Michael Bloomberg

Earlier this week, New York Times reporter Felicity Barringer filed an excellent story on San Francisco’s successful waste management strategy.

The story discussed San Francisco Mayor Gavin Newsom’s zeal for keeping garbage out of landfills. Currently, his city keeps 70 percent of its disposable garbage out of landfills.

You might think that would be enough, but it’s not. He is about to propose legislation to mandate recycling of cans, bottles, paper, yard waste and food scraps. If you don’t recycle, the city won’t pick up the rest of your garbage.

How much of New York City’s waste is kept out of landfills? About 30 percent. Of course, that puts us ahead of Boston at 16 percent and Houston at less than 3 percent.  read more »

Mayor Michael Bloomberg’s $59.1 billion budget is a model of discretion and restraint, the sort of document one wishes former Governor Eliot Spitzer would have presented last January. Unlike the former governor, the mayor understands that government must adjust to economic reality, and that reality is, for the time being, grim.

“We are living beyond our means,” the mayor said when he released the proposed budget on May 2. No politician enjoys saying those words, so when they are uttered, attention must be paid. Mr.  read more »

It’s hard to see how any city can thrive without clean air. And while New York City is still a long way from becoming the Beijing of the United States—the Chinese capital has had to spend $17 billion to get its air within a barely acceptable range for Olympic athletes—a new report from the American Lung Association places the city within the top 10 most polluted cities in the United States.

The association lists New York’s air quality as “dangerous,” with high ozone levels, and sees a resulting increase in risk for heart disease and lung cancer.  read more »

Appearing at a conference with Mayor Bloomberg this morning, The Police announced that their final show—no, really this time—will take place in New York this summer.  read more »

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The mayor’s executive budget released yesterday called for $389.7 million in city funding for the proposed Willets Point redevelopment, an amount that would be one of the largest direct city contributions for an economic development project during the Bloomberg administration.

[Summary of the executive budget here as a PDF].

The money would be used for acquisition and infrastructure work, according to a city summary of the mayor’s budget plan, with the capital budget calling for the money to be spread over a 12-year period, with the bulk of it at the start.  read more »

Technically, Michael Bloomberg’s $59.1 billion budget increases spending -- albeit by one tenth of one percent -- but the loudest critcism it's facing so far is from officials and interest groups that want him to spend more.  read more »

Michael Bloomberg said giving drivers a break from the gas tax is “the dumbest thing I’ve heard in an awful long time.”

I asked him about it right after he delivered his executive budget at City Hall just now.  read more »

Michael Bloomberg is presenting his $59.1 billion budget, which grows city spending by one tenth of one percent over last year, and, according to the mayor's chart here, cuts back on capital spending.

According to the graph, "city-funded capital commitments" will be cut back by 20 percent.

But the $400 property tax rebate, and 7 percent property tax rate reduction are still on the books.

 

Here’s Peter Vallone Jr. describing a yelling match he had with Michael Bloomberg outside City Hall just now over Bloomberg’s plan to open another power plant in Astoria.

“I said, 'What happened to your fair-share doctrine? When it came to waste transfer stations, everybody was responsible for their own garbage.”

New York Times City Hall bureau chief Diane Cardwell is leaving for a year to study at Stanford, Sally Goldenberg reports.  read more »

Michael Bloomberg is coming out with a new book, to be collaborated on with Margaret Carlson, who works for him, sort of, as a columnist for Bloomberg News.  read more »

How much credit does Michael Bloomberg deserve for the relative calm that’s followed the Sean Bell verdict? It’s a question that’s more than just academic, given the potential for racially fraught episodes just like this one to have a defining impact on a mayoral legacy – and on a mayor’s political fortunes moving forward.

According to veteran New York political reporter Andrew Kirtzman, who I emailed for his take on the question, Bloomberg has been more lucky than skillful in presiding over what has been, so far, a restrained fallout.

Here’s Kirtzman’s take, from early this weekend:  read more »

Shortly after Sean Bell was killed, Michael Bloomberg told reporters, "It sounds like to me like excessive force was used."  read more »

I just got back from Michael Bloomberg's press conference at a job center in Jamaica, not far from where Sean Bell was killed in 2006.

Bloomberg said he doesn’t expect any violence in response to today's verdict, and added that there is room for peaceful dissent and possibly legal action.

Also there were Queens Borough President Helen Marshall, Council Speaker Christine Quinn, Council members Leroy Comrie and Tom White, and State Senate Democratic leader Malcolm Smith.  read more »

Assemblyman Ruben Diaz, Jr. told me just now, "Once again it's a travesty of the judicial system where it seems like this verdict is going to have black and Latino communities feel like the system works for some but not for all."

