DOT's Statistical Slight of Hand

What's with the NYC DOT? Well, the answer is the same thing that's with all of the other city agencies that put out phony statistics to "prove" the validity of their policies. The best example of this is the DOH's calorie posting experiment that the city claimed was working to reduce fast food purchases. The facts,as revealed in independent reviews of the policy, were starkly different.

Which gets us to the absurd bike lanes, designed to foist a particular world view on New Yorkers; and doing so by ignoring the negative impact that the policy may have on, let's say, ecoonmic activity.

But, as the NY Post's Steve Cuozzo points out, ideology is bad enough without the resort to dishonest statistical analysis that covers up the fact that the policy is helping very few people. How many it might be hurting is not even a consideration of the DOT (just like the DOH couldn't give a tinker's damn about the calorie poating's impact on fast food outlets).

Here's Cuozzo's take: "The city Department of Transportation is lying through its teeth about an alleged biker boom. Last week, an NYU Furman Center study based on US Census data revealed that far fewer New Yorkers bicycle to work than the city's DOT claims. A flack for the agency "answered" by sneering at the survey's methodology: "We count cyclists, not questionnaires." Sorry: The Post has been counting cyclists too -- and they're far fewer on the ground than DOT pretends."

The DOT's counting acumen is on the level with the old state school tests: " The truth about how many people cycle to their jobs matters because Mayor Bloomberg and DOT Commissioner Janette Sadik-Khan are using a supposed increase to justify their crazed campaign to install new bike lanes all over town -- at drivers' and pedestrians' expense. If bike-ridership to work is negligible, what possible rationale can exist for wasting precious city funds to reduce the number of vehicular lanes? And, in the process, hurting stores and restaurants that depend on curbside dropoffs? (And let's not even touch Sadik-Khan's bizarre initiative to stick parking places in the middle of streets.)"

The bike lanes are not only failing to encourage folks to bike to work, they are making traffic much worse: "Fun's fun -- but to recognize the lie of a bicycle "boom," check out Broadway between 47th and 59th Streets, where a virtually unused bike lane and pedestrian mall shrank four auto lanes to two. You've only to be stuck in traffic there -- or on Allen Street downtown heading north, where a similar lane was installed -- to appreciate the DOT's stupidity."

We appreciate DOT's stupidity, but what about the agency's mendacity? Progressives like Sadik-Khan like to make fun of neanderthal right wingers for being anti-science; yet they have no compunction about doing junk science themselves in order to promote their ideology.

And what about hypocrisy? As we have pointed out before, the bike fanatic commssioner is in the mayor's vanguard trying to foist a phony traffic study for Willets Point on the NYSDOT-a development that will choke local roads and highway with massive traffic increases.

What all this means is that we have a city government that believes the end justifies the means. And given the mendacious use of data-from education and health, to traffic and bikes-every city agency should go through its own "means" test.

Warning Issued to NYSDOT

WPU has been contesting the EDC proposed ramps off of the Van Wyck for the better part of a year and a half-and in that time we have seen how the agency's consultants have consistently come up short in their efforts to explain of they are going to accommodate 80,000 car trips a day without totally messing up the highway system. And for the most part NYSDOT's own in-house analysts have agreed with us-with skepticism oozing out of all of the emails we have obtained through our Freedom of Information requests.

So it was with great dismay that we received a communication from the state informing us that the EDC Environmental Assessment for the ramps is about to be given a green light by the very skeptics who trashed EDC's submission a short while ago. Even greater was our dismay when WPU traffic engineer reviewed the accompanying data for the EA.

What has changed? Not too much-and the same impossible accommodation for the massive increase in cars has not been reconciled with the need to insure that the Van Wyck is not degraded by the auto efflux from Willets Point. The SDOT altered mindset then appears to have devolved not from the newly developed sophistication of EDC''s consultants, but from simply trying to get away from the political beating that it has been getting from a determined and bullying Bloomberg administration.

As a result, WPU's crack environmental attorney Mike Gerrard has penned a stern warning to SDOT-and the warning focuses, inter alia, on a grave mistake by the agency in its acceptance of a fatal flaw in the EA's analysis: its assumption of a baseline analysis that excludes the possibility that there would be no project built and no ramps constructed.

Simply put, SDOT accepts the city's argument that Willets Point will be built, and that therefore the ramps are needed to mitigate the massive traffic it will generate. But that assumption ignores the fact that the city has said that, without the ramps, no project can go forward at the Iron Triangle. This is the key baseline analysis that EDC has ignored and that SDOT ignores in apparent collusion.

So it is not proper for the baseline analysis to assume that the project is built and then compare the Van Wyck traffic with and without the ramps. It is a violation of basic environmental review principles and a apparent knuckling under by the state to political pressure. It opens SDOT up to a legal challenge that will severely embarrass it's alleged fairness and professionalism. When its internal criticism are aired in any legal proceeding it will not even be left with a fig leaf to cover its gross abdication of independent review and professional responsibility.

Here's Gerrard's letterl-with a copy sent to the Federal Highway Authority:

April 19, 2011

Phillip Eng, P.E.
Regional Director
New York State Department of Transportation
47-40 21st Street
Long Island City, New York 11101

Re: Van Wyck Expressway Ramps

Dear Mr. Eng:

We are in receipt of your April 12 letter concerning the environmental assessment and review process for proposed ramps connecting the proposed Willets Point project with the Van Wyck Expressway.

We have begun a preliminary analysis of the material in the January 2011 draft of the Environmental Assessment (EA). This examination leads us to conclude that NYS DOT’s approval of the ramps would violate its statutory obligation to ensure that new connections to interstate highways do not lead to significant degradation of traffic conditions on those highways.

The EA embodies a fundamental conceptual flaw. It assumes that the Willets Point project will be built, and it assesses whether the ramps will improve traffic conditions against that future baseline. But since the City of New York has consistently said that the construction of the full project is contingent on the approval and construction of the ramps, the baseline for analysis should be the future without the Willets Point project at all. A comparison of conditions with the Willets Point project, but with and without the ramps, is meaningless, because the City says that there will be no Willets Point project without the ramps. It is pointless to analyze an impossibility.

After looking at today’s conditions (which the Final Generic Environmental Impact Statement (FGEIS), the Access Modification Report (AMR) and the EA have all done to various extents), the EA should analyze and compare 1) future conditions on the Van Wyck without the Willets Point project or the ramps, and 2) future conditions on the Van Wyck with the Willets Point Project and the ramps. (The EA looks at future conditions in both 2013 and 2035, which is sensible.)

The City, as applicant and project proponent, understandably does not wish to see such a comparison, but it is NYS DOT’s obligation under NEPA, SEQRA, the Federal-Aid Highway Act and the New York Highway Law to ensure that it is carried out.

It appears that NYS DOT has ignored its own justified skepticism, expressed eloquently by its own staff in voluminous internal exchanges and in communication with NYC EDC that have been obtained by FOIL and have been widely published in the NY Times. This sudden departure from proper due diligence is underscored when analyzing the substance of the data inherent in the EA.

Our traffic engineer Brian Ketcham has reviewed the January 2011 EA, Chapter 9 -- Transportation, and compared it with the October 2010 version. Except for a revised note on the table on page 9-2, the transportation text is identical. Moreover, no change has been made in Appendix D (more than 3,600 pages), the supporting documentation for the transportation analysis.

