He Built This City
AM New York’s piece this morning assessing Mike Bloomberg’s legacy is one of the first of many, many articles that are sure to come as the mayor enters the twilight of his term. The article positions Mayor Mike as a great post-9/11 rebuilder who’s played a big role in luring tourists, spurring development and making…
AM New York’s piece this morning assessing Mike Bloomberg’s legacy is one of the first of many, many articles that are sure to come as the mayor enters the twilight of his term. The article positions Mayor Mike as a great post-9/11 rebuilder who’s played a big role in luring tourists, spurring development and making formerly undesirable neighborhoods hot. “Places like Red Hook that were once a no-man’s land are hipster havens, and Brooklyn is now a center for culture and art for the whole country,” says Mitchell Moss, a professor of history at New York University and adviser to the mayor’s first campaign. “Whoever thought people would want to live on the Gowanus.” The article notes that the Bloomberg administration’s aggressive rezoning agenda (“one out of every six square feet in the city” has been rezoned) and drive to incentivize development on NYC’s waterfront has altered the lay of the land, and New York has much more of a “luxury” sheen than it did six years ago. The cost of all this is high, according to critics who say the city has become too expensive for the working- and middle-class and resulted in inorganic changes. “There has been a pinching of people’s sense of place, and a destruction of community identity,” says Brad Lander, director of the Pratt Center for Community Development. “They have accelerated the transformation of this place from a manufacturing city to a condo and office tower city, but a lot of people don’t feel invested in that growth.”
Bloomberg Reshapes City, Despite High-Profile Setbacks [AM New York]
Photo by CarbonNYC.
Benson?
This is once again for your benefit Benson and I will not go any further than this. I thought that I came on under Dinkins but I hate to admit that you are correct. You googled it to confirm that it was Koch. I like you just did not remember. Please ask any of your “cop friends” about transporting to 100 Center Street and also ask them what a “special” is and the female area midnight tour CO’s. Only they would know. I know what I did for a living and so do you. Ask them please and post the results. Either you won’t ask them or you won’t post the truth.
7.02 PM/ 9.58 PM;
You keep digging yourself deeper and deeper in a hole.
Here is what you wrote at 7.02 PM:
“Mayor Dinkins lead NYC to a record hiring of law enforcement personnel with money that he requested from the fed’s under the Safe Streets program. I was one of those hired.”.
Here is what you wrote at 9.58 PM: “Hired in January 88. Retired 3 years ago.”
Er, excuse me, BULLSHIT ARTIST, but in 1988, Edward I. Koch was the mayor of the city, and as such, Mayor Dinkin’s “Safe Streets” program was not yet instituted, the progrsam under which you claime to be hired.
Please quit the bullshit. I can appreciate that you like Dinkins, and don’t like Giuliani. Just state the real reasons why, and please don’t bullshit us any more.
Thank you
Benson
I apologize in advance to the readers of this thread for the following boring details but this is being done solely for Benson’s benefit.
You are absolutely correct that I am not a Police Officer. I am a retired police officer. Hired in January 88. Retired 3 years ago. In the time that I was on the job, we had three photo ID card changes. Retired on 3/4 disability for a LODI injury caused by and EDP. Decison made at Lefrak City. Carried a S&W .38 calibre for the first three years and then transitioned to 9mm. I still have my Lady Smith though. Carried the S&W 5946. They use to give you a coffee can for spent rounds with the .38. Shopped at Park’s. They always have candy in the dish by the register. Nice people. Don’t charge for mourning bands. Didn’t mind transporting although many hate it especially in Manhattan, knew everybody there, Qualified bi-annualy at Rodman’s neck, hated the long cheese line, installed barriers after 9/11 at entrance barriers, toilets located in trailer at the top of the stairs, booths too small for you to both pull down your pants and hold your duty rig up while you pee, (you think they would have fixed that,) kept my kid and husband’s photo in my eight point hat, Indian head fell off of hatpiece when I dropped it and it was stepped on during a parade, United Insignia on bridge took car of it, never got a CD, hated cancelled PD’s for OT because I’d have rather spent time with my kid, etc……
Any one can go online to get a chronological list of Commissioners. In my previous post, I gave a synopsis of my experience and did not list each and every Commissioner. Most MOS even those who were on the job at the time, would not be able to give you a chronological list of all of the Commissioners under whom they served. Living around MOS, officers, police – not cops – doesn’t make you one. Most of your friends have probably never literally put their lives on the line. A line constantly used by the union BTW.
You Benson are probably a wannabe. You are facinated by police culture and although you may have taken the exam and passed you were more than likely disqualified.
Denton and 7.02 PM;
You are moving into the theater of the absurd. Yeah, I really believe that the Crown Heights affair was a police conspiracy to embarass Dinkins. According to 7.02 PM, Dinkins was a bigger supporter of the police. Which is it? In any case, pass the Kool-Aid and I’ll drink to that.
7.02PM: a special word for you. You are not a police officer, though I have to give you credit for trying to come off as one. A few tip-off’s:
Giuliani fired Bratton, he didn’t resign. As a member of the force, I assume you would remember that. Also, the reason he fired him was that Bratton was building up an incredible PR machine for himself. If you recall (as a police officer, of course) you would have remembered the issue: Bratton had a PR staff of 27 people reporting directly to him, larger than the White House staff. He even went and hired John Miller, the famous crime reporter, to be his spokesman. Bratton eas not liked by many folks on the force for this reason.
Moreover, after Bratton left, the commissioner that Giuliani hired was Howard Safir, not Kerik. Moreover, Safir served for a much longer term (5-6 years)than Kerik (one year). Kerik was brought on as commissioner in the last year of the Giuliani administration as a “placeholder”, since the administration was winding down.
