SAYS HE’D HAVE YANKED QUINN’S LEDGER DOMAIN

By FRANKIE EDOZIEN

April 4 2008 - Mayor Bloomberg said yesterday that he had no idea the city budget allocated millions of dollars to phantom organizations at the request of Council Speaker Christine Quinn’s office - and that he would never have signed off on the spending plan had he known. April 4, 2008 — “This is the first I’ve heard of it . . . There’s an investigation, and until I see the results of the investigation, I really can’t comment,” Bloomberg said yesterday when asked about The Post’s front-page report.

When pressed about the revelations funds for dozens of sham groups - including the “Immigration Improvement Project of New York” and the “Association of Community Partners” - were slipped into the budget, Bloomberg said:

“If I found there were fake organizations in there, do you really think that I would sign the budget? Thank you very much. I would hope you’d expect a little more from me, for goodness sake.”

The mayor didn’t attack Quinn for the practice, calling her “the most honest person I know.”

The Post yesterday detailed how Quinn’s office hid millions in taxpayer dollars by allocating them to nonexistent organizations as a way of holding on to funds to dole out later in the year after the budget had been passed.

Sources said those monies were eventually awarded to legitimate groups as political favors to council members, but Quinn, who intends to run for mayor next year, insisted the funds were used to correct mistakes and oversights.

City Comptroller Bill Thompson, also a potential mayoral candidate next year, said that the report raised “serious concerns” and that such actions “would represent a breach of public trust.”

The shady bookkeeping is now the subject of probes by the city Department of Investigation and the US Attorney’s Office.

“We can confirm that the listing under fictitious organizations has gone back to 2001,” Quinn told reporters yesterday.

Late yesterday, Quinn released records that show the practice started with five fake groups totaling $1.1 million.

By fiscal year 2007, it had ballooned to 18 groups and amounted to about $3.6 million.

Quinn and her aides have said that the money was eventually awarded to dozens of legitimate groups across the city and that there were no allegations that those organizations did anything improper.

Quinn said that she ordered her staff several months ago to halt the practice of listing sham groups in the budget but that her aides disobeyed her and continued it.

Quinn’s predecessor as speaker, Gifford Miller, under whose watch the practice expanded, didn’t return calls for comment.

But the prior speaker, Peter Vallone of Queens, whose last budget in 2001 included funding for several nonexistent groups, said he knew nothing about it.

“To use a false name? That never went on when I was there . . . It’s a complete surprise to me,” Vallone told The Post.

Quinn’s potential mayoral rival, Tony Avella (D-Queens), blasted the speaker.

“It is absolutely disgraceful that we’re using phony organizations to set aside money that could be later used down the road for political bribery,” he said.

Councilman Charles Barron (D-Brooklyn), a frequent Quinn nemesis, said: “I find it hard to believe that it was just staff. It is illogical to think she didn’t know about this because she has to use the money.”

But Councilman Simcha Felder (D-Brooklyn) said he didn’t have much of a problem with Quinn’s aides reserving funds for unforeseen expenses.

“In this case, the only thing that’s terribly wrong is the bogus organizations. That’s all,” Felder said.

Felder added that there has to be “a reserve fund when things come up that were not anticipated to be able to help organizations that are in desperate need of money just because somebody made a clerical error.”

Betsy Lyman of the Citizens Budget Commission said the allocations to phantom groups “flies in the face of good government,” especially since Quinn has made an issue of making the budget more transparent to the everyday New Yorker.

Dick Dadey, of the Citizens Union, an organization that has long lauded Quinn’s reform proposals, agreed, saying, “This problem is inconsistent with her efforts as budget reformer.”

Meanwhile, Quinn said she was “not the target” of the investigations and insisted she blew the whistle by telling investigators as soon as she discovered it.

“I stand by the fact that there has never been a council speaker who has been as committed to transparency and clarity in the city budget as I have been,” she said.

Quinn said she was shocked that her instructions were ignored.

“The vast majority of the people who work for me are dedicated public servants who implement the wishes of myself and my colleagues . . . so obviously it’s the last thing I would expect that a direct and clear instruction would not be followed.”