It is quite disturbing that in the 15 months since we met with both NYS DOT and the FHWA and provided a thorough review of the deficiencies of the original NYC EDC traffic submission for the AMR of August 2009, NYS DOT has not ensured that these deficiencies were corrected. The 2008 FGEIS for the Willets Point Project showed severe traffic impacts on the Van Wyck; the AMR did not. The large discrepancies between the AMR and the FGEIS remain unexplained, and now the revised EA appears to be agreeing with the AMR.

The numbers used in the FGEIS and the AMR are starkly different. For example, the FGEIS indicates that 46% of all the traffic from Willets Point will be diverted to the ramps, while the AMR puts that figure at 16%. The October 2010 EA adjusts this total upwards to about 32% of Willets Point traffic using the Van Wyck in order to lower local traffic impacts but still claims travel along the Van Wyck acceptable, contrary to the independent modeling by Mr. Ketcham that was submitted to you more than a year ago, and in continuing contradiction to what was reported in the FGEIS.

Mr. Ketcham’s work has also shown numerous other technical flaws in the analysis. His review of the new EA draft, which was provided to us last week, is ongoing. These inconsistencies highlight the importance of the request made by Willets Point United and endorsed by the Natural Resources Defense Council and the Sierra Club for an independent review of the documents, especially since the principal traffic analysis was prepared by AKRF, a consulting firm that is simultaneously working for NYC EDC and NYS DOT.

As you know, NYS DOT is in the process of upgrading the Kew Gardens Interchange at an estimated cost of $140 million, and NYS DOT’s own analysts have pointed out that the Willets Point traffic will make this work meaningless because of all the excess traffic generated by that development. NYS DOT engineers were concerned about 16% of Willets Point traffic moving along the Van Wyck Expressway. Now that EDC has doubled this number, one would assume that these concerns are even greater.

As Mr. Ketcham made clear in a letter to NYS DOT last year, “Thirty-one million square feet of new development is scheduled for the area surrounding Willets Point (including the 11 million square feet of the Willets Point project itself). As the attached report shows, assuming more than half of all new trips are by mass transit, these new projects will generate about 172,000 new car and truck trips daily, more than double the 80,000 estimated for Willets Point itself. If mass transit in downtown Flushing cannot handle another 196,000 daily transit trips assumed for this 31 million square feet of new development, car and truck trips will be even greater. Some of this new traffic will use the Van Wyck and some will move through the Kew Gardens interchange. The question is, have you accounted for all this new development and can you accommodate as many as 2,000 new car and truck trips an hour moving though the Kew Gardens interchange?”

When and only when a proper traffic analysis is performed will NYS DOT be in a position to actually do its job: examine whether this project meets the eight criteria established by the FHWA for reviewing proposed access modifications.

Another point deserves mentioning. The City repeatedly promised, including in affidavits submitted to Justice Madden of the New York State Supreme Court, that it would not carry out the condemnation of properties at Willets Point until the ramps had been approved. In February 2011 the City announced that it was abrogating that pledge and was segmenting the project into at least two phases. Phase I would involve condemnation and construction without the ramps. When informed of this, Justice Madden issued an order to show cause directing the City to explain why her 2010 order dismissing the Article 78 proceeding should not be vacated due to the City's actions going forward with condemnation without having obtained approval for the ramps.

These actions demonstrate the City’s disregard of traffic impacts and of any pledges it makes to other units of government, or the public, with respect to Willets Point.

I will also take this opportunity to remind you of the pledge you made in your letter to me of December 6, 2010 that NYS DOT would comply with the newly enacted Smart Growth Public Infrastructure Policy Act in connection with this project. We have seen no evidence of such compliance, including the smart growth impact statement that is required by that statute.

We reserve all our legal rights in this matter.

Sincerely,

Michael B. Gerrard

cc: Kenneth Dymond -- FHWA

Weiner and Willets Point

With the report today in the NY Daily News that Congressman Anthony Weiner is all but announcing that he's running for mayor, let's take a peek at what Weiner has said and done in regards to Willets Point-which is, after all, in his backyard. For years Weiner has cultivated an outer borough toughness and a homegrown neighborhood protectiveness image. No Manhattan limousine liberal is he.

It was precisely for this reason that WPU went to meet with the congressman last year to brief him on EDC's deceptive practices, and to seek his support against the eminent domain railroading of the Iron Triangle property owners. And Weiner was receptive to the pitch-particularly when WPU's Brian Ketcham explained how EDC's deceitful practices over the Van Wyck ramp traffic would lead to gridlock permeating through all of the neighborhoods surrounding Willets Point. He was also swayed by the fact that the NRDC had endorsed an independent review-along with a growing number of local civic groups.

WPU's concern was that the regulatory process might be rigged-especially since we had seen how the Bloomberg administration had used extra legal methods to gain approval for the project at the city council. Clearly, we felt that the billionaire mayor's influence might mean that state and federal regulators would bow-not to the facts-but to the pressure.

Weiner assured us that, if we could show that the process was not above board, he would look to intervene. That was then. Since that time we have bombarded his office with evidence that shows the the regulatory review process has been tainted-even pointing to the fact that the NYC DOT commissioner was cited for threatening a SDOT official for not expediting-rubber stamping in our view-the EDC application for the ramps.

This, as it turns out, was merely child's play. Now we can see how EDC is trying to totally avoid any regulatory review by embarking on a Phase I that is a product of a warped imagination. As Brian Ketcham has once again shown, this phase will generate tens of thousands of daily car trips that need mitigation or else they will inundate the local roads and highways. And minimally, ramps off of the highway are needed to lessen this expected gridlock.

As part of WPU's fight for fairness we have drafted a letter to the Washington office of the Federal Highway Administration that calls for that agency to take a hard look at the ramp proposal. In the letter we cite an email that heretofore we have kept under wraps. Here's the relevant section of the letter:

Via letter dated July 2, 2010, Phillip Eng, Director, NYSDOT Region 11, responded to the Natural Resources Defense Council, in relevant part: "We understand the request for an independent review but believe that working closely with NYCEDC, we can assure that the analysis will be based on sound data".

NYSDOT's refusal to solicit any independent review of proposed roadway project X770.44 is disappointing, especially considering that NYSDOT apparently routinely relies on the independent firm AKRF to perform reviews of environmental analyses on behalf of NYSDOT. Candid internal NYSDOT email communications obtained by our community organization reveal NYSDOT's actual position, that independent review is a plague that could
afflict NYSDOT's future large projects:

"this [request for independent review] is dangerous ground and the Commissioner needs to be prepared to address. The use of a separate consultant, so-called independent, is a waste of the tax payer's money especially at a time when such expense cannot be afforded. We went through this on the Meeker project (to our detriment) and fought successfully against it with the K-bridge. To yield on this point now would reinforce this practice and possibly wind up plaging [sic] all of our subsequent larger projects. It is the responsibility of the Department to exercise this oversight and I think we have done it well. Lets [sic] not abrogate this point." – Peter King, Director, Planning/Program Management, NYSDOT

Region 11, email to Ian Francis, Senior Transportation Analyst, NYSDOT Region
11 and Phillip Eng, Director, NYSDOT Region 11; September 12, 2010, 9:09AM."

