MAY 1997 $1.

00
H I W Y O R K ' S R B A N A I = I = A I R S N I W S M A G A I I N I
T H E C I T Y S E D U C E S
B E D - S T U Y W I T H
P R O MI S E S O f
I N S T AN T C O MME R C I AL
l C AT I O N
Servants' Entrance
t
he only way that housing usually gets on the news is when there's afire, a
five-story cave-in or when The Donald affixes his Trump to midtown's lat-
est architectural travesty. So, you'd think City Limits would be happy that
every reporter in New York City is mobbing our tutfto cover the rent wars.
Nah.
The truth is that the battle over rent regulations is
totally eclipsing Albany's other huge issue this year:
welfare reform. If the rent wars have dominated the
capitol lobby, the state's welfare overhaul is being
whisked in through the servants' entrance.
EDITORIAL
The main reason welfare is so low on the agenda is
simple. The rent war has huge political implications in
upcoming statewide elections. Senate leader Joe
Bruno's bluster has boomeranged on his fellow Republicans, energizing angry
city Democrats and putting George Pataki at greater risk of losing his job in
1998. Political seismologist Al D'Amato, Pataki's mentor, can even feel his own
seat shaking from the rent war reverberations.
By contrast, most polls show that the majority of state voters are basically
okay with the outline of welfare refonn-if they care about the issue at all.
That's a shame, because there's plenty offighting to be done over the state
welfare law, which needs to be drafted in response to federal mandates this
year. State Assembly Speaker Sheldon Silver has passed his own proposal,
which the Welfare Reform Network calls "very disappointing." It doesn't cut
benefit levels, but it includes time limits and a sketchy plan to give vouchers to
people kicked off the dole. But Pataki's bill is far worse. It cuts benefits by 45
percent and, as we report in this issue, imposes harsh rules that force foster
parents into workfare jobs without providing adequate child care resources.
To keep Pataki at bay, Silver will have to be tough-especially because
there's a very real possibility that Republicans will try to mix the rent reg and
welfare reform battles. Like pills and booze, it would be a deadly combination.
"They're going to tell Shelly that if he wants to keep most rent regulations, he'll
have to give in on welfare reform," says Liz Krueger of the Community Food
Resource Center.
It will be hard for Silver to resist such an offer-especially when a majority
of city voters are so passionate about rent regulations and so ambivalent about
welfare. The Speaker's plan has its problems, but by passing it in early spring,
he effectively enshrined it as the official Democratic position on welfare reform.
The least he can do now is make sure it becomes law.
* * *
Usually, the indecipherable scrawl that appears at the bottom of this page
belongs to Editor Andrew White. But last month, Andrew and his wife Melanie
had something more significant to deliver than a magazine. The little girl's
name is Billie Clare White. We welcome her to the City Limits family.
Cover Photograph by David Schulz
Glenn Thrush
Senior Editor
-
(ity Limits
Volume XXII Number 5
City Limits is published ten times per year, monthly except
bimonthly issues in June/July and AugusVSeptember, by
the City Limits Community Information Service, Inc., a non
profit organization devoted to disseminating information
concerning neighborhood revitalization.
Editor: Andrew White
Senior Editors: Kierna Mayo. Kim Nauer, Glenn Thrush
Managing Editor: Robin Epstein
Contributing Editors: James Bradley, Rob Polner
Design Direction: James Conrad, Paul V. Leone
Advertising Representative: Faith Wiggins
Proofreader: Sandy Socolar
Photographers: Dietmar LizLepiorz, Melissa Cooperman
Associate Di rector,
Center for an Urban Future: Neil Kleiman
Sponsors:
Association for Neighborhood and
Housing Development. Inc.
Pratt Institute Center for Community
and Environmental Development
Urban Homesteading Assi stance Board
Board of Directors:
Eddie Bautista, New York Lawyers for
the Public Interest
Beverly Cheuvront. City Harvest
Francine Justa, Neighborhood Housing Services
Errol Louis. Central Brooklyn Partnership
Shawn Dove, Rheedlen Centers
Rebecca Reich, Low Income Housing Fund
Andrew Reicher, UHAB
Tom Robbins, Journalist
Celia Irvine, ANHD
Pete Williams, National Urban League
"Affiliations for identification only
Subscription rates are: for individuals and community
groups, $25/0ne Year. $35/Two Years; for businesses,
foundations, banks, government agencies and libraries,
$35/ 0ne Year, $50/Two Years. Low income. unemployed,
$1O/ 0ne Year.
City Limits welcomes comments and article contributions.
Please include a stamped, selfaddressed envelope for return
manuscripts. Material in City Limits does not necessarily
reflect the opinion of the sponsoring organizations. Send
correspondence to: City Limits, 120 Wall Street. 20th Fl. .
New York, NY 10005. Postmaster. Send address changes to
City Limits, 420 Wall Street, 20th FI. , New York, NY 10005.
Periodical postage paid
New York. NY 10001
City Limits (lSSN 01990330)
1212)4793344
FAX 1212)3446457
e-maiILCitLim@aol.com
Copyright 1997. All Rights Reserved. No
portion or portions of this journal may be reprinted with-
out the express permission of the publishers.
City Limits is indexed in the Alternative Press
Index and the Avery Index to Architectural
Periodicals and is available on microfilm from University
Microfilms International, Ann Arbor, M148106.
CITY LIMITS
MAY 1997
FEATURE
MaliAdjusted
New York's main shopping drags are coming back. But many small
commercial strips that could make low-income neighborhoods worth
walking again remain bodega badlands. The city's solution is suburban-style
mini-malls. Is this the right idea? By Kim Nauer
PIPELINES
It Ain't Just Rent
If Joe Bruno pulls off the murder of rent stabilization, he'll be killing
a lot more than cheap rents. He'll be eliminating a whole roster of hidden
tenant rights, perks and protections. By Kathleen McGowan
Wrongshoreman
A Brooklyn Congressman from the West Side of Manhattan
has a worker-friendly plan for resurrecting a dead port.
So why is everybody talking like Jerry Nadler's just proposed
Westway 2000?
Welfare's Foster Scare
By Michael Hirsch
Workfare and benefit cut-offs may increase child abuse and stress out the
foster care system. By Adam Fifield and Brian Halpem
PROFILE
Parents on Patrol
The halls of PS 70 in Tremont were scary until a group of parents created
their own security patrol. Now they are visible around the school, wielding
walkie-talkies and lots of influence. By Mary Bliltch
CULTURE
A Healthy Baby Girl
Cavalier corporations let pregnant women take a drug that gave their
daughters cancer. One survivor turned her story into a film that's become
an organizing tool for toxics, labor and women's health activists. By Robin Epstein
SPECW REPORT FROM THE CEMTER FOR AM URBAM FUTURE
Punishment Without Rehabilitation Hurts Kids
Governor George Pataki 's juvenile justice proposal would toss more
children into prison with adult criminals for longer periods of time than ever
before. And that's bad news for the neighborhoods.
Cityview
Silicon Allies
Cityview
NYC's Young and Restless
Review
Gang, She-Bang
Spare Change
Who Are They?
Briefs
COMMENTARY
DEPARTMENTS
6, 7 Editorial
NYCHA's Not-Sa-Free Speech
Doherty Trashes Garbage 'Hoods
It Takes a Village, Idiot
Letters
Professional
Directory
Grousing Court Job Ads
128
By Vemon Ballllrd
By Kim
130
By Mary P.
134
By Glenn Thrush
2
4
32
31, 33


, Regulation Crazed
While potentially valuable, "7 Deadly
Signs of New York City's Unheeded
.... L E.T.T ... Housing Crisis" in the April issue of City
.. Limits was plagued by many unattributed
and misinterpreted statistics. Moreover,
while it is not my place to take sides in the
often bitter dispute between tenants and
landlords, your article ignored many
salient factors as to why rents have risen.

You claim the "greatest drop in number
[of units renting for less than $500] took
place in the $300 to $400 range." Later,
you state the irrelevant, misleading statis-
tic (I don' t even know if it's true) that
"between 1981 and 1993 ... New York's
median rent rose just $100 in inflation
adjusted terms. But from 1993 to 1996
alone, the median rent jumped nearly
another $100, from $50 I to $593."
The $100 increase issue is, in fact,
pointless.
Moreover, with the economy recover-
ing from the doldrums of the late 1980s
and early 1990s, landlords not only are
suffering fewer collection losses, but can
charge legal rates which they previously
were unable to collect. Thus, a landlord
entitled to charge $500 for a unit, might
have been able to collect only $400
because of a tenant's economic distress. If
that tenant obtained a job or a better job, or
if that tenant left and was replaced by one
who could pay the full $500, the landlord
would be able to collect the full rent.
Other statements reflect shoddy report-
ing. One woman claimed her rent went
from "$572 to $700 last year." Any knowl-
edgeable reporter would know at once that
such a hike, if true, meant that the unit was
not subject to rent regulation or had
received an illegal increase. Even if the
woman had agreed to the RGB-authorized
two-year renewal lease at 7 percent, her
rent only would have increased $40, and
not $128.
The article also states that the 1981 to
1993 rent increase figures were "inflation
adjusted," rather than actual numbers. This
is disingenuous since the RGB is supposed
to factor inflation into its yearly guideline
adjustments anyway.
Finally, the article states that since
1993, rents have gone up "nearly another
$100," from $501 to $593. Even if true,
this is a $92 increase. Given that the
RGB's meetings usually involve acrimo-
nious debates over a mere 0.5 percent
increase, it is sloppy journalism to play
fast and loose with an 8 percent margin.
There are too many other errors of fact
and interpretation to address herein, but it
is interesting that this article, which seemed
to be a thinly-veiled screed against Mayor
Giuliani and Governor Pataki, failed to state
the most telling, categorical and unchal-
lengeable truth: during the Guiliani admin-
istration's three years in office, two of the
years saw the all-time lowest RGB-autho-
rized rent increases: 2 percent for one year
leases. Thus, if City Limits can explain how
2 percent (\ 994) plus 2 percent (\ 995) plus
5 percent (1996) added up to an increase of
"nearly another $100" or elsewise caused
the evils suggested in your article, I would
be most indebted.
Edward S. Hochman
Chairman, Rent Guidelines Board
Glenn Thrush replies: I thank Mr.
Hochman for affirming my purpose in
writing the article: to illform the rent reg-
ulation-crazed horde that most poor,
unregulated tenants have far graver con-
cerns than the loss of rent stabilization.
Throughout his letter, Mr. Hochman-
who seems to think the axis of the universe
passes through his outbox at the Rent
Guidelines Board-myopically mangles
statistics describing housing and relit con-
ditions for the population at large with
stats affecting only rent-regulated tenants.
He calls the loss of low-rent apartments-
and the $100 increase in real rents between
1993 and 1996 "irrelevant." I don't think
anything could be more relevant.
At other points, 1 am not quite sure
which article Mr. Hochman read. He says
1 play "fast and loose" with numbers-
then corrects me with my own stats.
And an error which Mr. Hochman attrib-
utes to "shoddy reporting" is, in fact, his
own. He says that "any knowledgeable
reporter" would have questioned one poor
tenant's claim that she had her rent raised
$130 a month in one hike: anyone claiming
such a huge rent hike could not have been
protected by rent regs, he reasons. He 's
right. Perhaps 1 wasn't clear enough in the
story-she isn't protected by rent regs.
Neither are most poor tenants who often pay
up to 75 percent of their income for shelter.
80 Women?
I am writing in response to Kim Nauer's
article, "The Apprenticeship of Money
Kravis" (March 1997). I would like to bring
a significant point to the attention of your
readers concerning United Neighborhood
Houses (UNH). Ms. Nauer writes,
"Nonprofits struggling to set up program-
related investments, all the rage with foun-
dations right now, certainly report no such
luck. At best, these enterprises have been
generating 10 jobs here, 50 jobs there. Even
UNH, which approached Wylde for help
with a day care business, ventures that in
the first two years, their enterprise would
employ no more than 80 women."
The employment of 80 women as fam-
ily day care providers, a statistic which
was quoted in the article, is entirely mis-
leading. This figure came from a founda-
tion proposal which was developed prior
to the relationship established between
UNH and the New York City Investment
Fund.
In point of fact, the number of women
assisted is not the major factor in our pro-
gram. Utilizing funding from the Surdna
Foundation and consulting assistance from
the New York City Investment Fund,
UNH's goal is to form an effective model
of family day care networks. These net-
works would support and result in the cre-
ation of a substantial number of child care
jobs in UNH settlement house communi-
ties and beyond.
Emily Menlo Marks
Executive Director
United Neighborhood Houses
Kim Nauer replies: Let me simply quote
from my notes verbatim:
Nauer: "How many people do you see
this employing in phase one?"
Marks: "In phase one, which will be
about 18 months, we hope to have 80
providers and 300 children and an infra-
structure capable of substantial further
expansion and further replication."
This alone makes my assertion in the
article entirely correct. But let us assume
that Marks was referring only to the initial
phase of the project and she genuinely
believed Kathryn Wylde's assertion that it
would be possible to create "one hundred
thousand" new day care jobs from this
program. The next question gave her the
opportunity to layout that vision. Marks
reply was decidedly more subdued.
Nauer: "Do you have a phase after
that where you think you may be doubling
that number? Or do you just expect other
people to be replicating this model? ",
Marks: "We hope to do both, and so it
could double. "
CITY LIMITS
t
Francisca Salce, a.k.a. Joe, taking
care of making her business rise at
her store on 1121 St. Nicolas Avenue
at 166th St. in Washington Heights.
CALL: CHASE COMMUNITY
DEVELOPMENT COMMERCIAL
LENDING 212-332-4061
Joe's Pizza's got the dough.
Joe's Pizza was a first. Not only did Francisca Salce make
a neighborhood name for her store with great tasting
pizza, she was the first recipient of a loan under The
Chase Community Development Group's Small Retailers
Lending Program.
The Small Retailers Lending Program is a unique Chase
initiative whose purpose is to expand access to bank
loans for hard to finance small businesses, particularly
those located in low- and moderate-income communities.
This program made it possible for Ms. Salce to obtain a
loan to relocate her restaurant, renovate the new space
and still remain in the neighborhood in which she has built
a successful business.
Which is just fine by Joe's Pizza's customers, who swear
by the dough.
:......................... Community Development Group
CHASE. The right relationship is everything.
sM
1997 The Chase Manhattan Bank. Member FDIC. Equal Opportunity Lender Q
MAY 1997

Crying that the city's poor were being " crucified. " members of a dozen West Harlem churches protested In front of
the clty's W. 135th Street Hamilton Income Support Center on Good Frtday.
DOHERTY TRASHES GARBAGE 'HOODS : a i : : ~ t ~ e ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ; ~ ~
new transfer stations
There's clamor of an upcoming Neighborhoods is calling for a mora- not be placed in overburdened neigh-
garbage-dump crisis rising from the torium on the opening of new transfer borhoods. And last March, a state
city's waterfront neighborhoods, but stations. Supreme Court judge quoted
New York's top trashman apparently In early April, representatives of Carpinello's own testimony in an
doesn't want to hear about it. OWN's 20 member organizations order forcing the Giuliani administra-
As the city plans to shut down the filed into the City Council chamber, tion to obey the law. The city is
Death Star-sized Fresh Kills dump on taking advantage of a hearing on the expected to appeal the ruling.
Staten Island, officials are gearing up privatization of the Department of In Doherty's absence, environ-
to begin shipping 13,000 tons of resi- Sanitation's South Bronx marine mentalists directed their complaints
dential waste out of state each day. waste facility to air their broader at his empty chair. Rising to testify,
But a new coalition of waterfront concerns. Carlos Padilla of the South Bronx
communities says those plans will Sanitation Commissioner John Clean Air Coalition squeezed a
likely result in the opening of addi- Doherty was invited to testify, but squeak from a foot-long black rubber
tional privately-owned waste trans- refused to attend or send any of his rat. "Look, I've brought along the
fer stations in neighborhoods that aides. Calls by City Limits to the san- commissioner of the sanitation
already house most of the city's ItatlOn department were not department," he quipped.
small, smelly waste stations- includ- returned. "Now, now, don't be picking on
ing Greenpoint-Williamsburg, Red Doherty had good reason to skip rats," responded Councilmember
Hook, the South Bronx and southeast the hearing. In early 1996, his deputy, Kathryn Freed, the Manhattan
Queens. Michael Carpinello, admitted at a Democrat who chaired the hearing.
The Organization of Waterfront Council hearing that the city had -Glenn Thrush
Resources
IN ADDITION TO DOLING OUT
CAMPAIGN CONTRIBUTIONS
by the metric ton, the land-
lord-loaded Rent
Stabilization Association, is
passing around an aquama-
-
rine academic tome it
believes demolishes the foun-
dations of the city's rent reg-
ulation system.
The book, "A Reevaluation of
Residential Rent Controls," is
livelier and less weasely rea-
soned than either its sponsor
or its title suggests. The
author, Brookings Institution
fellow Tony Downs, argues
that rent controls are evil for
two basic reasons: 1) They vio-
late long-held capitalist prin-
ciples that allow property
owners to do anything they
II TAKES A
VIllAGE,
IDIOT
With the tOOth anniversafy of
New York City's five.borough gov-
ernment looming next year, one
reformer has a downsizing dream 10
change the city's besic political
structure.
Richard Benjamin, a SUNY/NeW
Paltz professor and one of the
architects of the city's 1989 charter
reform, told participants at an April
Regional Plan Association confer-
ence that he wants 10 see New York
revert to a system of 50 or 60 -vil-
Iages,- Gone would be the power-
drained borough presidencies
along with politician-appointed
community boards and the newly
weakened school boards.
The villages, Benjamin says,
would elect their own governing
boards and control the $3S million
budgets formerly spent by the
beeps, "To bave reel local govern-
ment we need to get rid of what's
there now, - he said. Such towns-
within-cities will be able to more
clearly articuleta policy priorities.
he added.
But critics argue 1hIt 1hiI hemIe-
1izatiGn scheme wouldn't do much to
change 1118 basic prollIem local g0v-
ernments have faced in their fights
with City Hell: the cily's refusal to
cede real power or cash 10 neigh-
borhoods. Wif we need more local-
ism, we have a system now that can
wort,- says Edward Rogowsky, 8
city planning commissioner and for-
mer community board director for
Brooklyn Borough President
Howard Golden. -Sive community
boards the resourcaa, the expecta-
tions and accoontability and then
klfs see what happens'-
-MBryBsm
want with what they own; 2)
New York's reinstitution of
rent regulations in the 1970s
has put a chill on construction
because developers think lib-
erals are always on the verge
of instituting new rent caps.
Both of these arguments
CITY LIMITS

