The Latest

The Principal’s Contract: Better Than the Last One

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The contract just reached between the city and the principal’s union contains some new ideas that are relatively fair to the rest of us. First, it includes higher pay for those with tougher jobs — running failing schools. Second, it ends the guarantee of an assistant principal job for assistant principals in schools that are closed down due to failure. Such
employees, if no other principal wanted to take them on, would be given the option of a buyout or teaching half a day. It also added merit pay, something I am less keen on given my lack of confidence in the ability of public sector managers to fairly identify merit, although the success of an entire school may be easier to judge than that of an individual employee. These, however, are half-measures, adopted after years of standoff with the City using the minimal leverage it has — deferring a contract and allowing wages to lag behind inflation, falling in real dollars. It was a limited gain from a very protracted fight.

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First Wood and Copper Now Cement

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Some of you may recall my post on the high bids in the MTA Capital Plan here. I recommended waiting until the housing bubble deflates, and lower prices were available, before accepting any bids. The price of wood and copper has already fallen. Today Bloomberg (the company, not the Mayor) reported “Cemex SA, the world's third-largest cement producer, may report profit fell for the first time in three quarters as a slump in U.S. housing hurt sales.” Cement must be produced locally, but the inputs to cement will be falling in price. If construction continues to boom in New York, and falls elsewhere, new producers may also be tempted to enter the New York market. Notes Bloomberg “The slump in the U.S. housing market, which accounted for 23 percent of Cemex's revenue last year, hasn't kept the company from seeking to expand there.” Lots of cement will be used in the Croton Water Filtering Plant. So why, from what I read in the newspaper, is the federal government pressuring the city to hurry up and award a contract to the only remaining bidder at a price way above the estimates before the price goes down?

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Public Streets and Public Parks

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Assemblyman Richard Brodsky is beginning to get on my nerves. Not only has he demanded that NYC's share of state education funding be cut more than I suspect it already has been (still waiting for ALL the data, and where did you think his extra share would come from)? But he is also objecting to an attempt to use a congestion charge as a means of limiting overuse of our public streets. In fact, people from elsewhere in the state would be welcome to use our public streets — on foot — just as they are now welcome to use our public parks. Is that true for NYC residents in all the parks out in the suburbs?

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Tolerating Law Breaking

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The City section of Sunday’s NY Times had an article about Jose Adames, who has the crazy idea that he is really Mayor of New York.

The story treats Adames as a harmless eccentric but does point out that he is constantly violating the law by taping or pasting fliers on light poles and other places.

The 2 relevant paragraphs are:

Mr. Collins confronted Mr. Adames at a board meeting in February. “I stood up,” he recalled, “and I said to him, ‘I have a question: Will you stop littering the community with your fliers?’ People in the audience applauded. He said, ‘No.’ ”

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Earth Day and Judgment Day

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I hear there are lots of people around the country who aren’t that worried about the fate of the earth and humanity. Judgment Day is coming and both are doomed, in their view, but that’s OK because righteous people like themselves will be going to a better place and leaving the losers behind. It is kind of like the hippie vision in the Crosby, Stills, Nash and Young song Wooden Ships. While I’m not a theologian, however, I’m not sure Judgment Day will turn out like those waiting for the Rapture have planned. Perhaps God has placed humanity in a circumstance that will force all of us to cast judgment, collectively, on ourselves — by placing us on a planet with the resources, and giving us both the ability and the will, to create either heaven or hell right here on earth. And He is sitting back and waiting to see what our choice will be.

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Finally, An End In Sight; Amen.

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A few months aback, when I first wrote about the vacancy in the 40th city council district, I had never in my wildest imaginations expected so much drama to a simple special election; but drama we had, and maybe the best is yet to come. No sense rehashing all the funky stuff of the past few months, but let me bring some of you up to date as to where we are, with just three days to the election (part two).

About 48 hours ago, a federal judge put candidate Wellington Sharpe back on the ballot, after he was removed by the NYC Board of Elections, which had upheld a challenge on Sharpe’s petitions from the Mathieu Eugene camp. Then yesterday, an appellate court held that despite the fact that Eugene had created the present vacancy in this district- by failing to take up his duly elected post- he should be still placed on the ballot, since his deceptive behavior didn’t reach the level of a felony. They arrived at this position despite the fact that the law is clear: once you create a vacancy, you cannot run for said office. The law is also clear that failing to swear in to office meant that “you” created the vacancy. So on Tuesday (4-24-07), there will be a special election in Brooklyn again, with Mathieu Eugene, Wellington Sharpe and Harry Schiffman as the candidates. So much for the law, its variations and violations; and on we go, and on we go, and we go on………

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Perhaps Joe Bruno Gave Some Assurances

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Current Employment Survey data is out for March, and local government employment is down 2,700 from 12 months earlier in New York City and up 8,400 in the rest of the state, continuing a trend that has gone on forever. Clearly something must be done about this. Such as taxing NYC residents to send more "tax relief" to the rest of the state, so it can continue hiring, while cutting the city's general revenue sharing. State government employment was up by 100 in NYC, and 1,600 in the rest of the state, as well. At least the city's private sector is growing. Because if it wasn't, and state revenues dropped, the city would be first in line for reductions in state funding, based on what has happened in the past.

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The National Transit Database: Retired?

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I’ve downloaded 2005 financial data on mass transit from the National Transit Database, and crunched it down to the most relevant information, with the intention of providing and discussing it on Room Eight. I’m still going to do that, but something I saw there makes me uneasy. The only heavy rail (subway) system in the U.S. with lower operating costs per revenue vehicle hour is the Chicago Transit Authority. This could be because the CTA has already installed a more advanced signal system (cab signaling) and gone to one-person train operation, efforts underway in New York, but there may be another factor. New York City Transit spent nearly 70 cents on fringe benefits for every dollar spent on wages, and while some of those benefits go to those working today, much of the money is for pensions and retiree health benefits. In Chicago, according to the NTD data, fringe benefit spending actually exceeded wages and salaries. But I read that the CTA is drawing to down its pension fund to pay oppressive retiree costs rather than building it up. In that case, the CTA’s costs may appear lower because retiree costs are being deferred to a future financial catastrophe. Given varying levels of pension and retiree health care under-funding, what does this comparative cost data really mean?

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The Budget: Still Waiting for the Answer

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The Fiscal Policy Institute has released school aid data based on the adopted budget. Their data shows the city’s share of state school aid was cut. But from what I can see, this data only includes school aid that is called school aid. From a practical perspective, it doesn’t matter if you send money to schools for them to spend without collecting local taxes, send money to schools to offset the local taxes they do not then collect because they spend it instead (STAR), or send money to taxpayers to offset what they do collect (the new checks). Education funding, therefore, in reality includes STAR and the new “tax relief” checks. I want to see it all.

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2007 NYC Election Scorecard

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2007 is an “off-year” in New York City politics. There are no Citywide or Statewide positions to be elected and no Congressional seats to be filled.

But there will be an election this year in New York City and there even may be some Primary contests.

As a public service, I present the list of public offices to be filled this November, with some commentary about who might be running.

This list only applies to public office (not party positions like District Leader or Judicial Convention delegate) and does not include special elections. Also, this list is still subject to change because on death or resignation.

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