembers elected in 2005, so that they will be able to remain in office until 2017, even if the public votes in 2010 for a two-term limit.

That would be an enormous injustice. Members of the classes of 2001 and 2005 stretched the law to its limit by voting to extend their own eligibility. They found a loophole in the Charter and drove right through it. Now, if the public votes for a two-term limit, it would mean they must leave in 2013, as the Charter originally provided. As a result, they are seeking to create yet another loophole by grandfathering themselves into third-term eligibility. This would again frustrate the will of the voters if they support a limit of two terms, with which polls indicate that 71 per cent of the voters agree.

If the Commission and its members seek to retain their good reputations for integrity and independence, they cannot allow this scheme to succeed. When the public repeatedly says, in its Orwellian mode, "Two terms good, three terms bad" the handful of councilmembers who created the problem in the first place should not be allowed to concoct another scheme to deny the public the right to vote on whether they should have third-term eligibility. The case is worse than a parricide who demands mercy as an orphan. Here the officials are trying to prohibit the jurors from even considering whether they should be allowed to profit from their misdeeds.

Now is the time to close the door on this unfortunate chapter of New York political history. To allow the situation to carry over to 2017 would invite another referendum next year on the same issue. That would denigrate and obscure the other serious matters on which the Charter commission is charged with deliberating.

Close the barn door. Conclude this matter in 2011. Let the Charter Revision Commission go forward with constructive study of municipal issues, of which there are many, rather than stooping to reward the handful of self-serving councilmembers whose desire to linger generated this problem.

GEESE: Latest census, taken by Anne-Katrin Titze, shows 114 geese, nine swans and numerous ducks on the Prospect Park Lake. The swans are members of two families, who are not always friendly to each other. The population consists of four adults and five cygnets. On July 7, Federal agents removed and executed about 300 geese, but the lake is being repopulated as new Canada geese arrive. They are apparently unaware of the fate that befell their brothers and sisters last month.

TREES: The Pelham Parkway 87, originally marked for destruction for highway construction, have received a temporary reprieve after their cause was embraced by local newspapers, Regis Philbin of ABC, who grew up near Pelham Parkway, and community activists. The city will review its design to protect both trees and cars.

A greater threat has arisen to the trees on Pelham Parkway South. The proposed reconstruction of a sewer threatens the roots of mature trees on the sidewalk and in the park. The plans should be reviewed by the community and the city agencies involved, Design & Construction and Environmental Protection, before any excavation is begun which endangers the root system of nearby trees. This is entirely possible to do through a process called in situ construction.

ESPADA: No report is complete without an update on the actions of Senator Pedro Espada, who initiated the June 2009 coup which tied up the Senate for a month, along with his sidekick, now former Senator Hiram Monserrate.

Espada is involved in a dispute with a clothier who sold him six custom-made suits, for which the Senator refuses to pay. The scandal was broken by Tom Robbins, who described the affair in absorbing detail, on pages 10 and 11 in the August 18 Village Voice, and reported on p2 of yesterday's Daily News by Tina Moore and Kenneth Lovett.

The unpaid bill is said to be $7200. Sales tax is 8.875% in the Bronx, which he represents, and 7.4% in Mamaroneck, where he is said to live. On a purchase for that sum, the difference is sales tax would be $106.20, and the question arises as to which address he used.

On the other hand, if you're not going to pay the bill, why be concerned about the sales tax?

Cops Go Forward; Geese Come Back

Budget Deadlock - Day 113



Police Will Scan Data Manually

To Comply With Stop and Frisk,

Geese Returning to Prospect Park



Our Tuesday column on stop and frisk legislation produced interesting reactions. The first emailed replies received were negative, some castigating me for going over to the dark side. The next day, Wednesday, predominantly supportive emails were received. Today (Thursday) people are no longer writing us on the subject. This shows that, although the opinion of our readers is divided, the opponents of the bill feel more intensely about it. Further comments are welcome. You may go to this link to post your thoughts.

The new law, which precludes an electronic database of those stopped by the police but not arrested, passed 85-55 in the Assembly, with 14 Democrats joining 41 Republicans in opposing it. The Democrats were Assemblymembers Marc Alessi, William Colton, Steven Englebright, Ginny Fields, Dennis Gabryszak, Sandra Galef, Aileen Gunther, Janele Hyer-Spencer, Michael Miller, Amy Paulin, Mike Spano, Robin Schimminger, Harvey Weisenberg, and Kenneth Zebrows. Three of the 14 are from New York City: Colton (Brooklyn), Miller (Queens) and Hyer-Spencer (Staten Island).

