June 10th will, indeed, be a great day in Bedford-Stuyvesant. Brooklyn-Queens Day seemed a fitting choice for a day of celebration. There are still several churches that participate in the traditional Sunday School Parade, and efforts are underway to renew the wonderful spirit of that event in the coming years. In its place is what may become a new tradition as the Discover Your Neighborhood Expo joins forces with Boys and Girls High School for their first “Pride and Joy Day”.
The Fourth Annual Discover Your Neighborhood Resource and Safety Expo will be held at historic Boys and Girls High School, from 5:00 to 8:00 p.m. With the theme, “Discover Bed-Stuy”, the event is an invitation to neighbors throughout the community to come and find out more about the many services and programs that are available either right in the neighborhood, or easily accessible through the network of city services.
The Expo is presented by the Bedford-Stuyvesant Youth, Education and Safety (YES) Task Force, Community Board 3 and the Brownstoners of Bedford-Stuyvesant, Inc. This year, the event is hosted in partnership with Boys and Girls High School. The new principal, Bernard Gassaway, has solid plans to open the school to the community, and to develop collaborative efforts that will assist the students. Under his leadership, creative initiatives have already been instituted, and the Expo is an example of the type of ongoing community support that will be necessary to encourage the entire school family. As part of the Expo collaboration, the students have designed an exciting series of events under the banner of “Pride and Joy Day”. Plans are underway for a Pride and Joy Parade that will begin at noon and proceed from “the High” to “Old Boys High”, “Old Girls High”, and back to the school. Other activities may take place on the field prior to the opening of the Expo at 5:00 p.m.
According to Michael Bailey, this year’s Discover chairperson, “This is one-stop shopping in a fun and exciting setting. People will be able to meet and talk with representatives from municipal agencies as well as local groups of all kinds.” Last year, more than thirty city agencies and community-based organizations were represented. This year, such municipal agencies as the Departments of Fire, Sanitation, Housing, Preservation and Development (HPD), and Parks and Recreation are already set to participate. Critical youth services such as SCO Family Dynamics, Herbert Von King Cultural Center and Children of Promise will all have information about their programs.
Discover 2010 is planned as a community happening that will have something for every community resident. The Health Pavilion is being coordinated by The Watchful Eye and Community Board 3, and will provide confidential on-site screenings and wellness information. Bedford-Stuyvesant Family Health Services, the Provident Clinical Society and Woodhull Hospital will be among the providers taking part.
One of the most popular aspects of the Expo is the informative workshop series. For example, adults are invited to the session on free and low-cost job training programs. Daisy Torres, Principal of the Brooklyn Adult Learning Center, said that, “Very often, people are either looking to learn a new skill in order to upgrade on a present job or to prepare to compete in the job market for the first time. They do not know that Brooklyn Adult Learning Center has been right here in the Old Girls High School building for more than forty years. We have thousands of great success stories of people who have gone on to make better lives for their families. We offer a wide variety of courses that range from basic education and GED prep all the way to careers in such fast-growing areas as computer repair and licensed practical nursing.” A second workforce preparation session will offer information for young adults who have left school before graduating.
Another important workshop will focus on the greening of Bedford-Stuyvesant. Retrofit Bed-Stuy is a project that is operated jointly by NYSERDA and the Bedford-Stuyvesant Restoration Corporation in collaboration with the Pratt Center for Community Development. Homeowners and block associations will learn more about the programs under the Retrofit umbrella that will bring much-needed relief to people who want to make more energy-efficient improvement to their properties. There are many incentives for block associations, as well as real opportunities for training and placement in green jobs. In a community with high unemployment and foreclosure rates, these workshops will provide hopeful resources.
The 79th and 81st Precincts will be on hand with a workshop entitled, “Working Together to Create a Crime-free Community.” This workshop will feature strategies that can be jointly undertaken by residents and police personnel operating in a cooperative manner. Crime rates have spiked in some areas, and there is growing concern in all parts of the community. Brenda Fryson, one of the co-chairs of the Bedford-Stuyvesant Youth, Education and Safety Task Force, said that this situation can only get better when police and community work hand in hand. “There must be mutual respect on both sides. We depend on NYPD personnel to be as courteous and professional as they are in other neighborhoods around the city. We have the exact same expectations, and will accept no less. Thanks to the work of our precinct councils and other groups such as the Task Force, we have made steps toward better police-community relations.”
