Four more years of Mayor Zweben?!?

Photo Credit: Kingston Times

If it seems like the city is pursuing a policy of full employment for lawyers unless they are retained to advise the Common Council, you might be correct.  The Kingston Corporation Counsel and Mayor Gallo are involved in yet another "showdown" destined for further legal challenges, this time with a home for the disabled.  Recently I drove by and my passenger commented about the West Chestnut parcel, "Is that Chiz's old place?  It looks great! " Zweben, a West Chestnut Street resident seems to be taking the lead.  The home's owner is not going to win any humanitarian prizes, but helping to foster decent quality housing for the disabled is a necessity under the City's Fair Housing Plan, if not a moral imperative given the lack of decent accessible units in the city.  The state supreme court has issued a restraining order against the city after Junior Mayor Zweben deemed the property "uninhabitable" and sent the police to "inform residents" they were living at an illegal property; kind of intimidating, no?  A separate court case will determine if the home can continue to operate as a boarding house, as it has for the past 70 years.

The Corporation Counsel's role is solely to represent the interests of the City, not aligned to department or political party.  In my opinion, many actions of the office contradict that purpose.  Probably the most glaring example was the termination of Jeremy Blaber. Many people came away "shocked" at the potty language and angry tirade of Mayor Gallo.  Around city hall, and for anybody who knows the mayor, we just called that Tuesday.  Here is what we should be concerned about.  Corporation Counsel sat through the meeting and allowed the residents to be exposed to potential litigation.  Say what you will about Mr. Blaber's behavior, all well earned by a drug addled (former by all current accounts) existence.  It is illegal to threaten violence and an abuse of power to suggest the police perform on command.  In my opinion, as the City's attorney Andrew Zweben has a strict ethical code that was not adhered to.

But wait, there is more...  For the sake of brevity I will bullet for now and reserve the right to revisit: 

• Parks Equipment.  After the school consolidations, excess playground equipment was considered to supplement much needed upgrades at city parks, especially Hasbrouck adjacent to JFK Elementary.  It was decided that we could not expose the city to potential liability so new equipment was ordered after parents raised private funds and demanded improvements.  According to the Daily Freeman, Saugerties will be the beneficiary of Sophie Finn's playground equipment.  I'm sure the PTO members are thrilled.     

• Public Use conflict followed by fundraiser for private non-profit at City Hall.  This is so weird and convoluted it is hard to even coherently write about this.  Kingston Parks Movies Under the Stars - an all volunteer team was disbanded and replaced by the City because we were successfully presenting movies to hundreds of people each week and promoting the parks at no cost to the taxpayer (to quote, we lacked "capacity").  Primary reason?  The witch-hunt against the program was rooted in the premise that because we used city resources, it was impossible to show preference to one non-profit when others are left out.  And some of these non-profits could be religious and there is the whole separation of church and state...  No non-profit activity that utilizes city resources. Several weeks later a fundraiser was hosted at City Hall for the Deep Listening Institute.     

• BMX Park Contract.  The BMX Park was created by yet another all volunteer team looking to enhance recreational opportunities for kids in our city.  After the park was cleaned up by the BMX Parents Association and provided for years one of the cleanest well-managed recreation facilities in the city, it was discovered (Queue the ominous music - think Imperial March) operated without a valid contract.  The fact that numerous other non-profits and even a few for-profits were in similar or grossly undervalued situations utilizing public space/resources, i.e. the Knothole League at Barman Park, the Kingston Volunteer Fireman's Association, Mariner's Harbor sidewalk eatery, and most tellingly the Bank of America private parking lot granted to SAFCO for $1/year negotiated during the same time-frame, did not cause Mayor Zweben to pause and take a holistic approach to contract management.  In the end, the BMX group was required to leap through numerous hoops and a fee of $500/year.   No word yet on the status of the 2015 season.     

• Pike Plan.  Nobody can say there isn't problems with drainage at the Pike Plan.  In fact a study and anybody standing under the canopies during moderate rain already has.  So why not fund another $42,000 "visual inspection" study to identify problems with the canopies to provide further ammunition for a lawsuit on a project that has already been signed off as complete.  How about they take the $42,000 and fix the drainage? 