"What do we do now? What do we do now? What now?" Diaz asked rhetorically.  read more »

A little more than a year ago, Mayor Michael Bloomberg launched his pathbreaking "PlaNYC 2030" urban sustainability plan. According to the city’s own progress report on the plan’s first year:

 

The implementation of PlaNYC's 127 initiatives requires the effort of more than 20 City agencies; the help of our Sustainability Advisory Board; partners and supporters from all across New York City; and close cooperation with the City Council and other elected officials. In the first year since the release of the plan, we completed rezonings, planted 54,484 trees, moved our taxis and black cars toward fuel efficiency, encouraged bicycling with 60 new lane miles, and engaged New York City in the most significant transportation discussion in a generation.

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Here’s political science professor Doug Muzzio, who says there may not be much to look at, literally, once Michael Bloomberg’s two terms as mayor are over.

Here is something I just noticed.

Minutes after Kevin Sheekey went on NY1 and blasted Sheldon Silver for not having the "courage" to vote on the mayor’s congestion pricing plan, Sheekey officially made a new Facebook friend: Paul Newell, one of two Democrats seeking to oust Sheldon Silver in the September primary.  read more »

Despite Michael Bloomberg’s unsubtle hints, there are some people still trying to put him on the ballot for the 2008 presidential election.  read more »

City Councilman Jimmy Oddo, who has been critical of the city's Department of Buildings for years, said that getting rid of the commissioner, as Michael Bloomberg just did, should just be the beginning.

“You can replace [Commissioner] Patricia Lancaster with the most talented person in the world, and if you don’t provide this department with resources to put boots on the ground, you’ll have the same results for the last couple of years,” Oddo said.  read more »

Patricia Lancaster is out as the commissioner for the city's Department of Buildings.

Michael Bloomberg announced her departure in a statement just now.

From Bloomberg:  read more »

Today is Earth Day! It’s also the one-year anniversary of Michael Bloomberg's formal announcement of a plan for congestion pricing.

To honor the occasion, a congestion pricing critic, Assemblyman Mark Weprin, is distributing a letter that commends Bloomberg for putting the issue on the table:

"So while I opposed the congestion pricing plan, I applaud the Mayor for appropriately placing traffic congestion and its environmental impacts at the forefront of public discourse. Indeed, every mayoral candidate running next year will now have to present a serious plan for traffic mitigation in New York City.

Here's the full letter:  read more »

So last week, Michael Bloomberg hosted an elite luncheon at the Four Seasons hotel where he talked about things he hoped the various powerful figures in the audience would advocate when politicians ask them for contributions. He also spoke strongly in favor of issues like independent legislative redistricting and free trade with Colombia.  read more »

At a conference today organized last week the Regional Planning Association, which describes itself as a non-profit organization dedicated to improving the quality of life in the NY/NJ/CT metropolitan region, one topic dominated the discussion: the failure of congestion pricing.

Albany was the main focus of the conference participants' ire.

An exasperated Edward Skyler, the deputy mayor for operations, said, "The smallest things require approval from the state. For example, if we want to put traffic cameras up, we can't do that unless we get approval from Albany."  read more »

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At a press conference in Lower Manhattan about expanding 311, Michael Bloomberg gently tamped down the speculation that he might purchase the New York Times, saying, "I am not a newspaper person."

Bloomberg said he was "flattered" that anyone would think of him as a possible buyer.

Which is how he responded to, but didn't discourage, more than a year's worth of rumors that he would run for president.  read more »

At his press conference in midtown yesterday Michael Bloomberg was asked why one city agency approved a funding application for the Donna Reid Fund after the same group had been denied funding by another agency.

The mayor defended what had happened and added, "In fact, the process worked."

 

Two employees of Councilman Kendall Stewart have now been accused of skimming money off the grants the nonprofit received.

UPDATE: Councilman David Yassky's office released a letter this morning in support of the actions of the first agency to see an application from the Donna Reid Foundation--the Department for the Aging--expressing support and commending the agency for taking the right course of action. In recent days, D.F.T.A. has been blamed for not doing more to expose inconsistencies in the nonprofit's application.

Here's the letter:  read more »

Michael Bloomberg is having another run at Albany lawmakers, but this time, he's taking a less direct approach.

At an event in midtown yesterday afternoon, Bloomberg said he was donating money to help Arnold Schwarzenegger’s effort to push nonpartisan redistricting in California and said he hoped the efforts out there would advance the issue here.

If California could do it, Bloomberg said, it might "shame" New York lawmakers into doing likewise.  read more »

Michael Bloomberg and Arnold Schwarzenegger spoke with Charlie Rose about the economic and political issues they're facing at the annual Card Luncheon, which is going on at the Four Seasons in midtown right now.

Bloomberg acknowledged the economy is tough, but said that because the cost of construction is coming down, "if you want to build a building, now is the time to do it."