QUINN OFFICE PROBED OVER BOGUS GRANT GROUPS

 

 

 

EXCLUSIVE

By FRANKIE EDOZINN

April 3, 2008 — City Council Speaker Christine Quinn’s office hid millions of taxpayer dollars by allocating grants to phantom organizations as a way of holding the funds to dole out political favors later - bogus bookkeeping that is the subject of city and federal probes, The Post has learned. Among the dozens of fabricated groups that were slated to receive funds were the “Immigration Improvement Project of New York” ($300,000), the “Coalition for a Strong Special Education” ($400,000) and the “American Association of Concerned Veterans” ($422,7The total amount set aside in 2007 and 2008 for the fake organizations - which are each listed by name in the city budget after being inserted at the council’s request - was $4.7 million. In the two years, 30 phantom groups were listed, council aides confirmed.

The money, in effect, became a slush fund for the speaker and was later used at Quinn’s discretion to reward groups that were loyal to her and to fund favored council members’ pet projects, sources told The Post.

The scheme gave “the speaker a stash of cash with which to thank or pay off politically important allies or cooperative council members,” a source said.

Quinn insisted in an interview yesterday with The Post that all of the taxpayer funds were ultimately used for legitimate purposes.

The never-before-exposed practice of hiding the funds dates to 1988, council aides said last night.

“It was used at the speaker’s discretion,” said an insider who worked for the council at the time it was headed by Quinn’s predecessor, Gifford Miller. “People would come in and say ‘We need money for this or that.’ ”

Sources said it may have been started to make an end run around the City Charter, which requires that all funds be allocated at the start of the fiscal year. That limits the speaker’s ability to dole out monies throughout the year as needs arise.

In the interview, Quinn, who plans to run for mayor next year and has made “transparency” in budgeting one of her pet causes, admitted she knew some funds were being held in reserve, but learned only several months ago they had been allocated to sham organizations.

Quinn said she ordered that the shady practice be abolished and only recently discovered her staff had not complied.

“I was kind of sick over the fact that there were things listed in the budget that were not accurate and that my instructions to the staff were disregarded,” Quinn told The Post.

When she learned several months ago that the practice had continued, Quinn said she turned over information about the bogus bookkeeping to “appropriate authorities,” including the city Department of Investigation and the Manhattan US Attorney’s Office.

Quinn’s aides insist she blew the whistle on the practice, but authorities have been investigating some aspect of the council’s finances since last year, sources have said.

Quinn recently hired an outside law firm to help comply with requests from investigators for documents and information dating back several years.

In a development that sources said was tied to the scandal, two of Quinn’s top finance aides were either forced out or resigned earlier this year.

 

 

 

 

 

By FRANKIE EDOZIEN

March 20, 2008 — The number of city cops will plunge to levels not seen since the early 1990s, Police Commissioner Ray Kelly testified yesterday.

Kelly told City Council members that he will follow Mayor Bloomberg’s order that agency heads cut their budgets by not hiring 1,000 officers that had been planned for.

The NYPD has had trouble in recent years hiring, and officials point to the current $25,100 starting salary as the chief reason.

“Right now, we have to do something to reduce our budget, and the 1,000-officer reduction seemed practical because we can’t hire,” Kelly said.

“We had no recruitment problems until June of ‘05 when the arbitrator lowered the starting salary . . . It’s been very difficult to recruit these past 21/2 years with a $25,100 salary in this most expensive city in North America.”

An arbitrator is expected to come up with new salary scales in the coming months.

Officials at the Patrolmen’s Benevolent Association disputed Kelly’s assertions that starting salary was the problem and said overall cop salaries are the issue across the board.

They said focus groups show that salaries in general are a problem.

“The NYPD has turned its inability to maintain staffing levels into budgetary savings at a time when local community precinct houses are screaming for more police officers,” said Pat Lynch, the PBA president.

He said Kelly’s plan to reduce cops by 1,000 will “strain to the breaking point the work force that is already burdened by fighting crime and terrorism.”

But Kelly told lawmakers that the reduction would not affect current operations.

Crime is down to record levels, with murders down to 496 in 2007 - 17 percent fewer than the year before.

By July, cops would number 36,838. Right now, there are about 35,800. In 1992, there were 35,802 cops.

But lawmakers, who were full of praise for Kelly for the city’s continually dropping crime levels, were skeptical that fewer boots on the ground could sustain the low crime levels.

