PLA MORNING DRIVE
July 23, 2014
Your morning reading from PLA – A sampling of today’s New York news
STATE NEWS
Cuomo’s Office Hobbled State Ethics Inquiries New York Times (Susanne Craig, William K. Rashbaum and Thomas Kaplan)
With Albany rocked by a seemingly endless barrage of scandals and arrests, Gov. Andrew M. Cuomo set up a high-powered commission last summer to root out corruption in state politics. It was barely two months old when its investigators, hunting for violations of campaign-finance laws, issued a subpoena to a media-buying firm that had placed millions of dollars’ worth of advertisements for the New York State Democratic Party.
The investigators did not realize that the firm, Buying Time, also counted Mr. Cuomo among its clients, having bought the airtime for his campaign when he ran for governor in 2010.
Left, right meet to attack Cuomo Times Union (Matthew Hamilton)
Don’t expect them to team up again anytime soon, but for at least one Tuesday morning, Republican gubernatorial candidate Rob Astorino and left-leaning Democratic primary candidate Zephyr Teachout were on the same page.
The candidates held a joint news conference on the steps of Manhattan’s Tweed Courthouse — a symbolically chosen location — to call out Gov. Andrew Cuomo over what they called the “growing corruption crisis in Albany” under his watch. According to a transcript provided by her campaign, Teachout assailed Cuomo’s various 2010 campaign vows to clean up Albany as broken promises.
The gov voters love and insiders loathe New York Daily News (Bill Hammond)
For the growing ranks of critics and rivals who would love to see Gov. Cuomo get a comeuppance this election year, Monday’s Siena College poll comes as a stinging reality check.
Cuomo isn’t merely beating GOP candidate Rob Astorino, but thrashing him 60% to 23% — a daunting 37-point gap with less than four months to Election Day.
Not even the head of the Republican Governors Association, Chris Christie of New Jersey, is pretending this is competitive.
NY Conservative Party chairman rips Christie: He’s “in bed with Andrew Cuomo” Politics on the Hudson (Joseph Spector)
State Conservative Party chairman Mike Long today criticized New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie for seemingly abandoning GOP gubernatorial candidate Rob Astorino, saying Christie “in his bed with Andrew Cuomo.”
The Conservative Party has endorsed Astorino, the Westchester County executive. Christie said yesterday that as head of the Republican Governors Association, he won’t “invest in lost causes” in putting money behind Astorino.
Cuomo approves parking system, red light cameras Times Union (Matthew Hamilton)
Breathe easy, Albany residents: The residential parking permit system officially has been extended, though running a red light may soon be a tough rap to beat.
Gov. Andrew Cuomo signed into law Tuesday a bill to extend Albany’s pilot residential parking permit system for two years. He also OK’d a bill that will allow the city to install red light cameras at up to 20 intersections.
Review panel status: stalled Times Union (Rick Karlin)
Who’s watching the watchers? In the case of the state’s Joint Commission on Public Ethics, no one is.
That wasn’t intended three years ago, when Gov. Andrew Cuomo and lawmakers passed the law creating JCOPE. The legislation also called for creation by June 1, 2014, of an eight-member review panel to “study, review and evaluate” the activities and performance of the commission. The bill says the review panel is supposed to issue a report in 2015.
Did editing taint report? Times Union (Casey Seiler)
The leader of a business group opposed to New York’s Scaffold Law offered edits to an academic analysis of its impact on construction costs and worker injuries — an $82,800 study that was funded by the same group.
Tom Stebbins, the leader of the state Lawsuit Reform Alliance, and officials at SUNY’s Nelson A. Rockefeller Institute of Government insist that their communications during the preparation of the report had no impact on its data or conclusions. But labor groups who support Scaffold Law say it deepens their belief that the study — including a controversial chapter the institute has backed away from — amounted to advocacy camouflaged as research.
NYC NEWS
Novice City Council members still don’t know what they’re doing New York Post (Yoav Gonen, Amber Jamison and Rich Calder)
It took six months in office for members of the City Council freshman class to admit they really don’t know what they’re doing.
An e-mail obtained by The Post shows that some of the 21 novice legislators expressed befuddlement over the rules governing the so-called “stated” meetings — which have been held at least twice a month since January.