Color and excitement will be added to the evening with the popular Food Court, Kids’ Corner and Shopping Bazaar. The Food Court will feature reasonably priced tastings from some of Bedford-Stuyvesant’s most gifted chefs and caterers. The cost of the food is intentionally kept low so that more people can have the opportunity to enjoy what is known as “A Taste of Bed-Stuy”. The Family and Kids’ Corner will play host to the Brooklyn Children’s Museum, the Brooklyn Public Library, an arts and crafts table, face painting and family reading information provided by the Brownstoners of Bedford-Stuyvesant.
All block and tenant associations are encouraged to register for the workshop series that has been designed especially for them. Topics include: Retrofit Bed-Stuy, Foreclosure Prevention Assistance, and Creating a Crime-free Community. As in past years, a gift will be presented to each association that sends at least five representatives to each of the workshops. There will be special recognition at the fall meeting of Community Board 3.
“We want to make sure that all of our neighbors come out and enjoy this free event. It is just for us …those of us who live and work in Bedford-Stuyvesant. We have a lot to offer, and the Expo is a great opportunity to find help of all kinds,” said Henry Butler, Chairperson of Community Board 3.
Funding for the Expo is generously provided by Councilman Albert Vann and the New York City Council. Community partners include Our Time Press, Office of the Brooklyn District Attorney, the Coalition for the Improvement of Bedford-Stuyvesant, African-American Clergy and Elected Officials Organization, and the Boys and Girls High School Advisory Committee.
For more information on all Expo events and to register block and tenant associations, please call Community Board 3 at (718) 778-6005.
Living Wage Bill Introduced
A monumental shift regarding how developers relate to working class New Yorkers was introduced in the City Council this week. Intro. # 251, also known as “The Fair Wages for New Yorkers Act” would amend the administrative code of the city of New York, in relation to requiring the payment of a living wage to employees employed on property developed by recipients of financial assistance for economic development.
The living wage bill proposes that any development project that receives public subsidies pay a living wage to employees, defined as $10.00 per hour plus benefits or $11.50 per hour without benefits. The bill would establish a city-wide standard for all development projects that receive public subsidies worth more than $100,000 in the form of tax credits, discounted land sales, or other benefits.
The Fair Wages for New Yorkers Act was introduced by Council member G. Oliver Koppell and sponsored by Council members Koppell, Palma, Arroyo, Cabrera, Chin, Dromm, Ferrera, James, Mendez, Sanders Jr., Mark-Viverito, Foster and Seabrook (by request of the Bronx Borough President), then referred to the Committee on Contracts, Chaired by Council member Darlene Mealy. The Contracts Committee will hold a public hearing, solicit expert testimony, and receive public comments. The bill will go back to the full council for a vote, then be sent to the Mayor for signing. If the mayor vetoes the bill, it will be sent back to the Council, where it will need 34 votes to override the Mayor’s veto.
Council member Barron said the living wage bill is “very important,” and referenced the Gateway ll project, with 2,300 affordable housing units and 600,000 square feet of new commercial space as an example. “This is where the bill helps,” said Barron, “Any business that receives public subsidies must pay a living wage.”
For Barron, Walmart is a classic example of what not to do. “Walmart,” Barron said, “They are the worst when it comes to paying employees fairly. Walmart has $13 billion in annual profit. Walmart’s CEO makes more that $20 million a year. Yet they want to pay workers $2,000 below the federal poverty level. Business can’t rip off labor by paying minimum or below minimum slave wages.”
Barron said Mayor Bloomberg supports developer’s interests, and is against the bill. Barrons suggested low wage workers pack the hearing “like an invasion of City Hall.” He said workers should demand organization, mobilization, and activism. Barron said “I am tired of developers getting rich off the backs of workers. When they get free money, it is called subsidies. When we get free money, it is called welfare.” The current environment, Barron said, “maximizes profits with slave wages and union busting.”
Council member Barron said the Mayor’s argument that the bill will encourage developers to stop doing business is “Nonsense. Related is one of the richest developers in the country. Will Related go broke or leave the city if they pay a living wage? Only middle and working class people making $58,000 or less can no longer afford to live here.” Barron said companies like Related “will continue to build and develop here because they are making money here.”