“Your force is so over-extended that we will not be able to continue to make the gains that we have seen in the past. I believe that we are about at that point now,” Public Safety Committee chair Peter Vallone Jr. said.

Councilmember Hiram Monserrate (D-Queens) pointed out that the city had more cops in 2001 than now.

“During the worst crisis that this city ever faced we had 38,630 police officers and now we have approximately 35,548, somewhere around that. I don’t think that makes much sense.”

Monserrate, a retired cop, added, “I know if there was a Mayor Kelly right now, we would not be facing this issue.”

Kelly said after the hearing that cops would continue working to keep streets safe no mater what the numbers are.

“The Safe Street/Safe City head-count was 38,310, I believe, and the head-count that we are shooting for now is 36,838, so the numbers speak for themselves but a number of efficiencies have been brought to bear since that time.”

WENT BALLISTIC ON GAL PAYING WITH PLASTIC

 The New York Post

By FRANKIE EDOZIEN

CRAZY CABBY: A driver may lose his license after screaming at a passenger who tried to pay by credit card.

March 18, 2008 — A cabby who unleashed a frightening foul-mouthed tirade on a female passenger who tried to pay him with a credit card - and then drove off with her cellphone and wallet - now faces the loss of his license.

When passenger Nicole Omara, 25, reached her destination at East 75th Street and Third Avenue last September, she swiped her credit card in the yellow cab’s machine. That triggered a screaming rant from driver Ilias Jerhada, she testified at a recent hearing before an administrative law judge.

“Bitch, give me my f- - - ing money,” Omara quoted him as yelling.

She said the driver snatched her open purse, took out her wallet and cellphone and tossed the bag on the sidewalk before driving off.

Using a friend’s phone, she called police. Then she called her own phone, which Jerhada answered, still boldly demanding his money, she said.

He returned to the spot where he dropped Omara, triggering a new round of screaming just as cops pulled up.

Police had to separate the two, authorities said, but wound up arresting Jerhada when they found Omara’s property on him.

Administrative Law Judge Faye Lewis substantiated the allegations from the 4 a.m. dustup, noting Jerhada’s license had been suspended several times.

He failed to show up for the hearing, so he did not defend himself.

Lewis recommended that the Taxi & Limousine Commission fine him $500 and revoke his license. The ruling was made public last week.

Jerhada has several more days in which he can make a defense in the case.

TLC Commissioner Mathew Daus, who will issue a final decision, said yesterday it was a “particularly egregious case and we are thankful that Ms. Omara was not injured.”

Omara declined to be interviewed, pointing to criminal charges still pending against the cabby.

The case comes as the TLC is cracking down on drivers who tell riders they can’t pay by plastic.

The New York Post
By FRANKIE EDOZIEN

March 4, 2008 — Commissioner of Aging Edwin Mendez-Santiago told skeptical lawmakers yesterday the frozen meals the city is considering for seniors aren’t the average TV dinner.
“It’s not the same as when we take our own leftovers and stick it in the freezer,” the commissioner said.
“Within seconds of when the food is cooked, it’s immediately flash frozen so that when it is reheated, it’s as if it were as fresh as coming off the stove,” Santiago-Mendez testified in the City Council yesterday.
“When you go to your local supermarket to get something that might look green and fresh, that might have been flash frozen to retain its nutritional value while it was transported,” he added, saying the flash technology is used by reputable nonprofits such as God’s Love We Deliver.
After years of testing the program in The Bronx, the Bloomberg administration wants to give seniors the choice of either getting one hot meal daily or flash-frozen meals delivered twice a week.
A typical menu for the 17,000 lunches now served to seniors every day consists of appetizers, a main dish, fruits, vegetables and dessert.
Right now, officials said the myriad of contracts for senior meals cost between $2.60 to $26.04 per meal, but fewer contracts with the flash-frozen option would average $6.88 a meal.
That change would lead to fewer contracts and the ability to handle more specific requests, such as catering to diabetics, and being more culturally sensitive and offering more choices to seniors.
Currently, seniors only have two choices; kosher or regular.
Helen Foster (D-Bronx) wondered about the sodium content of the meals because she heard the food was a tad salty and asked, “Have you tasted the food yourself? I want to make sure we’re not offering something we haven’t tasted ourselves.”
Mendez-Santiago said his office and service providers had conducted numerous taste tests. “We even had Mayor Bloomberg do a taste test with some of the members of the bullpen [his office staff], and generally, across the board, people were very satisfied with the meals.”
He stressed that no senior would be forced to get the frozen meal - it would be a choice for those who would prefer not to wait for daily deliveries that might conflict with doctor’s appointments or other commitments.
Many lawmakers are concerned that the administration’s wholesale revamp of senior centers and senior meals might be moving too quickly. Lawmakers are also reluctant to sign off on a plan that takes away the daily human contact some homebound seniors have with those who deliver the food.
“Was there an outpouring of seniors who wrote the Department for the Aging, who wrote the mayor and said, ‘Listen the current system isn’t really working for me’ ” asked Melinda Katz (D-Queens).
Maria del Carmen Arroyo (D-Bronx), the chair of the committee. “You guys have a year and change left in this administration. You are locking in contracts for six months. What’s the rush?
“This is a lot to bite off. I’m not confident that [the Department for the Aging] is going to be able to chew this and digest it in a year and 10 months. Whoever comes in after is going to deal with the fallout. It takes six months to a year to understand if you were successful,” she added.
City officials are taking comments on their revamp proposal from now until March 14 at conceptpaper@aging.nyc.go