Now clearly SDOT was fighting the idea of any independent review for its own institutional reasons-and that it was trying mightily to expedite the Van Wyck ramp approvals in order to avoid the federal bogeyman. That it has yet to do this-and that EDC is now trying the old end around ploy-dramatically underscores just how deficient the EDC traffic data submitted to SDOT actually was. And this is further demonstrated by the way in which NYC DOT Commissioner Sadik-Khan has tried to bogart the state agency into a rubber stamp approval of the ramps.

The Anthony Weiner from the neighborhood that we have always admired would never allow this kind of deceit and bullying to go unchallenged. In the past two years, however, Weiner has been polishing his progressive credentials by bashing national Republicans at every turn. In our view, that's fine, but it's time that he came back to his roots.

This entire Willets Point development process has been tainted by extra-legal methods, influence peddling, and outright strong arming of small business owners. According to Daily Politics, Weiner anticipates the support of the Clintons if he runs for mayor. If so, he should take a page from the old Bill Clinton playbook and triangulate back to the middle-back to his neighborhood roots. WPU needs a champion, and it is precisely the right role for mayoral candidate Weiner to play going into the next election cycle.

Inhuman Trafficing

The NY Post comments today on the duplicity of the NYC DOT in regards to the traffic impact of all of its anti-car experiments:

"In a City Council Transportation Committee hearing last week, Chairman James Vacca got Department of Transportation officials to admit that they have no real clue as to the full impact pedestrian plazas are having on surrounding streets. The plazas — such as those at Times and Herald squares — seem second only to bike lanes on Department of Transportation chief Janette Sadik-Khan’s anti-automobile agenda.The eventual goal is to have at least one plaza in every one of the city’s 59 community boards. Fourteen are in the planning stages — at the “request” of locals boards, so the DOT says."

Before we get into the breathtaking hypocrisy of Sadik-Khan's efforts to supposedly reduce the city's carbon footprint by eliminating as much vehicular traffic as possible, let's examine the agency's data veracity:

"DOT officials assert that traffic flow at Times and Herald squares has increased efficiency since the plazas were installed two years ago. The city also insists that local air quality is improved. But why believe them? The agency’s data on this issue, as well as bike lanes, have proven questionable at best — undermined even by its own numbers, to say nothing of independent studies."

What gets us is that all of these officials-from the mayor on down-claim to be data driven; and then they proceed to cook the books by releasing self serving statistics that can't hold up to any independent review. Sound familiar?

It's the same phenomenon over at Willets Point-with a shoes on the other foot quality. There EDC is pushing forward with an Environmental Assessment of ramps to the Van Wyck that is nothing short of a giant Con-with the development agency relying on political muscle instead of science to bogart the state and federal regulators.

Put simply, the EDC traffic mavens have not proffered any new data that would diminish or debunk WPU's original put down of the first fraudulent traffic analysis that the agency submitted to SDOT all the way back in 2009! Back then the state was on the verge of rubber stamping the report until WPU intervened. A year and a half later, SDOT is once again looking like it's going back to its original craven posture in spite of all of the solid contradictory data that demonstrates the chaos that will ensue if the ramps are built.

But let's get back to the blatancy of Sadik-Khan's hypocrisy. First, here's Michael Goodwin's take on the City Council hearing:

"It's taken a while, but a city councilman nails the problem with street plazas. James Vacca, a Bronx Democrat, gets to the heart of complaints when he asks, "How do we make sure that we're not just shifting and diverting traffic and that the problem we had in one spot moves to another?" City officials don't have a good answer because they don't care about cars and delivery trucks. In a perverse way, they see congestion as their friend because, they hope, it will encourage people to give up driving. What it actually does is encourage people to give up on the city."

Yet this same bicycle helmet for brains commissioner is cited as the bad cop brow beater of SDOT. For what, you may ask? For not expediting the project (by ignoring contradictory data) that will generate 80,000 cars trips a day onto the Van Wyck and all of the local streets surrounding the proposed Willets Point development.

What links all of this? The city's reliance on fraudulent stats to promote nay and all of its projects. Whether its car reduction or car promotion, the one thing you can rely on with the Bloomberg crew is unreliable numbers-often intentionally so.

We'll conclude with an observation made by the Post about this chronic unreliability. The paper's reference to pedestrian plazas can easily be transposed to the Willets Point ramps:

"Vacca wants the DOT to produce real data of the spillover effect for every community board where a pedestrian plaza is to be installed. Hope he’s not holding his breath; he’ll turn bright blue before the city coughs up the data. And should it ever do so, he’d do well to double-check every tittle and jot."

EDC's year-long coverup continues

From the Neighborhood Retail Alliance:

It is now approaching a year since Willets Point United and its traffic maven Brian Ketcham blew the whistle on a fraud that was about to be committed by EDC over the application to build ramps off of the Van Wyck Expressway to accommodate.

What has transpired since last February is nothing less than a vaudeville act. The DOT, after promising transparency and cooperation with whistle blower Ketcham, circled its wagons and has refused any direct information exchange with the expert who prevented the agency from looking like a compliant horse's ass. The actions of EDC, however, are even more egregious-it has refused to give up any information on the work product that has gone into the AMR's revision-and this is after DOT promised WPU that it would have a revised AMR by no later than October 1st.

Can any one concerned with accurate and open government defend the actions of these two agencies?

...WPU has got ungatz from either DOT or the NYC EDC-a stonewalling that further compels that this entire process should be opened up for an independent and public review process. But review aside, EDC is breaking the open government law-refusing to hand over documents that it is required to do under the Freedom of Information Act; a refusal that is instructive about the way this quasi-public agency goes about its business.

The Willets Point development is a massive use of tax payer funds that, while forcibly removing property owners, will have a huge impact on, not only the immediate Willets Point/Corona/Flushing neighborhoods, but the entire region. The proposed Van Wyck ramps are the linchpin of this development, and their ability to accommodate and mitigate thousands of daily car and truck trips is essential for the ability of this development to function smoothly-and NYC has admitted this in court papers.

Put simply, if the ramps either aren't built, or can't perform the tasks assigned to them, the entire Willets Point development becomes a collapsing house of cards. Therefore, the review of these ramps is a crucial variable in evaluating the feasibility of the entire Willets Point project.

If, however, the process is suborned by agency collusion-aided and abetted by an administration used to getting its way in spite of any perceived contradictory facts-a disaster awaits Queens County and its road and mass transit infrastructure. EDC is in dire need of an intervention-the people of Queens and the rest of NYC, including the embattled Willets Point property owners deserve no less.

Ramp Fix?

The Flushing Times is reporting on our dismay over the apparent about face being done by MYS DOT over the long-and appropriately-delayed approval of the Van Wyck ramps: "A representative of a coalition of Willets Point business and property owners opposed to the city’s plan to undertake a $3 billion redevelopment of the neglected area says he is dismayed at indications that the state may be green-lighting the project"

If true, the agency is making a big mistake and is skating on thin ice. According to what we were told by State Senator Martin Dilan-who had a sit down with former commissioner Stanley Gee-the agency, at least at that time in late December, had strong misgivings about the viability of the ramps.

