TOLLS STUDY WON'T SWAY MARTY A policy analyst who favors East River bridge tolls has figured out that 98 percent of city residents (of driving age) would average less than $50 per year in tolls. Charles Komanoff's study also found that tolls would cost Brooklynites far less than last fall's property tax surcharge is costing Manhattan residents. "Memo to Marty Markowitz: Manhattan took its hit. Now it's your turn," Komanoff emailed us. (Incidentally, Komanoff lives in Manhattan, though his colleague at the Bridge Tolls Advocacy Project, Steve O'Neill, lives in Park Slope.)

The report is posted at www.bridgetolls.org, but we doubt the borough president will be visiting. Markowitz is steadfastly opposed to tolls on the Brooklyn, Manhattan, and Williamsburg bridges, because on balance they would disproportionately affect Brooklynites (albeit a small percentage of them). It's worth mentioning that Markowitz is in favor of restoring Brooklyn-bound tolls on the Verrazano, an indication that he has no problem with tolls so long as his constituents aren't paying them. Perhaps Markowitz is just following the script that Brooklyn's leader is bound by, just as the Staten Island beep must support keeping the Brooklyn-bound Verrazano free.

Markowitz, if you ask him (and we did), will also rattle off less Brooklyn-centric reasons for opposing East River tolls, such as "tolls are a job-killing tax." But traffic congestion also kills jobs, Komanoff counters, and tolls would divert enough travelers to public transportation to speed up drivers' trips over the bridges.

Markowitz adds that tolls would deter Manhattanites from visiting Brooklyn restaurants. By that logic, Komanoff points out, Brooklynites would be deterred from visiting Manhattan restaurants, and instead would eat here. Markowitz notes that some folks have no alternative but to drive to Manhattan. That is true. We also have no alternative but to eat. Should the city pay our grocery bills? By the same token (as it were), many more folks have no alternative but to take the subways and buses. Yet they still pay a fare.

In fact, fares are going up 33 percent. Why make straphangers pay almost the entire cost of their trip (our subway subsidy is about the lowest nationwide) while drivers pay nothing for bridges and roads? Markowitz's best argument against tolls is that some of the revenue might subsidize suburban systems like the LIRR and Metro North, which are already more heavily subsidized than buses and subways on a per-trip basis. Indeed, if tolls are implemented on the East River bridges, the revenue should be kept in the city.

STOLEN CAR'S E-Z PRESS FOR CHUCK Leave it to Senator Chuck Schumer to turn his stolen car into press coverage. Schumer, master of media opportunities, seemed flummoxed but remarkably upbeat when we noticed him and at least six cops talking about car theft outside his Park Slope apartment earlier this month. It was obvious his car had just been stolen, but perhaps he was already thinking about the media opportunities. Sure enough, there he was in the Post three days later blasting E-ZPass for charging him $23 to replace his stolen tag. The MTA should replace them free, like the DMV does stolen license plates.

The MTA smartly responded that your initial license plate costs money, unlike your initial E-ZPass. We'd imagine most folks would rather get the first tag free and pay for replacements than vice versa. In his letter to E-ZPass, Schumer wrote, "It is outrageous that crime victims facing the burden of paying for another car should also be required to pay for a replacement E-ZPass." We presume Schumer's stolen Ford Taurus was insured. But if not, he needn't face "the burden of paying for another car." He could simply do without one. The senator is chauffeured about by his staff, while his wife, city Transportation Commissioner Iris Weinshall, has a city-issued Ford Explorer. Is a third car really necessary?

For those rare family trips, they could always use the rental car agency around the corner from their residence.

FIDLER, SHARPTON AGREE City Councilman Lew Fidler was sampling hors d'oeuvres at Rep. Ed Towns's March fundraiser at Gage & Tollner when a booming voice beckoned. "Fidler!" It was his old Tilden High School classmate, the Rev. Al Sharpton, who once picketed Fidler's mother when she was president of Tilden's PTA. "You're going to endorse me for president, right?" Sharpton said, flashing his trademark humor. Fidler shot back, "I won't endorse you if you promise not to endorse me." Finally, something on which they could agree.

