[VIDEO] EXCLUSIVE: New York 2015 - FOUR THOUSAND sleeping on the streets, 80 homeless encampments in the city and beggars making $75 a day as arrests for panhandling and street drinking plunge

They are sleeping in front of the Empire State building, sprawled in front of the doors of Macy's, and panhandling outside Grand Central.

New York is in the grip of a homeless epidemic so bad that it has raised fears of the city slipping back into the disorder of the 1970s and 1980s.

The city's police chief this week said that as many as 4,000 people are now sleeping rough in the city, in a crisis which even the city's ultra-liberal mayor has finally acknowledged after months of denials.

Police officers have identified 80 separate homeless encampments in the city, 20 of which are so entrenched that they have their own furniture, while its former mayor Rudolph Giuliani has spoken scathingly of how his successor is failing to keep order. 

This week New York governor Andrew Cuomo said bluntly that 'it's hard not to conclude that we have a major homeless problem in the city of New York' while the city's police chief Bill Bratton described the scale of it as 'a tipping point'.

And even Bill de Blasio, who has spent months refusing to acknowledge that the growing scale of rough sleeping was anything other than a 'perception problem' finally said there was 'a reality problem'.

Now Daily Mail Online can reveal how a toxic combination of cheap drugs and softly-softly policing are fueling the epidemic - and that beggars are making as much money as someone on the city's minimum wage in cash each day.

Homeless people spoken to by Daily Mail Online said that they were making $70 dollars every day from panhandling.

The amount is the same as working an eight-hour day in a minimum wage job in New York, where the state-mandated minimum wage is $8.75.

One homeless man - a former professional who had become a drug addict and ended up one the streets - said: 'People... are very kind and and give me food and on a good day I can get about 70-80 dollars which shows you the kindness of New Yorkers.'

And Patrick Kolher, who begs outside the Trump International Hotel at Central Park West, said he regularly saw donations of $70 a day into his collection tin.

If the amount of money they can make is encouraging people on to the streets there is little policing to drive them off.

Daily Mail Online has established figures which show how little police action has been taken against the problem.

Arrests for offenses normally associated with the homeless and street dwellers and assessed under the quality of life bracket, have dropped drastically since the election of Bill de Blasio as mayor.

The self-proclaimed champion of 'the progressive agenda' came into office after a campaign in which he was critical of the New York Police Department's stop-and-frisk tactics.

He set himself as a reformer who would move away from the aggressive policing championed by former mayor Rudolph Giuliani and his successor Michael Bloomberg, which was credited with dramatically cutting crime in the city, which went from being one of the most dangerous in the US, to one of the safest.

But figures provided by the NYPD suggest that their 35,000 officers - of whom around 20,000 are on regular, uniformed patrol duties - are making far fewer arrests for the sort of quality of life crimes which blight streets.

The department provided figures for previous years, but only those for the first three months of this year. 

They show that in 2007, for the consumption of alcohol on streets, 129,073 people received criminal charges. Over the years the numbers went up or remained steady until de Blasio was elected.

This year, during the first three months, police summonsed only 12,477 which means at that rate, less than half of those arrested in Bloomberg's last year of 2013 will have faced charges.

In crimes such as littering, urinating, exposure, spitting and pan handling, the number of arrests have also dropped.

In 2013, there were 8372 charges for littering. In 2014 when de Blasio took office the number dropped to 7886. For the first three months of 2015, there were 1227 arrests.

People who were accused of urinating in public faced courts 29,579 times in 2013. This figure fell to 28,609 last year when the current mayor took power and the first three months of 2015 saw 4,547 summonsed.

Arrests for exposure in 2013 were 723. In 2014 the number stood at 619 and for the first quarter of this year, the figure was 108.

Police held for spitting numbered 2230 in 2013.Last year it was down to 1827 and until March of this year the figure stood at 324.

In 2013 there were 56,103 arrests for disorderly conduct. Yet between January 1 2015 and the end of March there were 7005, which is again heading for a 50 per cent reduction.

A New York Police Department spokesman told Daily Mail Online: 'If someone is stopped for aggressive panhandling and they have no ID they will be arrested.'

But only 50 people were arrested for the offense up until March this year, while in 2013 there were 310 and last year 201 in the same period.

