Bronx News Roundup, October 26

The Daily News analyzes rising tensions between African immigrants and African-Americans in the South Bronx.

Looking for a fright on Halloween? According to Bronx historian Paul DeVillo, the Bronx is riddled with ghost stories and is still haunted by ghosts.

Today, residents of an apartment building in Morris Heights will go to court to argue that their landlord illegally raised rents on 80 apartments. The apartments used to be part of an affordable housing program.

Thompson aides were surprised that Thompson trails Bloomberg in the Bronx polls (50% Bloomberg, 38% Thompson). Thompson expects to perform well in the mayoral election in the Bronx.

A Bronx family is suing a Harlem funeral home for damaging their family member's casket when the hearse carrying the body exploded on the Major Deegan.

A Bronx social worker speaks out against domestic violence in her new play, "The Death of a Dream," playing at the Roy Arias theater in Manhattan.

Tough One

I didn't get to watch last night's Bloomberg-Thompson faceoff (hey, a 5-year-old with a 7:30 bedtime and less civic-minded viewing priorities will do that to you) but I did check my Twitter account and discovered a Brian Lehrer (WNYC talk show host) tweet reporting that the candidates were asked if Pedro Espada was a better Senate majority leader than Joe Bruno. Now, that just made my brain hurt. (Hmmm, the indicted former Republican from upstate or the forever-hovering-under-the-prospect-of-indictment Bronxite who took the legislature hostage over the summer?) But then as we were tossing it around the office here, we realized that Espada may be the majority leader, but he is not the leader of the Senate, since they decoupled the titles of majority leader an pro tem leader, as Joe Bruno was. The fairer question would have been whether John Sampson, the Democratic conference leader and actual head of the Senate, is a better leader than Bruno.

For the record, Thompson said Espada is a better leader, and Bloomberg said Bruno.

A Few Quick Links on Water Rates

Just a few quick updates on the water front:

The Water Board is proposing a 14.5% rate hike for this July 1. The best news summary of the situation is by Jarrett Murphy on City Limits. A longer report on water rate reform can be found on UNHP's website.

Also, here is an op-ed in the Post from Friday by Comptroller Thompson regarding the controversial rental payment.

Bronx BP Carrion Announces for ... Comptroller!

Some political observers predicted this, but it was a stunning political development nonetheless, when Bronx Borough President Adolfo Carrion, Jr. announced at a breakfast this morning that he would be running for city comptroller rather than mayor.

This is a big Christmas gift with a giant red bow on it for current comptroller William Thompson, an all-but-declared mayoral candidate. Thompson has always spoken highly of Carrion going back to when Carrion was a Council member.

But whether this means Carrion supports Thompson is still a question mark. Carrion just did Thompson a big favor. What can/will Thompson do for Carrion?

The BP could of course still support Congressman Anthony Weiner and shore up his support among Jews and middle class whites, which would pose interesting questions for who he might support, if anyone, in the next borough president's race.

Let the jockeying begin.

Bronx News Roundup for Sept. 7

Assemblyman Jeffrey Dinowitz lays out his rationale against congestion pricing in The Riverdale Press (which is finally on-line).

The Times dissects the buzz that has elected officials, including Latino politicians in the Bronx, encouraging Bronx Borough President Adolfo Carrion to run for comptroller rather than mayor. The rationale goes something like … African Americans supported Freddy Ferrer twice. Now it’s our turn to support a progressive African American, i.e. current comptroller William Thompson — a friend and admirer of Adolfo—in his bid for Gracie Mansion …
But the message the reader takes away from the Times’ City Room post is that the Bronx BP is focused like a laser beam on being mayor.
Hey, John McCain was once a friend and admirer of Fred Thompson.

This is interesting. A Carrion staffer makes a statement at a public hearing on the Yankee parking garages complaining that his office has still “not received vital information regarding the details of the Bronx Parking Development Company financing.”
Keep in mind that Carrion was the cheerleader-in-chief for the controversial Yankee stadium deal. The least he probably expected in return was a free flow of information.
This should get even more interesting. You can almost hear the cacophonous cries of “I told you so,” from neighborhood residents and other activists who opposed the deal. (And in fact some of the comments to this StreetsBlog post say just that, though a lot less nicely.)

Here’s the Norwood News’ recent editorial on the Yankee parking garages.

Here’s video, via the Politicker, of State Senator Jose M. Serrano talking about why there should be public financing at the state level, like there is in the city.

And here’s video of Assemblyman Ruben Diaz, Jr., a candidate for Bronx BP in 2009, talking about the endless nature of recent campaigns.

By the way, the new issue of the Norwood News is out on the streets, and will be on-line by Monday, which is when we debut our brand new Web site. We’ll announce it here.

News Roundup for Aug. 13

The feds are still fining the city $30K a day for not inking a deal yet with construction firm Skanska to build the Croton filtration plant, according to the Times.

The Times uses the opportunity to report on some rather old news (the Norwood News ran this story on the same subject in May) concerning the massive cost overruns on the project.

Newsday has the AP story on the filter fines.

By the way, we ran into Assemblyman Jeffrey Dinowitz the other day in Riverdale and he said he wasp planning to sit down with the city’s Department of Investigation soon in hopes of getting them to, yes, investigate the project and the cost issue.

Likely mayoral rivals Adolfo Carrion, Jr. and William Thompson marched together at the Dominican Day Parade over the weekend, the Observer reports. The progression of their relationship in the coming months will be closely watched. Thompson has always spoken highly of Carrion, beginning with the latter’s days as councilman. We’ll see how long it lasts as they each eye Gracie Mansion. Or maybe they will eventually form a powerful Black-Latino ticket -- Thompson for mayor, Carrion for comptroller.

Lots of Giuliani dissection this week. A lengthy profile in the New Yorker and over at the Village Voice Wayne Barrett takes a look at “Rudy Giuliani’s 5 Big Lies About 9/11."

WNYC reports that the city will be spraying the borough’s southeastern nabes with pesticide on Wed. night to deter West Nile Virus.