Sharpton's about as popular as pork chops among Fidler's Jewish constituents. And the two rarely find themselves behind the same podium. But Fidler admits, "He's always been charming on a one-to-one basis."

DAVIS BLAMES NYPD, NOT COPS City Councilman James Davis took exception to our claim that he "holds a press conference whenever a cop shoots someone," saying he only does so if it appears the use of force was "excessive." Furthermore, Davis said, "I go after police policy. I do not go after police officers as individuals." Noting that he was an officer for "12 years, 3 months, and 26 days"-the NYPD fired him for appearing on the Liberal Party line while on active duty, a mix-up that Davis challenged successfully in court-he said, "I've worked with police officers, trained cops, seen cops get shot in the line of duty."

We'd also written that given his penchant for press conferences, he should keep a podium in his trunk. Davis didn't disagree. "I don't have a problem with the portable press conference or podium. That's OK. I'm a politician, no different from (Rep.) Anthony Weiner, (State Senator) Carl Kruger, the speaker of the City Council, no different from any elected official, whose job is to be out there in the forefront. "You're damned if you do and damned if you don't. If you're not out there, they say 'Where were you?' And if you're out there too much, they say you have a portable [podium]."

FELDER FIRES BACK City Councilman Simcha Felder would just as soon do away with the meaningless resolutions that councilmembers spend so much time debating. "It makes no sense for the City Council to involve itself in international resolutions that have no real impact," Felder declared in a press release. "No matter what the issue, these resolutions should be abolished." Councilman Jim Oddo agreed, saying, "We are the City Council, not the Security Council."

Yet Felder thought the issue merited a press release because he was incensed at the anti-Semitism elicited by the council's Iraq resolution. "In our own chambers a woman testified with a chilling 'No blood for Israel!' At recent demonstrations, participants held up signs accusing this of being 'Israel's war,'" Felder said.

He noted the Virginia congressman who stated that Jews were behind the push for an invasion of Iraq, which he called "vile, despicable anti-Semitism." (Is there any other kind?) "It is a dangerous display of hate. It is unconscionable and must end now," said Felder, who represents Borough Park and Midwood.

The feeling here is it's better to expose latent anti-Semitism than let it fester just beneath the surface of public view. Let anti-Semites and racists stand up and be counted. They're more likely to humiliate themselves than to persuade others to follow. We are reminded of the woman on the street who gave her reaction on the nightly news to the 1989 death of black 23-year-old Michael Griffith, who was chased by whites onto the highway in Howard Beach, where he was struck and killed. "He didn't have to run onto the Belt Parkway," the woman said. "He could have run down Cross Bay Boulevard." But we digress.

The Iraq resolution, opposing war in Iraq except as a last resort, was opposed by Felder, Oddo, Lew Fidler, Mike Nelson, Domenic Recchia, and 13 other councilmembers. It was supported by Charles Barron, Tracy Boyland, Yvette Clarke, James Davis, Bill deBlasio, Erik Dilan, Sara Gonzalez, Diana Reyna, Kendall Stewart, Al Vann, and David Yassky, and passed 30-18. Dare we point out that the dissenters all have substantial Jewish constituencies? And the supporters (except deBlasio, who represents a chunk of Borough Park) do not?

Anyhow, we agree that the council should do away with resolutions and stick to legislation. "I'm starting to wonder whether or not it is a proper use of our time," Fidler told us last year, after the council argued with vitriol over Barron's resolution on what Barron called the "political prisoners" in state prison.

Yet Fidler has co-sponsored resolutions as well, such as one calling for the Palestinian Authority mission to be removed from the city and condemning suicide/homicide bombers and rising anti-Semitism in Europe. "I do not vote based on polls," Fidler told Searchlight last year. "But I would hope-and I know-that these issues are important to a large number of my constituents. And it is important to me. As an American and as a Jew, I know that silence in the face of bigotry helps bigotry to grow." We know this much: It is hard for councilmembers to resist resolutions that play well in their districts. Better to do away with them altogether so the legislators can focus on governing.