The New York Post

By FRANKIE EDOZIEN

March 3, 2008 — At least one American politician is sorry to see Fidel Castro go.
City Councilman Charles Barron said yesterday Cubans get some of the best health care in the world and he wants to study their system.
Barron leaves today for a nine-day tour of the communist island nation, where last week Castro - after 49 years at the helm - announced he would step down.
The Democratic Brooklyn councilman is going with a group of students from the City University’s Center for Worker Education, and will also tour educational facilities.
Barron told The Post he has a special fondness for Castro because of the Cuban leader’s efforts to help several African nations, particularly Angola, in their march toward independence decades ago.
“I think we should lift the embargo and normalize relations with Cuba,” said Barron, a former Black Panther Party member. He said the economic embargo was hurting Cuban citizens.
Barron’s support for Castro isn’t the first time the outspoken lawmaker has embraced an international political outcast.
Five years ago, Barron hosted a City Hall reception for Robert Mugabe, the dictatorial president of Zimbabwe, an event most council members boycotted.
Critics said Barron had ignored international outrage over Mugabe’s brutal and economically repressive regime.
It is doubtful Barron will ever get to roll out City Hall’s red carpet for the 81-year-old Castro.
The revolutionary leader hasn’t been seen publicly in almost two years since he ceded provisional authority to his younger brother, Raul.
The elder Castro made that transfer of power permanent last week when he said he was too ill to continue running the country on his own.
Barron said he is not scheduled to meet with either Castro, but said he’d welcome the opportunity should it present itself while he is there.
He added that he was eager to study the Cuban health-care system, which - echoing documentary maker Michael Moore’s film “Sicko” - he says is one of the best in the world.
The fiery councilman said he was paying for his trip with his own funds, not taxpayer allocations to his office, and that all travel was aboveboard. He is expected back March 12.
Officials at the State Department yesterday declined to comment on Barron’s plans, but in general journalists, members of non-governmental organizations and others can visit Cuba without special permission. Students, members of religious groups and relatives of Cubans require special travel documents

  

The New York Post  

By FRANKIE EDOZIEN

February 28, 2008 — After much backroom negotiation and wrangling, the City Council passed a watered-down version of the Bloomberg administration’s “green carts” proposal.

Administration officials had hoped to flood low-income neighborhoods with 1,500 vending carts stocked with fruits and veggies to fight obesity and diabetes.

The bill was opposed by many grocers and lawmakers but was passed by the council, 37-9.

The revised version cuts down the number of carts to 1,000 and precincts where the vendors can operate from 43 to 34.