Marie Louis, CEO of BUILD said the living wage bill “is an important piece of legislation. It would help to insure that people earn the wages they need to afford to live in the city. If someone is working on a project subsidized by public funds, there should be an obligation for those who benefit from public subsidies to pay people decent living wages.”
“There are too many hardworking New Yorkers earning poverty wages, and for too long, city-subsidized developers have earned profits at the expense of taxpayers and low-wage workers,” said Council Member Al Vann. It is time for these developers to provide public benefits to our city’s communities in return for receiving this taxpayer money. Living wage laws, as enforced in other cities and states, have proven to not only be beneficial for workers, but also for local economies. This law would be a critical tool for lifting New Yorkers out of poverty, and therefore I support it.”
Council member Mealy, Chair of the Contracts Committee, was unavailable for comment.
Just one day before introduction of the living wage bill, the Drum Major Institute hosted a forum entitled, “Using Economic Development to Create Good Jobs.”
Comptroller Liu said “The issue is not all economic development. The issue is specifically about economic development that involves large amounts of public subsidies. In these cases, the public needs a far better understanding of exactly what the city does in deciding who or which private developer gets these huge public subsidies. The public is already demanding an answer. The Comptroller’s office is going to do everything we possible can to answer those questions so that the public can better understand what goes into, and comes out of the EDC (the city’s economic development office). When there is a subsidy for economic development, it is absolutely reasonable for public officials and the public to demand that the jobs created are decent jobs, not just minimum wage jobs.”
View From Here: Terror in the Gulf
The oil gushing from a well a mile underwater is the result of an amazing feat of engineering that private industry has achieved and only they have the engineering technology, robotic submersibles working at the drill head and controlled from a room in Houston, Texas for one example, to even begin to stop it. The Obama Administration has very smart people giving advice and support as they work their way through the unique and “unprepared for” engineering predicament their expertise and technological hubris has led to.
This piercing of the earth and continuing another 35,000ft. through rock to tap a toxic substance that Mother Nature surely thought she had safely tucked away, has allowed us to see oil in its purest form-as a destroyer of life. It is akin to an underwater radioactive bomb, destroying life throughout the water column and a way of life all along the coastline.
We see independent reports with estimates ranging between 25,000-90,000 barrels of oil a day being released and spewing into the Gulf. Much of it is being dispersed into droplets too small to see, too small to rise to the top but able to be caught in ocean currents fouling life cycles from plankton to people and from the wetlands of Louisiana on to Florida and possibly around and up the East Coast.
President Obama has to bring a full light on the situation in the form of an official revision upward of the estimate of the gusher and a radical recalibration in the level of his response such that the perception of government is changed. If current efforts, what the industry calls a “top kill” fail to stop the discharge, Obama can keep his cool but he’ll have to do it at a Joint Chiefs of Staff meeting where they treat the Gulf Coast as a third front for all appropriate resources. Have Drones monitor the oil above and below the surface and put the images on YouTube. Break protocol on nuclear subs and announce there’s one in the area full of scientists. Call in the Marines. Have troop trucks on the highways headed for the coast. Show them marching down to the shoreline with shovels, oil-absorbent material and buckets of Dawn. Let the debate be if the administration went “over the top” in its response to protecting the coastline and the nation’s security. Less than that and the possibility exists that Obama will spend the rest of his presidency in explanations instead of cheers.
Sparks Fly at NYS Attorney General Candidate Forum
Brown Memorial Church opened its doors recently to host a forum for candidates for NYS Attorney General. With the expected announcement of a run for governor from current NYS Attorney General Andrew Cuomo still pending, a diverse group of Democratic and Republican candidates are seeking his presumably open seat. Democratic candidates in attendance at the forum included Richard Brodsky, NYS Assembly member; Sean Coffey, Senior Law Partner and Retired Navy Captain; Eric Dinallo, former NYS Insurance Commissioner; Kathleen Rice, Nassau County District Attorney; and Eric Schneiderman, NYS Senator. Candidate Elizabeth Holtzman was a no-show.
As the only female candidate in the race, Nassau DA Rice tried to distinguish herself as the only candidate who is not an Albany or Wall Street insider. Coffey responded by saying, “The notion that anyone would group me with Wall Street insiders is nutty. I fought those guys for 11 years. Bloomberg Markets magazine designated me as the new Wall Street nemesis.”