BIG WIN FOR VINNY Sixteen days after 10,000 ballots were cast in Bay Ridge, Bensonhurst, and Dyker Heights, former State Senator Vinny Gentile emerged with a scant 31-vote victory over Republican Rosemarie O'Keefe and four other Democrats to succeed Marty Golden in the City Council. Golden, a Republican, had booted Gentile from the Senate in November, but in a district drawn specifically to include blocks that tend to vote Republican. O'Keefe had no such advantage, and saw 70 percent of the vote go to Democratic candidates.

That doesn't bode well for the G.O.P. in November, when it will have another chance to win the council seat in a traditional partisan election. The district lines will be only slightly different then, not enough to give a Republican a boost.

But back to the Gentile-O'Keefe contest. Gentile was down by 34 votes before about 600 paper ballots were counted. About 90 of them were still in the uncounted "disputed" pile when O'Keefe conceded on March 13. Of the valid paper ballots, Gentile was named on 41 percent to O'Keefe's 29.

Why the disparity? Senior citizens, Gentile believes. "I think a majority of those voting absentee were seniors and that's one of my strongest bases in the district," he said. "That was a big factor." So he doesn't mind when they pinch his cherubic cheeks on visits to senior centers? "I don't mind one bit," Gentile laughed. "They do that quite often, actually."

The councilman-elect was downright giddy when an excruciating two weeks ended in his triumph. He wasn't even bitter at the two Democrats who stood no chance to win but who probably diverted enough votes from Gentile to nearly cost him the race. "So, are you going to invite Steve Harrison and Carlo Scissura to your victory party?" we asked. "Ha! Ha! Ha!" Gentile cackled. "There's an open invitation. If they'd like to come, they can."

In fact, Harrison congratulated the winner very cordially, Gentile said, adding, "It was probably the most pleasant campaign that I've been involved in." (Clearly, we are not doing our job very well.) There was the matter of the Gentile campaign mailing that purportedly infuriated Mayor Mike Bloomberg because it included a photograph of the billionaire's townhouse. "The overreaction was done for political purposes, which leads me to believe they weren't that upset about it and it won't be a sticking point between the mayor and myself," Gentile said. Indeed, the uproar was contrived. The townhouse photo had previously run in the Daily News and besides, all candidates' voting addresses are public and available on the Internet.

"This was something they thought they could make some hay on, but it's something I think I got the best of the publicity on," said Gentile. "More people saw my piece in the newspaper than got the piece at home. They helped me do a mailing." Gentile doesn't have much time to rest. By the time he hires a staff, opens a district office, and gets his committee assignments, it will be time to start circulating petitions for the September 9 primary.

But his long-term prognosis is good. If he wins a two-year term in the fall, he could still serve another two four-year terms after that before term limits kicked in. By our count, that would be 11 years in office, making Gentile the city's senior councilmember in 2010. And he could trace it back to 31 votes in 2003. "If I find those 31 people," he told the Post, "I'm going to hug them."

Postscript: Log Cabin Republicans of New York City, a gay political club, issued a statement after O'Keefe's defeat saying she'd be a councilwoman today had she not rejected the group's potential endorsement and support. "Refusing to meet with Log Cabin Republicans cost Rosemarie O'Keefe this election. Surely there were more than 31 gay-friendly Republicans in the district, not to mention election day volunteer workers we had hoped to provide," remarked Stephen Scherock, president of the New York City chapter.

Could the group have rounded up few dozen more people to vote for O'Keefe? We'll never know. But on principle alone, O'Keefe should have welcomed Log Cabin's support. By rejecting it, she implied that Bay Ridge is a homophobic community. That alone might have cost her 31 votes.

Borough Politics Archive

2002
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2002
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2001
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2000
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1999
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