• Chief Saltzman/Chris Rea.  These cases are very sad because both individuals are well respected and had their reputations damaged.  The pageantry around their separation from employment was absurd, coinciding with a scathing analysis from the NYS Comptroller.  Saltzman retired, but Chris Rea has fought the charges vehemently.  Cleared by the State Supreme Court, a Civil Service Hearing officer, and the Ulster County District Attorney, Rea is looking at a substantial claim of back pay, but a ruined reputation doesn't have a price tag.

• Catskill Mountain Railroad.  Who needs to be reminded of the dump truck placed across the tracks?  Again with the all-volunteers.... 

• NYC Lawsuit to pay for Sinkhole.  Well millions have been dumped down the hole so far, why not spend $15,000 on an attorney's opinion?  One quick reference question - didn't they balk at $10,000 to obtain a second opinion on the multimillion dollar project requirements when conflicting information came out of the engineering reports, but were eager to spend $15,000 to see if they could potentially sue NYC to recover damages?  Of course we can sue!  Anybody can sue anyone at any time for any reason, that's the beauty of our legal system.  Should we sue is the pertinent question when the city has significantly altered the original tunnels built by NYC.  

So if you disagree with the administration in this city, even with an off-hand Facebook quip about a certain mayor vacationing in Aruba during a significant Kingston emergency, be prepared for Junior Mayor Zweben to find some code or rule that has been violated and soon you too can have your story splashed across the front page of the Daily Freeman; at the very least your library card will be revoked.  And get a lawyer; it is the only language this administration speaks. 

Odds and Ends

Saturday was the Junior League's annual Easter Egg Hunt.  I made these for the bake-sale to help fund our scholarships; adorable right?  Ever since I found the Sally's Baking Addiction site I have been adding sprinkles to everything.  Sally is kind of evil and needs help and if you don't want to take my word for it check out her recipe for Oreo Cookie cake.  It is like 4,000 calories just to look at, but possibly the most insanely good dessert you will ever eat.  Damned you Sally for being so darn good!

A deal has been struck on the budget.  It mostly maintains the horrifying testing regime, scraps the expansion of charter schools, but adds more money than Cuomo had initially proposed (not incidentally the $2.1 billion needed to guarantee every student a sound basic education).   Sadly the draconian educational policies that Cuomo was hoping for have not yet been tossed to the scrap heap because NYC's school system will need re-authorization which provides another opportunity to hold the legislative system hostage to pay back the big donors to his campaign.

NYSUT has come around and joined the opt-out testing movement.  While some might argue they are coming late to the game, I say  "Welcome!"

The Telegraph reports that scientists can now explain why "hipsters grow beards."  I can only hope that scientists get to work immediately on why hipsters drink expensive fancy bottles of water and $5 a cup coffee.


  

Drowning Man Parable

So I don't know why, but this morning I woke up thinking about the Drowning Man Parable.  It can be used as a benchmark to identify primary causes.  The story is of a woman standing by a fast flowing river when she sees a drowning man struggling in the rushing water.  She jumps in and pulls him to safety, but no sooner is the man secured on the banks of the river when she hears another scream for help.  Again and again she spends her day pulling victims from the river.  Finally she asks the question, "who the hell is throwing these people in the water?"   In a perfect world she and the former victims go and conquer the story's antagonist, but it sort of ends with the question, leaving the reader to decide the next move.

When I think about yesterday's post about education and apply the drowning man parable, the solution to improving education seems simple.  Every study confirms that income and social networks (family, personal contacts) are the primary indicator of educational performance.  The proposed solution to improving education has been to starve the public education system of funding by proposing various tax incentives that seem like a 1% giveaway, diverting funds to private charter schools, and testing to hold teachers "accountable" for student performance.  Applying the parable, good policy would be primarily about working to address income inequality (like the $15 dollar minimum wage campaign), job creation and training, and more supports in the classroom to grow the child's social and cultural understandings.  For several years running, Congress debated extending unemployment insurance leading to showy floor fights between the Republicans and the Democrats.  Have any of them tried to live on an unemployment check?  Keep your stinking poverty check and create real jobs with the money.  I could go on, but I'll save it for tomorrow.  Down with the jerk who keeps throwing people in the river!