NYCHA'S
NOT-SO-FREE
SPEE(H
A team of well-paid New York City
Housing Authority's lawyers spent
the better part of a week in April fer-
vidly fighting to keep a group of East
Side protesters from getting the word
out about NYCHA's proposed deregu-
lation scheme.
Yet despite three court actions,
three judges' rulings and the authori-
ty's contention that not all speech
should be free in its housing develop-
ments-members of the Jacob Riis
Houses tenants association held their
April 26 informational rally on a street
adjacent to their East Village project
This spring, tenants groups and
housing advocates have been orga-
nizing to oppose the city's request to
free NYCHA from federal public
housing regulations-which could
allow the authority to rent to richer
tenants, disregard some rent caps
for low-income tenants and even
sell some NYCHA properties to pri-
vate developers.
Val Orselli, executive director of
the Cooper Square Committee, said
the idea of the Riis meeting was a
way of getting the word out on the
downplayed plan. [NYCHA's own
information session, mandated by the
Mothers and daughters of men killed by police officers lead a march to City Hall against police brutality last
month Groups represenllng the Puerto Rican, African American and ASian communities are demanding that the
mayor control what they say is unprecedented levels of police violence
feds, is planned for May 6 at the
Fashion Institute ofTechnology.J
"We are planning to inform ten-
ants of the potential dangers they
face with NYCHA," Orselli said.
"Oangers like it being able to
charge higher rents, opening
apartments up for families with sig-
nificantly higher incomes, elimina-
tion of tenant grievance proce-
dures. Basically, we wanted people
to know that deregulation is part of
a movement to privatize public
housing."
On the Monday before the rally,
city lawyers claimed NYCHA denied
permission for the rally because
event leaders wanted to use the rally
for partisan political purposes. Two
days later, State Supreme Court
Justice Helen Freedman shot that
argument down.
Then early Friday, a team of three
NYCHA lawyers filed an appeal-a
move which, for the moment, barred
the demonstration. A few hours later,
yet another state judge had okayed
the demonstration-but only allowed
Riis tenants to attend.
GROUSING COURT
able verdicts. The group also claims
that judges too often revert to off-the-
record conversations with lawyers-
requesting court recorders tum off
their tape recorders-witttout agree-
ment from landlord attorneys.
"This whole thing was crazy. They
had three lawyers working full time
just to keep a group of tenants from
meeting," said Judith Goldiner, the
Legal Aid lawyer who represented
the Riis tenants. "The New York City
Housing Authority is crazy."
Landlords have claimed for years
that housing court is stacked against
them, but a fedaraI judge has shot
down an eight-vear-old lawsuit
alleging that tenant-friendly court
administrators are violating owners'
constitutional rights.
Federel Judge Shirley Wool Kram
ruled in late January that the Rent
Stabilization Association hed failed
are hole-y, for the following
reasons: 1) American govern-
ment has always infringed on
private resources for the pub-
lic good (think eminent
domain, property taxes and
jury duty). 2) Any contractor
who thinks politicians are
MAVI997
to prove a pattern of unconstitutional
abu881 that stacked the odds
against them in court. Kram also
decided that federal courts had no
jurisdiction in the matter.
RSA contends that court adminis-
trators improperly ,Row distribution
of anti-landlord literature, issue ille-
gal rulings and, at times, make it diffi-
cult for owners to appeal question-
moving towards adding new
regulations nowadays has
been inhaling his own paint
thinner. Indeed, Downs
admits to City Limits that
there could be "a whole lot of
different reasons" why the
city's housing construction
In the wake of the recent defeat,
RSA lawyers say they probably won't
appeal the decision. MI don't think
there are any (plans to suel. but I
can't say for certain, says Mitchell
Posilkin, RSA's general counsel.
-lh8nna Agr8n
sector is so sluggish: building
costs, community opposition
to projects and labor expens-
es, to name three.
Nonetheless, Downs is a
deft and lucid propagandist
and the book is a good read
in a know-thine-enemy way.
The demonstrators did have to
sidestep one more hurdle: sometime
during the week before the rally,
road crews began tearing up the
disputed ground. "I walked by and I
saw the sidewalk being torn up by
whatever you call those big, loud
machines," Goldiner added.
-Glenn Thrush
Every rent stabilization
advocate should have a
copy. (all the Urban Land
I nstitute at (202) 833-7200
for a copy.

PIPELINE
While a three-
dimensional Gov.
George Pataki
attellded a big-buck
GOP fundraiser at
the South St.
Seaport in April,
tenalllS dragged a
two-dimensional
George into the
rent-war fray.
It Ain't Just Rents
If the GOP kills rent regulation, anti-eviction protections
get buried too. By Kathleen McGowan
K
ren Baicker is the prototype
of the lucky rent-stabilized
tenant. She pays less than
$500 to live in a spacious
partment on lower Fifth
Avenue in Chelsea. Her rent is well below
market rate-which would be in the thou-
sands-but she has paid in other ways.
Losing heat or hot water for more than 30
days during the brutal winter of 1995-96
was just the beginning. By last fall, there
were 120 outstanding violations on her
landmarked building.
"The electricity was also out in the
entire common space. And we had no
intercom. That went on for at least a
month," Baicker, a mother of two small
children, says.
But because she's covered by the rent
stabilization laws, Baicker was able to file
a harassment claim with the state
Department of Housing and Community
Renewal (DHCR)-a charge her landlord
denies. Now the agency is at least moni-
toring her situation.
"It's gotten better," Baicker says. "I
think that harassment case made an
impact. They did put a new boiler in, and
there are now people that clean the build-
ing, which hadn't happened in eight
months."
Everyone knows the state rent regula-
tion laws-which keep rents capped for
over a million New Yorkers-are under
attack by GOP State Senate boss Joseph
Bruno. But few tenants-Baicker among
them-realize that Republicans are also
trying to eliminate vital protections and
rights that are also written into the laws.
The rent law allows tenants to sue their
landlords for repairs without having to
worry about being booted out on the street
in retaliation; gives them protection
against harassment and overcharging; and
prevents landlords from gutting a build-
ing's amenities to encourage low-rent ten-
ants to leave.
"These protections are as important, if
not more important, than the rent-setting
parts of the law," says Sam Himmelstein, a
tenant lawyer who is an expert on rent reg-
ulation law.
T.nant Rights
The danger, tenant lobbyists say, is that
Bruno and Governor George Pataki will
quietly try to weaken these protections as
part of a brokered "compromise" that pre-
serves current rent levels.
Even without the rent-hike protection,
New York's rent regulation laws are,
arguably, the strongest and most clearly-
articulated tenant protections in the nation.
The cornerstone of the law is the right
to lease renewal. Landlords of rent stabi-
lized buildings are required to deliver a
renewal lease to their tenants every one or
two years. The owners are also required to
maintain the same level of services-ele-
vators, intercoms, even lUXUry amenities
like swimming pools or parking garages-
that buildings had before they went under
rent regulations.
Owners don't have much choice in the
matter. They must offer a renewal unless
they can prove their tenants are deadbeats
or that they're illegally subletting for prof-
it. DHCR also grants rare exemptions if a
landlord's relatives need to
move in.
This guarantee of a lease
renewal is key. Without it, the
rent stabilization and control
systems would be useless. In
effect, it creates a right of ten-
ancy that competes with the
owners' right to use their
property in any way they
want. That's why rent protec-
tion is intrinsic to the rent reg-
ulation: without one, the
other doesn't work. "If you're
not offered a lease, then the
rate at which you're not
offered it is meaningless,"
explains Frank Braconi, a
housing researcher.
Tenant Aisha Collins, a
Clinton Hill resident who has
been locked in a 12-year
struggle with her landlords,
puts it more directly, ''Thank
God for rent protections."
Like Baicker, Collins has
pressed her case with DHCR
and seen one change in her
building's conditions as a
result: the installation of func-
tioning mailboxes in her lobby
CITY LIMITS

for the first time in years. Collins believes
she achieved this small but significant vic-
tory because her landlord was legally bound
to renew her lease year after year.
Without the tenancy right, says lawyer
Ken Rosenfeld, a tenant representative on
the Rent Guidelines Board, tenants would
be unwilling to press complaints against
bad landlords for fear of not having their
lease renewed. "If I don't get heat, for
example, I might think twice about com-
plaining," he says. "If my landlord doesn't
like me, he can decide not to renew. I
might not want to be considered a pain in
the neck."
The law also requires that landlords
certify that their buildings provide basic
services: common-area lighting, major
appliances, a superintendent, and, most
important, heat and hot water-before
they are granted sanctioned rent increases.
And tenants are entitled to an explanation
of how their rent is calculated.
All of these requirements are cross-
stitched into a patchwork of regulations,
written by different legislative classes and
translated into the DHCR's arcane code of
regulations. It is the bane of landlords,
who are eager to simplify their lives and
boost their income.
"[These] parts of the rent control laws
are very difficult for landlords to deal with,
they' re unfair, and they should be changed
to promote development in the city," says
Myron Altschuler, a partner in one of the
city's largest landlord law firms. "Over the
years, I've had many clients leave state
because they' re tired of dealing with the
complexities of the rent laws."
Marassm.nt Prot.ctlons
But most landlords have stayed in
town. Many of them have vigorously sup-
ported Bruno's December pledge to "end
rent regulations as we know it"-and lav-
ished him with campaign contributions.
In April, Bruno backed a little off his
harshest rhetoric, telling city Democrats he
planned to cut a "compromise" on vacancy
decontrol. In an April AM-radio conversa-
tion with former mayor Ed Koch, Bruno
said he would accept the decontrol of all
rent-regulated apartments as they become
vacant in lieu of his prior commitment to let
the rent laws completely lapse on June 15.
At around the same time, Bruno told
reporters he wanted to kill the lease renew-
al law. He also said he would try to do away
with state regulations guaranteeing "suc-
cession"-the state mandate permitting
family members or domestic partners to
inherit rent -stabilized apartments from
leaseholders who die or move out.
MAY 1997
"People Must Be
Happy With Their
Landlords"
The Department of Housing and Community Renewal (DHCR), the state
agency legally required to investigate allegations of harassment and neglect, is a
mess.
The problem is that the agency has been more or less headless since former com-
missioner Joe Holland resigned under pressure last year-and it was never aggres-
sive at pursuing cases even when Holland was around.
According to DHCR figures provided to City Limits, just over 500 harassment
claims made by tenants were pending by the end of 1996, a threefold decline from
the 1400 cases pending in 1993.
"Our intake is down considerably," says Donna Ackerman, the agency' s
spokesperson, who provides the following explanation: "People must be happy with
their landlords."
But that glib assessment doesn't quite gibe with what tenant advocates are wit-
nessing in the city. "The truth is we' re seeing more harassment complaints now than
ever before," says Jennifer St. John, who advises lawyerless tenants in Brooklyn for
the City-Wide Task Force on Housing Court. "It's a trend. Landlords seem to be
getting a lot more aggressive."
The reason for the statistical drop is simple, tenant lawyers argue. "Word's
gotten out that the state is so ineffective, it's generally a waste of time to go to
them with harassment cases," tenant lawyer Sam Himmelstein says. "I know I
don't go to them much because they have an incredible reluctance to prosecute
these cases."
Under the rent laws, DHCR can punish a landlord who overcharges or ignores
repairs by nixing a rent increase or, more substantially, by leveling penalties up to
three times the overcharge, plus accrued interest. But in February, State
Comptroller H. Carl McCall reported that tenant overcharge complaints took, on
average, over four years to resolve. The delays mean that many tenants never col-
lect their refunds-a cumulative total McCall's estimates to be $69 million.
Still, landlord lawyers say DHCR's complaint system is the one of the few parts
of rent regulations that works fine. "It's simple for a tenant to file a complaint at
DHCR," says landlord lawyer Myron Altschuler. "I think that' s a good thing, and I
don' t see the need to change it. The DHCR enforcement unit protects tenants who
claim they are being harassed."
However, tenant lawyers say most tenants simply withhold their rent and fight
their cases out in housing court instead of entering the DHCR morass. They join a
swarm of unregulated tenants who have no option but pursue cases in court, further
burdening the overloaded court system.
To make the situation even worse for tenants, owners are pushing a state Senate bill
that would require tenants in non-payment cases to deposit their entire back-rent
before having their cases heard. This is a problem because most of the tenants driven
to Housing Court are too poor to come up with such a massive outlay so quickly.
Last year, most of the Bronx Assembly delegation introduced the measure,
which never made it out of the lower house's housing committee. While Assembly
Speaker Sheldon Silver has opposed such measures in the past, some legi slative
aides say Silver may have to give ground on deposits if he wants to preserve rent
stabilization for moderate-income tenants.
One thing is for sure: Bruno is intent on pushing for rent deposits as part of any
rent-reg deal.
"No one talks about the rent deposit bill," says Billy Easton at the New York
State Tenants and Neighbors Coalition. "But we know it will be on the table when
the final deal is being cut."
-Kathleen McGowan alld Glenn Thrush