A police spokesman declined to answer a question of whether police under de Blasio have been instructed to have a softer approach to street crime.

This week, however, Bratton said that his officers would be tackling the problem - with the department's chief of patrol describing how they would be asking the homeless 'why are you out here? Where are you from?', the New York Times reported.

Bratton provided the first official estimate of the scale of the problem, saying there were as many as 4,000 sleeping on the New York streets, compared to 56,000 in homeless shelters.

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'Chase them': Rudolph Giuliani has been severely critical of the response to the homelessness crisis, saying that police have to act to get people off the streets

The city's laws mean that anyone who is homeless is entitled to a place in a shelter.

Of the 3,000 to 4,000 on the streets, Bratton said: 'It's a number that's been growing over a period of time,

'It's reached a tipping point, however, I think, to use that term, that it did become more visible this summer.'

Officers are now moving through a total of 80 homeless 'encampments' which they have identified.

One was removed this week in Harlem, an increasingly trendy area which has seen complaints of aggressive beggars around its busiest stations.

But the action only goes some way towards meeting vocal criticism made by Giuliani of the current state of policing.

He revealed last month how he had complained at his local police precinct about a homeless man who was urinating near his Upper East Side home.

He told NBC 4 New York that his message was: 'You chase 'em and you chase 'em and you chase 'em and you chase 'em, and they either get the treatment that they need or you chase 'em out of the city.

'I had a rule. You don't get to live on the streets.'

That put him at odds with de Blasio's administration, who say that street homelessness is related to a growth in the number of homeless people overall - which they say is because of Giuliani and Bloomberg.

They claim that increasingly expensive rents are making it impossible for the poorest to live in New York, leading them to move into shelters.

However another factor appears to be leading to the increasing dysfunction on the streets - a wave of cheap drugs, especially heroin, which can be bought in New York for just $10 a fix.

A leading expert charged with treating heroin addicts in New York has described the drug problem as an 'epidemic'.

Monika Taylor, who runs drug treatment at a hospital in Syracuse, NY, and who has been tasked by New York state to look at the problem, told Daily Mail Online the crisis is being fueled by the cheap price of the drug on the streets.

Via: Daily Mail

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Uber Shows How To Break Crony Capitalism

The taxi medallion scam is one of the worst examples of crony capitalism.  Uber (and some other app-driven services) are in the process of defeating the scam in New York and, apparently, in many other places as well.  It's about time.

The scam is simple.  A city issues a limited number of so-called "medallions," which convey exclusive rights to pick up passengers on the streets, and often at airports as well.  I have never heard anybody articulate a good rationale for why the number of medallions should be limited.  Fake rationales include preventing "destructive" competition (don't we have that in every industry?) and so-called environmental concerns (always articulated by those holding medallions whose only value lies in artificial scarcity). 

I have a long-time friend, call him R, who is head of one of those lenders that specialize in loans for the purchase of taxi medallions.  Twenty or so years ago I went for the first time to a fundraising event for a candidate for City office, and there was R.  Since then, I haven't been to many fundraising events for candidates for local offices, but at the few I have attended, somehow R was always there.  I can't say I was surprised when Bloomberg News reported last month that the medallion taxi industry had contributed over $500,000 to the campaign of Bill de Blasio for Mayor.  Probably, they contributed that amount or close to it to other candidates as well.  Other than the City employee unions and real estate interests, the taxi medallion guys have been right at the top of the political contribution heap.

Back when I first found out from R what business he was in (I think this was in the 90s), I expressed some very severe skepticism.  From there, the conversation went something like this:

R:  It's literally the best industry to lend in.  We have not had a single default in decades.

Me:  That will be true until the day that all the value suddenly disappears.  Basically, all the value comes from the artificial scarcity.  One day that will disappear, and the medallions will suddenly be worthless all at once.

R:  They've been saying that for decades.  Meanwhile we are diversifying to some degree.  

Since this was before this blog recorded all my thoughts, I don't have an official record of my prediction.  However, it is now rapidly coming true.

For the past few years, New York City taxi medallions have been trading for over $1 million each.  With over 13,000 medallions issued, this has represented a value of over $13 billion --a good measure also of the value of the inconvenience inflicted on people in neighborhoods where taxis have been systematically unavailable for decades due to the corrupt crony system.  But with the advent of Uber, the value of the medallions has suddenly plummeted. This article from CNN Money in July reports that the value of a medallion is off by some 40% from its peak just last year.