Brodsky also took issue with Rice’s characterization of him being an insider. “It is a stereotype, and I don’t like it. I want to be judged for what I have done. If Miss Rice thinks that I have been ineffective, I welcome the opportunity to hear that. She and I have differences. She opposed the Rockefeller Drug Law reforms, I supported them for years.” Brodsky warned what would happen if the Democratic primary turns into a “throw the bums out”. “We do not need a Tea Party here,” he said. Rice responded by addressing what she characterized as a “complete falsehood” regarding her record on reform of Rockefeller Drug Laws. “Not only did I support them, but I was doing diversionary programs two years before the laws were reformed. We didn’t even saddle people with an arrest; it was a ‘second chance’ program. We all know how hard it is to go out and get a job once you have a conviction,” said Rice.
Brodsky responded by saying he has a letter with Miss Rice’s name on it in which she opposes the Rockefeller Drug Law reforms. He did acknowledge her good work with diversionary programs. “The part she opposed was the part giving judges rather than DA’s the ability to determine sentencing,” said Brodsky.
OTP asked Rice about the Aloysius Staton case where a young man was beat up in an Oceanside, Long Island McDonald’s by three white men, “and instead of prosecuting the white men, you prosecuted Mr. Staton. He ended up spending a month in jail because he could not afford bail, then the case was dropped. In the case of Antoine Butts, when you were in the Brooklyn DA’s Office, you were a defendant in a civil case where you were accused of ‘suborning perjury.’ Some of the witnesses in the case said you and a couple of ADA’s had instructed them as to who to point out as the person who did the crime. As a result, Antoine Butts ended up spending 2 years in jail on a murder charge he did not commit. How can the community trust you to be the top law enforcement officer in this state when this is your record on civil rights?”
Rice responded with this: “I appreciate you asking that question. Over my almost 20-year career, I have handled thousands and thousands of cases. Two cases are being brought in, that you are mentioning, and you are using those two cases to say that this shows that I don’t appreciate civil rights. I don’t know what you are saying. I take personal offense to this. And I take exception and it’s like a knife in my heart to use two cases out of a 20-year career to say that I engaged in some kind of race-based prosecution. Nothing could be further from the truth.”
Council member Charles Barron asked about the return of Alton Maddox’s license. Coffey said, “I know about the case, and want to know more about the case. I don’t think, with rare exception, someone should be defined by their worst moment. So I would like to hear more about why you think this is a travesty. I have represented a disbarred attorney in my career and I know how painful that can be. There have been plenty of lawyers who have been restored. This may be such a case.”
Moderator Faye Moore asked a variety of prepared questions appropriate for candidates vying for the state’s top law enforcement office.
On stop-and-frisk, Brodsky said, “In its purest form, stop-and-frisk is what Arizona intends to do.”
Schneiderman said as attorney general he would take up the issue of mass incarceration. “The problem with our criminal justice system is the incentives for the police is to stop more people. The incentive is to arrest more people. Incentives for prosecutors is to put away more people,” Schneiderman said. “This is the fault of our predecessors and colleagues who spent 30 years being afraid of being accused of being soft on crime. That is what they chose to vote for – Rockefeller Drug Laws, three strikes you’re out laws, mandatory minimums. With everyone paying a prison tax so that we can keep almost 2« million people in prison and have 700,000 people a year dumped out into poor communities – mostly African-American and Latino – with no reentry and no programs and wonder why those communities have trouble.”
Coffey said there are some serious questions about the constitutionality and scope of stop-and-frisk policy. “The problem is when it is abused and used as a pretext for harassment. That is wrong. My office, when I am attorney general, will vigorously investigate,” Coffey said. He explained how his background is relevant: “You should know, I spent 11 years in a law firm that handles employment discrimination cases on behalf of aggrieved employees. I went to the firm for its role in the Texaco race discrimination case and won the largest settlement for African-American employees at the time. And I was proud to work on cases involving African-American bankers who were being discriminated against at the Bank of America. I come from that area, and will be very aggressive with the civil rights bureau pursuing, from a government perspective, that which my firm pursued in a private arena.”
Rice said she appointed the first bias crime prosecutor in the history of the DA’s Office in Nassau. “There is too much bias crime, too much racism in Nassau,” Rice said.