"Common sense tells me that if I don't own
something, then I shouldn't have the right
to will it to someone else," Bruno said.
But it was the Koch-culled vacancy
decontrol comment that brought Bruno
the headlines. It also brought the voluble
senate leader into line with fellow
Republicans AI D' Amato and George
Pataki who have called for various forms
of vacancy decontrol. "And what's wrong
with vacancy decontrol?" Koch asked
City Limits.
Everything, tenants say. For one, it
would mean the slow but steady death of
the whole system-achieving Bruno's
master plan withln a decade. And if the
GOP succeeds in its goal of combining
vacancy decontrol and the elimination of
the right to a lease renewal, the system
would effectively end within a year or two.
Landlords could simply choose not to
renew the leases of tenants with low stabi-
lized rents, replacing them with people
willing to pay top dollar.
The changes could also lead to an
unprecedented campaign of harassment
from landlords eager to rid their building
of low-income tenants.
Bruno has said he would take unspeci-
fied steps to combat harassment. But
killing the anti-harassment provisions con-
tained in the main regulation law will
mean tenants lose the only civil-code pro-
tections against tenant harassment on the
books, lawyers say. ''There is no general
harassment statute on the books outside of
the rent laws," Himmelstein says. ''There's
a common-law right not to be harassed, but
you have a much better case if you use the
rent laws to bring harassment cases."
Harassment isn't easy to prove under
rent regs; tenants must establish a pattern
of bad landlord behavior. But if the laws
are eliminated-Dr just tenant advocates
fear landlords will be emboldened to use
illegal tactics to drive tenants out: direct
threats, changing the locks, noisy pseudo-
repairs, or simply letting the buildings run
down to the point where frustrated tenants
pick up and leave.
L on. of the '70.
Tenant advocates say that's exactly
what happened when the system was
deregulated in the early 1970s.
Between 1971 and 1974, 388,000
apartments became deregulated
under vacancy decontrol. A special
1974 governor's commission that
led to the re-adoption of rent regs
found that the decontrol had resulted in
massive displacement and hardship for
city tenants. Rents citywide had increased
by 50 percent, on average, while landlord
expenses had climbed only 7.9 percent.
But the figure that tenants point to is
the fall in landlord outlays. Expenditures
for service, repairs and maintenance
decreased by 30 percent in that time peri-
od-<iespite the fact that owners were rak-
ing in greater profits.
Many advocates think the cuts in land-
lord spending were a hidden form of harass-
ment that will be occur again if indiscrimi-
nate vacancy decontrol wins the day.
''The thought at the time was to get off
landlords' backs, to allow them more
money," says Ann Pasmanick, executive
director of the Community Training and
Resource Center. "But they didn't perform
any better. Vacancy decontrol is an experi-
ment we've already learned from."
Additional reporting by Glenn Thrush.
Specializing in
Community Development Groups,
HDFCs and Non ... Profits
NeVI York
Lawyers
for the
Public
Interest
Low ... Cost Insurance and Quality Service.
NANCY HARDY
Insurance Broker
Over 20 Years of Experience.
270 North Avenue, New Rochelle, NY 10801
9 1 4 ~ 6 5 4 ~ 8 6 6 7
provides free legal referrals for community-
based and non-profit groups
seeking pro bOllo representation.
Projects include corp<:'J!te, tax
alld real estate work, zoning advice, haL/sing
and employment discrimil1ation,
environmental justice,
disability and civil rights.
For further information,
call NYLPI at
(212) 727-2270.
There is no charge
for NYLPI's
services.
CITY LIMITS
J
Parents on Patrol
A mom-and-pop security team watches over a troubled South
Bronx elementary school. By Mary Blatch
O
ne recent morning, Anthony
Williams was walking past
the string of bodegas and
candy stores that line 174th
Street on the way to PS 70,
the Tremont elementary school his two
sons attend. It was close to 9 a.m., just
before the morning bell, when Williams, a
37-year-old part-time college student,
heard the familiar sound of young children
and the tweetering of video games coming
from a nearby convenience store.
Then he heard something he had never
heard before: the owner telling the kids to
move along, it was time to go to school.
"They used to let the kids hang around all
morning," he recalls.
Two years ago, before Williams and
other neighborhood parents began an
aggressive and occasionally controversial
parents patrol, the owner would have been
happy to let the kids go on playing their
games. After all, no one came around look-
ing for them. Not teachers, not school safe-
ty officers, certainly not their parents. But
the patrol, a team of mothers, fathers,
grandparents and neighborhood retirees
who guard areas in and out of the school
with walkie-talkies, has begun to change
all that.
They keep their eyes on the kids, the
neighborhood troublemakers who prey on
young students and, most important, the
under-performing school. Making sure
kids get to school intact and on time was
their initial motive, but parent power has
turned out to be the ultimate goal.
"If we don't get involved, who will?"
asks Sybil Mulligan, president of PS 70's
parent association and a patrol member.
"[Board of Education officials 1 very rarely
even visit the schools .... They come with
good intentions, but they get caught up in
politics and stop paying attention."
Educational Root-Rot
Community School District 9, whose
school board has been suspended numer-
ous times, has a history of political flim-
flam and educational root-rot. Barely one-
third of PS 70's kids read at grade level;
just over half meet that proficiency in
math. The building itself is hopelessly
overcrowded; 1,700 restless kids have
MAY 1997
been crammed into classrooms and modu-
lar add-ons in space built to hold 1,400.
The surrounding streets are even less
hospitable. All but 3 percent of the stu-
dents come from households that are poor
enough to qualify them for free lunch. And
the local precinct is in the top ten when it
comes to juvenile arrests.
It was this general atmosphere of child-
on-child violence that prompted the par-
ents to organize the patrol in the first place.
For years, students in IS 147, ajunior high
separated from PS 70 only by Claremont
Park, have bullied, berated and even
mugged the younger students. One fifth
grader told City Limits she still remembers
a mass raw-egg barrage she endured from
the older kids one Halloween. Even with
the patrol members around, incidents are
not uncommon: Mulligan tells of a junior
high student who approached a PS 70 kid
and snatched off his backpack.
"We chased him but he was so quick
we couldn't catch him," Mulligan recalls
with an incredulous laugh. She also says
she's known kids who were beaten up for
less than five dollars. "People will kill for
less than that, so parents are very con-
cerned."
Despite such constant threats, the
school's 21 exits are protected by only two
full-time and one part-time guards. They
are overwhelmed. Before and after school,
the students are joined by five busloads of
kids from other scl100ls who come for day
care, creating a child-swarm that even the
most conscientious teachers find difficult
to monitor. "I've seen children come in
one door and go out another to the park,"
says Sonia Martinez, who has a son in the
fourth grade. "Patrol members say it's also
not uncommon to find un screened
adults-mostly parents-roaming around
the school without the requisite building
passes.
Because the Board of Education allo-
cates guards on the basis of a school's
number of violent incidents, elementary
schools are often shorted when it comes to
guards. "The Board of Ed is not as inclined
to supply security for elementary schools
as they are for junior high and high
schools," admits principal Sylvia Simon.

PROFILE
The day begins with
a parent's helping
hand at Tremont's
PS 70.

The idea is to keep their eyes
on the kids, the neighbor-
hood troublemakers and the
under-performing school.
Patrol leader Sybil
Mulligan gets her
young charges to
class on time.
K plng Par. nts Tog.th. r
A small group of PS 70 parents-
Williams, Mulligan and Aida Morales-
had talked about setting up a patrol for
years, but it was a $4,000 grant from
Pro mesa, a local nonprofit multi-service
agency, that helped them get started with
uniforms and walkie-talkies. They also
hired Bea Lurie, a former city housing
official who advises local groups on public
safety issues.
In a school system where bake sales are
the most common form of parent involve-
ment, such parent patrols are still a relative
rarity. In Tremont, the other reason that
makes parents come together-and keeps
them from breaking apart-is that the
patrol is almost a full-time job.
Each morning the patrol members see
if they have enough troops to keep an eye
on all the school's exits, hallways and
bathrooms over the course of the day.
Often, however, there are only enough vol-
unteers available to oversee the rush hours:
before school, lunch time and after the
final bell.
The patrol is anchored by a few par-
ent. They are the first ones on site in their
signature blue-and-yellow T-shirts, hats
and jackets. Although 25 to 30 parents
began the current school year in the patrol
only 15 make the rounds now. Parents
drop out for any number of reasons:
fatigue, other commitments (many par-
ents work multiple jobs), the season (on
winter mornings it's particularly hard to
get parents). What's more, parents simply
aren't used to other parents taking part in
their children's school lives.
"Groups like that get too into people's
business, I'm too busy for that," says Jason
Rivera, whose daughter is a fifth grader at
PS 70. "I've had [patrol members] call me
at my job because my daughter was mis-
behaving in the halls. Call me at home
about that."
Personality politics and petty clashes
have also wounded the organization's
credibility with some parents. Last year,
parents complained that one patrol mem-
ber, Carolyn Green, had been rude to some
parents and kids. Green says she was the
one verbally abused, but the patrol decided
to kick her out, prompting at least one
other member to resign in protest. Green,
who is still angry over the affair, thinks
parents shouldn't have the right to pass
judgment on other parents. "They're
bogus," Green says of the patrol. "They
keep other people from becoming
involved."
Mulligan, for one, is undaunted by
such criticism. When the patrol is particu-
larly short-handed, she takes a more direct
approach. She has even been known to
drag parents out of school assemblies to
get them to join the patrol.
And for all the travail, there have been
undeniable victories. Mulligan and the
principal say that violent incidents around
the school have dropped. And patrol mem-
bers have become more assertive in calling
for changes when they see things they
don't like.
Take one particularly lousy school
guard. "When it was really cold, she'd be
in the store instead of watching the chil-
dren," Morales says. "And she always had
an attitude with the parents." Last
September, they succeeded in having the
woman removed from her post-although
she hasn't yet been replaced.
It was a small victory, but an important
one for parents who are trying to make
their imprint on a system that has long
ignored them. As for attacking parent apa-
thy and hostility, Mulligan offers a simple
pitch to mother and fathers who refuse to
join her patrol:
"Your child will respect you and all
adults more. They behave better because
they know you care. You will see the
improvement."
Reach 20,000 readers in the nonprofit sector,
government and property management.
ADVERTISE YOUR BUSINESS
OR SERVICE IN THE CITY LIMITS
PROFESSIONAL DIRECTORY!
Call Faith Wiggins at
(212) 479-3344
CITY LIMITS
Wrongshoreman
Brooklyn waterfront residents think Congressman Jerry
Nadler's superport dream is all wet. By Michael Hirsch
C
onnorants nest on the aban-
doned piers along Brooklyn's
Sunset Park waterfront.
Herons, egrets and wild par-
rots make their homes amidst
the toxic tidewater remains where a half
century ago the bulk of war materiel bound
for Europe was loaded by thousands of
muscle-backed stevedores. On the water-
front today, birds far outnumber union
cards. New York's shipping business, for
anyone who hasn't been asleep for half a
century, is sunk, and the twisted remnants
of Bush Terminal's piers jut from the
bayswater like a beached wreck.
But earlier this year, Jerry Nadler, a lib-
eral West Side Democratic Congressman,
and Mayor Rudolph Giuliani announced
plans to begin a port salvage operation in
Brooklyn, a task akin to raising a thousand
Titanics. Rep. Nadler whose district
includes neighborhoods in Brooklyn and
Manhattan, and Giuliani both support a
$4.1 billion plan to rebuild a I, I 29-acre
section of the derelict Brooklyn waterfront
into a "superport." To link their dream to
the continental U.S., they are also propos-
ing sandhogging a new rail tunnel under
New York Harbor to New Jersey or Staten
Island.
The plan is a boon to those who believe
New York's commercial future lies with its
seafaring past. Build the port and tunnel ,
MAY 1997
they argue, and just watch the factories and
warehouses sprout up in job-hungry neigh-
borhoods like Red Hook, Sunset Park and
Gowanus.
"If New York becomes the hub port, it
can add at least 50,000 new jobs, and prob-
ably much more than that," Nadler told
City Limits.
"He's thinking about expanding [the
port] and keeping jobs," says Robert Fitch,
author of "Assassination of New York,"
which pilloried city officials for allowing
the port-linked industrial economy to dis-
integrate while they subsidized the finan-
cial services and real estate sectors.
"Nadler's singular among politicians
working to put infrastructure in place."
Not everybody feels that way. Instead,
a growing number of Brooklyn communi-
ty leaders-people who have been rede-
veloping neighborhoods brick by brick for
years-think the plan could be a disaster.
They fear it will kill the small, hardy
industries that have managed to thrive on
the waterfront-and wa te a once-in-a-
century chance to develop the area. Get
ready for the next big development brawl.
"I'm not buying into the plan until I
know what will happen to local people
affected by it," says Tom Angotti, chair-
man of Pratt Institute's graduate planning
department. 'The potential for an active
and viable port is enormous ... but who gets
the jobs? Are they permanent? Will they
sustain local communities? Can we have
industry, waterfront development and at
the same time, public access and recre-
ational use?"
"They are panicking over intangibles,"
the responds Nadler. "Right now we don't
even know how big it has to be or where it
should be placed."
Rotterdam-on-Hudson
The notion of a coming age of super-
ports has been spawned by shipping com-
panies, who are moving aggressively to
consolidate costly operations in ports
throughout the country. The development
of a new generation of monster-sized cargo
ships with unheard of 46-foot drafts is the
key; double-hulled ships being built to tote
payloads of up to 6,000 truck-sized con-
tainers each will render current ports with
shallow channels and limited offioading
areas obsolete.
The prototype for 21 st century ports is
Rotterdam, Holland-Europe's "main-
port"-a 62-foot-deep channel through
which flows a majority of Europe's con-
tainerized freight. The New York Harbor,
which includes Newark, is currently the
East Coast's largest port, but it handles
only half of the tonnage Rotterdam does.
And almost all of the freight now passes
through the vast container ports on the
Jersey side.
The best place in New York City to put
a Rotterdam-type facility-which would
require acreage almost equal to Central
Park and Prospect Park combined-is the
curved expanse of waterfront between the
Red Hook piers and the Brooklyn Army
Terminal rail yards on 65th Street in Bay

Brooklyn's post-
industrial water-
from could be the
key to the rebirth of
NYC's port-city
hegemony.
Me

e-
Ridge. Its feasibility and exact placement
will be determined by a two-year, $2 mil-
lion study funded by the city with federal
transportation money.
Nadler believes that tbe East Coast will
only be home to one such port. "We have
to recognize we're in a race with Norfolk,
Virginia and Halifax, Nova Scotia [cities
that have their own superport aspirations],"
he says. "[If we fail] it might lead to our
losing as much as half of the 180,000 port-
related jobs the Port Authority estimates
the area has now."
If all goes according to plan, Nadler
thinks construction could begin in just four
years and be completed by 2010. "We
can't afford to be held up by lawsuits,"
Nadler adds, in an acknowledgement of
how seriously he takes the brewing neigh-
borhood opposition.
There is no question that the neighbor-
hoods Nadler represents could use the eco-
nomic boost the Superport plan promises.
Columbia Street, the waterfront drag
that runs from the pierheads in Brooklyn
Heights to the end of Red Hook, saw
tracts of land cleared for a container port
decades ago that was never built. Red
Hook is scarred by sprawling car-tow
pounds, sanitation facilities and home to
a fast-gentrifying industrial building
stock. The pier-feeder streets in Sunset
Park are a mostly weedy waste of produce
emporiums, half-empty factories and cav-
ernous strip joints.
But to establish the new port, the city
would probably have to bulldoze many of
the buildings that huddle along the whole
waterfront in order to clear enough tarmac
"staging area" to accommodate large
freight containers. Even if the neighbor-
hoods look dead, there's a lot left in these
mixed-use areas, including small factories
and some low-rise housing.
In fact, the state Department of Labor
estimates there are some 15,000 jobs in the
Sunset Park waterfront section alone, pro-
viding employment to some of the poorest
New Yorkers. The Brooklyn Army
Terminal houses more than 50 employers
and provides some 3,000 jobs, according
to the city's Economic Development
Corporation. The South Brooklyn Marine
Terminal houses NYNEX, Federal
Express, a large beverage distributor as
well as textile firms hiring new immi-
grants. Within a block of the water sits the
500-bed Lutheran Hospital, also a signifi-
cant employer.
"The scheme will just destroy work
here-jobs done by minorities. It's anti-
job," predicts Ben Meskin, a Park Slope
community leader who is one of the plan's
harshest critics.
A recent Sunset Park Restoration hous-
ing survey even found more than 5,000
residents living in the heavily industrial
waterfront sector. The group's Tony
Giordano calls the strip, which is severed
from the rest of the neighborhood by the
Gowanus Expressway, "a land of missed
opportunities and communication between
players."
Reflecting these concerns, Community
Board 7 bas drafted a resolution demand-
ing that any new port plan "must build on,
not over, what is already there."
Nadler responds by saying that the vast
tracts of space needed for the port could be
built by filling in adjacent parts of the har-
bor - avoiding the need to close any
existing businesses. "With landfill, there is
ample land to do what we need to do with-
out any real dislocations," he says.
Still, whether "what we need to do" can
be accomplished without unleashing a
tsunami of green opposition is an open
question. In addition, community leaders
also question whether the billions spent on
the tunnel and port would be just another
ambitious plan that dies on the docks. They
point to the Red Hook Fishport, opened in
1987 on the site of the Erie Basin cargo ter-
minal as a fish-proce sing center to rival
the mobbed-up Fulton Fish market. It
failed to generate much commerce, was
poorly managed, generated very few jobs
and closed in 1990. Even the Red Hook
mini-container terminal isn' t making
money, according to the Port Authority.
"If we keep on dreaming about a return
to the glorious 1950s, we'll end up with
nothing and stay a third world waterfront",
says Carroll Gardens community leader
Buddy Scotto, who has developed housing
on the Columbia Street waterfront.
Even those who have followed the evo-
lution of the ports in Europe say it is
unclear if the superport will evolve as
America's transportation paradigm. "The
[superport] theory is popular among peo-
ple who think they'll be the load center,"
says Allen Wastler, transportation editor
for the Journal of Commerce. "It's not so
popular among those who don't." Even if
one East Coast superport wins out, there
will always be some role for smaller ports,
he adds.
Nonetheless, there are a number of
Brooklyn leaders, including officers of key
local economic development corporations,
who support the plan. That's not surprising
in a borough with an II percent unem-
ployment rate.
Dominick Massa, vice chairman of
the Brooklyn Chamber of Commerce and
F
president of Sunset Park's Harborside
Management, an industrial park that
would likely abut future development,
calls it "an opportunity that can' t be
missed. Sure we should spend a lot of
money on parks, and we need waterfront
access. But what good are parks if the
people aren't working?"
The scheme also has the support of the
once-powerful International Long-
shoreman's Associatioo whose Brooklyn
membership has dwindled to a mere 400
members. Recently, in a bit of merciless
irony that demonstrates the utter death of
the old port, !LA's Carroll Gardens head-
quarters was converted into a Mormon
community center.
Madh.r's Folly?
Another irony is that Nadler, cbampi-
on of West Side Manhattan Democrats,
known for his support of West Side com-
munity groups in their battles over
Westway and Donald Trump's Riverside
South proposal, is being accused of
high-handedness by his Brooklyn con-
stituents.
Ben Meskin, for one, thinks Nadler has
forged an unholy alliance with City Hall
Republicans content to sell Brooklyn a
port in a poke. "How come Giuliani can
know enough information to be for it, but
we're told there isn't enough to know to be
against it?" he asks.
Pratt's Angotti wants significant com-
munity input early on in the city's multi
million dollar study, "not at the end when
people only have the option of approving
or saying no" and seek to scuttle the pro-
ject.
Despite promoting the plan to local
development groups, meetings have been
held or are scheduled.
"I' m opposed to any process that does-
n' t involve the community boards and
other local people in the planning," the
congressman ripostes.
But, as Nadler knows well from his
West Side development wars, an unhappy
community can hamstring even the most
ambitious plans. John McGetrick, whose
Red Hook Civic Association recently won
a state Supreme Court decision against
the city over waste-transfer station siting
requirements, says the congressman
needs to heed Brooklyn's concerns in a
hurry. "I certainly would go to court to
demand an environmental impact state-
ment," he said .
Michael Hirsch is a Manhattan-based
freelance writer. His father was a
merchant seaman.
CITY LIMITS
A Healthy Baby Cirl
Greenpeace's work against
trash and medical waste
incinerators, the bigge t emit-
ters of dioxin, which was the
culprit in Agent Orange and
at Love Canal. DES and diox-
in are sister chemicals; both
A cancer survivor turns her story into afilm that's an organizing tool
for toxics, labor and women's health activists. By Robin Epstein
I
n March 1990, Judith Helfand, a 25-
year-old filmmaker, volunteered to
work on a documentary about DES,
a synthetic estrogen that was pre-
scribed to 5 million pregnant women
from 1947 to I 971.1t caused many of their
daughters exposed in utero to develop dev-
astating health and reproductive illnesses,
including a very rare cervical cancer.
Helfand, who grew up in Nassau County,
Long Island, which has one of the highest
DES exposure rates in the country, had
known since she was 14 that her mother
had taken the drug.
"I grew up feeling really safe, because
I was informed," Helfand says. "I thought
if you didn't have cancer by 22, you
wouldn't get it." She was wrong.
The producers asked everyone working
on the film who'd been DES-exposed to get
checked. Within weeks, Helfand had a mas-
sive hysterectomy. In a six-hour operation,
surgeons removed her uterus, cervix, fallop-
ian tubes and the top third of her vagina.
Carrying her catheter in a bag from the
Metropolitan Museum of Art, she went
from the hospital to her parents' ranch
house to heal. Mourning the children she
never would have, she thought the film
crew would follow her home. When they
didn't, she set up a tripod in the comer and
began a video-diary that was to last for
five years.
MAY 1997
Her resulting film-A Healthy Baby
Girl-premiered in January at the Sundance
Film Festival in Park City, Utah and is one
of ten independent non-fiction films chosen
out of hundreds to be in the P.O.v. series on
PBS. It will be televised June 17.
Making It U lul
While Helfand's personal story is
indeed affecting, it is the questions she
asked while making the film and her
plans for the completed movie that make
A Healthy Baby Girl especially com-
pelling for activists. Helfand strove to
keep the movie true to what her family
is-white, middle class, Jewish, subur-
ban. But she was just as adamant about
making a film that would be a useful
organizing tool for all people working on
toxic exposure, family and reproductive
health or corporate accountability.
Judging from the reaction of activists
across the country, she's succeeded.
Within days of seeing the film, Bill Walsh,
Greenpeace's national toxics campaign
coordinator, assigned one of his staff to
help Helfand with the film's distribution.
Greenpeace recently sponsored a screen-
ing for the Inuit community in Anchorage,
Alaska and plans to do a blitz in
Louisiana's "Cancer Alley" around the
national broadcast.
The film' s message dovetails with
throw the hormonal and
endocrine systems out of whack. The
EPA, which is currently re-evaluating
dioxin's toxicity, has said most Americans
already have more dioxin in their bodies
than is safe, says Joel Tickner, a
Greenpeace staff scientist.
"It really blew my mind," Walsh says
of A Healthy Baby Girl. "It teaches that the
chemicals we're dealing with produce hor-
rible effects at very low doses, that the
chemical you ingest today can have an
impact on your child in the womb that
won't manifest itself until 25 years after
she's born, and that, like cigarette compa-
nies 30 years ago, chemical companies
today know about the impact of their
chemical products."
Robert Wages, president of the Oil,
Chemical & Atomic Workers Union, gave
Helfand funds for post-production. Helfand
remembers that when she showed the film
to an OCAW convention in Long Beach,
California, she was a little nervous. Would
it offend men who work in oil refineries,
she wondered? After all, in one scene she
exclaims, "Daddy wrote 'vagina' to
President Bush?" She had nothing to worry
about. "They completely got the movie and
they could completely relate," she ays,
because they work with known carcino-
gens, hormone- and endocrine-disrupters
and chemicals that have never even been
tested. "People don't talk about their sterili-
CULTURE
Judith Helfand
and her lIIother,
Florence, then
and now