“Does this solve every problem? No. But it’s just one of many pebbles that we have to throw in an ocean of neglect where people are not taking care of themselves in a healthy way,” said Leroy Comrie, (D-Queens) chairman of the council’s Consumer Affairs committee

The New York Post 

 By FRANKIE EDOZIEN

 February 18, 2008 — Supporters expect Barack Obama to pick up one or two delegates when primary results from New York City are recounted. The unofficial results were strikingly under-recorded in several districts around the city - in some cases leaving him with zero votes when, in fact, he had pulled in hundreds, Board of Elections officials have said.Those results gave Obama no votes in nearly 80 districts, including Harlem’s 94th and other historically black areas - but many of those initial tallies proved to be wildly off base.“Every election has problems, but in this case, all the problems seem to have been his,” said state Sen. Bill Perkins (D-Harlem). “He got all the zeroes and undercounting.“Some gross mistakes have been made. Very often, there are clerical errors. In this case, it was strictly with regards to Obama.” Perkins told The Post the issue is more than the “one or two delegates” that could be added to Obama’s tally, noting that if the results were accurately represented, there would not have been a “false momentum” for Hillary Rodham Clinton.

“It reflects the popularity and the weakness to her in her home state. It contributes to a false momentum,” he said.

A spokeswoman for the Board of Elections, Valerie Vasquez, stressed that the reported numbers are “unofficial.” Official results will be announced on Feb. 26.

THE NEW YORK POST

By  FRANKIE EDOZIEN 
February 14 2008 - Happy Valentine’s Day - here’s a condom. 

In what’s become a Valentine’s Day tradition of sorts, city health officials will be at subway stations today to hand out the city’s free condoms in sleek new packages with the slogan: “Get some.”

    “We want to give away as many condoms as people will use because we’re trying to make New York City an even safer place to have sex, and this is a powerful way to do it,” said Monica Sweeney, the Health Department’s assistant commissioner for HIV prevention.

    The new condom wrappers are all black with white lettering and a smattering of rainbow colors. They feature the slogan “Get some” over the label “NYC Condom.”

    Venues that will stock the free condoms will receive a new platinum-colored dispenser intended to draw people in to, well, get some.

    The Health Department released its first official New York City condom last year, distributing about 3 million a month. The old packaging was inspired by the city’s subway logos with brightly colored circles and letters.

    The new condom wrapper designs were a gift to the city from designer Yves Behar, of the San Francisco-based agency fuseproject.

    “We gave out more than 36 million of them last year. I hope the fresh look will help even more New Yorkers protect themselves from infection and unintended pregnancy in 2008,” Sweeney said.

    The free condom initiative is part of the city’s effort to reduce rates of sexually transmitted diseases and unplanned pregnancies. 

    The Big Apple remains the nation’s epicenter of the HIV/AIDS pandemic, with nearly 100,000 of New York’s 8.2 million residents infected.

    Currently, about 900 establishments - some restaurants, bars and salons, but mostly nonprofit groups - offer the condoms, Sweeney said.     

    Condom-carrying street teams from the department will greet commuters today at subway stations, including Union Square, Penn Station and Times Square in Manhattan; Atlantic Avenue in Brooklyn; and 149th Street and Grand Concourse in The Bronx.

THE NEW YORK POST  

By FRANKIE EDOZIEN

February 14, 2008 — Under threat of a mayoral veto, the City Council yesterday overwhelmingly passed a bill forcing manufacturers to collect discarded flat-screen TVs, computers, monitors and other electronic items - and recycle them at their own expense.

“We think we have to have some teeth,” said Mike McMahon (D-SI).

“We don’t want to have teeth that are too sharp, but we think what we’ve done here is very reasonable,” he said before the 47-3 vote.

By next summer, manufacturers who sell in the Big Apple would have to present a recycling plan to Department of Sanitation officials for approval.

By 2012, manufacturers would have to recycle 25 percent of what they sell.

Companies that do not meet the standards by 2012 could be hit with a $50,000 penalty for each percentage point below the standard.

Administration officials are opposed to the mandatory recycling targets.

Mayoral spokesman John Gallagher said “it penalizes the wrong people - the manufacturers who can’t control whether customers recycle or not.”

Larry Mandelker, a lawyer for the New York Metropolitan Retail Association, which represents some retailers that manufacture their own products, agreed.

“We don’t have the ability to go into people’s homes and seize their products,” he said.

Speaker Christine Quinn said, “We are hoping that we will be able to resolve any outstanding problems in the time that exists between now and when the mayor would have to take action on the bill.”