City Council set to pass Avonte’s Law Thursday New York Daily News (Corinne Lestch)
The City Council is expected to pass Avonte’s Law Thursday, which will require the Education Department and NYPD to determine whether public and charter schools need door alarms outside the buildings.
The legislation, named for autistic teen Avonte Oquendo – who went missing in October when he walked out of his Queens school unnoticed – requires the DOE and NYPD to take a close look at elementary schools serving students in grades K-5, and District 75 schools, which serve kids with disabilities, to see whether alarms are warranted.
The Mystery of the White Flags on the Brooklyn Bridge Wall Street Journal (Melanie Grayce West and Pervaiz Shallwani)
Investigators are trying to determine how two bleached-white American flags mysteriously appeared atop the Brooklyn Bridge Tuesday morning—and whether the stunt was an art project, a political statement or just tomfoolery.
By early afternoon, police officers removed the two white flags and replaced them with American flags, the standard topper to the bridge’s granite towers.
Police believe the removal of the flags began after 3 a.m. Tuesday, John Miller, the New York Police Department’s deputy commissioner of intelligence, said at a news briefing.
NYPD Orders New Training in Use of Force Wall Street Journal (Pervaiz Shallwani and Sean Gardiner)
Every New York Police Department officer will be retrained in the use of force following the death of a Staten Island man after an officer subdued him with an apparent chokehold, Commissioner William Bratton said Tuesday.
The “top-to-bottom” retraining of nation’s largest police force, with 35,000 officers, is an undertaking that could take years, Mr. Bratton said.
Thursday’s death of 43-year-old Eric Garner raised new questions from elected officials and civil-rights leaders about police brutality. The NYPD prohibits the use of chokeholds.
BUFFALO/WESTERN NY NEWS
County Democratic factions on brink of war Buffalo News (Robert J. McCarthy)
Factions of Erie County’s divided Democratic Party appear headed for open warfare today following allegations that Board of Elections officials deliberately destroyed designating petitions for a local candidate deemed unfriendly to Democratic Headquarters – a potential criminal offense.
It all revolves around party officials loyal to Chairman Jeremy J. Zellner and an opposing group led by former Chairman G. Steven Pigeon. The Pigeon group now contends that Democratic Board of Elections officials under Commissioner Dennis E. Ward disposed of designating petitions for Michael K. Deely, a New York State United Teachers official who has been active in Democratic politics and was running for county committee.
Hamburg Schools superintendent under investigation by police Buffalo News (Barbara O’Brien)
Turmoil in the Hamburg Central School District took a dramatic turn Tuesday when the district announced that Superintendent Richard E. Jetter is under investigation by police and that two administrators would be filling in for him.
The move comes as board members learned there were questions about damage to the superintendent’s car.
A witness has surfaced who challenges the prevailing belief that a vandal on May 6 damaged Jetter’s white Nissan Maxima, leaving a typed note under his windshield wiper that said: “Watch your back, you (expletive) sleezebag.” The incident shocked the school community and was a sign that the tumult in the district had crossed the line. Teachers and others rallied behind Jetter the following day.
WESTCHESTER/HUDSON VALLEY NEWS
Astorino’s outside job leads to questions about Westchester Ethics Board Politics on the Hudson (Elizabeth Ganga)
Three Democratic members of the Westchester Board of Legislators have asked state Comptroller Thomas DiNapoli to audit the county Ethics Board after criticism of the county executive’s outside job led to questions about the effectiveness of the volunteer board set up to be the county’s ethics watchdog.
County Executive Rob Astorino, the Republican candidate for governor, has been criticized for doing outside consulting work for a radio station while in office and clearing the job with the county attorney rather than the Ethics Board. Astorino disclosed the job on his annual ethics forms, a spokesman said, but the ethics board never conducted its review to see if the job created a conflict with his public office.
LONG ISLAND NEWS
Suffolk detectives questioned by DA’s office over leaks to press, say sources Newsday (Tania Lopez)
Two veteran Suffolk detectives who were once part of the federal Long Island Gang Task Force have been questioned by the district attorney’s office about police department leaks to the press, sources said.
John Oliva and William Maldonado were separately questioned Monday by district attorney’s office investigators and told there was a criminal investigation underway, the sources said.
Oliva, sources said, was pulled over by a marked patrol car and an unmarked vehicle and questioned on the road. The two district attorney investigators showed him a search warrant and took his phone and told him he could be facing criminal charges if he is found to be the generator of the leaks.