-p

r.
ty or infertility, but a whole shop can be
affected;' she says. "I realized what was
going on in my house might help people in
similar situations open up and start to talk
about what was happening to them."
Health and Family Impacts
With the alternately haunting and joy-
ous Eastern European sound of the
Klezmatics as accompaniment, the film
tells the story of the havoc DES wreaked
not only on Helfand's body, but also on her
relationships with those closest to her-
her mother, father, boyfriend and extended
family. It explores the classic DES cru-
cible-her mother's feelings of guilt and
Helfand's fear and anger.
In the film, Helfand assures her mom,
"I don't think you did anything wrong."
"But sometimes you blame yourself,"
her mother replies, later adding, "I would
rather it had happened to me."
Explaining why she included such
painful scenes, Helfand says, "We've got-
ten really used to hearing about damages
due to unbridled corporate power. What
we're not used to hearing about is what
happens to the people.
"What happens inside their relation-
ships, inside their bodies and inside the
bodies of their children is not any different
from what happened between me and my
mom and our health. What's different is
the form. My mom took a pill. They might
have made the pill or been exposed on the
shop floor. In both cases, they were trying
to take care of their families."
Following Helfand as she joins the
DES Cancer Network and lobbie in
Washington for the first federally-funded
DES research and education effort, A
Healthy Baby Girl presents the history of
DES as the corporate betrayal that it was.
In 1938, the year DES was synthesized,
laboratory mice exposed to the drug devel-
oped cancer, says Susan Helmrich, an epi-
demiologist at the Public Health Institute
in Berkeley. The following year, in several
studies, exposed mice were born with mal-
formed reproductive organs. In 1941 ,
farmers began buying DES to plum pen
chickens and fatten cows. Male agricultur-
al workers developed breasts, Helmrich
says, but it wasn't until 1959, when high
concentrations of DES in poultry produced
similar symptoms in consumers, that the
Food and Drug Administration barred its
use in chicken and lamb.
Still, pharmaceutical companies mar-
keted it as a wonder drug to prevent mis-
carriage, says Helmrich, who is also pres-
ident of the DES Cancer Network. A con-
trolled study in 1953 showed that DES
did nothing to guarantee a full-term preg-
nancy, and indeed caused higher rates of
premature birth. Yet it wasn't until 1971 ,
after an outbreak of rare cancer among
several young Boston women whose
mothers had taken DES, that the FDA
issued an advisory against its use during
pregnancy. However, drug companies
sold it for that purpose in developing
countries into the early 1980s.
Building a Constltu.ncy
Helfand differs from filmmakers who,
while politically committed, see their
work as primarily theirs. As intimate as
the film is, she wants organizers to feel
that they, too, have some ownership of A
Healthy Baby Girl. And while many
filmmakers hope their movies will
change minds and affect policy, they
rarely do the legwork Helfand does to
make connections between their subject
and seemingly unrelated issues.
Drawing on what she learned from
making The Uprising of '34, a film about a
general textile strike in the south that she
co-directed with George Stoney, her for-
mer professor and one of the founders of
public access television, Helfand worked
to build a constituency for A Healthy Baby
Girl while she was still shooting and edit-
ing the film.
"I feel like I'm a filmmaker/organizer,"
she explains. "If you want to make a docu-
mentary that's useful for social change, work
with social change groups. They helped me
understand what their needs were. When
your movie is done, it's too late."
Wanting to be sure the film would
"read" outside New York, Helfand
screened rough-cut versions of the movie
to focus groups in San Francisco,
Knoxville and a dozen cities in between,
aiming each time for a diverse crowd of
organizers-anti-toxics folks , environ-
mental policy wonks, labor unionists,
women's health advocates and Jews prob-
ing the spiritual responsibility of tikkun
olam, or care of the earth.
She built relationships with national
groups including Physicians for Social
Responsibility, the National Women's
Health Network and the Citizens
Clearinghouse for Hazardous Waste and
with regional organizations such as the
Carolina Alliance for Fair Employment,
Western MassCOSH, the Utah Progressive
Network and the Coalition on the
Environment and Jewish Life.
Hetal Dalal, field organizer for the 850-
member National Organizers Alliance,
recalls that after showing a rough cut to
NOA's annual gathering last year, Helfand
asked the audience if they were bothered by
the film's lack of ethnic diversity. "She was
concerned about whether it would be acces-
sible to other people," Dalal says. "And folks
at NOA decided there was enough texture
about this family that it reaches out in ways
not all films filled with just white faces do."
Helfand made critical decisions about
what to keep in and what to leave out
based on this feedback. Because of this
process, there are organizers all over the
country who have an investment in the
film, says Pam Calvert, the organizing and
outreach coordinator for A Healthy Baby
Girl. ''They're aware of how it can be
used, because they helped shape it."
SharH Visibility
Now that the movie is completed, the
Healthy Baby Girl modus operandi is to
get on the hom, hunt down a source of hor-
mone- and endocrine-disrupters nearby
each scheduled screening, and invite local
organizers to piggyback off the film's pub-
licity to generate attention for their cause.
"Grassroots activists are so overwhelmed
with work," says Calvert. "When we say,
'We have the screening and you can use it
as a hook,' it's music to their ears."
As with the focus groups, Helfand's
distribution strategy creates opportunities
for activists who don't know each other to
meet. "What I see in A Healthy Baby Girl
is an opportunity to build cross-class,
cross-community, cross-issue alliances,"
Helfand says. "I don't think any group can
walk alone, particularly when you're talk-
ing about corporate power."
At Sundance, local organizers
explained to the crowd of film buffs that
the health effects of the dioxin released
by a chemical weapons incinerator 55
miles away from the festival could mirror
that of DES. "There was a woman who
stood up afterwards and said, 'I'm a DES
daughter, and I will help you work
against this incinerator,'" Calvert recalls.
The Deseret News, a conservative,
Mormon-owned newspaper, did a big
spread on DES, dioxin, and the threat
both pose to children. The local NPR
affiliate and several TV stations also
linked the film and the incinerator.
"That's pretty cool, groundbreaking
stuff in terms of how film distribution and
organizing can connect," says Dalal.
"Judy as a filmmaker helped figure out
what the story was. That's at the core of
what good community organizers are
struggling with-how to frame the story
so people will listen. She's got lots of
lessons to teach us, and vice versa."
CITY LIMITS
Welfa re's Foster
Scare
Worlifare schemes could trigger a Joster care cataclysm.
By Adam Fifield and Evan Halper
M
aria's two foster children
are three years old and
each have severe mental
and physical handicaps.
Since she took in the boys
when they were infants, she's had exten-
sive training, including CPR and lessons
on intravenous feeding. Caring for them is
a "24-hour job," she says. "I don't get
much sleep ... Right now one of mine is
sick. I will take him to the hospital. I may
have to spend the whole day there."
But, since Maria receives welfare, the
city is ordering her to sweep streets or
clean toilets as part of a workfare initia-
tive without providing sufficient
resources for her to fmd good day care
for the kids. "I told them that I have chil-
dren with special needs, but
they don' t want to hear
that," she says.
Unable to find affordable
or competent daycare alter-
natives, Maria may face a
loss of her welfare benefits
simply because she wants to
be a good mother. "They're
going to call me again in
May," she says in a whisper.
"They may have to close my
case."
Over the next five years,
expect to hear about a lot
more Marias unless the state
takes on the safety net role
that the state constitution
requires. As federal welfare
reforms begin to take effect,
many parents-especially
foster parents-who receive
public assistance will have to
choose between abiding by
workfare rules or raIsmg
their children. And when
they reach their five-year
welfare time limit, parents,
along with their vulnerable
children, will be kicked off
the rolls altogether.
Welfare reform, advo-
cates say, will decimate the
already beleaguered foster
MAY 1997
care system. First, workfare requirements
will render foster parents unable to contin-
ue taking care of their young charges.
Second, as more poor families are kicked
off the rolls, they will begin abusing their
kids, who, in turn will flood a foster care
system unprepared for the deluge.
Of all the bad news about welfare
reform, the impact on foster care may be
the worst news of all.
For Maria, all these projections coa-
lesce into one desperate worry. "I don' t
want to lose my kids," she says.
Half a Million Kids
For many of the 540,000 New York
City kids receiving public assistance-the
majority of those facing loss of benefits
and resources under the new federal law
are children-life is about to get much,
much worse. According to the federal
Department of Health and Human
Services (DOH), an estimated 22,000
New York State children who will be
denied public assistance are likely to
require child protective services due to
abuse or neglect.
That 's because work requirements and
benefit cut -offs will start a dangerous
chain reaction that causes shaky families
to split apart. The DOH recently reported
that the poorer a family gets, the more like-
ly they are to abuse or neglect their kids. It
goes to follow that welfare reform could
massively increase the burden on a foster
care system that has been overloaded for
years, child welfare experts say.
A report commissioned by the
Foundation for Child Development esti-
mates that if, in any given year, just two
percent of the kids currently supported by
welfare are forced into foster care, there
might be twice as many admissions into
the system. Since each foster care case
costs the city $15-$20,000, the bill for the
new cases would be at least $165 million.
(In contrast, the average Aid to Families
s
PIPEliNE .
,
The city is forcing
Maria into work-
fare without provid-
ing adequate day
care for her two
f oster sons.
s
f:M
Estelle's Dilemma
E
stelle Wilson Is a welfare recipient and a foster
mother of two boys, ages II and 15. Both of her boys
have severe behavioral problems and require con-
stant supervision. She not only cares for the boys but also
watches her two grandsons every evening and teaches a
parenting class each week.
Since February, she has also been enrolled In the
city's Work Experience Program, answering phones In a
city administration office.
How does she take care of the kids and work at the
same time? Her 20-year-old son, who came home from
college In February, has been around to care for the kids
while she Is at work. But when he goes back to school on
May 13, there will be no one around to watch them. "Once
he goes, I'm at risk of losing my children," she says.
Since she began workfare, she hasn't been able to give
her kids the level of attention they need. She Is worried
about what might happen to them If she can no longer care
for them herself.
"If these children weren't In this foster care program,
they'd be In an Institution/, she says. After a pause, she
adds, "Welfare reform Is a good Idea-but they didn't think
It out, they didn't think about who It's going to affect."
with Dependent Children grant for a fami-
ly of three is $6,900 per year.)
However, that study's numbers may be
conservative-the caseload could more
than double. "Everybody I talk to says that
kids are going to come into the system and
the system will be swamped," says David
Tobis, Director of Social Welfare,
Research and Planning at Hunter College's
Center for the Study of Family Policy.
"And this is a system already teetering
on the brink of collapse," adds Gail
Nayowith, executive director of the
Citizens' Committee for Children of New
York.
Governor George Pataki, who is
required to oversee implementation of the
federal law, has told Washington he plans
to institute a "family cap," which would
deny additional benefits for children born
after a family has already been on welfare.
The Childrens' Defense Fund's Marlene
Halpern estimates that by the year 2005,
just over 60,000 infants in New York State
will be born into poor families no longer
entitled to any additional increases in their
grants to support that child.
In 1991, when the California's welfare
grant was reduced by just 2.7 percent, Los
Angeles County officials reported that
child abuse and neglect referrals rose by
12 percent. When benefits were cut 5.8
percent the following year, referrals rose
by another 20 percent.
"It is not surprising to hear that a
decrease in AFDC grants results in a con-
current increase in abuse and neglect com-
plaints, since that is the population we
serve," remarks Nicholas Scoppetta,
Commissioner of New York City's
Administration for Children Services.
"Any decrease in aid and service is likely
to make our job of protecting children even
more difficult."
Dr. Larry Aber, executive director of
the National Center on Children in Poverty
at Columbia University School of Publ ic
Health, says child welfare case workers
will be hard-pressed to keep up with new
cases of "technical neglect." "It's an invis-
ible problem-they don't call the child
welfare authorities and say 'I'm going to
leave my kid at home.'" he says.
Others say the workfare implications
for some families could be even more
devastating. "We also think that more
people will involuntarily give up their
children out of desperation," adds Elie
Ward, executive director of Statewide
Youth Advocates. ''There's no recogni-
tion that we have to do some planning."
And once families are split up by foster
care, getting them back together will be
very difficult. Mary Ellen McLaughlin,
executive director of Good Shepherd
Services, which runs a foster care agency,
concedes: "We couldn't send a child back
to a family that has no source of income."
The cuts also threaten to punch a huge
hole in the foster care safety net itself.
Foster care stipends, which average $400
per month per child, are not sufficient to
support entire families, should they lose
their welfare benefits, says Edith Holzer,
Executive Director of the Council of
Family and Child Caring Agencies.
The city council's welfare committee
estimates that 40 percent of the city's
15,000 foster parents currently receive
public assistance. And foster care
providers tell City Limits they are wor-
ried that workfare will discourage wel-
fare recipients from applying to become
foster parents in the first place. A foster
parent shortage in poor neighborhoods
could even put a serious crimp in
Scopetta' s ambitious plan to place foster
children in nurturing homes near their
old residences.
Child Care's the Key
One obvious way for the new welfare
system to function is for government to
expand its subsidized child care system.
Governor Pataki has proposed in his state
budget plan to dedicate $54 million in fed-
eral money for the creation 23,000 new
child care slots. In April, Lilliam Barrios-
Paoli, the new city welfare commissioner,
announced that her agency estimated the
city may need an additional 12,000 day
care slots.
But that won't be enough, experts say.
The Independent Budget Office estimates
that the city alone will need to add
between 33,000 and 84,000 full-time child
care slots by the year 2002. That's if Pataki
convinces the state legislature to enforce a
GOP rule mandating that all welfare recip-
ients be put to work within two years of
their getting on the dole.
New York City now spends only $80
million a year to provide subsidized child
care to a mere 25,000 children whose par-
ents were in welfare-to-work jobs-and as
of 1994, only one in seven eligible parents
was getting subsidized care.
The city, according to the Citizens
Committee for Children, would need to
increase spending by nearly a half a billion
dollars to cover the cost of putting 300,000
children of workfare-mandated parents in
day care.
In a single-house bill passed last
month, the state assembly proposed adding
$140 million for child care for parents in
welfare-to-work activities, plus $90 mil-
lion for low-income child care.
Instead, Pataki's proposal calls for
something called "informal" child care,
where parents are given about $45 a week
per child and are left to make their own
arrangements. Such a system-without
CITY LIMITS
significant government oversight-could
result in "dangerous day care situations,"
according to the Children's Aid Society's
Jonathan Rosenberg.
In addition, Pataki wants to provide
day care money-or work fare exemp-
tions-only for parents with kids six and
under. The assembly wants to maintain the
state's existing under-I 3 commitment.
In 1995, Pataki cut child protective and
preventative services, resulting in a $131
million cut to New York City child welfare
funding and forcing city officials to scale
back key programs.
This year, Pataki has proposed setting
aside $70 million from the new federal
welfare block grant program for child wel-
fare services and another $20 million to
make up for the cut in the state's Title XX
allocation, which funds child protection
and family preservation services.
Advocates also question whether the
$74 million Pataki has set aside to make up
for the loss of federal Emergency
Assistance to Families funding-for ser-
vices like emergency shelter for children,
child care, child protection, and foster
care-will be adequate.
Harsh Penalties
So far, Pataki hasn't shown much
desire to make the workfare-vs.-child-care
squeeze any easier for parents.
If parents fail to show up at their work-
fare assignments, the entire household-
kids included-would lose their benefits, a
much harsher punishment than under cur-
rent law.
In addition, the governor also wants the
right to drug-test recipients and kick their
families off the dole if they fail the test
twice, despite the fact that three-quarters
of child abuse and foster care cases come
from chemically-dependent parents. Pataki
plans to spend $250 million on the testing
program, but hasn't slated a penny for drug
treatment programs.
The competing Assembly proposal
would sanction parents, but not their kids
and features a more limited drug-testing
scheme while proposing $50 million for
drug treatment. But Pataki spokesman
John Signor blasted the alternative propos-
al as fiscally irresponsible. "The
Assembly wants to be all things to all peo-
ple," he says.
Signor said the governor would encour-
age localities to come up with their own
solutions, "Why can't a welfare recipient
have training and be a child care provider
and watch the children of other welfare
recipients?" he asked.
MAVI997
Ship the Kids Oft
To parents on welfare,
such gray-suited sugges-
tions from Albany seem to
mock their own struggles
to get real jobs outside of
welfare and workfare.
Elsinia Cortez, a
Brooklynite who cares for
her three young children,
has tried to find a job and
get off welfare, even
enrolling herself in a ten-
week computer training
course. The city gave her
$30 a week for child care
and $15 for subway fares
while she participated in
the program, but she paid
the full $45 to a friend to
care for her one-and-a-
half-year-old boy. She
Pataki is pushing something
called "informal" child care
where parents are given $45
a week and are left to make
their own arrangements.
Advocates say that's too little
money and too much risk.
walked over a mile to class each day. way out, she's decided to ship the kids off
to their grandmother in Texas. Training or no, she still can't find a job.
All the local day care centers are booked,
she says, with waiting lists in the hun-
dreds. The after-school programs she's
approached don't have any openings
either.
"After that," she admits, "I don't know
what I'll do.".
Adam Fifield and Evan Halper are free-
lance writers based in New York City. This summer, while she tries to figure a
RrF
of
NEW YORK
INCORPORATED
Your
Neighborhood
Housing
Insurance
Specialist
For 20Years
We've Been There
ForYou.
R&F OF NEW YORK, INC. has a special
department obtaining and servicing insurance for
tenants, low-income co-ops and not-for-profit
community groups. We have developed competitive
insurance programs based on a careful evaluation
of the special needs of our customers. We have
been a leader from the start and are dedicated to
the people of New York City.
For In/ormation call:
Ingrid Kaminski, Executive Vice President
R&F of New York
One Wall Street Court
New York, NY 10005-3302
212 269-8080 800 635-6002 212 269-8112 (fax)