So what has changed since that time? Not the data that Brian Ketcham has told us has not been significantly been altered since February 2010. This would mean that the EDC consultants have not really found a way to square the huge traffic influx on the highway with the traffic impact requirements of the federal highway folks.

And given the skeptical emails we have recovered from the agency it is hard to see how such a dramatic change of direction can be justified-or defended in court.

But one major change has occurred-there is a new commissioner and her background may just be instructive. You see, until 2007, Joan McDonald was a vice president of the NYC EDC corporation. State Senator Avella met with her recently: "State Sen. Tony Avella said he met with state DOT Commissioner Joan McDonald recently and that she said the agency had yet to decide whether or not to give its approval. “I had a personal meeting with the state DOT commissioner looking at the issues of the ramps within the EIS that the city did and also other issues,” Avella said Tuesday. “They said basically they were still reviewing it.”

WPU attorney Mike Gerrard has a different take here: "According to Michael Gerrard, an environmental attorney working on behalf of Willets Point United, the “tone of the e-mails” suggested that the state DOT had completed its environmental review of the proposed development and that it planned to approve the city’s plan for building ramps onto the Van Wyck Expressway to deal with tens of thousands of new car trips the project is expected to create each day."

In our view the change of commissioners is the only new variable and the fact that she hasn't recused herself from this review procedure is a significant ethical lapse. There is no way that someone with her prejudicial background should be in charge of this major department decision and we're surprised that the Cuomo administration-with a huge new emphasis on ethics-hasn't seen the problem and sought to address it.

This is particularly true since it was Cuomo as AG who sat on the investigation of the illegal lobbying activity of Claire Shulman-effectively running out the clock on it before being elevated to governor. The fact that he accepted the endorsement of the mayor during this time frame further complicates the ethical issues.

The facts of this ramp review aren't changed. There is simply no way that the ramps and the Van Wyck can accommodate the huge traffic influx; and SDOT's acceptance-as a given-that the Willets Point project will be built is unacceptable under the basic principles of environmental law, creating a fatal flaw should it approve the ramps.

NYS DOT is planning for a public review of the ramps sometime very soon. Discretion would dictate that this review be postponed at least until the commissioner recuses herself and an independent arbiter is brought in to monitor the process. Otherwise, everyone is going to believe that the fix is in-and that once again ethics in government will be seen as nothing but an oxymoron.

Uncovering Fraud and Deception at NYSDOT

The more that the review process for the Van Wyck ramps is examined the more evidence is brought to light that the entire review process-to quote a great legal phrase-lacks honesty integrity and good character. WPU's examination of the emails we have obtained indicates just how poorly the review was done prior to WPU's intervention; and just how nonfeasance is now poised to be converted into malfeasance if the agency does move forward with an approval and a public hearing.

In the winter of 2009 NYSDOT was poised to approve the ramps-blithely moving ahead without any apparent understanding of their difficulties and the fact that NYC EDC had done two separate contradictory studies. Here's a representative sample from one email:

"Chung-kuo Chiang (NYSDOT Civil Engineer), 9/3/2009 at 9:39AM:

"... I have reviewed the AMR (Access Modification Report) for the Willets Point Development Project. I found the AMR follows the NYSDOT Project Development Manual Appendix 8 "Interstate & Other Freeway Access Control & Modifications" formats and guidelines. I think the submitted AMR technical document used to request and to justify the Van Wyck Expressway ramp access and/or modification's acceptability and approval could be granted pending final approval from Main Office DQAB..."

Main Office Mobility Bureau, Main Office Liaison Engineer, and FHWA Division Office.

And this from the regional director-apparently eager to do EDC's bidding:

Phillip Eng (NYSDOT Regional Director), 8/19/2009 at 11:55AM:

"Ian, Where do we stand on the AMR and the schedule we have in place to meet EDC's timeline needs? Thanks."

In December Eng expresses the following: "... I'd like to approve the AMR asap"

In January NYSDOT's Peter King is ready to wrap the AMR up in a bow

"I think we're near the 'finish line' regarding Willets Point, but we still must review, comment on, and discuss with EDC, the attached material which was requested at our meeting in my office several weeks ago. I'm particularly looking for input from Traffic/Safety since those seem to be the critical issues outstanding. If you can look at Gil Mossieri's memo to EDC and generate comments, Ian and I will set up a conference call with EDC and hopefully complete the resolution of all remaining questions. Please note that Phil continues to get pushed on this so we must make it a priority to satisfactorily resolve. ..."

All is rosy except for the comments of DOT's last honest man-an engineer named Michael Bergman who expressed significant reservations to the viability of the project:

"Michael Bergmann (NYSDOT Region 11 Structures Unit), 11/10/2009 at 9:27AM: "Peter, please note from my previous comments that this proposed access increases traffic on the VWE down to the KGI interchange. I know we have previously stated internally that we really don't want that to happen. Their previous answers on this do not address the question."

Michael Bergmann (NYSDOT Region 11 Structures Unit), 12/3/2009 at 4:42PM: "... my original comment simply stated that NYSDOT had serious concerns with increasing traffic volumes on the VWE. Kew Gardens is only one part of this issue, and is probably not the most serious part. There is another major interchange between this site (Willets Pont) and KGI: the LIE/GCP/VWE interchange. Region 11 did a lot of analysis of this interchange over the last few years. If any traffic changes on the VWE affect Kew Gardens, those same effects are likely to affect the LIE interchange too. The point of my comment is that we simply cannot add traffic to an existing expressway which has known congestion problems and ignore the effects of the increased traffic. I have yet to see anything from the consultant on this."

Bergmann's skepticism, high standards and insistence that NYCEDC still had not addressed significant issues may have influenced NYSDOT's decision to divert from NYCEDC's schedule, by not approving the proposed Van Wyck ramp project prior to the end of 2009. Although Bergmann's contributions to NYSDOT's evaluation of the proposed Van Wyck ramp project were noteworthy and he appears to have done a remarkable job, Bergmann is altogether missing from all records that WPU has obtained that have been generated since January 1, 2010 relating to the proposed van Wyck ramp project.

It is as if Bergmann had been relieved of his responsibilities concerning the proposed Van Wyck ramp project, and re-assigned by the powers-that-be to other projects.But Bergman's honest critique bought WPU time so that its intervention could be effective.

Once WPU did get involved, all of the rosy sentiments were tabled as if SDOT went into shock. Brian Ketcham rocked their cozy little world and exposed the inadequacy of the review process-causing the 16 month hiatus that was supposed to be a revision process but has turned out to be a charade; if what we are now seeing from NYSDOT is true.

Once Ketcham exposed EDC's submission the traffic agency's tune began to change-particularly after the FHWA received Mike Gerrard's letter that was based on Ketcham's work. The FHWA's rep Tom Breslin reacted with alarm:

"This past Wednesday, I met with Ken Dymond (legal) and our environmental people. FHWA was not involved in the review of the Willets Point redevelopment project itself. The NEPA Checklist is for the Federal Action (the AMR) only. With your office we pursued the Federal Action only to the AMR, not the indirect impacts.

