Parsons and the Poor
With Time Warner CEO Richard Parsons in City Hall right now to present a study on poverty in NYC with Mayor Bloomberg, it's worth noting that the study reads like a potential mayoral plan for Parsons, whose electability has been under discussion for some time now.
While there are some similarities between Parsons and Bloomberg (CEOs, self-made, Republican), there is one noticeable difference: Parsons seems more comfortable talking about poverty, a subject that received little enough conspicuous attention from Bloomberg during his first term that it became a central line of attack for Fernando Ferrer last year. The study's recommendations make reference to expanded affordable housing, public education and job training.
Noting that nearly 340,000 New Yorkers are employed and living below the poverty line, Parsons writes, "Playing by the rules and being rewarded for hard work must be the ticket to financial security for our city's families."
-- Azi Paybarah
the mayor's hand-picked commission ignored the plight of the fastest growing needy population in new york -- the elderly.
instead they gave us the plan to increase budgets at 2 overbloated city agencies - the dept of education, where joel klein is silverplating his toilet, and the agency for child development, where their failures mean more money so they can fail more spectacularly.
bloomberg plans to do the same with his foundation. after all, his mom has all the money she needs so tough luck to all you old geezers in poverty.
The working poor is just the people this commission needs to keep the focus on. Lower income individuals get all kinds of benefits, but those that fight their way out of poverty are greeted by loss of health insurance, housing subsidy and food stamps. We need to ensure that is a good thing to escape poverty, not a trap that makes lives worse not better.
I heard from a reporter who was there that more than half of Bloomberg's Commission failed to show up. That Geoffrey Canada made an ass of himself and that Parsons stood there like Frankenstein while the Mayor was pulling strings.
Sounds like it could be a new reality show.
If Dick Parsons does decide to run, he can prove himself a better man than our current mayor by respecting the will of the voters and abiding by the campaign finance system, rather than drowning the voters in money during election season and then backburnering their economic realities once elected.