-4
IUDY'S 41CIOI PL4111141S CI411S rOI BID-STUY
up shop 19 years ago in a burned-out patch
now known as Saratoga Square. A young
recently arrived from India, he visited the
that it needed a drug store. He knew it was
communities-but to him that also meant
serious competition.
to patiently answer his customers' questions
following, particularly among a poor popula-
the bum's rush from emergency room atten-
. His business flourished. But Wattamwar
a decade of promises to restore this Fulton Street
construction is slated to begin this summer on
Plaza, the first of eight neighborhood
under Giuliani administration's
retail initiative. This two-story retail mall,
City Partnership, will likely feature a
office, as well as discounted space
and local franchises.
, for Wattamwar at least. The biggest
be a 10,000 square-foot Rite Aid drug
to deal his way out of the crisis. After
be a local economic development project
healthy businesses around. They'd work
with him, he thought. So he arranged to make a counter offer for
the space; Thiftway Associates, a regional drugstore chain with 28
stores, readily agreed to go into a joint venture with Wattamwar
meeting Rite Aid's terms.
But the Partnership concluded Thriftway simply lacked the
financial heft needed to guarantee future rental payments for the
project's backers. Ironically, Wattamwar is being undone by the
same business forces that guided his decision to settle here two
decades ago. Rite Aid figures the neighborhood needs prescription
pills and there isn't much competition. Wattamwar now says it's
likely he will have to move on.
"I will miss this place," he sighs. "It's the customers. They
treat me extremely well here."
The ANCHOR plan-for better or worse-will be the model
for New York's inner-city business development in the foreseeable
future. After decades of complaining about how the nation's big
stores have abandoned poor neighborhoods, city officials and non-
profits are finally doing something-most dramatically, by plop-
ping "big box" megastores down on major traffic arteries. But on
the secondary strips, the neglected commercial capillaries that
would provide the most direct economic bloodflow into poor
communities, the city is trying a scaled-down megastore strategy,
centered around the introduction of smaller chain stores, theaters
and restaurants.
It's hard to deny the attractiveness of the chains: they offer a
way to privately finance projects, replacing direct government .
subsidies. In ANCHOR, the Giuliani administration has opted for ~
a practically funding-free approach to inner city retail, offering ~
CITY LIMITS
Druggist Suresh
Wattamwar may be
forced to leave
Saratoga Square after
19 years of doing busi-
ness here. A Rite Aid
would replace him.
--
low-cost financing and federal loan guarantees, yet relying most-
lyon chain stores' own eagerness to tap the inner-city market.
But there is a small but growing chorus of critics who say the
program is flawed, especially in neighborhoods that lack the polit-
ical leadership to ensure that ANCHOR responds to community
needs.
In Saratoga Square, some neighborhood leaders charge they
are being bulldozed. Under the current arrangement, the
Partnership and city housing bureaucrats have had total control
over the project: no formal public review of construction plans
was required; no community input over who would develop the
site was solicited. And some neighborhood leaders say that not
enough has been done to find out what new businesses are really
needed on Fulton Street.
Activists argue that this strip had real potential. Rex Curry,
associate director at the Pratt Institute Center for Community
and Environmental Development (PICCED) worked with
locals to design a plan four years ago for a new shopping prom-
enade and farmer's market. "This could have been a major
town center," he says. Instead Fulton Street is getting a Rite
Aid and a strip mall-"homogenized into something you could
see every place."
"Who's making the ultimate decisions here?" charges Majorie
Matthews, chairwoman of local Community Board 3. "Everybody
besides me."
"
ith a serious squint, it's possible to see a future life for
this broken leg of eastern Fulton Street. There's no reason
that the main drag, fed by people coming and going from
the Ralph Avenue subway stop under Mt. Sinai's reassuring cathe-
dral spire, couldn't be a vital part of the Central Brooklyn com-
mercial corridor.
As the Partnership touts, the surrounding area has become
more attractive to working class people over the last decade,
boosting the average income for a neighborhood that was almost
exclusively poor. Some 730 new two- and three-family homes,
marketed to farnjlies earning between $30,000 and $55,000 a year
have been built over the last eight years. In 1980, the neighbor-
hood had only 1,100 households with incomes between $35,000
and $150,000. By 1990, that figure had risen to 10,900, according
to Partnership marketing documents.
Yet there is little evidence of this progress along Fulton
between Saratoga and Ralph avenues. More than half of the active
storefronts are home to churches and social service agencies.
Most of the remaining stores are open only sporadically. Fayaz
Rasheed, owner of Rio Drugs, says that with the notable exception
of one bright new open air meat and vegetable market, the strip
hasn't changed a bit in the time he's been there.
Why, Rasheed adds, would anyone want to invest in a mall
here? The bodega next door, All My Children Variety and
Grocery, has gone in and out of business three times over the last
year, he says. A small Associated Supermarket attached to
Wattamwar's shop closed two months ago after someone report-
edly poured gasoline down the air conditioning ducts and lit the
store on fire. And many of the storefronts along Fulton and
Ralph-Brooklyn Nails, Spencer Upholstery, 24 Hour Discount
Midnight Store to name a few-appear to be permanently shut-
tered. "Just look at it," sighs Frank German, a local resident stand-
ing outside Rasheed's shop. "It's dismal."
Neighborhood people who have money get in their cars and
drive to Kings Highway or the new Atlantic Terminal to shop,
concedes Joseph Holley Sr., executive director of the Northeast
Brooklyn Housing Development Corp. and coordinator of the
Ralph Avenue Merchants Association, an organization which he
describes as "kind of dormant." Holley says he's tried over the
years to persuade both store owners and landlords to make the
area more inviting, but the merchants are so poor and the rents are
so low-sometimes less than $5 per square foot-the landlords
aren't interested in helping out.
This shouldn't be surprising. In affluent neighborhoods, a
broad range of retail is taken for granted. But experienced devel-
opers say that building a shopping strip from scratch in a place
like Saratoga Square takes careful planning-and a willingness to
accept the fact that things may go bad even if everything is done
right. Robert Brandwein, president of the Boston-based Policy
and Management Associates and a veteran of New York's non-
profit retail development world, says a workable deal requires
three financial elements: low cost loans, a competent developer
and solid store owners willing to commit to long leases and sub-
stantial rents. The political stars must be aligned too; the opposi-
tion of even one vindictive councilman has been known to doom
a project. And most importantly, the community must buy in; after
all, these are the people who are going to do their shopping here.
If the goal is to build retail, the Giuliani administration's
ANCHOR initiative could work as long the mayor delivers on
promised low-cost financing, Brandwein says. But if the goal is
to also support solid neighborhood businesses, hire local people
and invest profits back into business support services, the city
will need to develop strong collaborations with effective local
leaders. "Development in New York City is aggravating as hell,"
he says, insisting that he would never attempt one of these pro-
jects without the leadership of a neighborhood-based nonprofit.
They are the only ones with the connections and the moral
CITY LIMITS
authority to make a project work, he says. "Because they're
local, they can do it."
4
NCHOR, short for Alliance for Neighborhood Commerce
Home Ownership and Revitalization, claims to be a shot at
real community building. While the program has never
been a headline grabber like Giuliani's big-box zoning plan, it
nonetheless stands a chance of becoming important since its
architect is Richard Roberts, a former aide in mayor's office who,
after quitting for a time, was brought back to lead the foundering
Department of Housing Preservation and Development (HPD).
When asked by City Limits about his intentions when he was
appointed two months ago, Roberts replied that expanding the
ANCHOR program would be one of his top priorities.
It has also been billed as such by the Partnership's Kathryn Wylde
who says it is her organization's first attempt at "comprehensive
community development," a much-hyped goal in foundation board
rooms, but ultimately a back-breaking mission. The Partnership---
which was instrumental in designing and funding the ANCHOR pro-
gram-will be largely responsible for the new building. For its part,
HPD is charged with monitoring the development, finding other
builders for abandoned commercial space and vacant city-owned land
and pressuring other city agencies, like parks, sanitation and police,
to improve the look and feel of these ANCHOR strips.
As community board officials in Saratoga Square have figured
out, the Partnership exerts enormous influence over every facet of
the process. Urban renewal planning for the area was completed
more than five years ago under the Dinkins administration;
because the construction plans were accepted then, the
Partnership'S blueprints require no public review now. The
Partnership was also responsible for choosing the developer, one
of many that it has worked with doing housing in Brooklyn. And
the developer, in tum, is responsible for leasing the space and
making the project's numbers work.
As a condition of its contract, the developer is also required to
invest some money-25 to 30 percent of profits after business
costs-back into business-related services for the neighborhood.
Still Steven Brown, president of the Community Partnership
Development Corp. , the Partnership's development arm, couldn' t
estimate how much this would be.
While the only immediate goal of the organization is to build
and lease its eight Partnership Plazas, officials there make no
secret of their ambition to make ANCHOR a prototype that will
be duplicated in other neighborhoods. The task is to figure out
what mix of tenants and fmancing might make inner city retail
development routine in the future.
If such a formula exists already, it is in the proliferation of
well-publicized Pathrnark superstore deals going on around the
city and, indeed, allover the region. But ANCHOR is designed for
neighborhoods typically too small to support a Pathmark-sized
leviathan. Therefore the Partnership and its developers have been
looking at aU kinds of alternatives, ranging from small supermar-
kets to Blockbuster video stores.
In run-down Saratoga Square, the Partnership's choices have
been decidedly limited; Rite Aid has stepped up as the sole anchor
tenant. If it signs on the dotted line, as it has committed to do, the
drugstore will be the deal maker. The chain is talking seriously
about taking a 20-year lease, paying $23 to $25 a square foot for
the privilege of doing business there.
MAY 1997
Big chains makes these developments possible, Brown
explains. Because they can afford to pay far more per square foot
than local businesses, they subsidize the project allowing the
developer to charge lower rents to locals.
More importantly, banks want to see a long-term lease agree-
ment from a national company so they know someone will be
paying rent even if the development 's smaller, less stable retail-
ers bailout. Such lease agreements are particularly critical as
this stage, he adds, because the Partnership Plazas have no track
record. The banks have no way of judging whether they will tum
a profit.
That, he says, is why the Partnership had to tum down
Wattamwar's Thiftway offer in favor of the larger chain's.
"Ride Aid's on the hook," Brown says. He admits that chain
stores are not perfect; it's possible, for example, that Rite Aid
could eventually go bankrupt as plenty of other large retail chains
have. But hopefully by then, he says, the mall will be successful
enough to attract a new anchor tenant and carryon. "The fact is,
today Rite Aid has a pretty good balance sheet," he says, adding
with a short laugh, "and today is when I need them."
'
he Partnership'S Rite Aid deal is maybe financially safe, but
does it give the people of Saratoga Square something they
reall y need?
A couple years ago, the Ralph Avenue Merchants Association
took an informal survey of residents outside of the local subway
station asking them what kind of businesses they would like to see
in the neighborhood. A new drug store was nowhere near the top
of the li st. Holley says the big winners were a large sit-down
restaurant, a hardware store and a clothing store. There were also
numerous requests for a sports store and a bank with an automat-
ed teller machine.
Others in Bed-Stuy also make no secret of their desire that some
of the new retail space to go to local African-American entrepre-
The Parlllership's
Steven Brown argiles
that large retail chains
like Rite Aid make
inlier city developme/lt
deals work.
Rev. James Dallielled
one of the community's
IIIOSt promising efforts
to redesign the retail
strip-but he aban-
doned the plan.
--
neurs. Businesses should not be allowed take all the wealth out of
this community, asserts CB 3 District Manager Lewis Watkins. The
people along East Fulton Street do not have stock in Rite Aid, he
points out, nor do they have any say over the actions of the New
York City Partnership. Without some community control over these
investments, he says, the Partnership is only "offering tidbits."
"Decisions are being made centrally, not locally," he adds.
"And we have to live with those decisions."
B
ut if the neighborhood wants its needs met, the reality is that
it must be endowed with leaders capable of articulating
those needs-shouting if need be-and boldly manipulating
the city's vast, multi-layered bureaucracy.
One of the great success stories is Congressman Floyd Flake.
Having built a housing and social service empire from his church,
Allen A.M.E. in southeast Queens, he has also been successful at
retail development. Along a ten-block stretch of Merrick
Boulevard, Allen A.M.E. Housing Corp. owns and manages more
than two dozen storefronts.
The church has used its own financial strength-thanks to $3.5
in annual earnings from offerings, tithes and other gifts-to buy
properties whenever they come available at affordable prices, says
Deborah McCaffity, executive director of the Allen A.M.E.
Neighborhood Preservation and Development Corp. Attempting to
support the business community, counselors provide free advice on
subjects such as corporate and tax laws, bookkeeping and bank
financing. And the next step will be to bring franchises to the strip,
providing sit-down restaurants, clothing shops and, ultimately, a
major supermarket. "We have a full vision," she says, smiling.
Other community-based organizations have racked up similar
successes. Brandwein cites, by way of example, his work with
Coney Island's Astella Development Corp., a housing develop-
ment organization that began work last year on a plan to restore
Mermaid Avenue under-no big surprise-the ANCHOR pro-
gram. A small Pioneer supermarket, a Rite Aid and a Blockbuster
video store have already opened up and the Partnership is in talks
with a major movie theater to spur development on the corridor's
desolate eastern end.
Astella's executive director Judy Orlando is Brandwein's para-
digm of a powerful, well-connected local leader. Orlando, who can
usually be found working the phones in her office on Mermaid
Avenue, has been a driving force behind this development. At the
moment, she is schmoozing in the hopes of achieving her ultimate
goal: building space for at least 40 new stores-complete with res-
idential space above--{)n the area's vacant lots. Brandwein, who
has invested $100,000 of his own money in an Astella mall project,
says Orlando's personal ties don't hurt either.
"Judy's husband was formerly head of the community plan-
ning board and worked as an assistant to [Dinkins Deputy Mayor]
Barbara Fife when she was in the Dinkins administration. She was
also with Flatbush Development Corp. and socially she sees a lot
of those people. Her cousin is Henry Stem, the parks commis-
sioner. There are a lot of those things," Brandwein says. "I don't
want to single her out, but she's very good."
S
aratoga Square has had no such leader-and not much luck.
Both Holley and "Sir Chief' Charles Joshua, a self-promot-
ing sachem who leads the 135-agency Central Brooklyn
Coordinating Council, have tried their hand at business develop-
ment. But their sputtering efforts have gone nowhere.
There was one attempt, however, at building a plan for the
neighborhood with some interesting vision. Back in 1991, Rev.
James Daniel Jr. was looking to do a groundbreaking community
development project through his church. For help, he approached
PICCED's Curry and asked him if he and his students at Pratt
would help design the plan.
Then an elder at Mt. Sinai Cathedral, the neighborhood's
largest church, Daniel had a bully pUlpit and a natural base of
church-going consumers. Knowing that, Curry agreed to take on
the project, spending periods over the next two years working
with his students on things like marketing studies and
streetscapes. By the time they finished in 1993, the group had
designed an elaborate new plan for the area that included new
retail space, walking promenades, a farmer's market and space for
new mixed-used housing developments.
It all sounded good, but Daniel as a leader was making critical
mistakes. Though he was naturally articulate and charismatic, he
didn't attempt to aggressively seLl the plan to his parishioners,
Curry recalls. Daniel himself admits that he alienated neighbor-
hood politicos by aligning himself with community organizing
groups like the ACORN, who at the time were demonstrating
against the Partnership'S middle-income projects in the hopes of
spurring low-income construction.
Perhaps most significantly, Daniel reportedly copped an atti-
tude with Mayor Dinkins' economic development team-then
working on the area's urban renewal plan-by demanding that his
newly formed East Fulton Street Group Local Development Corp.
get exclusive rights to neighborhood development funding. The
organization had no track record, yet Daniel demanded total con-
trol. "We couldn' t do that," recalls Angela Brown, a former
Dinkins administration official.
By 1993, the East Fulton Community Development Plan was
just about sunk. Daniel admits his interest in Saratoga Square
CITY LIMITS
began to wane as he began doing outreach and educational con-
ferences on economic development through his newly formed
21st Century Partnership. The result, Curry says, was that there
was no church or agency committed to doing the legwork of sell-
ing the plan to city officials and the community.
By this time, the Dinkins administration, having grown confi-
dent with the ongoing work of the New York City Housing
Partnership, had all but ceded development of the neighborhood
to its president Kathryn Wylde. And while she was interested in
developing retai-she had come to recognize that her middle-
income developments weren't going to spontaneously generate
local business-her interests were decidedly less grassroots than
those of Rev. Daniel or Pratt.
At a long meeting in the basement of a local public school,
Curry and others in Daniel's group tried to sell the Partnership on
their plan. An unimpressed Wylde crucified it-and them. "I'm
still trying to pull the nails out of my hands," Curry jokes.
C
urry admits that the book-length plan had its flaws. For one
thing, there was no attempt at determining how much such a
project would cost or how a developer might pay for it. But
Curry believes that it was, de facto, the community's last chance to
eltert some control over the look and feel of the ANCHOR devel-
opment. Today, he adds, the Partnership is more interested in rush-
ing Rite Aid's mall into production than in working to make the
strip, and the surrounding neighborhood, a bona fide development
success. 'They never spent the time in the community centers and
church basements like we did," Curry says. 'There was a lot of
hope there."
Rev. Daniel, now a pastor at Ecclesiastes Church of God near
downtown Brooklyn, says the community's handling of the plan
should be a lesson in future ANCHOR battles. "East Fulton
Street and eastern Bed-Stuy have not gotten the best they could
get-that's the bottom line," he says today. "Who's at fault ? A
lot of us."
Yet truth be told, those concerns are not much reflected on the
political landscape, nor among the people who walk along East
Fulton's depressing streetscape. Leaders like Assemblyman
William Boyland simply want the abandoned lots and graffiti-
laced storefronts replaced with something, anything. "This is the
third attempt to develop that comer," he testily replied to a con-
stituent who wrote out of concern for Suresh Wattamwar. "Each
time some idea and financing have been presented we have had to
stop because of some isolutionists [sic] or obstructionists.
"Sure Drugs should join the program," he concluded, "and
help get the project going forward rather than leaving this comer
abandoned for another fifteen years."
About the only dissident voice being raised is Wattamwar's. In
the hopes of avoiding a public relations quagmire, officials at both
the Partnership and HPD are scrambling to accommodate the
diminutive druggist, who has said he will be happy if the city can
find him 2,000 square feet of new space in the neighborhood at,
of course, reasonable rents.
''We've shown him a whole range of available commercial
space," says James Lima, HPD's point man on ANCHOR. But, he
adds with some eltasperation, "he's been a little bit specific in his
requirements."
Bruce Kelly, a Manhattan-based freelance writer, contributed to this story.
MAY 1997
EDFrancbisiDg BedStay
a deal too good to pass up. Colvin Grannum had potentially lucrative busi-
for sale-<lirt cheap.
with Banker's Trust and the Local Initiatives Support Corp. (LISC),
Bedford-Stuyvesant Community Development Corporation was offering
and relaxed financial terms to residents interested in opening a new busi-
ago, Grannum started aggressively working his contacts in the com-
for people to buy in.
still looking for his first taker.
we would have to beat people back, but it's been much slower than I
admits. "I guess it's going to require a lot of fine ore-ing to get at that
of entrepreneurs."
Grannum is chief eltecutive officer of Bridge Street Development Corp. , a nonprofit
based at Bridge Street A.M.E., one of the city's oldest African American congregations.
His organization is one of silt helping to distribute some $3.5 million in low-cost financ-
ing raised by Banker's Trust and LISC. The initiative is designed to increase the num-
ber of community-owned businesses and improve retail service in inner city neighbor-
hoods including Bed-Stuy, Coney Island, Central Harlem, Washington Heights and the
South Bronlt.
He explains that his priority is to improve the retail mix along eastern Fulton Street
and Broadway in Central Brooklyn, an area that has been largely ignored by aspiring
merchants but has benefited from the construction of large middle-income housing
tracts. Dozens of young families have been moving into the neighborhood and they are
looking for new retail services, he says.
"We're interested in stabilizing the neighborhood and creating jobs," Grannum says.
"As these young families begin to mature, they're going to be upwardly mobile. They
will leave if you don't develop the services that round out a community."
So why go the trouble in getting people to buy their own businesses? First, the kinds
of franchise businesses these neighborhoods need-restaurants, clothing stores, dry
cleaners-are costly. In the final analysis, it is the person buying the franchise who is
responsible for paying for it, and making enough profit to produce a good living.
Under the Neighborhood Franchise Project, the entrepreneur must come up with ten
percent of the cost of the start-up. In the case of a Dunkin' Donuts, for example, devel-
opment costs for one store might range from $250,000 to $300,000. The entrepreneur
would have to have come up with $30,000 up front and then go into debt for the rest of
the costs. That's big bucks for anyone, admits Gary Hattem, managing director of the
Community Development Group at Banker's Trust.
"Finding people with the equity and business experience is challenging," he says.
"There's not a lot of wealth in minority communities, and that's something we're trying
to overcome."
Grannum adds that some of the prospects he has approached are not terribly interested in
owning the kind of franchises that LISC and Banker's Trust have negotiated with. The pro-
gram links entrepreneurs with more than a half dozen companies-ranging from big family
style restaurants to smaller dry cleaning and shoe repair businesses-identified based on
marketing surveys of the neighborhoods' needs. But people still dream of owning a big fast
food restaurant, Grannum smiles. "McDonald's have made many people into millionaires."
Hattem stresses that the program is still a major bargain. In other instances, bankers
are loathe to lend any money to anyone for these kinds of enterprises. And in cases
where banks are willing to lend to franchisees, they typically demand that the entrepre-
neur produce at least 2S percent of the franchise purchase cost up front.
The other benefit of the program, he says, is that the new entrepreneurs will gain
from close ties with the neighborhood CDC. The way the program is structured, organi-
zations like Bridge Street are investors and have a financial stake in seeing the business
succeed. Those ties will make a difference in terms of marketing and customer support,
he says. 'They are there to help root the business in the neighborhood."
Despite the slow start, Grannum has identified six people he thinks may be good can-
didates for the program. With some negotiation and creative wheedling, a couple of
these prospects will probably bite, he hopes. "We need them," he says. "In order to sta-
bilize this community, we need them to make this major push."-KN
--
Punishing Young
lawbreakers at the fxpense
of Community Safety
AN ANAlYSIS Of GOVERNOR
GEORGE PATAKI'S JUVENilE
JUSTICE PlAN fROM THE
CENTER fOR AN URBAN fUTURE
overnor George Pataki wants to tum the war on crime he's been wag-
ing since entering office into a war on kids. Having passed the death
penalty, banned work release for adult convicts and won half a dozen
other adult criminal justice reforms, he has set his sights on overhaul-
ing the juvenile justice system.
Until now, New York's juvenile justice system has had four
main components: prevention, neighborhood-based programs, incar-
ceration and aftercare-the array of services given juveniles upon
their release. But a close look at Governor Pataki's bill reveals that
he is really talking about narrowing the juvenile justice system and
