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January 10, 2007
The Big Payback
Daily Politics
By Errol Louis
Ex-Assemblyman Roger Green has taken a hit in the free-circulation Brooklyn Papers for yanking, in his final days in office, a $100,000 member item he'd promised to the Council of Brooklyn Neighborhoods, a coalition of groups, created in 2005, that includes principled skeptics and manic opponents of the Atlantic Yards development project. CBN says the cash shortfall means it won’t be able to pay all sorts of urban planning experts it hired to analyze (and criticize) Atlantic Yards.
CBN will probably never get that money. Green is out of office and his successor, Hakeem Jeffries, is a freshman with scant discretionary funds who never promised to give the group money. CBN should consider the lost funds tuition, however costly, in the school of political reality.
NoLandGrab: It's sad that Roger Green's political career has flamed out with this one parting eff-you to the community.
CBN is comprised of many neighborhood groups, including several who merely hope to mitigate the project, not stop it. Since they all benefitted from the work commissioned by CBN, these groups should continue to insist for payment of services rendered to the community. This may not be how the political game is played in Brooklyn (oh, for a return to the good ole days!), but it's what's right.
Posted by lumi at January 10, 2007 9:11 AM