Schwarzenegger thanked the mayor for donating money to push the governor's plan for redistricting in California.

Bloomberg said he'd like that to happen here, and that if legislators can't be convinced to do it, he could "maybe shame them into doing it."

Here are the priorities listed on this year's New York City Card, according to a release sent out by the mayor's office:  read more »

Here is Michael Bloomberg holding court with a few people at the Four Seasons in midtown before a roundtable discussion to outline the mayor's priorities for the city.

The white-haired guy to the right is (former?) Eliot Spitzer nemesis Ken Langone.

The annual "Card Luncheon" is when Bloomberg tells city elite about what he thinks they should ask for when political folks knock on their door for contributions.

Barbara Walters is there.  read more »

Michael Bloomberg's "soul mate," Arnold Schwarzenegger, is in town today. Here's what they'll be doing, according to mayor's schedule:

*12:30 PM Hosts 2008 New York City Card Luncheon with Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger
The Four Seasons Restaurant
99 East 52nd Street between Lexington and Park Avenues
MANHATTAN
*Q & A to follow.

7:00 PM Speaks at National Marfan Foundation Annual HeARTworks Gala
Cipriani  read more »

Tishman Speyer, the newly-chosen developers of the West Side rail yards, would like to eliminate the northernmost spur of the High Line.

Friends of the High Line president and co-founder Robert Hammond doesn't believe it's going to happen—after all, he's already overcome seemingly insurmountable obstacles in the conversion of the elevated railway into a new city park.

When he first went to Mayor Bloomberg, he said, "The Mayor said 'Don't show us pretty pictures. We've got enough parks, we can't pay for them all.'"

So Hammond showed the city it could make money off the High Line—or at least, property owners in West Chelsea could and some other money would trickle down.

"I've seen this movie before," Hammond said today of Tishman Speyer's plans, speaking at the 2nd Annual Trends in New York City Land Use and Real Estate Development conference down at New York Law School this afternoon. "I think we'll get the whole Line," he said.  read more »

From the Bloomberg press office:

In anticipation of the sixth annual Poem In Your Pocket Day on Thursday, April 17th, Mayor Michael R. Bloomberg today published his first poem:
Press Conference

Pardon me, sir, I’ve a question or two …
You.
Sir, you said poetry is a delight…
Right.
Reading it makes you smarter, more mature?
Sure.
But is it better for people not to read verse?
Worse.
Do you read sonnets? Limericks? Odes?
Loads.
All these short answers. Why?
I -  read more »

Who, exactly, are Michael Bloomberg’s friends in Albany?

Since getting elected in 2001, Bloomberg has always counted on Joe Bruno and Republicans in the State Senate whenever he’s needed help in the capital, and he even gave a $500,000 donation to the Senate majority in the run-up the crucial elections later this year.

But lately, Bloomberg’s Albany team hasn’t counted for much.

First, a small a small band of Assembly members were successfully able to block the billionaire mayor's plan to open a waste transfer station in a part of lower Manhattan.

More recently, lawmakers in the capital shot down his cherished congestion pricing plan, which never made it to the floor.  read more »

Michael Bloomberg has struck a deal with Wal-Mart that will have the world’s largest retailer keeping records on guns they sell that are used in crimes.  read more »

 

In case you missed it, here’s Michael Bloomberg airing the new ad by Mayor's Against Illegal Guns on Good Morning America.  read more »

Last week Mayor Bloomberg announced that the Department of Citywide Administrative Services (DCAS) would request proposals from private developers to enter into a 20-year deal with the city to buy, install, own and maintain solar panels on city-owned buildings in New York’s five boroughs.

The goal is to deliver two megawatts (MW) of solar power to city-owned buildings. In 2007 New York City was selected by the U.S. Department of Energy (D.O.E) as one of 13 cities to help build the country’s solar-energy market. As part of this partnership, the city set a goal of increasing its photovoltaic cell capacity from 1.1 MW in 2005 to 8.1 MW by 2015.

This is of course a small drop in a very large bucket.  read more »

Councilman Lew Fidler of Brooklyn has a number of concerns about the "historic reforms" Christine Quinn announced at a press conference earlier in the day. Fidler said he does not object to spirit of what Quinn said—aiming for greater transparency—but he thinks the mechanisms will harm too many small groups.

Quinn said all groups that want money from the approximately $20 million speaker's discretionary fund will have to go through the Request for Proposal (RFP) process.

"The RFP process is flawed, and it tends to favor the large, well-funded groups that can hire grant writers," Fidler said. "It's this ladder process for the use of discretionary funds that really funds the local CBOs [community-based organizations)] that aren't quite as fancy or ritzy. You know, if they don't win the RFPs ..." he added, before trailing off.  read more »

Just days before the deadline to get federal funding for congestion pricing, New Jersey Governor Jon Corzine suddenly came out loudly in opposition to the plan.