leaving it with one main purpose: punishment.
Under the administration's proposals, New York would lock up more young peo-
ple than ever before-and keep them incarcerated for longer periods of time. In a
giant step away from the state's historic commitment to rehabilitate youth, the gover-
nor would also take older teenagers who typically have served their time in facilities
with others their age and transfer them into prisons with grown-up criminals.
The truth is, despite his get-tough rhetoric, the governor's punitive reform plan
will increase crime, not prevent it. Researchers have proven time and time again
that youth incarcerated with adults are more likely to commit further crimes-and
more violent crimes-upon their release than those incarcerated with other juve-
niles. The research also shows that lengthy sentences do nothing to deter youth from
criminal behavior.
The governor's Juvenile Justice Accountability and Reform Act of 1997, which he
unveiled in February, is a recycled version of his 1996 plan, which went nowhere. But
this year, the Republican-controlled State Senate promptly passed it. To date, the
Democratic-controlled State Assembly's response has been passage of a proposal to
earmark $50 million for juvenile crime prevention.
What follows is a brief analysis of what the Governor's proposals would mean
for residents of the Empire State, especially those who live in low-income neigh-
borhoods. They not only bear the biggest brunt of crime, they also see a dispro-
portionate number of their young people ground up in the maw of the juvenile
justice system and then thrown back into their communities with little support.
TREATING CHilDREN
AS ADUllS
ne of the governor's most pernicious proposals would
expand the reach of the 1978 Juvenile Offender law,
which determines which young law breakers are tried
and treated as adult criminals. There are three pieces to
this plan; first, he would nearly double the number of
crimes for which a young person can be tried in adult
criminal court; second, he would double the minimum
sentences for most offenses (i.e. for arson, youngsters would get
12 to IS years instead of 6 to IS); and third, he would transfer
nearly all juveniles to adult prisons once they reach their sixteenth
birthday. Currently, court judges have discretion over these deci-
sions; Pataki would give that power to the State Division for
Youth (DFY), which has indicated a desire to move as many teens
out of its overcrowded system as possible.
Currently, 18-year-olds are often transferred to the adult
prison system, but it is a rare occurrence for younger offend-
ers. Under the new proposal, well over one hundred 16- and
17-year-olds would be transferred to the adult prison system
each year.
Mixing juvenile offenders and grown-up convicts is a
recipe for disaster. Jeffrey Fagan, director of the Center for
Violence Research and Prevention at Columbia University's
School of Public Health, has been studying the effects of placing
young people in the adult criminal justice system for ten years.
He has found that, upon their ultimate release, young New
Yorkers prosecuted as adults are re-arrested twice as often as
their counterparts in New Jersey, who were prosecuted as juve-
niles. Fagan also found that juveniles in adult prisons are 200
percent more likely to be beaten by staff and 50 percent more
likely to be attacked by inmates with a weapon than juveniles in
youth facilities. A University of Florida study found that the sub-
sequent crimes committed by young people prosecuted as adults
were more serious and more violent than crimes committed by
those tried as juveniles.
These studies bear witness to a fact well-known to parents,
teachers, psychologists and anyone who has interacted with ado-
lescents and young adults: The years from age 12 to 18 are
developmentally crucial ones, and what happens during those
years has great influence over the rest of a person's life.
Therefore, it stands to reason that if youngsters spend those cru-
cial years surrounded by hardened criminals, they will emerge as
adult criminals themselves.
CITY LIMITS
MAGNifYING
SfNHNCfS
he governor's plan is also more punitive where younger
teens and children are concerned. His plan would incarcer-
ate more kids ages 7 to 15 than ever before. It would also
put them away for longer periods of time and make them do
that time in the state's most restrictive juvenile facilities.
His new "two strikes and you're out" law would result
in hundreds-if not thousands-of additional youths being
locked up in the juvenile system's most restrictive environments for
much longer periods of time. Whereas now, on average, this popu-
lation's incarceration lasts one year, and many of these teens serve
time in DFY's less secure facilities, under the new law, they would
all be sentenced to three to five years, and be sent to the division's
most secure locations.
To accomplish this feat, Governor Pataki would alter the
state's Designated Felony Act. Today, only 3 percent of all juve-
nile justice cases in New York State Family Court are designated
felonies-the most violent crimes and those which carry the
longest sentences. The governor's proposal would boost this to
close to 50 percent by converting virtually all felonies committed
by youth into designated felonies.
The two-strike plan would also force judges to sentence sec-
ond-time offenders found guilty of these new designated felonies
to up to five years in secure placement. This will mean a "stag-
gering" increase in the number of incarcerations within two years,
according to a highly placed DFY official.
Even the Rand Corporation, a conservative think tank,
released a study which indicted California's "three strikes" law as
expensive and ineffective. Rand found that spending under $1 bil-
lion on parent training and on high school graduation incentives
would result in a 42 percent reduction in crime. Meanwhile,
spending $5.5 billion on the three strikes law, which mandates life
sentences for adult repeat offenders, would result in half as much
crime reduction.
liP
SfRVICf
o balance these sweeping punitive changes, the gover-
nor's bill appears to endorse the concept of early interven-
tion and neighborhood-based sanctions, including com-
munity service and alternatives-to-incarceration. But a
closer look reveals no money in the bill for any of these
programs. Nor is there funding for aftercare. A proven
crime-stopper, aftercare's intensive supervision regime
helps youngsters make a smooth transition home and stay out of
trouble in the future.
Governor Pataki's legislative prescriptions also betray igno-
rance of programs already operating successfully in his state.
Employees at city and state agencies who would be responsi-
ble for carrying out the governor's mandates say the proposals
ring hollow. As one official at the Office of Court
Administration said, "They want us to place children as young
as 10 years old into community service programs-without any
extra money." And Pataki proposes to create a commission to
study alternatives to incarceration-as if such programs weren' t
already up and running. The Division for Youth plans to disre-
gard the plan's mandate that it "develop an aftercare plan before
any youth is released from residential placement" because the
agency already does this.
MAVI997
OUT Of
THE lOOP
n embracing punitive measures at the expense of other
approaches, Governor Pataki appears to be immune to the
latest thinking in the juvenile justice field-including that of
some of his conservative compatriots.
In a February report released by the Manhattan Institute,
John DiLulio, the Princeton professor who coined the term
"super-predator," and William Bennett, the former education
secretary and drug czar, called for a juvenile justice system that
incorporates a range of sanctions and recognizes that young
people are malleable and must receive mentoring and supervi-
sion early on.
And just in the past few months, a number of government
strategies running counter to Pataki 's plan have been proposed
or implemented. New York State Chief Judge Judith S. Kaye
has released a reform plan that will dispense grants to new com-
munity youth courts; Mayor Giuliani has requested an increase
in the city's number of aftercare caseworkers; and the New York
City Board of Education is starting Second Opportunity
Schools that will work intensively with violent youth, with the
aim being to reincorporate them into their neighborhood
schools within a year.
The governor is even willing to jeopardize money from the
national Office of Juvenile Justice and Delinquency Prevention, a
wing of the Justice Department, which is dispensing more than $16
million in grant money to states willing to create juvenile justice
systems more geared toward first-time offenders and aftercare.
AlTERNATIVES TO
THE GOVERNOR'S PlAN
he Center for an Urban Future, New York's only neighbor-
hood-oriented policy think tank, does not believe it is use-
ful to point a finger without offering an alternative.
During the last year, Urban Future, in consultation with
dozens of community leaders, agency officials and acade-
mics, has devised a comprehensive reform agenda for New
York's juvenile justice system. Here are the highlights:
Create neighborhood-based community courts for first-time
nonviolent youth offenders. Instead of going through the formal
criminal justice system, children under age 16 charged with
crimes such as shoplifting or drug sales should be diverted to com-
munity courts-panels comprised of resident volunteers and
young people and staffed by a Family Court probation officer.
These panels would design sanctions and restitution and rehabili-
tation plans.
Give judges smart sentencing options. Rather than be confined to
a rigid "two strikes" law, judges should be able to choose a middle
path between giving young felons traditional probation, which is too
lax, and sentencing them to adult prisons, where they only become
better criminals. This middle path would be tough; it would demand
accountability and channel them into jobs or school.
Require aftercare for juvenile offenders, the most violent young
lawbreakers. They need it most but do not get it under current law.
To prevent this population from committing more crimes when
they are released, we recommend that judges tack aftercare onto
their sentences.
For a copy of the Center's report, "Neighborhood Justice:
A Community Response to Juvenile Crime," call (212) 479-3353.
...
CITYVIEW
Silicon Allies
By Vernon Ballard
T
raditionally, the principle targets of discrimination
were gender, race, class and religious belief. But
now there is another social construct that can poten-
tially lead to discrimination-one's ability or
inability to access and usefully process informa-
tion. Globalization and technological change are reshaping the
economic realities faced by communities throughout the world.
In fact, in the immediate future, those communities whose res-
idents understand how to use on-line resources will have far,
far greater opportunities than those whose residents do not.
But what are mostly disenfranchised communities like
Harlem, where I live, doing to insure that they can compete in
the new information age? Right now, not much.
By modest estimates, Harlem has over 500,000 residents,
2,500 small business and 1,000 nonprofit organizations. Still,
after counting all the scattered computing resources in my
community, I found there are fewer than 100 networked per-
sonal computers available to the general public for training. To
make matters worse, the vast majority of those computing
facilities require users to be enrolled in an educational institu-
tion or specific social service program. More
advanced facilities that are supposedly open to the
general public are little more than showcases that
offer insufficient hours or lack the training staff to
assist even a small population.
A universally acknowledged hurdle to com-
puter access is cost: households and businesses
of modest means simply cannot afford it. What
we need are community computer network cen-
ters supported by the private and public sectors,
where residents can conduct civic and social
activities, learn and sharpen their technical
skills and, most importantly, discuss and
develop projects and programs that foster
community growth.
Building these new computer network cen-
ters, however, means more than just putting
computers in community-based organizations
" B II d or eXlstmg neighborhood centers. It means developing
ernon a a ~ f d ki h' b . I .
is the director of ocuse, wor ng partners IpS etween socIa servIce agen-
computer opera- cies, advocacy groups, schools, universities, religious insti-
tions for the tutions, small businesses, local governments and corpora-
New York Public tions with ties to the community. In this dawning age of tech-
Interest
Research Group nology, it is important for communities to understand this
(NYPIRG) and powerful and sophisticated tool and its impact on organizing.
the co-manager To begin this process, everyone-individuals, leaders, and
of the City groups-must invest time, thought and resources into deve1-
;::f2::edia oping models for applying technology to the existing com-
Learning munity infrastructure.
Center. I participated in one such short-term partnership-the
Technology Education and Awareness Conference for Harlem
(TEACHarlem)-which was organized by City College, the
Barnard-Columbia Center for Urban Policy, Community
Technology Centers' Network, the Harlem Partnership
Center, NYPIRG and the NYNEX Technology Education
Center. The purpose of this two-day conference was to figure
out how we could empower our community by strategically
combining our social and business networks with our local
technological resources. The conference featured hands-on
workshops, demonstrations of community-wide applications
of technology and tips on how to obtain resources. It also
included a group discussion about community issues which
relate directly to technology.
For the organizers, the conference was only a first step. To
follow up, we plan to create a directory of computer support
resources in Harlem. Many times, the skills, technology and
funding are right in the community, but simply have not been
tapped. The time is now for communities to seriously investi-
gate the development of community-funded, -controlled and
maintained computer network centers-places for all neigh-
borhood residents and organizations, but especially for youth,
seniors and displaced workers.
Word processing and number-crunching merely scratch
the surface of what today's networked personal computers
can do. This week, I used my three-year-old computer to
read texts, get up-to-the-minute news, answer and screen
phone calls, pay bills, send e-mail, video conference with
new friends in Africa and Europe, watch a few videotapes
and listen to CDs and archived radio broadcasts. Using this
same $1,500 computer, I also produce documents which
integrate text, pictures, sound and video. And anything I pro-
duce on my computer can be made accessible to more than
50 million other people's homes and offices worldwide via
Internet homepages. Many people assume one must be a
"techie" to coax a computer to perform all of these functions,
but in reality, these are very simple things, and anyone with
the right training can do them.
In the end, this relatively new medium is more than just a
vehicle for consumer entertainment and commerce .
Beginning to understand this technology's power and com-
plexity is crucial for communities devastated by budget cuts
to public services. Using computer networks as cost-effective
and powerful tools for organizing and communicating, com-
munities can strengthen links between art, business, educa-
tional, religious, health and housing organizations. With func-
tional community computer network centers, Harlem could
achieve countless quality-of-life improvements. After all,
today's network computer is not merely a calculating type-
writer with a television screen; it is a new and powerful tool
for social change .
If you have an idea or concern you think New Yorkers need to know about, call 212-479-3344 for Cityview writer's guidelines.
CITY LIMITS
NYC'sYoung
and Restless
By Kim McGillicuddy
E
veryday I work with young people at Youth Force,
a South Bronx-based center that supports youth
organizing and advocacy. On a recent morning,
looking out the window from my desk onto
Jackson Avenue, I saw a young girl standing on the
corner suggestively. To see prostitution on a street like Jackson,
with its abandoned buildings and warehouses, is not unusual.
What was rare was to see a young woman out there who didn't
look beat down, who didn't appear to be ravaged by drugs and
disease, who still looked beautiful and bright-eyed and hopeful.
Her name is Brenda, she's seventeen, and the mother of a
baby with another on the way. She's married. In many ways, she
reflects the spirit of this neighborhood. The poorest congres-
sional district in the nation, Mott Haven-like Brenda-is
struggling to survive.
Seeing her took me back. Growing up in L.A. on the West
Coast-a.k.a. the Stress Coast-we made up life as it came.
Aside from parents and police, there wasn't much else in the
way of adult support. Occasionally, we had coaches or teachers
we could relate to. But for the most part, income, acceptance
and sex education came by way of Street University. So when I
came to New York in 1984 at the age of 19, I was blown away
by all the youth programs here. It seemed like there was some-
thing positive for youth on every block. It wasn't surprising to
me that youth crime rates in LA were so much higher. Here was
a city that clearly loved its young people.
But increasingly, I wonder what our city has to offer youth
like Brenda. Just as New Yorkers clutch bags and cross streets
to avoid young people, too many of us stood by quietly over the
past three years as city programs for young people like the
Mayor's Youth Advisory Council and the Youth Human Rights
Commission were eliminated and city education spending was
radically reduced. So many New Yorkers did nothing as hun-
dreds of nonprofit youth programs closed their doors-the
casualties of budget cuts.
Imagine the contributions of such programs to even one
New York family:
In January, five-year-old Lucin Amanda Rosario was on the
front pages of New York's daily newspapers. Sitting in her bed-
room in the St. Nicholas Houses in Harlem, Amanda was hit by
a stray bullet. At Youth Force, we knew of Amanda not through
the papers, but because her aunt, 19-year-old Marangely
Sanchez, is a tenant organizer here. The papers reported on the
crime, concentrating on forensics and police reports. What
went unreported were the daily heroics and compassion of two
youth programs who came to the support of Amanda's family.
In the South Bronx, Marangely had been a member of the
East Side House Settlement's Project High Road since she was
MAVI997
- - - . . . . ~ ... ' ... -
in junior high school. They helped her to conquer her stuttering,
obtain her GED, survive the death of her father and enroll in
college. When little Amanda was shot, the program's staff and
participants were at Marangely's side providing emotional sup-
port and around-the-clock babysitting for Amanda's sisters so
the child's family could be at the hospital.
In Central Harlem, Amanda has been a member of the
Motivation Room, an after-school program run by the Rheedlan
Foundation at PS 207, The program organized regular trips to
the hospital to support Amanda's mother, helped with the fam-
ily's financial needs and organized a community celebration of
life to welcome Amanda home.
Since 1994, the New York City Department of Youth
Services (which was recently merged with the Community
Development Agency to create the Department of Youth and
Community Development) has been cut by over $29 rnillion-
nearly half its budget. These cuts meant multiple losses for
young people: tutoring, recreation, summer jobs and college
preparation were eliminated for many of them with one blow.
This month 600 students and their families at IS 183 in Harlem
are trying to imagine life without High Road. By the time you
read this, High Road may be a memory: it is closing its doors
on May 30.
So what does the future hold for Brenda, Marangely and
Amanda? New York City spends as much as $88,000 a year to
detain a young person awaiting trial. A youth center
that provides the same young person recreational, edu-
cational and cultural activities after school and on
weekends costs $350 to $1000 per year per youth. For
the last two decades, Los Angeles chose police and
prison as its youth development strategy. But the
blood of LA's youth continued to flow. Now LA
looks to New York for what to do with its young peo-
ple. Of course LA wants to know about summer jobs
and afterschool programs. Will New York have any-
thing to show?
For our immediate future, all New Yorkers
should call Mayor Giuliani and urge him to support
the proposal made by the Emergency Campaign to
Restore Youth Programs for a $25 million increase
in this year's budget for youth services.
For today, Youth Force organizers-them-
selves 16 and 17-went outside to connect with
Brenda, to talk to her about job opportunities, the young pros-
titute on Jackson Avenue, to offer a sandwich. Tomorrow, if she
needs someone to talk to, a bit to eat, a different job, a way to
get back to school, or day care for her children, we'll be here
again .
CITYVIEW
Kim
McGillicuddy is
a community
organizer with
Youth Force in
the South Bronx.
AM
-_.---...... -.-, . . '''.-
REVIEW
Cang, She-bang
By Mary P as told to Kiema Mayo
u8-Ball Chicks:
A Year in the
Violent World of
Girl Gangsters"
by Gini Sikes,
Anchor Doubleday,
1997,276 pp., $23.95
I
was a drug-gang "Queen
Pin," and I spent five years in prison for it.
Trust me when I say I know first-hand that there is a
great deal about the lives of girls and women who join
gangs that has been completely overlooked by society in
general, mass media and even the women's families. That is
until now.
"8-Ball Chicks: A Year in the Violent World of Girl
Gangsters" is a remarkable peek into the lives of girls in gangs.
It proves two things once and for all-these women do exist,
and they are screaming for help. The book's author, Gini Sikes,
is a veteran New York-based journalist who spent two years
chronicling the worlds of these complex girls and women in
three American cities-Los Angeles, San Antonio and
Milwaukee. What she found on her journey through backyards,
living rooms and housing-project stairwells was startling. There
are perhaps thousands of girl gang members across the nation,
and yes, many of them are violent. Yet police departments
around the country ignored this phenomenon until quite recent-
ly, when TV talk shows brought it to light.
Sikes' book underscores the sexism prevalent in the lives of
these girls. The subtext is that, along with racism and poverty, sec-
ond-class citizenship actually inspires girl gang activity. Despite
much of the despair suffered and caused by the girls who join
gangs, both prior to and during their gang affiliation, girl gangsters
are considered unimportant by the men who run the institutions in
their lives-their homes, their 'hoods, and their local precincts.
Unlike in my case, most girls do not rise up their gang's hier-
archy, especially if there are boys or men involved in that gang in
any capacity. Instead, as noted in "8-Ball Chicks," many of the
girls are used and abused both sexually and physically. More often
than not, Sikes writes, gang members are beaten by boyfriends
and by both male and female gang members. They also suffer
from a variety of abuse both at home and on the streets.
"8-Ball" is especially clear about female victimization as it
pertains to the horrifying claims of gang-rape among female
initiates. In San Antonio, where many gang members are mid-
dle-class, white children, Sikes reports rumors of a gang prac-
tice called "roll-ins" whereby new female recruits are forced to
roll dice and have sex with as many guys as the number that
appears. "A 12-year-old girl now sat in the juvenile detention
center on charges she had lured her 13-year-old friend to a
party in a trailer, so that nine male gang members, ranging in
age from 14 to 31, could brutally rape her. During her indict-
ment, the girl showed no remorse. The same had
been done to her," Sikes writes. "In detention she'd
received dozens of letters from gang boys who
admired her nerve."
But because Sikes is careful to profile a wide
cross section of women (neither girl gangs nor their
members are all the same), we are introduced to
women who cannot be seen merely as victims.
Many of the girls in "8-Ball Chicks" are looking
for love, family, or, as I was, power. It should surprise
no one that gangs often give a person all three. Some
of the women in the book are mothers; many of them
aspire to higher career and educational goals.
T.J. , a 19-year-old Mexican girl with whom I
found myself identifying most, has completely
turned her world around. She once attempted to
avenge the murder of her homegirl's 12-year-old
brother, Danny, by going up to the suspected mur-
derer at a party and shooting him point blank, only to discov-
er later that he had survived. To carry out her criminal activi-
ties, he often disguised herself as a man, noting that people
never suspected women were capable of such acts. But T.J.
also worked part-time, illustrating children's books, "creating
scenes she herself never experienced of yellow-haired girls
cradling rabbits on lawns with white picket fences," writes
Sikes. I cried at the book's end, when T.1. peeled off her gang-
ster gear and told an all-white, upper-middle-class audience
about how God changed her life-because that's exactly what
happened to me.
Parents should defmitely read this book, particularly those
who are having trouble with their children, because it offers a
great deal of insight into the way some young people think-
both collectively and as individuals. The book shows how
pressing social or economic needs render children immensely
vulnerable. However, the gang members in "8-Ball" who final -
ly make their way out of their troubling situations are the girls
who have concerned parents or mentors.
Sadly, "8-Ball Chicks" does not include a referral list of
agencies or centers that work with girls in need of support. It
seems to me that because this is the type of book that could
actually inspire at-risk girls to say, "Damn it, I can change," a
resource list could have made all the difference.
In any case, as a woman who experienced the silent hell of
gang involvement and only figured out there could be another
way once I was incarcerated, I wish girls who are in trouble
could read this book. It might help them realize that there's not
only darkness in life .
Mary P. is a housing organizer with a local nonprofit group.
CITY LIMITS
City Limits shows you what is working in our communities:
where the real successes are taking place, :w:hQ is behind
them, why
they're working
and what we
YES! Start my subscription to City Limits.
can all learn
from them. And
o $25/one year 00 issues)
o $35/two years
we expose the
bureaucratic
garbage, sloppy
supervision and
pure
Business/ Government/Libraries
o $35/one year 0 $50 two years
Name
Address
City State Zip
corruption that's
failing our
neighborhoods.
City Limits, 120 Wall Street, 20th floor
New York, NY 10005
City Limits: News. Analysis.
Investigative reports.
Isn't it time
GUTSY.
you subscribed?
INCISIVli.
PROVOCATIV Ii.
I' I I I I \ \ I 1\ I{ () I, I I{ \ (, I I" (
When it comes
to insurance ...
We've got
you covered.