And that's if you can sell a medallion at all.  Many reports indicate that the market has gone dead as lenders have been spooked and refuse to lend. 

When the medallion market first started to plummet, de Blasio and his friends on the City Council (all takers of industry cash) floated several proposals to put the reins on Uber, including, for example, a limit on Uber licenses.  But when the reports started to come out about the unbelievable amounts of political contributions they had received from the medallion taxi industry, suddenly they were in a tough spot.  Turns out that our "progressive" Mayor and City Council would happily sell their outer-borough constituents down the river, inflicting them with $13 billion of inconvenience, and handing the $13 billion to a handful of cronies, in return for a paltry few million of political contributions.

The latest news is that de Blasio and the Council are refusing to help out their medallion-owning friends, so the medallion owners are now pinning their hopes on a litigation contending that existing law restricting non-medallion owners to only "pre-arranged travel" effectively outlaws the Uber model.  Good luck with that.  Of course de Blasio and the Council will gladly help out their medallion-owning friends as soon as nobody is looking; but it seems that people are going to be looking at this one, at least for a while.  Now, will anybody start to pay attention to, for example, the "green energy" scam?

Via: Manhattan Contrarian

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Top de Blasio backer mulling run against ‘anti-business, anti-cop socialist’

One of the nation’s wealthiest black business leaders is considering mounting a self-financed campaign to topple Mayor Bill de Blasio in 2017 — saying he has lost faith in the candidate he once supported.

“I’m giving serious thought to running for mayor of New York City . . . I was a political supporter of Bill de Blasio,” real estate mogul Don Peebles told The Post on Tuesday.

Peebles and wife Katrina contributed $9,675 to de Blasio’s 2013 campaign and inaugural committees, records show.

But during an extensive interview, the lifelong Democrat — who is reportedly worth $700 million — delivered a withering attack on the mayor’s handling of taxes, charter schools, stewardship of the NYPD and chilly relations with Gov. Andrew Cuomo.

“I’ve lost confidence in him. It would be irresponsible of me to do nothing,” said Peebles, 55, who owns the largest African-American-run real estate company in the United States.

“He’s anti-business, he’s anti-wealth, he’s anti-accomplishment. His performance has not been up to par. He’s failed.”

Top de Blasio backer Don Peebles (right) says the mayor has failed the people of New York City, and that he would consider running against the candidate he once supported.

Peebles’ mulling of a mayoral run comes amid reports that some disaffected Democrats are looking for an alternative to the mayor in the next election.

Among the names being mentioned are city Comptroller Scott Stringer, Brooklyn Rep. Hakeem Jeffries and Bronx Borough President Ruben Diaz Jr.

Peebles said that if he runs, there’s a “90 percent chance” he would challenge de Blasio in a Democratic primary.

He added that he would self-finance a campaign and spend “whatever it takes” to win.

Describing himself as a “pro-business” Democrat, Peebles described de Blasio as a divisive “socialist” who wants to punish wealthy people with higher taxes.

“My approach is to expand opportunity by increasing the size of the pie, not taking away from others. The mayor is supposed to be the mayor of all the people, not be the mayor of the Socialist Party.”

He slammed de Blasio on numerous fronts, from his management skills to his chat with his son, Dante, about how to act if approached by cops.

“That was disrespectful,” Peebles said. “What he should have been saying is that the NYPD is the best police department in the country.”

Peebles argued that the mayor hurt himself by continuing to press for an income tax hike on the rich to fund his pre-K program even after Cuomo offered state money for it.

“It’s very frightening. His basic view is that all businesses and wealthy people are not paying their fair share. That’s not true. It’s wrong,” he said.

Peebles also took issue with the mayor’s handling of education, saying he’s siding with the teachers union instead of standing up for kids and charter schools.

Peebles said he and his wife have supported faith-based and alternative schools in Florida and his native Washington, DC.

Via: New York Post

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De Blasio is padding City Hall with jobs for all of his friends

Mayor de Blasio’s patronage mill is churning out junk jobs funded with taxpayer money for longtime pals, campaign grunts and acolytes.

