Sunday, November 01, 2009

A critical moment for the city

A glimpse at Bloomberg's New York -- sent to me by a worried tenant who is currently being harassed by her landlord -- tells me what the future holds when the economy revives:

2005 or 2010?

The harassment of tenants by landlords is widespread in New York. It is encouraged by city agencies under the mayor's direct control. The Department of Buildings no longer enforces its own regulations, the city does not collect DoB fines; meawhile Bloomberg continues to defund it. Without funding or the ability to levy and collect fines, the DoB is helpless to prevent developers from abusing tenants.

With no city agency standing in the way of developers and landlords, harassment of tenants has become easier and more frequent. When the economy was booming, harassment was rampant. It is the mayor's goal to return to those golden days of development evictions. That's what he means by 'reviving the local economy.'

New York is all about real estate speculation. If you want to know who this mayor is and what he's all about, look at the DoB, the department of development oversight. It is a bankrupted agency. It bears the true profile of our mayor.

Tenants have been evicted and are in the process of being evicted on my block through landlord harassment encouraged by the failure of the DoB. I hear similar stories from all over the city. I'm sure you have too. I can think of no better reason to vote on Tuesday.

Cartoon from BloombergWatch.com

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