The concerns raised by Mr. Gerrard fall into a gray area. AMR guidance from our HQ is quiet about indirect impacts to a Federal Action. During this discussion we agreed that the Willets Point redevelopment falls into the category of indirect impacts. If we include these indirect impacts, we will need to revisit the NEPA Checklist. The combination of the access modification and the redevelopment will not pass the NEPA Checklist.

The redevelopment may need a full EIS (currently the redevelopment project has a Generic EIS that we have not reviewed) in order to pursue the project with the modification of the VanWyck ramps. We are having a conference call with Ian Francis of your office and EDC this morning at 10.00. We plan to discuss the indirect impact issue and what needs to be done to meet NEPA.

The redevelopment project could go ahead without the access modification to the VanWyck ramps but traffic in the area would be horrible. If we go ahead as is, the project may need to do an EIS (once we include the indirect impacts) as the Checklist would no longer be applicable to this project."

The proverbial stuff hit the fan-and that's when the Bloomberg bullying began in earnest, culminated by the following comments from Eng about NYC DOT Commissioner Sadik-Khan:

Phillip Eng (NYSDOT Region 11 Director) to Stanley Gee (NYSDOT Acting Commissioner) and many other key names at NYSDOT involved with the proposed Van Wyck ramps, 9/23/2010 at 11:49AM:

This is to let you know that I had a conversation today with JSK [presumably, Janette Sadik-Kahn of NYCDOT)... JSK noted that she will be sending me a letter holding me personally responsible for holding the Willets Pt project hostage. I'm okay with that as we need to ensure that we have thoroughly reviewed the issues and that they are resolved satisfactorily. I told her that we need to have our staff meet (sometime next week) including NYMTC and go over the concerns raised by the city and bring them to a resolution."

As we have commented then Commissioner Gee was a skeptic and told Senator Dilan of the department's concerns about the adequacy of the AMR. Since he was replaced by Joan McDonald, however, a sea change appears to have occurred at NYSDOT. The fact that McDonald used to be an executive at NYC EDC hasn't escaped our attention.

Nothing about NYSDOT's review of the Van Wyck ramps should comfort anyone interested in honesty and transparency. From its initial false confidence and euphoria for EDC's deficient submission, to subsequent temporary "intransigence" after WPU intervened, and finally to the current eagerness to approve, NYSDOT has consistently failed in its statutory obligations to the citizens of New York State.

After WPU exposed the EDC fraud NYSDOT should have immediately commenced an independent review of the entire matter. Instead it continued to act as if it was EDC's partner in this endeavor rather than its evaluator. It is now our firm belief that NYSDOT needs to be relieved of its oversight role and an independent monitor be appointed to conduct a proper review of the efficacy of the Van Wyck ramps.

We remain convinced today, as we were in February of last year, that there is simply no way for these ramps top pass regulatory muster-and that there is no way that NYSDOT can be trusted to do the proper evaluation of the massive impacts of the Willets Point project and these ramps.

Ethically Speaking-Careful What You Imbiben

City Room has a breaking story about the appointment of Ellen Biben to become the state's lead ethics watchdog-and not everyone is happy with the governor's choice;and we agree with those who are concerned:

"The appointment raises question about the commission’s independence from the executive branch, and its commitment to transparency. The new executive director, Ellen Biben, is a respected former federal prosecutor who served as a deputy under Mr. Cuomo in the attorney general’s office, and now serves as his inspector general. It is not clear why the appointment was not announced, or if Ms. Biben, who is said to have applied for the job, is having second thoughts."

Our agreement with those concerned about Biben's independence comes from the fact that her office has failed to even acknowledge-after more than half a year's time has elapsed-the WPU letter that raised questions about the governor's appointment of Joan McDonald, the former vice president for transportation at NYC EDC, as the new commissioner of NYS DOT. As we said last July:

"WPU sent a letter to the IG on May the 18th concerning the questionable appointment of Joan McDonald, a former NYC EDC executive, as commissioner of SDOT and we have yet to hear from her. In that letter we had pointed out:

"We are now calling on the Office of the State Inspector General to institute a full review of the actions of NYS DOT and its new commissioner in order to determine whether Commissioner McDonald has treated this review process with the fairness and impartiality it deserves.The governor has made governmental ethics a signature policy issue of his administration.

In the same spirit, WPU requests that you institute such a review by first calling on Commissioner McDonald to recuse herself from the ramp review process; and by then calling on the agency to also launch an independent evaluation of all of the environmental data that has been submitted by NYC EDC.

The actions of the new commissioner since she took office need to be subject to close scrutiny. This needs to be done in order to determine whether her past association unfairly deprived WPU and the citizens of New York State of an impartial review of a transportation project that we believe will cause huge negative impacts on the residents of New York City."

Not a peep from someone who-as a laudatory story in Capitol News highlighted-was been portrayed as an overseer who who be fiercely independent politically (unlike those ethically challenged Pataki folks, don't you know). Now Biben's silence on the Willets Point related issue may perhaps be no accident since she had previously headed the NY AG's "Public Integrity Unit," the one that punted the Claire Shulman investigation right after AG Cuomo accepted the endorsement of Mayor Bloomberg: "When Biben accepted the Public Integrity Unit post with Cuomo in 2007, she took over an office that had been gutted by prior administrations but was suddenly facing its most high-profile case in years."

That would be the Hevesi case and Biben and the AG went after the former Comptroller with a vengeance. But what about issues that are closer to home? Never crap where you eat is a phrase that comes to mind and we shouldn't expect any degree of real Independence from Biben on anything that remotely might impact the new Emperor of New York. Everyone else in Albany, as City Room reports, better watch out:

"Mr. Cuomo has put a priority on ethics reform in Albany, where there has been a parade of lawmakers accused or convicted of using their office for corrupt means. He hailed the ethics overhaul last year that created the joint commission as an important step in restoring the trust of New Yorkers in state government."

WPU is not finished with IG Biben, however, and we are going to be asking that her office investigate the conveying of public funds to Shulman's group while it was till supposedly under investigation by the current AG's office. What needs to be said most forthrightly here is that Cuomo shouldn't appoint a loyal retainer to do a job where independence is vitally needed. That he hasn't done so in this case is an indication that-as far as Albany is concerned-the more things change the more they stay the same.

High Comedy in High Office

The Times Union has a story on the efforts being made by AG Schneiderman to expand the powers of his office to investigate public corruption: "Cracking down on public corruption was a major theme of last year's election, but Attorney General Eric Schneiderman says he was rebuffed by the Cuomo administration when he sought to expand his office's jurisdiction in the area."

Poor Eric, he isn't being given enough power to root out all of the bad guys. Of course, this is all quite laughable considering his Keystone Kops routine involving the supposed investigation his office has into the illegal lobbying of Claire Shulman. If the AG is either unwilling or unable to use the power of his office to get to the bottom of an illegal scheme-one that involves the billionaire mayor of NYC-to deprive small property owners of their Constitutional rights, then it serves no public good to give the guy greater authority to root out corruption.

Willets Point is a test case and so far Schneiderman-and the hapless Comptroller DiNapoli-are flunking the test. But then again the AG is in good company since his predecessor sat on the investigation for a year and a half and pocket vetoed any action after Mike Bloomberg endorsed him on September, 6, 2010. Cuomo went on to become governor and in one of his first appointments placed Joan McDonald in charge of the DOT.