When asked about eminent domain, there was strong disapproval from the audience. Rice said there has to be a balance between development versus the interests of the community. “The attorney general comes out on the side of supporting the community advocating for themselves,” she said.
Schneiderman said he disagreed with the New London decision. He said, “I am the sponsor of legislation in the Senate that would change the eminent domain laws to stop this business of private interests being able to use public powers to enhance their own well-being. I don’t have objections to the concept of eminent domain, but that’s supposed to be for the public good. I would move program bills and I would enforce them rigorously. Also, the AG can conduct investigations into the way these projects are carried out. Even if they are technically complying with dome of the laws, I assure you there are other issues that can be raised by an AG. I will look aggressively at the way these folks are proceeding. The example here in Brooklyn is held up by advocates all around the state of what we do not want. If my bill isn’t passed this year, when I am AG that will be a program bill from my office.”
Brodsky said, “Five years ago, I passed the first bill to reform the eminent domain system before the Brooklyn issue came up because it had occurred in my county. I would urge this community and any advocate to avoid redefinition of those laws that allow blight to be a characteristic of what allows eminent domain laws to be exercised. Blight is Yiddish for ‘poor people’. If you focus any reform effort on poor communities, you are just going to get more of the same. Brodsky said the problem was state laws; the instrumentality is the state public authorities law “that essentially allowed a legislative body to transfer private property from one private person to another private person in the name of the public good. We passed the Authority Reform bill which would no longer make the Hudson Yards and Atlantic Yards transactions possible.”
Dinallo said he would use the appeals and opinion section of the AG’s office to issue a revisitation of [eminent domain], then use that opinion to signal a potential lawsuit around getting the laws changed, turning it back to a public enterprise, and not a private taking.
Coffey said we need someone who can affect change in Albany. “I did that when I took on Wall Street, the most powerful interest in this country. In the WorldCom case, 17 investment banks – including Goldman Sachs – tried to crush my little team with the best law firms in the country,” Coffey said. “We took them to trial and got $6 billion dollars. We need an agent of change, someone who is willing to leave the comfort of the private sector to come into Albany and affect change.”
On the subject of Wall Street, Brodsky said he introduced a bill five years ago would take the law Eliot Spitzer used so successfully and expand the ability of plaintiffs to be protected. “Right now, if you are a private citizen and Bernie Madoff rips you off, you recover,” said Brodsky, “But a pension fund cannot be treated the same way.”
Dinallo said when he was in the AG’s office, he was the person who brought the cases against Wall Street, and helped transform that office into the Sheriff of Wall Street and a protector of investors returning billions of dollars. “I am the only person here who can talk about standing up to Wall Street and insurance companies as a public official,” said Dinallo.
Rice said “When you are talking about reforming Wall Street, and Albany, you can’t be a Wall Street insider, or an Albany insider. You need an outsider, someone who has been an advocate their entire career, like I have.”
Coffey told the audience, “To be effective reforming Wall Street, you have to understand Wall Street. You have to know where the bodies are buried; you have to know their tricks. I know those tricks. Wall Street is important; it pays the bills. The best way to keep Wall Street growing is to keep it honest. I have recovered over $10 billion for defrauded investors, large and small. I have made people pay personally for the first time in history. The CEO of WorldCom, I took everything he had except the furniture and the silverware. I got it for the investors, including his $5 million joint tax refund. As AG, I am going to make the bad people pay – those CEO’s, those directors. I am going after these third parties, the credit rating agencies, the audit firms, the lawyers, the bankers. This is not a job for a rookie.”
Schneiderman explained the history of financial regulations, then said “On the state level we have some of the oldest financial regulations in the country. Some are too old. We can do a much better job with legislation. I understand the markets, I was a securities lawyer.”
Among the notables in attendance were Mayor of Hempstead Wayne Hall, Assembly members Annette Robinson, Inez Barron and Jim Brennan, Council members Letitia James Al Vann, and Charles Barron, State Senator Velmanette Montgomery, District Leaders Olanike Alabi and Jesse Hamilton and Chris Owens.
The forum was sponsored by Brown Memorial Baptist Church, Central Brooklyn Independent Democrats (CBID), Council members Al Vann and Letitia James, District leaders Olanike Alabi, Jesse Hamilton and Shirley Patterson, Rosa Parks Independent Democratic Club, The 57th Assembly District Democratic Organization, and New Kings Democrats (NKD).