As a member of the force, how could you forget this fact? Answer: because you haven’t served on the force. Rather, you tried to silence the debate by invoking the authority of “one who has put his life on the line”.
By the way, this statement was the biggest tip-off that you are not a police officer. I was raised in a neighborhood of many police, and they simply don’t use that line in a conversation like this.
Benson
Brad Lander is such a hypocrite. He used non-union labor to build his affordable housing with the Fifth Avenue Committee. He’s the one taking advantage of his fellow New Yorkers.
Of course leadership can make the difference.
Mayor Dinkins lead NYC to a record hiring of law enforcement personnel with money that he requested from the fed’s under the Safe Streets program. I was one of those hired. This had a direct correlation to the decrease in crime, in addition to some of the social factors mentioned by previous posters(population age shift, etc.) When my co-workers picketed, I use that term lightly, in front of city hall, Dinkins showed the utmost restraint and respect for their civil liberties. He told his Commissioner not to mete out discipline for wrongdoing during the demonstration. Dinkins showed much of the same restraint when dealing with the public. Guiliani, on the other hand, who gave us the worse contracts ever, big fat zero’s, would have called in the national guard if his dominions revolted against him. He had every officer working doubles during the Republican National Convention to squash anticipated disturbances by “dissenters.” Dinkins appointed Lee Brown as Commissioner, under whom Ray Kelly worked. Brown instituted the Community Policing program and instituted the bottom up theory which tackled quality of life issues starting with the squeegee men at the bottom. Brown resigned for personal reasons and was replaced by Kelly who continued and improved upon the intiatives started by Brown.
The Uniform Crime Report UCR)actually has crime topping out under Guiliani. Although I did not like him personally, he continued the downward trend in crime by first handpicking William Bratton as his Commissioner. This was a smart move. Bratton was known as a boy wonder in the law enforcement community and he didn’t disappoint by continuing to add programs which helped in the reduction of crime, the most famous of which was CompStat. The problem was that Bratton was not a yes man and often butted heads with Rudy, so he left. And then Guiliani appointed that buffoon Kerik. Not good leadership on his part.
Where Dinkins was sometimes too passive, Guiliani was clearly too aggressive. Bloomberg’s style is the perfect fit for this city and he was smart enough to get Kelly back.
As someone who has literally put my life on the line for the people of this city, I’d rather do it under Bloomberg. If I had to do it again under either Dinkins or Guiliani, I’d choose Dinkins. Having the support of the community counts for a lot, during the course of your tour. It just wasn’t there under Guiliani.
Dear Benson:
My post was not only in response to you, it was in response to several.
The murder rate hit its all-time high in Dinkins’ very first year in office. It takes time for policies to take effect. In the second, third, and fourth year of his office, the murder rate declined.
The drop accelerated in 1995, Ghouliani’s first year in office. It is entirely possible that Dinkins should get some of the credit for that year, as I doubt that criminals went into trembling hibernation just cuz Rudy got elected. But that point could be argued. My main point, that crime declined under Dinkins, holds true. The murder rate the last year of Dinkins admin was lower than the first year. That’s the beginning of the decline that continued under subsequent admins. Most posters here and elsewhere do not believe this, which is a simple statistic. Really, put the numbers in a graph and look at it!
As far as the Crown Heights affair, Dinkins was the victim of a police conspiracy. Since you are a New Yorker, you may recall the Ghouliani-fueled and beer-fueled police riot of September 1992, where drunk cops stormed City Hall, waving racist signs. The occasion? The modest request that the Civilian Complaint Review Board contain all civilians! In the same way the military is under civilian control.
That pissed the NYPD off to no end.
Since when has the NYPD been afraid to bust a few black heads during a riot? They didn’t in Crown Heights cuz they knew if they let things run out of control Dinkins would be gone. And they were right. No investigation, and there were many, ever showed that Dinkins ordered the cops to hold back. They did it all by themselves.
As to other things, sure, he made some mistakes. And yeah, nothing pisses off white folk more than a black man playing tennis! How dare he!
Fifteen years later, it’s still remembered that he was playing tennis. Basketball, of course, would have been ok. But I’m playing the race card.
Denton;
Keep trying!!
First, please note that I was born in NYC. As a native of NYC, I know the difference between NYC and NY State. I know the population of NYC is not 18,000,000. If you look at the statistics that you supplied, they are for NY State. Look at the population figures (18,000,000)
Second: tell me where I denied in my post that crime started declining in his term??
Third: did not the murder rate hit its all-time peak under Dinkins, which is what I DID state in my e-mail?
Fourth: was the drop in crime not significantly higher under Giuliani and Bloomberg than under Dinkins, as your own statistics show? Once again, I would like you to compare the crime in Dinkin’s last full year with Giuliani’s first full year.
Finally: was, or was not, Dinkins an incompetent in many ways? As I stated above, did he not let a riot run in Crown Heights unabated for three days? Did he not let the “demonstrators” run free in front of the Korean Green Grocer on Church Ave for weeks, with the proprietor’s life being threatened (even the NY Times couldn’t tolerate this situation, and told him to do something about it). Did he not run to the side of the mother of a vicious drug dealer (Jose “Kiko” Garcia), assuming that he had been wrongly killed by a police officer (Walsh) when a tape of the struggle clearly revealed that it was Walsh whose life was in danger (he radioed for help)? Dinkins didn’t even wait for the tape to be released: he assumed that the police officer had murdered Garcia. Did this same incompetent mayor, however, not find the time (he was busy playing tennis) to comfort the parents of tourists from Utah whose son was killed in a midtown subway station, trying to intercede in a mugging?
OK, you can go back to trying to playing the race card.
Benson