Senator Hiram Monserrate, has been giving a series of interviews, in which he constantly repeats the talking point that he was once a Marine and a cop and then tries to explain his wacky behavior of the last week. While I’m glad his defense is not as lame as his defense from the charges that slashed his girlfriend (at least he doesn’t deny he voted with the Republicans!), his statements make no sense.
For example, on Politckerny.com, he once again claims that he did what he did because of “vacancy decontrol legislation that was stalled.
http://www.politickerny.com/4051/monserrate-right-side-history
Monserrate must think that nobody remembers what appeared on the same website last week.
http://www.politickerny.com/3941/after-coup-landlords-reprieve
Joseph Strasburg has spent the past half-year playing legislative defense on behalf of landlords of stabilized apartments. This defensive posture was a relatively new one for the president of the Rent Stabilization Association, as he’d enjoyed a years-long alliance with the Senate Republicans, who dutifully blocked any major new rent regulations.
…Particularly if there was a full repeal of vacancy decontrol—which would prevent rent-stabilized units from becoming market-rate—the bills pushed by tenant groups would cost his members millions and, by landlords’ telling, would unleash a wave of defaults on apartment building loans citywide.
And in an instant—3:46 p.m. on Monday, June 8, when the Senate flipped from Democrat to Republican, to be precise—Albany, along with the positions of these two men, was turned on its head.
….Still, he and his colleagues at the other major landlord groups—the Real Estate Board of New York and the Community Housing Improvement Program—are hardly breaking out the Champagne, at least not publicly. “I think the reality is, it’s a reprieve, albeit a temporary reprieve,” Mr. Strasburg said. “You’re talking about a change that extends to next year,” if the deal sticks.
…The RSA had commissioned a study to show the deleterious effects on the construction industry that added regulation could have, and held a luncheon honoring Pedro Espada, the Bronx Democrat who led this week’s revolt.