Why is this significant? Because McDonald used to be an executive of the NYC EDC-the lead agency promoting Willets Point development. State DOT is responsible for the approval of ramps off of the Van Wyck-the linchpin of the development. This is therefore a target rich environment and we suggest that the AG accomplish this test of his bona fides on corruption before begging the governor-of all people!-for more authority.

EDC Misinforms-Again! Ramp Approval Not Imminent

The NYC EDC is at it again-misinforming the public about a phantom approval for ramps that will do nothing but make Queens highways even more impassable. As Crain's reports: "Late Wednesday, the Bloomberg administration took a significant step toward the redevelopment of Willets Point, Queens. The state Department of Transportation and the Federal Highway Administration approved the Economic Development Corp.'s environmental assessment of off-ramps proposed for the Van Wyck Expressway. The city, which has called the ramps essential to the massive Queens project, can now go ahead with a required public review process."

While this may be a short step for EDC it isn't any giant leap for NYC-and as Crain's reports a bit later: "Once public comments are received, the city will resubmit its assessment for final state and federal approval." So what is left out is that there is still a public review process that EDC would like everyone to believe is a mere formality because it was able to coerce its former executive-new DOT Commissioner McDonald-to green light its Environmental Assessment.

This will prove to be a false step by the head of an agency that should never have been allowed to oversee an agency whose project she likely had some involvement with back in 2007 when she was still at EDC. It will prove to be even more so after WPU's Brian Ketcham demonstrates that the new EA is as rancid as the original fraudulent submissions that the agency sent back for revision in February of last year.

In fact, what the press should do is give Old McDonald a call up at her farm and ask her how many calls and meetings she and her staff have taken with EDC and its minions since she arrived in January. And while they're at it, the press should track down the former commissioner to see what he thinks about the SDOT's abrupt about face.

As Jake Bono told Crain's: "The current review process for the Van Wyck ramps has been tainted by deficient and fraudulent data that the regulatory authorities are well aware of,” said Jake Bono, a small business owner and member of the opposition group Willets Point United. “There is no way that the ramps can qualify and be approved under the Federal Highway Authority guidelines. We will be advancing this before any review panel and before the courts if it becomes necessary to expose any malfeasance.”

So DOT is walking on very thin ice and malfeasance is a mild characterization of what has transpired in the ramp review process.

Controlling Contracting

The WSJ is reporting that the city council is considering legislation to rein in outsourcing of city services through independent contractors: "The City Council is expected to approve legislation aimed at reining in the billions of taxpayer dollars that are spent annually on outside contracts, a move that Mayor Michael Bloomberg's administration contends will increase government inefficiency and bureaucracy."

That's a real backslapper! All of a sudden the mayor is interested in increasing government efficiency after ten years of larding up the public payroll? No friends this is all about control and the ability to award contracts and have the contractors beholden to-well, the mayor, of course.

Here's the mayoral spokesman's comical turn of a phrase: "Marc LaVorgna, a spokesman for the mayor, said the administration has "worked hard to reduce the cost and inefficiency of government by streamlining bureaucracy and cutting red tape." He said the bill "not only adds to those requirements, but erects barriers and limits commissioners' discretion to get services as quickly and efficiently as possible."

This is all Kabuki theater because-in a plague on both your houses fashion-the mayor and the council are twin culprits in the growth of government. The council's move is really to insure that more services are performed by the elite corps of unionized public servants that are known for their efficiency-not to mention crippling pension and benefit costs.

What neither Speaker Quinn nor the mayor are inclined to do is reduce the size and scope of this ever expanding and useless government edifice-the real culprit for the fact that NYC ranks at the top of the list as one of the worst places in the entire country to do business. These two are simply quibbling over the manner in which the tax payers are to be fleeced.

But if the council is really serious about containing outsourcing it might profit from taking a long hard look at the out of control NYC EDC-a "quasi-governmental" agency that runs amok without any supervision. As the NY Daily News reported last year:

"The agency that collects rent on city property failed to turn over millions to the city - but still managed to spend big bucks on extravagant travel.

The Economic Development Corp. paid for luxury hotels in China, London, San Francisco, Las Vegas, Miami and Washington, expenses from January 2008 through April show.

The records show that EDC operates under looser travel rules than city employees, who are supposed to fly coach, stay in economy hotels and limit how much they spend on food and drink."

And the same cavalier attitude applies to the agency's contracting-where they let contracts out without competitive bidding. Who decides? Who sets the rates? Who cares? We have seen what this attitude brings when it comes to the incestuous relationship between EDC and the environmental firm AKRF-phony data proffered with no accountability. AKRF is chastised for a bad data submission to state DOT by being awarded more money to clean up its filthy act.

So let's not get misdirected by the council's actions here-it's Quinn tip toeing past her Bloomberg loving past to try to curry union support for 2013. The only thing missing is a truth in advertising provision. What we need are elected officials who understand that the NYC Leviathan is the problem-the current crop couldn't understand this without a frontal lobotomy.

Lawsuit Filed

As expected, WPU filed its lawsuit against the city for its bait and switch tactics over the formerly essential Van Wyck ramps. The NY Daily News has the story:

"Willets Point property and business owners filed a lawsuit yesterday accusing the city of beginning eminent domain proceedings before meeting key environmental mileposts.

It's the first of two legal salvos expected to be launched by Willets Point United in a bid to keep its land and businesses in the gritty industrial zone.

At the center of the suit, filed in Queens Supreme Court, are traffic ramps that were to be built off the Van Wyck Expressway. The ramps were supposed to ease traffic congestion expected with the sweeping redevelopment of the so-called Iron Triangle, near Citi Field."

We say formerly essentially because EDC had argued to anyone who would listen-and in a sworn court affidavit-that the development could not proceed without the ramps to mitigate the traffic: "EDC officials said the first phase of the development would not require the ramps to be built. "We were shocked that the city went back on its promise to the court and to the community that it would not condemn property without approval of the ramps," said Michael Gerrard, one of the lawyers representing Willets Point United. "This project would generate a colossal amount of traffic, and there would be no place to go," he said."

Indeed it will, but the EDC sleight of hand known as a Technical Memo, is making the unsubstantiated case that Phase I will be hunky dory even without ramps-and wants everyone to simply take it at its word without any concomitant review. That calls for the suspension of a whole lot of disbelief.

The city for its part, however, remains confident: "Julie Wood, a spokeswoman for the EDC, said the city expects to win the legal challenge."We feel confident that we are on strong legal footing and look forward to resolving this matter as quickly as possible so that this project can move forward without further delays," Wood said."

We wonder how strong that footing is-given the public record and the published reports over EDC and NYC DOT's frustration over the regulatory delay on the approval of the formerly essential ramps: "Jerry Antonacci, a property owner and leader of Willets Point United, said the city must follow protocol."They still have to jump through their hoops, and they don't want to do it. If you need approval, you need approval," he said."

What this legal case will dramatize is the extent to which EDC has continued to pursue extra-legal methods in its pursuit of the Willets Point development. This is a Bloomberg legacy project, and some legacy it will be. Conceived in illegality through the hiring of Claire Shulman's LDC, this ends justifies the means agency now seeks to end run the regulations that it itself claimed were necessary preconditions for any eminent domain use.