F
or over 40 years, Pelham Brokerage
lnc. has responded to the needs of
our clients with creative, low-cost
insurance programs. We represent aU
major insurance carriers specializing in
coverages for Social Service organ-
izations. Our programs are approved by
City, State and Federal funding agencies.
Let us be part of your management
team. As specialists in the area of
new const.ruction aJl d rehabilitati on
of existing multiple uni t properti es,
we work closely with our customers
to insure compliance on insurance
requirements throughout the develop-
ment process. Thereafter, we wiU tailor
a permanent insurance program to meet
the specific needs of your organization.
Our clients include many of the leading
organizations in the New York City area
providing social services.
For infOlwati on caU:
Steven Potolsky, President
111 Great Neck Road, Great Neck, New York 11 021 Phone (516) 482-5765 Fa, (516) 482-5837
I " " I I{ \ " I I
DEVElOPMENT ASSOCIATE. The South Bronx
Overall Economic Development
Corporation (SOBRO) seeks a
Development Associate to assist in
fundraising and public relations.
Responsibilities: Identifying and generat-
ing government, foundation and corporate
revenues for SOBRO programs and gener-
al support; writing funding proposals and
final/interim funding reports; maintaining
databases on foundation and government
funders and donors; scheduling special
events; editing publications; drafting press
releases. Qualifications: BA plus two years
grants writing or related experience, excel-
lent writing skills, interest in community
economic development and strong inter-
personal skills, computer proficiency.
Ability to work under deadline pressure.
Salary: Negotiable, depending on e x p e r ~
ence. Send resume, cover letter, two writ-
ing samples to Karen Hill , SOBRO, 370 E.
149th St., Bronx, NY 10455. (718) 292-
3115 (fax).
EXECUTIVE DIRECTOR. Sunset park nonprof-
it seeks Executive Director responsible for
program development, fiscal and person-
nel management, and grants writing and
fundraising. Knowledge of a range of hous-
ing issues including pre-purchase/ post-
purchase home ownership counseling,
housing rehabilitation programs, tenant
advocacy and city, state and federal hous-
ing programs. Requirements: 4 to 6 years
housing experience. Spanish a plus.
Salary range mid 40s. Send resume and
cover letter to Search Committee, 5313
Fifth Avenue, 2nd floor, Brooklyn, NY
11220 or fax to (718)492-3692.
ASSISTANT DIS1RICT MANAGER. Chelsea/
Clinton community board seeks motivated
person with excellent administrative and
communication skills to troubleshoot
neighborhood problems and work on zon-
ing/land use, housing, social service and
waterfront issues. Computer knowledge a
plus. Resume & writing sample to:
Community Board #4, 330 W. 42nd St. ,
26 fl ., NYC 10036. High 20s and excellent
City benefits.
QUALITY ASSISTANCE DIRECTOR. Brooklyn
program for psychiatrically disabled and/ or
homeless seeks professional with strong
computer skills and experience in social
services and government performance
contracts. Must have facility in word pro-
cessing, database, spreadsheets and LAN
operations. Strong inter-personal skills
required to work with managers and line
staff to develop standards and procedures
for quality improvement. Experience in sys-
tems and project design and implementa-
tion required. Responsible for identifying
software and training staff. Reports to
Executive Director. Send resume, including
salary history, to: Executive Director, PAES,
105 Carlton Ave. , Brooklyn, NY 11205.
MORE JOB ADS ON PAGE 33
WI
C ommunity D evelopment Legal A ss istance C enter
a proiect of the lawyers Alliance for New York, a nonprofit
Real Estate, Corporate and Tax Legal Representation to Organizations
Tax Syndications Mutual Housing Associations
Homeless Housing Economic Development
HDFC's Not-for-profit corporations
Community Development Credit Unions and Loan Funds
99 Hudson Street, 14th FI, NYC, 10013 (212) 219-1800
5' 9 Sueet
'It'll 11233
(711) 455-1133
"Developing Ideas; Growing Success"
Fundraising Special Needs Housing
Strategic Planning Organizational Development
Computer Training
Kathryn Albritton Development Consultant
IRWIN NESOFF ASSOCIATES
management consulting for non-profits
Providing a full-range of management support services for
non-profit organizations
o Strategic and management development plans
o Boord and stoff development and training
o Program design and implementation 0 Proposal and report writing
o Fund development plans 0 Program evaluation
20 St. Johns Place, Brooklyn, New York 11217 (718) 636-6087
Committed to the development of affordable housing
DELLAPA, LEWI S & PERSEO
150 NASSAU STREET, SUITE 1630
NEW YORK, NEW YORK 10038
TEL: 212-732-2700 FAX: 212-732-2773
Low Income housing tax credit syndication. Public and private financing.
HDFCs and not-far-profit corporations. Condos and co-ops. )-51 Tax
abatement/exemptions. Lending for Historic Properties.
George C. Dellapa Roland J. Lewis Mariann G. Perseo
DEBRA BECHTEL - Attorney
Concentrating in Real Estate & Non-Profit Law
Title and loan closings 0 All city housing programs
Mutual housing associations 0 Cooperative conversions
Advice to low income co-op boards of directors
100 Remsen Street, Brooklyn, NY 11201, (718) 624-6850
--
LAWRENCE H. McGAUGHEY
Attorney at Law
Meeting the challenges of affordable housing for 20 years.
Providing legal services in the areas of General Real Estate,
Business, Trust & Estates, and Elder Law.
217 Broadway, Suite 610
New York, NY 10007
(212) 5130981
Pub lie Rcla.tiohS for NOhPrOfitS.,." -f." "
News ReleJ.scs 3. Me-liJ. MJ. ... J.'elne ... t
to ,ct your IncssJ.,e &.eJ.r-l
Cool 8rocl.urcs. Re,.orh. T cstilno ... y
You'll DIG !!
Ma.rty SOl\l\cl\fclci. Prcsiclcl\t
Tel. (718) (718) 95,-0901
COMPUTER SERVICES
Hardware Sales:
IBM Compatible Computers
Old data Printers
Lantastic Networks
Software Sales:
NetworkslDatabase
Accounting
Suites/Applications
Services: NetworkIHardware/Software Installation,
Training, Custom Software, Hand Holding
Morris Kornbluth 718-857-9157
SPECIALIZING IN REAL ESTATE
J-S1 Tax Abatement / Exemption . 421A and 421B
A!;:plicatiCl1S SOl (e) (3) Federal Tax Exenptions
All fonns
of goveITlIl'eIlt-assisted housing including
LISC/ Enterprise.
Section 202, State Turnkey, and NYC Partnership Homes
KOURAKOS & KOURAKOS
Attorneys at Law
CO UI.TY IESOURCE EICBllOE
Co iUed to d"elop.eat of co itJba d or(aaizatiol.
LOllSA I'CII" rll'ICIAJ. .'1'81.11' cOlsn"I'
'rll .. d r,d",d r,t" ",ild/, (or 1J"liO,d ".",8
90 St., rloor, nc 10011
2 I 2 - 344 - 0 I 9 5
CITY LIMITS
COMMUNITY REPRESENTATIVE. Brooklyn City Council Member seeks
dedicated, hard working individual to respond to constituent
inquiries and assist communities in solving problems. Must have
strong writing abilities, excellent telephone skills, proficiency in
word processing, and persistence. Salary commensurate with expe-
rience. Send cover letter and resume to City Council Member Joan
Griffin McCabe, 406 43rd Street, Brooklyn, NY 11232 or FAX (718)
436-2656.
LEGISlATIVE INTERN/ASSISTANT. Brooklyn City Council Member seeks
dedicated, hardworking individual to monitor legislation, budget.
and City Council committees; respond to constituent inquiries;
research public policies; and prepare testimony and briefings.
Strong emphasis on education policy issues. Must have strong writ-
ing abilities, excellent telephone skills, proficiency in word process-
ing, and persistence. Salary commensurate with experience. Send
cover letter and resume to City Council Member Joan Griffin
McCabe, 406 43rd Street, Brooklyn, NY 11232 or FAX (718) 436-
2656.
CREDIT UNION MANAGER. The Central Brooklyn Federal Credit Union,
a 4-year-old, $5 million, 5,000 member credit union is seeking a
new MANAGER to oversee day-to-day, fiscal and lending operations,
supervise staff, ensure regulatory compliance and implement pro-
grams. A minimum two years credit union management or consumer
banking management experience required; excellent writing and ver-
bal communications skills; Bachelors' degree. Salary negotiable.
Send resume and cover letter to: Search Committee, Central
Brooklyn Federal Credit Union, 1205 Fulton Street, Brooklyn, New
York 11216.
EXECUTIVE DIRECTOR. Cooperative photojournalist agency.
Progressive organizations to major media. Qualifications:
Managerial, industry experience. EOE. Resumes: Search, Impact
Visuals, 24 West 25th Street, 12th floor, New York, NY 10010; fax:
212-807 -6644.
ADMINISTRATOR for small national nonprofit peace through interna-
tional exchange organization. Requires strong people, communica-
tion, organizational and computer skills (dbase and windows NT
administration). Supervisory and nonprofit experience helpful.
$27,000 with good benefits. EOE. Mail resume and cover letter to:
US Servas; Administrator Search; 11 John Street, Suite 407; NYC
10038. http:/ / servas.org
PROJECTS COORDINATOR FOR ECONOMIC DEVElOPMENT. Brooklyn-based
community development organization seeks a motivated individual to
manage community enterprise development projects. Responsibilites:
Coordinate pre-clevelopment through start-up of several for-profit busi-
nesses; assist in development and coordination of an economic litera-
cy/"popular education" program. Qualifications: Previous experience in
community economic development and/ or business development.
Rnancial literacy. Well organized with excellent communication skills.
Salary: DOE; good benefits. AA/ EOE. Mail resume and cover letter to:
Rfth Avenue Committee, 141 Rfth Avenue, Brooklyn, NY 11217 or fax
to (718) 8574322.
FUND DEVELOPMENT. Brooklyn-based social services agency with
emphasis on homeless housing seeks experienced professional to
develop private funding program, including grants, special events
and individual giving. Work with dedicated board and program staff
in expansion of services and broadening of giving base. Plan major
gift campaign. Benefits include excellent vacation package, medical
and dental options. Resume, with salary history and writing samples
to Executive Director, PAES, 105 Carlton Ave. Brooklyn, N.Y. 11205
PROJECT MANAGER sought to assist programmatically and adminis-
tratively non profit in housing and economic development, and mer-
chant organizing. BA required. Must work independently, be com-
fortable with public speaking, drafting reports and proposals, com-
puter literate. Familiarity with Caribbean-American community a
plus. $26,000 to start. Greater Flatbush Community Services
Corporation, 1498 Flatbush Avenue, 2nd FI., Brooklyn, NY 11210.
MAY 1997
COMMUNITY ORGANIZER. The Straphangers Campaign seeks a full-
time organizer to build support for mass transit. Salary is commen-
surate with skills and experience. Excellent benefits. Send resume
to: Gene Russianoff, 9 Murray Street, 3rd floor, New York, New York
10007 or fax to 212-349-1366.
THE EASTSIDE SRO lEGAL SERVICES PROJECT Of MFY LEGAL SERVICES,
INC. Seeks an ATTORNEY with two years litigation experience or one
year housing litigation experience to represent low income tenants
in hotels, rooming houses and lodging houses in proceedings
before courts and administrative agencies. The staff attorney
defends nonpayment and holdover proceedings, and represents
individuals and groups of tenants to remove housing code and other
violations and restore buildings to habitability. Must have good writ-
ing and negotiating skills as well as patience and toughness.
Current New York Bar admission required. Law graduates please do
not apply. Salary per collective bargaining agreement. Position avail-
able now. Please forward resume and short writing sample (no tele-
phone inquiries, please) to: Olive Karen Stamm, Esq MFY Legal
Services, Inc., 41 Avenue A, New York, New York 10009.
THE CrnZENS ADVICE BUREAU seeks a PROGRAM DIRECTOR to over-
see a mUlti-component social service office. Current initiatives
include a walk-in information and referral center, case manage-
ment project for the prevention of homelessness, after-school pro-
gram, women support groups, teen projects, and family day care
training and technical assistance project. Responsibilities include
supervision of staff, monthly reporting for all government and
foundation grants, planning of new initiatives, grant proposal writ-
ing, and participation with agency management staff in planning
meetings. The requirements for this position include MSW or
equivalent , several years of experience in social service setting,
supervisory experience, excellent writing ability and excellent
communication skills. Salary: mid to high 30's Contact: John
Weed, Citizens Advice Bureau/Girls Club, 1130 Grand Concourse,
Bronx, NY 10456, Fax (718) 590-5866.
SUMMER APPRENTICESHIP IN COMMUNITY ORGANIZING available
with ACORN, Mothers on the Move, and Northwest Bronx
Community and Clergy Coalition. Commitment to social justice
and willingness to work long hours a must. Potential for perma-
nent positions. Deadline for applications, May 20. Call TICO to
apply: 212-840-1339. Fax: 212-302-5344.
DIRECTOR OF OPERATIONS. The Manhattan Comprehensive Student
Life Center seeks a self-starter as manager for daily operations,
including oversight of graduate social work students in field place-
ment, a dozen student administrative assistants and dozens of
volunteers. Some direct counseling involved. The Life Center sup-
ports high school students ages 18-21 who have adult responsi -
bilities such as learning a living, by helping them with housing,
employment, tutoring, counseling and independent living. Half the
students are recent immigrants. The center is located within a pub-
lic school which operates from 11 am to 11 pm. The ideal candi-
date has 4 years clinical work with high school age youth and
administrative or organizing experience. MSW required; previous
field supervision helpful; second language highly desirable;
employment training, youth development skills and work with immi-
grants useful. Three evenings a week until 8:30. Salary high 30s;
full benefits. Send resume and writing sample (no calls please) to:
Gregory Cohen, Comprehensive Development, Inc., 240 Second
Avenue, NY, NY 10003.
VOCATIONAl. EDUCATION DIRECTOR. Organization based on the philoso-
phy that providing homeless ex-substance abusers with a home, sup-
portive services and job training gives them the motivation and skills
they need to regain their lives, seeks a full-time director of vocational
education. Candidate to lead the organization's efforts regarding jobs
and training. BA, minimum 5 years experience in vocational education
required. Oversee staff of two. Good benefits. Salary based on quali-
fications. Resume to Ms. A. Jordan, 2680 Broadway, Suite 3B. New
York, NY 10025.
MORE JOB ADS ON PAGE 31
j
Wh
Candidate
Sal Albanese,
Brooklyn councilman
Fernando Ferrer,
Bronx
Borough
President
Ruth Messinger,
Manhattan Borough
President
They?
By Glenn Thrush
here are four candidates seeking the Democratic nomination for mayor. They are bidding for the opportu-
nity to cross blades with Rudy Giuliani, who has probably amassed the greatest war chest anyone has ever
raised in pursuit of such a lousy, ulcerating job.
The sorry fact, however, is that although the wannabees have appeared on thousands of nursing-home
rostrums, TV spots and talk-radio bitch-ins, the typical New Yorker would be hard-pressed to ill them in a
police line-up. Al Sharpton, no stranger to law enforcement, is the obvious exception.
Upside
The Nathan Hale
of city politics.
Never backs
down from a
political bully,
even if it means
losing every-
thing.
The most prag-
matic player in
the field; helped
rebuild the South
Bronx.
Unwavering
moral rectitude.
Says things like:
'The Giuliani
Administration is
like the Rocky
Mountains. The
higher you go, the
whiter it gets."
Fewer cityfolk will ever come to truly understand the inner cores of the four. Until they read the fol-
lowing chart, that is.
Downside
He is a snowball. The
Democratic primary is
Hell .
Has the adenoidal
intonations and
speech cadences of a
young Ed Koch. Is
starting to look a little
like him too.
Unwavering moral
rectitude.
Never says things like
"I'm sorry," or "I
made a mistake."
What's In A Name?
"Sal" is short for "savior." "Alba" is a town
in northern Italy renowned for its truffles.
Namesakes: Salvador Dali, Sal Mineo
(brooding sidekick in "Rebel Without a
Cause"), Sal Maglie (1950s Brooklyn
Dodgers pitcher known as "The Barber"),
salmonella.
"Fernando" means "boldness" or "travel."
''Freddy'' means "peaceful1Uler."
Namesakes: Freddy Prinze, Freddy
Krueger, Fernando Lamas (movie star who
looked "mahvellous" before dying),
Fernando Wood (1860's NYC mayor who
endorsed slavery and was rumored to be
corrupt), Fred Mertz (Ethel's husband on "I
Love Lucy").
"Ruth" means "friend of beauty."
"Messinger," as in "Don't shoot the ... "
Namesakes: Ruth (biblical Moabite known
for her fidelity and stubbomess), Ruth
Bader Ginsburg, Ruth St. Denis (modem
dancer), Ruth Buzzi (nerdy "Laugh-In"
comedienne), Baby Ruth (gooey, nutty
candy bar).
"Al" means "warding off men."
Namesakes: Al D' Amato, Al 10lson,
Al Capone, Al Green, Al Bundy, Al Smith
(cigar-gnawing New York governor who
got creamed by Herbert Hoover),
Al Hamid II (19th century Turkish despot
who got creamed by the Russians),
Alton Maddox.
Unsolicited Advice
Sell Out!
Challenge George
Steinbrenner to an arm-
wrestling match over the
future of Yankee
Stadium. If you win, he
has to stay. If you lose,
ask reporters if they think
Ruth Messinger could
have done any better.
Buy a big floppy hat
with plastic daisies. It
worked for Bella Abzug.
Plant a tree in Israel.
-;
~ ~ - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - ~
CITY LIMITS
!lBankerslrust Company
Community Development Group
A resource for the non ... profit
development community