In addition to creating a $150,000 post for Stephanie Yazgi — the longtime girlfriend of his top strategist, Emma Wolfe — de Blasio has created positions to amp up his progressive agenda and national profile and spread propaganda touting his “transcendent” accomplishments.

The city’s television station — led by de Blasio buddy Janet Choi — devotes much of its taxpayer-funded $5.7 million budget to broadcasting his ribbon-cuttings, announcements and features about his friends, including his wedding singer.

His $105,000 digital director, Jessica Singleton, shapes his social-media image while his $69,000 media analyst, Mahen Gunaratna, measures the influence of his messages.

But the bulk of his buddies land jobs at City Hall in the mayor’s Community Affairs Unit.

The CAU traditionally had staffers represent the mayor at community-board and civic-group meetings across the city, reporting back to the administration on neighborhood concerns.

“The CAU has now turned into a four-year organizing arm of the de Blasio campaign,” said a former liaison with the unit.

Stephanie Yazgi, Emma Wolfe, Janet Choi and Jessica Singleton

Photo: Facebook ; Rob Bennett for the Office of Mayor Bill de Blasio (2) ; Assoc. Commissioner at New York City Mayor's Office of Media and Entertainment

The unit now employs Pinny Ringel, a $65,000-a-year liaison to the Jewish community and a former Public Advocate’s Office staffer under de Blasio.

Sarah Sayeed is a liaison who specializes in the Muslim community. And Jonathan Soto is senior community liaison to the Clergy Advisory Council, another de Blasio creation.

Kicy Motley, a de Blasio campaign worker who tweeted “F- -k. The. Police.” in 2012, found a home in the CAU office as $55,000-a-year Brooklyn borough director.

And Rebecca Lynch, a Teamsters union lobbyist who backed de Blasio’s campaign, landed a gig as an $85,000-a-year special assistant in the CAU before taking a leave of absence to launch a bid for City Council in Queens.

De Blasio’s politicized CAU failed him in the Legionnaire’s disease outbreak, when there was a disconnect between City Hall and South Bronx community leaders.

“The CAU is supposed to know everything happening in the boroughs in every community,” said political consultant George Arzt. “There should have been briefings on what is going on and what they hear on the ground.”

Via: New York Post

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Bratton is done with this amateur administration

Is Bill Bratton eyeing an exit? If so, who can blame him.

Forty-five years a cop, a motive force in Rudy Giuliani’s reclamation of New York City’s streets 20 years ago and a public-safety intellectual with a stellar international reputation, Bratton has been swimming with the minnows for 18 months now — and the exasperation is peeking through.

“I will not be commissioner for [another] six-and-a-half years — that’s the reality,” announced Bratton last month. Clearly, departure is on his mind.

“You can’t arrest your way out of this problem. It requires coordinated effort,” the commissioner said a week ago of disruptive street vagrancy — an obvious fact that seems only recently to have dawned on the folks who inhabit City Hall.

“There are people in our society — criminals . . . bad people. We need to work very hard to put them in jail and keep them there for a long time,” he declared on Thursday — delivering an explicit rebuke to an administration that came to office preaching an unadorned anti-police gospel.

Frustrated much? So it would seem.

After all, murder is up, some city police precincts have become virtual free-fire zones for gang-bangers, aggressive vagrants plague city streets and parks — all of it combining to tarnish the reputation of one of America’s leading public-safety professionals.

Certainly none of Bratton’s thoughts can be endearing him to the Lilliputians now running government in New York City — most notably First Frequent Flier Bill de Blasio and City Council Speaker Melissa Mark-Viverito.

They may not be saying much — but they wouldn’t be human if they weren’t seething inside.

But never mind them. It’s Bratton who matters.

What’s obvious — and critical — is that the past 18 months has frayed his tolerance for fools. And his exasperation at having to revisit a debate that he — and most New Yorkers — thought had been settled two-plus decades ago is palpable.

It’s all about the social contract.

Outside the administration, hardly anybody disputes that your right to swing your fist ends at the tip of my nose.

So, why is it so hard to understand that your right to an empty bladder gives you no claim on my front stoop?

Or that there is no proper space on public sidewalks and in the parks for the disruptive mentally ill — to say nothing of snake-bite-nasty panhandlers in the game only for the easy cash?

And that, yes indeed, criminals belong behind bars. Period.