We should conclude with the comments of Mayor Bloomberg when confronted by the exposure of the illegality of the Shulman hiring. In an interview with the Times Ledger, Emperor Bloomberg famously told his subjects: "These groups are designed to lobby,” Bloomberg continued. “I don’t know if they technically broke the law.”

That friends was the lie on which Mike Bloomberg wants to establish his legacy-and a fitting one it would be considering all of the other fables that have been propagated about his less than stellar accomplishments. But first he has to come through us. And like any good lead off hitter, WPU is going to prove to be one tough out.

Unwillling to ImBiben?

Capitol News has a fascinating profile of the new state Inspector General Ellen Biben. The job certainly has its challenges; "It may be a higher-profile gig, but it’s not without its shortcomings. Biben is heading an office that has been bruised for years by allegations of bias and accusations of toothlessness. The inspector general has a $6.5 million budget and broad investigatory authority over 50 separate agencies with more than 190,000 employees—but the office has little enforcement power."

That being said, she is serving a governor who has made ethics a priority: "As Cuomo positions himself as the savior of Albany and restorer of ethics and good government, where does that leave Biben? “I’m still trying to wrap my arms around this,” Biben said. “When people ask me, ‘What do you do?’ I don’t even know what the answer is.”

Well, when it comes to Willets Point the answer is-nothing.WPU sent a letter to the IG on May the 18th concerning the questionable appointment of Joan McDonald, a former NYC EDC executive, as commissioner of SDOT and we have yet to hear from her. In that letter we had pointed out:

"We are now calling on the Office of the State Inspector General to institute a full review of the actions of NYS DOT and its new commissioner in order to determine whether Commissioner McDonald has treated this review process with the fairness and impartiality it deserves.

The governor has made governmental ethics a signature policy issue of his administration. In the same spirit, WPU requests that you institute such a review by first calling on Commissioner McDonald to recuse herself from the ramp review process; and by then calling on the agency to also launch an independent evaluation of all of the environmental data that has been submitted by NYC EDC.

The actions of the new commissioner since she took office need to be subject to close scrutiny. This needs to be done in order to determine whether her past association unfairly deprived WPU and the citizens of New York State of an impartial review of a transportation project that we believe will cause huge negative impacts on the residents of New York City."

Biben needs to take a stand on this McDonald issue because it is a window into what may be a larger scheme to insure that truth a bout corruption surrounding Willets Point never sees the light of day: "Biben should be able to combat this difficulty in part because of her closeness with some of the agency heads who moved with her from the prior Cuomo administration, like Commission on Public Integrity Chairwoman Mitra Hormozi and State Police Superintendent Joe D’Amico. Familiarity can make it easier to press her cause. Good-government groups say it is also her greatest liability. To be an effective IG, they say, Biben must show total independence from Cuomo."

Yes that's the test for Ellen Biben-and so far when it comes to Willets Point she remains hidden in her house. It's time for the IG to come out and play

Ramp Hearing Today: WPU Press Release

Press Release

Willets Point United, Local Civic groups, Workers and Elected Officials to Speak Out At Press Conference before Hearing on the Van Wyck/Willets Point Ramps

Where: Flushing Public Library; 41-17 Main Street
Flushing, NY 11355

When: Today

Time: 3:30

Today the NYC EDC will be holding a hearing on an Environmental Assessment (EA) for ramps that it wants to build off of the Van Wyck in order to accommodate the 80,000 daily car and truck trips that will be generated by the massive Willets Point development project. The EA has been prepared by EDC’s own consultants and has not been the subject of any independent review-something that local civic groups and the Natural Resources Defense Fund have been requesting for over a year.

The delay over the approval of these ramps has been caused by the intervention of Willets Point United and its consultant Brian Ketcham who reviewed the original ramp report and convinced state regulators that it was either deficient or simply fraudulent. The first EDC sponsored assessment had flatly contradicted the study that EDC had submitted to the city council when the Willets Point project had gone thorough land use review.

As Ketcham, a traffic engineer with over 40 years of experience will tell the hearing today, the EDC assessment of the traffic impacts of the proposed ramps remains deficient and, because it does, should not be approved by state regulators at the Department of Transportation. Instead State DOT needs to conduct an independent review of the ramp proposal in order to accurately gauge the traffic impacts-and remove the review process from an EDC that has little interest in accurately gauging these impacts.

As Jerry Antonacci of WPU says, “EDC has cooked the books for too long. The citizens of Queens need an impartial and independent review of the traffic impact of this development and the ramps that are supposed to mitigate the huge number of vehicles that are going to be clogging local roads and highways."

In addition, WPU is calling on the State Department of Investigation to remove Transportation Commissioner Joan McDonald from any role in the ramp review process. Until just a few years ago McDonald was an executive at EDC and her presence in the process lends credence to the suspicion that the review will not be impartial.

The ramp approval process had been characterized by EDC’s dishonesty from its inception. But no matter how you slice it, there is no way that 80,000 daily car and truck trips can be mitigated by two ramps-or even by a multiple of ramps. Local roads will be massively gridlocked and the Van Wyck will be brought to a grinding halt. As a result, SDOT must turn down EDC’s ramp proposal and force the city to revisit the entire Willets Point project.

For a Bloomberg administration that purports to be for lowing NYC’s carbon footprint, the auto-dependent Willets Point development stands as a monument to the mayor’s hypocrisy. In addition, at a time when the mayor is laying off teachers and proposing to close firehouses, the massive use of public money for the Willets Point boondoggle represents a perfect symbol of the mayor’s disordered priorities.

Contact: Jerry Antonacci: 917-335-5427

Cuomo on Appointments

In Capitol Tonight Governor Cuomo said something that really was quite ironic-and not in a funny way. His new ethics body-called JCOPE has been tasked with looking into the sexual escapades of Vito Lopez and the efforts to sanction him by the NY State Assembly. One of the members of the body, Ravi Batra, has just resigned and apparently has also gotten under the governor's skin for his opinions on the composition of JCOPE-made up mostly of the governor's cronies.

Here's how Cuomo-unwilling to be upfront in his criticism-passive aggressively lashed out at Batra and Senator Sampson who appointed him:

"Cuomo said the responsibility for appointees ultimately lies with whoever gave them the job.

“It’s a reflection on the appointing authority,” Cuomo said. “The behavior of an appointee is not something you’re proud of that’s a reflection of you.”

Ho, ho ho. This is the same man who, after getting an important endorsement from Mike Bloomberg in 2010, not only deep-sixed the investigation into the illegal lobbying of NY EDC and its partners, but who then went ahead and appointed Joan McDonald as the new DOT commissioner even though the woman had been a transportation executive for the very same NYC EDC-a woman who would soon be in a position to push for the Van Wyck ramps that the staff at DOT had been resisting for over a year.

But it gets even better. When WPU wrote to the Inspector General, Ellen Biben, to ask that she examine whether there was a conflict inherent in this appointment-and this was after City and State had written a glowing portrait of her as an independent voice-she never even bothered to answer our letter-so much for courageous independence. Biben, for her part, understood that rhetorical independence only gets one so far-and not nearly as far as being a toady does.