Gary Hattem, Managing Director
Amy BrusHoff, Vice President
280 Park Avenue, 19West
New York, New York 10017
Tel: 212,454,3677 Fax: 212,454,2380
LET US DO A FREE EVALUATION
OF YOUR INSURANCE NEEDS
We have been providing low-cost insurance programs and
quality service for HDFCs, TENANTS, COMMUNITY MANAGEMENT
and other NONPROFIT organizations for over 75 years.
We Offer:
SPECIAL BUILDING PACKAGES
FIRE LIABILITY BONDS
DIRECTOR'S & OFFICERS' LlABILTY
GROUP LIFE & HEALTH
"Tailored Payment Plans"
PSFS,INCo
146 West 29th Street, 12th Floor, New York, NY 10001
(212) 279-8300 FAX 714-2161 Ask for: Bala Ramanathan
BARRY COMMONER'S CONTRIBUTION
TO THE ENVIRONMENTAL MOVEMENT
SCIENCE AND SOCIAL ACTION:
A SYMPOSIUM ON THE OCCASION OF
BARRY COMMONER'S 80TH BIRTHDAY
The Great Hall at Cooper Union
7 E. Seventh Street
(between Third and Fourth avenues)
Friday, May 30, 1997
9:30 a.m. - 5:00 p.m.
SPEAKERS INCLUDE:
Ralph Nader (keynote address)
Giovanni Berlinguer Virginia Brodine
Dan Kohl. Tony Mazzocchi
Peter Montague. Chicco Testa
Barry Commoner
This symposium is free and open to the public.
Please call 718-670-4180 or e-mail cbns@chelsea.ios.com
to register or for more information.