This morning, WNYC's Soterios Johnson asked Corzine if he had discussed congestion pricing with Michael Bloomberg before that time, and what led him to vocally oppose it so shortly before the deadline.

"We had long discussions with many people in the administration," Corzine said. "And I with the mayor himself, and had no conceptual difference of view with regard to congestion pricing. In fact, New Jersey drivers today are paying that $8 price to come across the George Washington Bridge or come through the tunnels. We had, I thought, an agreement that there wouldn't be any increase in congestion pricing beyond the $8, or, it would be offset by what we were already paying.  read more »

Michael Bloomberg, introducing John McCain before a speech in Bay Ridge on the economy, just said, "I got elected because of you."

John Turnbull, the owner of Windows We Are, Inc. in Bay Ridge, where John McCain is set to deliver a speech with an introduction by Michael Bloomberg, just told me he's a Democrat and voted for Al Gore in 2004 2000.

But being a Democrat in Bay Ridge is sort of like being a Republican on the Upper West Side.

When I asked if he thought Bloomberg would make a good vice presidential candidate, he smiled politely and said he didn't know.  read more »

Michael Bloomberg still isn’t over that whole congestion pricing thing.

In a statement congratulating state lawmakers for passing a budget, Bloomberg wrote:

“This budget will help our City continue moving forward, even though we also have taken some big steps backward this week. We were, of course, enormously disappointed by the Assembly’s refusal to bring congestion pricing to the floor for a vote. The implications of their lack of action will be felt for decades to come.”

Here’s Bloomberg’s statement.  read more »

The Assembly rules. Or, more specifically, the Democratic majority in the Assembly does.

As expected, the signature component of Michael Bloomberg’s PlaNYC program, congestion pricing, was killed this week by Assembly Speaker Sheldon Silver and his Democratic caucus.  read more »

After he delivered a speech this morning in Washington, a reporter asked Michael Bloomberg if he agreed with top political aide Kevin Sheekey that Sheldon Silver lacked "courage" on congestion pricing.

‘Well, I didn’t hear what Kevin said last night,” Bloomberg said, according to audio provided by his office. “I suggest you talk to Kevin.”  read more »

Speaking the morning after congestion pricing went the way of Westway, Mayor Bloomberg announced that he is seeking to install solar panels on city-owned buildings to create 2 megawatts of energy—similar to the amount of power created by some large wind turbines.

The city plans to issue a request for proposals for the initiative, which would double the city’s solar capacity, according to the mayor’s office.  read more »

Delivering the keynote to Newsweek’s Second Annual Global Environmental Leadership, the day after the pillar of his sustainability plan failed, Michael Bloomberg briefly chastised the New York State Assembly before reminding the conference that there are more components to PlaNYC than congestion pricing.

Here’s an excerpt:

“But unfortunately, as most of you know, yesterday the majority caucus in the Assembly chose not to bring the governor’s congestion pricing bill to a vote – effectively killing it.

[skip]

“That’s not leadership.

[skip]

Congestion pricing was important; it was new; and it was controversial, because we would have been the first city in the nation to implement it.

“But let me make something crystal clear this morning. It was one of only 127 items in the PlaNYC agenda. The other 126 initiatives are important too. Many of which can be achieved administratively. They require no approval by any other level or branch of government.

Full speech after the jump.  read more »

Michael Bloomberg and his aides have presented the demise of their congestion pricing plan, which occurred without a floor vote in the Assembly, as an example of Albany’s well-noted dysfunction.

Not surprisingly, the view from within the Democratic-held Assembly is different.  read more »

"Shelly just came out of our conference and said our conference does not have the support to bring this to the floor,” Democratic Assemblyman Mark Weprin yesterday told reporters after a meeting with Speaker Sheldon Silver and Assembly democrats about Mayor Bloomberg's congestion-pricing bill. “I want to be clear that the conference was overwhelmingly against it,” he further said.

To say that congestion pricing died because the Assembly members were against it is of course true, but not the point. When items are important to Speaker Silver he has this habit of “leading” his conference. He will maintain that his style is to engage his members and compromise, and his ability to bully the legislature is overstated. That is, of course, ridiculous—the Speaker usually gets what he wants. The bottom line is that Shelly Silver killed congestion pricing.  read more »

Speaking on New York 1 News just now, Michael Bloomberg political aide, and architect of his non-campaign for president, Kevin Sheekey said, “I don’t see any courage in Albany.”

When asked if the mayor wants Sheldon Silver to remain as Speaker, Sheekey talked around the issue. When challenged that he wasn't answering the question, Sheekey said, "No I didn't, did I?" He went on to say, "It's not a question I've asked the mayor so it's not a question that I'm going to answer tonight."  read more »