   

April Fools

This week in Albany our elected officials will be finalizing the annual NYS budget.  Last week my son and I made a visit to Albany with our friends from Citizen Action and the Alliance for Quality Education to speak with our elected officials about funding schools which is a big negotiating point in this budget cycle.  Governor Cuomo, lacking a true mandate to independently tie his shoes is holding school aid hostage by adding all kinds of poison pills to the budget, like more reliance on testing, more charter schools, and tax incentives that disproportionately benefit the  wealthy, in exchange for a fraction of the funding actually needed.  It is my understanding that the Assembly and Senate have rejected most of the proposals and are collaborating on a compromise budget, but it still falls short of the $2 billion in school aid that is owed and the love affair with testing for teacher evaluations is still on the table.  If you are reading this call your representatives and complain loudly before the final product is adopted.

Damning evidence is mounting from every corner of the ideological spectrum that the only incentive that has been fostered by testing for the sake of evaluating teachers is teaching to the test and ultimately demoralizing teachers, students and parents.  I will always support quality public education, but until this failed experiment with Race to the Top, Common Core, No Child Left Behind (collectively let's call them the creative use of marketing slogans), I'm educating at home.  The impetus to turn every public service into a commodity and imbed it with economic value to measure and evaluate is a destructive trend that fails on many levels.  I get squeamish when I hear about "patients" being referred to as "clients."  College students, now turned customer, spending a fortune on classes expect to automatically pass because they paid for it.  Why not?  It is no longer education, but an investment.  Students are not uniform widgets and teachers are not the owners of the factory with one objective to fulfill.  Kids are the product of their environment and families, with a dash of genetic lottery for good measure.  And on that note, I'm getting ranty...
     

Seems Like Old Times

Yesterday was Mayor Gallo's campaign announcement held at the Kings Inn parking lot.  I couldn't hear much from the speech because there was a ton of feedback from the sound system and the traffic tended to drown out most of the speech.  I missed the announcement four years ago at Kings Inn, but was horrified by the all-in-black thug photo-spread, just shy of jackboots (had I just listened to my gut instinct then...).  This time around he was buffered in by friendly seniors and his mother.  It was chilly but the mood was much warmer.  The crowd of more than 100 was diverse; a good turnout from Midtown, good friends from labor, city employees, and anybody hoping to business with the city and stay on the mayor's good side.   

I naively assumed there was going to be some big development announcement.  Let's think about this.  In four years we have an empty parking lot in the heart of the city, albeit with some nice benches and greenery.  It is across from a mysterious "spa," empty storefronts, and around the corner from a ratty Welcome to Midtown sign flanked by a dead tree.  There is the failed abandoned Bank of America building that remains vacant just a few doors up.  To be sure, there are some bright spots along the Broadway corridor that have popped up in the past few years like the Anchor which arguably has the best burgers in town, the Art Bar, Kingston Lighting, and the new snazzy new Barber Shop on the corner of Cedar Street.  Can we say this is due in part to the mayor?  That would seem to be overly generous.   

So now we have two announced Democrats.  I'll give the advantage to Gallo in the hair department, but Steve Noble had far superior refreshments.  Maybe more people could hear what Steve had to say since it was indoors at Tony's Pizza, also in Midtown, but there were many more pauses for applause and his message was positive.  As a longtime participant and observer in politics, I really like what I saw in the audience; no shortage of community minded do-gooders and a bunch of people who I have never met.  If you are looking for change bringing fresh faces into the dialogue seems like an obvious first move.          

Welcome!

Welcome to my new blog about local politics, education, motherhood and whatever else strikes my fancy.  Depending on my mood you may get a fabulous recipe for almond raspberry thumbprints or a long rant about the nonsense common core math problems that are torturing children.  As a former Alderman and unabashed political activist, you will hear a lot about politics.  It's all in fun so let's try to keep it clean.
 Animal Farm is one of my all-time favorites.  Orwell described his book as his first to fuse political with the artistic.  Power corrupts is a message that will resonate with anybody paying attention.  And who didn't love Snowball?