So why must New York City even have this discussion? Because some people never learn.

It may be lost on de Blasio, Mark-Viverito and her clown-council colleagues, but New York City solved street disorder a generation ago — and Bratton was present at the creation.

“[We] involved the Health Department, the police, the [public] hospitals and a bunch of others. [We] had a plan to maintain [order],” says a ranking veteran of the era.

Or, again in Bratton’s words: “You can’t arrest your way out of this problem. It requires coordinated effort.”

De Blasio & Co. seem only recently to have tumbled to this, hyperbolically announcing on Thursday a $22 million plan to coordinate mental health services for street people.

“What we are talking about is unprecedented, a culture shift in the way we think about and treat people who suffer from serious mental illness, who are also violent,” said first lady Chirlane McCray — the poet, artist and former speech writer who has pretty much been put in charge of the administration’s mental-health policy.

Maybe that’ll work. Maybe it won’t.

But coordination of services definitely isn’t unprecedented — and success will demand attention to detail and perseverance of a sort that so far has eluded the de Blasio administration.

Amazingly, Mark-Viverito is pulling in the opposite direction, pushing to decriminalize the so-called quality-of-life offenses — public urination, aggressive panhandling, fare-beating — that gives cops the tenuous hold they now have on the streets.

The fact is that de Blasio paid no heed whatsoever to the reemergence of street disorder in the city until this newspaper rubbed his nose in it. And, even now, there is no reason to believe he can or will do anything about it.

But ordinary New Yorkers have noticed — and they have no confidence in the mayor. That much is evidenced by an extraordinary Quinnipiac University poll that last week awarded de Blasio the lowest approval numbers of his mayoralty.

The mayor’s numbers, to put it bluntly, recall the fall from electoral grace of David Dinkins — a one-term mayor who was damned by his perceived indifference to crime and street chaos.

Nobody’s suggesting that things are that bad, not by a long shot.

But New Yorkers are hypersensitive to the issue — and, clearly, they have no appetite for another oblivious mayor.

So far, Bratton’s reputation is more or less intact. Certainly he got a strong thumbs-up in that Q-poll.

But he never has been much of a team player — his departure from the Giuliani administration followed a titanic clash of egos — and there is no reason to believe he’ll willingly take the rap for a feckless Bill de Blasio. Nor should he be expected to.

Who knows whether the mayor understands any of this. But if Bratton does take a hike, nobody who’s been paying attention will be surprised.

Via: New York Post

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UBER AND THE DEMOCRATS’ OLD WAYS

Presidential candidate Hillary Clinton doesn’t get it. Obama administration Labor Secretary Thomas Perez doesn’t get it. New York Mayor Bill de Blasio doesn’t seem to get it, either, as he only reluctantly reversed a bad decision on the matter.

In fact, generally, in a somewhat surprising reversal, many so-called Democratic “progressives” want to protect the old ways. But there are exceptions, like Virginia Gov. Terry McAuliffe, who worked with Uber to create a legal framework in his state; Sen. Cory Booker (D-N.J.), who says that hailing a cab has provided some of his most humiliating moments; and Rep. Hakeem Jeffries (D-NY), a Brooklynite who during Uber’s recent showdown with de Blasio said, in essence, “What’s wrong with a little competition?”

On the other hand, Republicans, who are accused occasionally of supporting “crony capitalism,” have embraced the new way and have been eager to let in new businesses to compete. Sen. Marco Rubio of Florida, a Republican presidential hopeful, gets it. One of the chapters in his recent book is titled, “Making America Safe for Uber.”

The new way is the “sharing” or “gig” economy of Uber, Lyft, Airbnb and others. Republican politicians seem more open to embracing these new businesses and new jobs, and the freedom of citizens to contract with each other.  

Spurred by unions, powerful bureaucracies, a lack of personal experience, and perhaps a more favorable view of regulation, many Democrats want to ban, restrict, and tax these services.

A politician’s position on Uber is a proxy for how in touch they are with their community. De Blasio obviously had no idea how people move around his city. And Clinton likely hasn’t driven a car in decades. What all politicians should start seeing is why it is both bad policy and bad politics to jump in aggressively and try to ban or heavily burden these services. 