She soon received the benefits of zipping her lip when the governor appointed her, hold for the laugh line, as the new head of JCOPE-a position that she holds today after Cuomo twisted arms to put her in the chair. This is the glass house living governor who's taking veiled shots at John Sampson. He should be careful of the stones he's throwing.

Crain's Oversight

In the Crain's Insider this morning the newsletter comments on WPU's efforts to get the city council to do an oversight hearing on the illegalities that have buttressed the Willets Point development ever since the land use applications were approved in 2008:

"Opponents of the Willets Point redevelopment—property owners and tenants who stand to be displaced from the Queens site—are requesting an oversight hearing on the project's recent headaches. It's the latest in a long series of actions in which every aspect of the process has been challenged. While the hearing would provide a soapbox for them to blast the Bloomberg administration and cite illegal lobbying for the project by a city-funded corporation, the opponents don't expect it to stop the project. However, they eventually expect to argue in court that they pursued every potential remedy afforded by the political process."

Let's be clear here. Our goal is to try to insure that the city doesn't have the authority to adopt illegal methods in its zeal to deprive us of our property rights-and if the city council were to intervene and aid us in this effort we would be more than happy to avoid the legal system altogether. But what are the chances that Chris Quinn will do the right thing and exercise her oversight authority? That's as close to a rhetorical question as one can get.

Quinn is joined at the hip with the Queens Dems and owes her political ascension to those power brokers-folks who are tied into the illegal shenanigans surrounding Willets Point. On good authority, Quinn is also a close friend of Claire Shulman, one of the ringmasters of this unethical and illegal scheme. Our goal then is to demonstrate just how much the political elites have aided and abetted the illegalities committed by EDC and Shulman's LDC-and how their nonfeasance has allowed this scheme to get to this point-the free transfer of $200 million worth of city property to one of the co-conspirators.

We have witnessed all along the reluctance of important political actors to intervene to prevent the scheme from continuing-and in the case of the previous attorney general (and current governor) we have witnessed how he rope a doped the investigation into illegal lobbying and parlayed the controversy into an endorsement from the mayor who he initially feuded with over the very investigation that WPU had initiated.

At the end of this process-one that his father should be ashamed of given his own righteous behavior over the plight of Willets Point-the new governor appointed a woman to run NYS DOT (a crucial interlocutor over the Van Wyck ramps) who had been a "transportation executive" for non other than NYC EDC. When we sent a written complaint to the NYS Inspector General-a woman named Biden who now incongruously runs the new state ethics board-we were never even given the courtesy of a reply.

So we are mindful of all the difficulties involved in getting politicians to do the right thing when that right thing runs against the powerful political grain. In spite of this we have succeeded, and the Insider should have recognized this, against all expectations to get a Supreme Court judge to issue an Order to Show Cause to have the city explain why it lied to the court; we have forced the city to withdraw its eminent domain application out of a fear of having all of its illegalities exposed; and we have managed to get the NYS AG to conclude the investigation into illegal lobbying with all parties involved admitting their guilt.

It is our belief that were WPU a protected class-one that the politically correct feels is sacrosanct-the question of what to do about the city's illegal lobbying scheme who be making headlines in the local papers; and a huge cohort of elected officials who be holding daily press conferences on the steps of city hall. Think sexual harassment or racial discrimination.

But property rights violations don't rise to that level-and that doesn't take away from the seriousness of the other issues but underscores how certain Constitutional rights have become like second class citizens. There's something wrong when putting a hand on an employees thigh becomes much more serious than taking away Jake Bono's property, land that has been in the family for four generations.

So Crain's is right about one thing. We don't expect elected officials to do the right thing-and believe that we will be able to show how their nonfeasance and active collusion allowed certain people to get away with their lawlessness. We wish it didn't have to come to this, but wishing won't change the absence of character in the political class of NYC.

Let's build Shangri-La next to an asphalt plant...

From the Queens Tribune:

The City is hoping to make pothole repairs more efficient and environmentally friendly, using the plant, which uses recycled asphalt, to dispatch repair trucks and asphalt that are closer to the Bronx, Queens and Upper Manhattan.

However, the City also has plans to redevelop the area directly adjacent to the plant, removing and relocating the industrial businesses that currently reside there.

Previously, the City Council passed a redevelopment plan for the "Iron Triangle" at Willets Point, a process that lurched forward in June 2008 when Community Board 7 approved the project; it established a precedent for trying to buy out all of the industrial companies there to make room for the redevelopment.

When business owners refused to leave the City Council held a public hearing regarding the plan and voted in November 2008 to approve the redevelopment plan, which includes the potential use of eminent domain to acquire property claiming the area was blighted. "The city has neglected us for 30 years. They let it get like that. We have no sewers, no sidewalks; they left us here," said Jerry Antonacci, owner of Crown Container and President of Willets Point United, a group of business owners who have banded together to fight their removal and redevelopment of the area.

In March 2010, the City purchased the Asphalt Plant for $30 million to make use of it in repairing roads. Bloomberg said it would "help make the streets feel brand new," as well as save taxpayers $5 million annually.

Richard Lipsky, a lobbyist for Willets Point United, said this was "Par for the course with the City," stating that it was operating "asphalt backwards" in purchasing and using an industrial plant while to trying to relocate others from the same neighborhood.

From the Times Ledger:

The plant is located a stone’s throw from Willets Point, a 62-acre plot of land populated by manufacturers, auto repair shops and other industrial businesses.

On the city’s slate of places due to get a makeover in coming years, the city is working to upgrade the area by relocating or purchasing businesses in the area to make way for a multibillion-dollar mixed-use development project. The area is ridden with crater-like potholes as much as a foot deep that turn into deep, dangerous pools of murky water whenever it rains.

And whose fault is that? Richard Lipsky knows:

Is it only us? Are we the only people who think that siting an asphalt plant next to Willets Point isn’t the best idea? Apparently we aren’t since the folks over at Queens Crapper forwarded us this report from the local papers-along with the following comment: “Stupid is as stupid does. Let's develop Shangri-la next to an asphalt plant…”

How right they are. But it actually gets even more ridiculous because of the justifying statement made by Mayor Bloomberg: “The new facility will allow us to resurface and repair more streets faster, in a more environmentally sound fashion and at a lower cost at a time when we are looking at all possible options to reduce expenses,” the mayor said. “By producing more recycled asphalt, we’ll avoid 2 million miles of annual truck trips that are used to carry milled asphalt to landfills, reducing congestion, pollution and wear-and-tear on our streets.”

So, let’s get this straight. They are going to build this plant next to the 9 million square foot Willets Point development-the one that will generate 80,000 car and truck trips a day-and there rationale is, “reducing congestion?” Is there a better reason for believing that the term city planning is an oxymoron?

Not to be outdone, NYC’s own Sadik weighs in as well: “Janette Sadik-Khan, commissioner of the DOT, said the new plant will help the city keep pace with design and repair demands without sacrificing time and money. “Continued investments that combine the safety and good repair of our streets with the need to reduce our city’s carbon footprint are helping New York City remain an international leader in sustainable practices,” she said.”

And to show we have a sense of humor, we will put the “sustainable practices,” asphalt plant right next to an unsustainable Willets Point.