Results tagged “bronxboroughpresidentadolfocarrion”

Back in 2006, an agreement signed the day construction started for the new Yankee Stadium promised the team would pay $1.2 million a year in cash and in kind to a fund benefiting Bronx residents for 40 years. It was a gesture to make up for the inconvenience during construction and loss of parkland the new stadium was costing the neighborhood. After a year and half, none of the money has been distributed - and it's unclear who will be distributing it, if ever.

Yesterday, Mayor Bloomberg presented PlaNYC: A Greener, Greater New York, his administration's thinking about what the city needs to do by the year 2030 in order meet sustainability goals. The plan involves 127 initiatives under the areas of Brownfield Remediation, Housing, Open Space, Transportation, Energy, the Water Network, Water Quality, Air Quality and Climate Change, but the big topic was congestion pricing. After much speculation, Mayor Bloomberg even acknowledged that congestion pricing was the "elephant in the room" and explained that the city would ask the state to embark on a 3-year pilot program:

I’ve thought about [the congestion pricing] question a lot. And I understand the hesitation about charging a fee. I was a skeptic myself. But I looked at the facts, and that’s what I’m asking New Yorkers to do. And the fact is in cities like London and Singapore, fees succeeded in reducing congestion and improving air quality. Many people are already paying to drive into Manhattan – there are tolls on most bridges and the four tunnels. But to avoid those tolls, many people drive through neighborhood streets. That not only clogs the streets, it increases air pollution – and asthma rates...

Continue reading "Mayor Bloomberg Says Congestion Pricing And Likes It"

Bronx Borough President Adolfo Carrion, Jr. wants Germany to apologize for an army instructor telling a trainee, "You're in the Bronx, a black van pulls up in front of you and three African-Americans get out and start really insulting your mother… act!" Carrion calls the video "inaccurate and bigoted," and says, "The Bronx and the African-American community are owed an apology."

- Affordable rent and health insurance are big challenges for the middle class

And the results were released during the DMI's conference about the middle class yesterday. In what the NY Sun and NY Times both called a preview of the 2009 mayoral race, City Comptroller William Thompson, Bronx Borough President Adolfo Carrion and Representative Anthony Weiner were present; City Councilman John Liu was also there (he wasn't mentioned in the Times). Weiner apparently sparred with both Liu and Carrion; Thompson wasn't on their panel, but he did mention the "barbell effect" - "low-income people and higher-income people expanding, and those in the middle being squeezed" (via the Times).

The next mayoral election may be more than two years off, but it's never too soon to start courting the union vote, especially when it's the Transit Workers Union. The men and women who make sure the trains run on time have the ability to derail any politician's campaign, so Democratic hopefuls took turns addressing the rank and file at a TWU "Save Our Union" meeting yesterday.

Mamadou Somare, the Malian immigrant cab driver whose wife and four children were killed after last week's devastating Bronx fire, will be able to bury his family in Mali and return to the U.S. Soumare's status was unclear: Though an illegal immigrant, he had applied for asylum many years ago; earlier reports suggested he either missed a court date or did not file the necessary paperwork.

Where's Reverend Billy? That quote is from today's NY Times article about people trying to stop a Wal-Mart from coming to the Bronx. Nevermind that Wal-Mart hasn't officially said that they'd like to bring one of its store to the borough - activists are just making sure it never ever happens. This is in spite of the majority of Bronx residents saying they would welcome a Wal-Mart.

Did you see the crazy Post article about baseball groupies in the city? We say crazy because it gives readers tips on developing on MO to have a fling with players:

This, [Melody] says, is how it works: She'll get a call or a text (sometimes from one of her players, sometimes from a go-between) to tell her that the team is in town and does she want to party?

Continue reading "Secrets of Baseball Groupies"

Hundreds of thousands of revelers enjoyed the beautiful weather and celebrated during yesterday's Puerto Rican Day Parade. And this year's theme was, "Boricuas...We count, We Vote!" Though Marc Anthony was the Grand Marshal, the real attraction was his wife, Jennifer Lopez. Mayor Bloomberg, who marched with the couple, said, "In the pictures tomorrow, I will be lucky if I am noticed at all." Anthony and Lopez ultimately needed the help of Guardian Angels to keep the paparazzi off them and keep moving along the parade route. And the couple was also there to promote their upcoming film, El Cantante, but the El Cantante float broke down towards the end of the route.

After reading our umpteenth post dreaming about pandas in our own backyard, a reader who was at the National Zoo sent us some exciting news:

Just thought you'd like to know, that when I was there, one of the pandakeepers said the Bronx Zoo had already filled out its paperwork for "borrowing" some pandas from China. So pandas might be closer to NY than you think. Of course the NY Times article on how pandas don't actually make any money for zoos won't help the cause much.

Au contraire - given that NYC is used to paying ridiculous prices for real estate and cocktails, $2 million for pandas should be easy. Please, if the Bronx Zoo can book private birthday parties, they can certainly have private panda parties - we'll eat bamboo shoots, apples, carrots, and yams and play in plastic tubs, then fall asleep immediately. Bronx Borough President Adolfo Carrion, start looking into plane tickets to China!

May is the 14th annual Bike Month NYC, but there are activities that start before May is officially here. The events, sponsored by Tra nsportation Alternatives and Department of Transportation, can be seen on this calendar, and they range from viewing an exhibit of bike paintings at the Brooklyn Brewery to a blessing of bicycles at St. John the Divine, or a bike repair workshops and bike celebrations with Bronx Borough President Adolfo Carrion and Brooklyn Borough President Marty Markowitz. And, of course, this Sunday, May 1, it's the Five Borough Bike Tour - 42 miles without traffic!

City Council Speaker Gifford Miller is staging an event in Brooklyn to "receive" support from various politicians there today. The Post reports the Brooklyn locale was a deliberate choice to one-up fellow Democratic candidate wannabe Congressman Anthony Weiner, a Brooklyn boy.

The Big Apple isn't just phat - we're also fat. The City's Department of Hygiene and Mental Health says one out of six New Yorkers is obsese and half are overweight. There are socio-economic correlations (African-Americans, Hispanics, and those making under $25,000 skewed towards obesity) and the figures are also broken down by borough: Bronx had an obesity rate of 24%, Brooklyn 20%, Staten Island 18%, Queens 16%, and Manhattan 13%. (The national obesity rate is 21%.) Bronx Borough President Adolfo Carrion and Brooklyn Borough President Marty Markowitz both coordinated borough-wide weight loss programs in the past years.