It’s bad policy because the transportation services are not just for upper-class urban dwellers. In fact, as a college president recently discovered while moonlighting as an Uber driver, these services are an important alternative for the working poor with limited public transportation options. They also don’t discriminate against minorities, the way many taxi drivers do.

Meanwhile, the home-sharing phenomenon created by Airbnb brings needed cash (and sometimes a cure for loneliness) for homeowners while allowing locales to attract additional visitors.

All this economic activity adds to reportable income and benefits both the public coffers and the economy.

My personal experiences with these services are almost all positive. My brother makes his mortgage payments on his Hawaii home only thanks to Airbnb. (He pays the same local taxes as a hotel.) My family is visiting Manhattan for a few days in August, and by using Airbnb we can have a reasonably priced separate room for the kids. (Try finding a Manhattan two-bedroom hotel room for less than $1,000 a day.)

I travel a lot for business and rely on Uber. I find ride hailing service drivers better. They have clean, smoke-free cars; they don't talk on the phone while driving; and our rating of each other after the drive ensures we both are courteous and safe. It is simply better than the typical cab experience. Plus, it is great competition.

In July, I took an Uber from Denver to Aspen for $240, less than half the cost of any timely alternative. It was scenic and fun, and I connected with the driver. Compare that to my United Airlines experience for that reverse route months earlier, when I paid double what I paid Uber, plus got hit with $250 in excess-baggage fees and was told a two-day-old policy barred me from checking my bags to another airline. (Thus, I missed my connecting Delta flight.) Yes, Uber was a great substitute for United.

It’s bad politics to oppose these services as they delight millions of average Americans. Moreover, they contribute to the financial well-being of tens of thousands of Americans who rely on them for supplemental income. For 84 percent of Lyft drivers, it’s not a full-time job. Uber likely has similar numbers.  

Some “progressives” are uncomfortable and argue that these drivers and homeowners are somehow worse off without government intervention. They want regulation going beyond safety, background screening, and insurance. They want union-like regulation for home-sharing and employee-related regulations and benefits for Uber and Lyft drivers.

Talk about imposing the nanny state on consenting adults. Having taken scores of Uber or Lyft rides, I have yet to meet a driver who says they want the government determining their employment status.

So, if Democratic politicians want to dig in their heels in fealty to unions and unnecessarily burden these services, Republicans can make inroads on many traditional Democratic constituencies. I can't wait to see the platforms of both parties leading up to their conventions. I predict that Republicans will embrace the sharing economy and that Democrats will try to, but add a lot of ifs, ands, or buts.

Via: American Spectator

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NEW YORK CITY: De Blasio is crafting his own downfall

Years ago, in a chat with then-Deputy Mayor Bill Lynch, I asked how the Dinkins administration set its agenda. Did it have daily staff meetings, consult with outsiders, poll public opinion?

Lynch, a respected, genial political operative who has since passed away, looked at me with surprise. “I wish we knew who set the agenda,” he said with a straight face.

At that moment, I realized the impression that the Dinkins mayoralty was being driven by events beyond its control was accurate. Whatever the problem, City Hall didn’t just seem to be caught off guard — it was caught off guard.

Something similar is now happening to Bill de Blasio. Mayor Putz is getting whacked like a ­piñata, and he always seems surprised.

One day, it’s murder mayhem, then an outbreak of Legionnaires’ disease, then a cheating scandal in the schools. Some days, like yesterday, it’s an avalanche.

The comparison with the Dinkins years is apt, but breaks down in one key way. Dinkins’ sins were mostly those of omission; de Blasio is the architect of his dis­asters.

His main campaign promise was to change the direction of the city, and, unfortunately, he kept that promise. He is taking New York backwards.

Although murder is up by 10 percent, reports show most major crimes continue to fall. Yet it doesn’t feel that way.

Many, if not most, New Yorkers believe the city is sliding downhill, and that each day brings us one step closer to the bad old days of terrifying lawlessness and public disorder.

The fear is fueled by enough anecdotes to make it rational — gunfire sprays, with children caught in the crossfire, increased muggings in Central Park, and disheveled maniacs, some violent, taking over sidewalks and subways.

In large measure, these are the fruits of de Blasio’s policies. He wanted a kinder, gentler police force, made Al Sharpton an adviser — and the result is a more violent, bloodier city.