In the Senate, all 32 Democrats supported it. If any one of them had opposed it, abstained, or been absent, the bill would not have passed. All 29 Republicans opposed it.

Governor Paterson signed the bill on July 16th, ignoring appeals by Mayor Bloomberg, Commissioner Ray Kelly, the News and the Post. You can click here to read our article from Tuesday, which has many links to primary data on the subject, including the governor's written signing statement in support of the bill.

Governor Paterson's explanation, a spontaneous expansion of his signing statement, was quoted in a Daily News editorial this morning:

"'That is not a policy for a democracy. Maybe that might work in Bosnia. Maybe that might in Somalia. Maybe it would have worked in the Soviet Union or in ‘1984’. But we can't allow it to happen here.'"

The News' editorial continued with increasing vigor, denouncing Paterson's remarks as "slander". We quote:

"He also cited the Police Department's computerized files in the same breath with egregious infringements on civil rights, including the Alien and Sedition Acts [1798], and the internment of Japanese-Americans during World War II.

"This is gubernatorial slander of a department that has a deserved reputation for successful crimefighting well within the bounds of the U.S. Constitution. Somalia? Bosnia? The Soviet Union? Are those the precincts into which Paterson believes Commissioner Ray Kelly has led the NYPD?"

The new law was sponsored in the Senate by Eric Adams, and co-sponsored by Pedro Espada, Velmanette Montgomery, Kevin Parker and Jose Peralta, who defeated Hiram Monserrate, his predecessor. The Assembly sponsor was Hakeem Jeffries.

The Police Department's initial response to the state restriction was reported in a story by Rocco Parascandola, chief of the Daily News police bureau. It appears across the top of p2, which is prominent placement. The article is headlined: "WRITE ON, SAY COPS: Brass Says Stop-&-Frisk Records Aren't Dead, Just Use Paper, Not Computers."

The lede: "Cops can no longer keep a giant electronic library of everyone they stop on the street - but officers can still collect names the old-fashioned way, a new NYPD memo says.

"The internal memo was sent out Friday, just after Gov. Paterson signed a law banning the NYPD from entering personal information of innocent people into a citywide database…."

We have not heard the last of this issue. Although opinion on the merits of the bill appears to be divided, as the Assembly Democrats are, the unanimity of Senate Democrats and Attorney General candidates indicates that they are marching to the tune of a different drummer.



THE GEESE RETURN TO PROSPECT PARK; DON’T TRY TO FOOL WITH MOTHER NATURE

The geese are back in Prospect Park.

According to a count this morning from two of our readers, Ed Bahlman and Anne-Katrin Titze, 28 Canada Geese have resettled at Prospect Park Lake since their feathered friends were rounded up and gassed to death on July 8th.

We have every reason to believe that our readers’ count is accurate, as it was Ms. Titze who conducted the official New York State Ornithological Association and NYS Department of Environmental Conservation Waterfowl Count of the area in January 2010.

Although the return of the geese is fair news for fans of the local fowl, we were hesitant to report it for fear that we would be sentencing these new settlers to the same fate as their predecessors. Upon further reflection, however, we were convinced that these geese would certainly not go unnoticed by the authorities, and so the best chance of advocating for their safety was to make public the fact of their residence.

The return of the geese deepens our suspicion that the eradication of the Prospect Park 400 was not adequately thought through. Does the U.S. Department of Agriculture, which is said to have ordered the mass killing, intend to hunt down these 28 geese too, along with those yet to join them? Are they to be gassed on a rolling basis or will the executioner come once a year after mating season, while they are molting and unable to fly?

Clearly, there are problems with the government's explanation of its actions. As we pointed out in our column on June 16th, the seven-mile kill zone extending from both LaGuardia and J.F.K. designated by the Agriculture Department for geese removal, does not accurately encompass Prospect Park, which is between 9 and 10 miles away from both airports. In a follow-up piece to our article, The New York Times confirmed our measurements.

We still maintain the public deserves more information about the government's policy of geese removal. We do not dismiss the possibility that the removal of some geese may be necessary for air safety, but there are unanswered questions about the Brooklyn geese, the cruelty of their execution and the disposition of their bodies. We believe that before more geese and goslings are butchered, a clear statement of procedures and alternatives is needed. The government requires an EIS for projects with less environmental effect than this mass ansercide.

We share this planet with millions of other species. We should not exterminate animals without clear evidence that it is necessary to do so to safeguard human life.