He said he wanted more humane policies on welfare and homelessness, and hired as commissioner Steven Banks, the former head of the Legal Aid Society who spent 30 years suing the city agency he now runs.

As Heather Mac Donald wrote in the City Journal, Banks “helped create, through lawsuit, New York’s unique obligation to provide housing on demand to families claiming homelessness.”

Given his disdain for efforts to get people off welfare and into jobs, it is fair to assume that Banks is at least partially responsible for the surge of people living in parks, shelters and on the streets.

Then there’s Schools Chancellor Carmen Fariña, lured out of retirement by de Blasio because no other established educator would adopt his policies. Intent on turning back the clock on mainstream reforms, he and Fariña embraced the teachers-union cartel and are thwarting accountability measures considered standard best practices. In their warped vision, rigorous teacher evaluations and charter schools are enemies, while the union parties like it’s 1970.

The outrageous cheating scandal The Post exposed is a prime example of de Blasio’s folly. The union puts the protection of jobs ahead of everything else, so handing out unearned diplomas is a no-brainer when the aim is to shield the adults from the consequences of student failure.

As one teacher told The Post, “The state, the city, the mayor, the chancellor all look good with an inflated passing rate.”

So true — until that passing rate is exposed as a sham. That’s where we are now, and it’s a perfect metaphor for de Blasio’s tenure.

Less than halfway through his term, he needs a shakeup at City Hall. Problems are multiplying, the quality of life is declining and he is isolated inside his bubble with like-minded lefties.

On the outside, he has squandered public goodwill by showing indifference to the daily travails of city life. Among government leaders, his high-handed lectures have earned him a cold shoulder and ill wishes.

If he has a reset button, now would be the time to use it. Before he runs out of time.

Via: New York Post

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Millennials Can Rescue Cities from Their Leftist Rulers

Most American cities have been ruled by left-wingers for decades, and a good case can be made that this has contributed mightily to their decline. Of course, this has done no favors for groups — minorities, the poor, blue-collar workers — that urban progressives count as loyal political allies.

Many Millennials are, so far, enrolled in this coalition but, if they’re paying attention, might be wondering why. On two key issues, the Left is unalterably out of step with most twentysomethings’ beliefs and interests.

First consider New York mayor Bill de Blasio’s recent attempt to defend his city’s taxicab cartel and stifle the fast-growing ride-sharing service Uber. His Honor lined up enough city-council votes to cap the size of Uber’s fleet (among other things) and then, while on a junket to Rome, went on a populist rant to justify his regulatory offensive, decreeing that “the people of our cities don’t like the notion of those who are particularly wealthy and powerful dictating terms to a government elected by the people.”

 Which turned out to be exactly backward. Uber and its (mostly Millennial) subscribers mounted a relentless PR counterattack, punching holes in the mayor’s assertions about the need for more regulations and making clear that they don’t like terms being dictated by the government. The chastened mayor backed off, promising to study the matter for a few months. In the unlikely event that this study is honest and objective, it would teach the mayor some very important lessons — foremost, that Millennials’ embrace of “Sharing Economy” firms like Uber does not merely make their lives easier and save them money. It helps save cities and, indeed, the planet.

Uber and its rival Lyft do not just bring competition (read: lower prices, better quality) to monopolistic markets. They exemplify a new kind of business that enables us to lighten our ecological footprints by making more-efficient use of our possessions. When we share otherwise-idle residential space (via Airbnb), tools (Open Shed), or clothing (Thredup), we squeeze more value out of the scarce resources used to create and maintain these goods. 

A nerdy economist might call this “efficiently amortizing fixed costs”; everyone else would just say it’s “being green.” And, in truth, this has always been a signal virtue of city life. When we cluster together in dense urban areas, we enjoy much lower costs per customer for our streets, water and power lines, and much else. Matthew Kahn has found that (after controlling for income and other influences on demand) the average suburbanite drives 31 percent more miles and consumes 58 percent more land, 49 percent more fuel oil, and 35 percent more electricity than the typical city dweller. 

Millennials are on board: A 2014 Nielsen survey found that almost two-thirds of the 77 million Americans aged 18 to 36 “prefer to live in the type of mixed-use communities found in urban centers,” and are currently living in such areas at a higher rate than any other age group.

Via: National Review

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