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April 4, 2009
The Tish James tax story, the incumbent's misstep, and the weeklies' avoidance of the bigger picture
Norman Oder picks up on the kinds of choices being made by the Brooklyn Paper and its sister publication, the Courier-Life.
So, after ignoring the news value of the 35th District City Council campaign of Delia Hunley-Adossa, who runs a questionable nonprofit organization with ties to Forest City Ratner (but won't answer questions about it), the Brooklyn Paper finally covers the race--by picking up a story broken by its new Courier-Life sibling (right): that incumbent Letitia James owes nearly $10,000 in back taxes over the past year.
Sure, it's defensible to lead with the latest news. And James's explanation isn't fully credible.
But the bigger picture, which the Brooklyn Paper hasn't yet provided--and the Courier-Life's Stephen Witt likely will never provide--is that James's main challenger has failed to answer legitimate questions about the operation of and support for Brooklyn Endeavor Experience (BEE), an organization that pays her a salary while she more visibly organizes rallies in favor of the Atlantic Yards project.
Oder directly contacted the Councilwoman for her reaction.
I contacted her yesterday, giving her a chance to elaborate, and she said, "No further explanation other than there is a huge difference between not paying taxes at all and paying late. I have paid property taxes for the last seven years and will pay, albeit late, as part of my responsibilty as a property owner. This is frankly nothing more than a distraction away from the more serious issues that I am dealing with in this district. I guess I should start a not for profit and accept funds from Murdoch, Bloomberg and Ratner to keep me afloat. Fortunately, I choose not to."
The papers are missing the big picture:
James's lapses do not indicate that she owes favors to any major powerbroker. Hunley-Adossa's silence suggests she might owe such favors to Forest City Ratner.
Similarly, the silence (in response to questions from both me and the Times) of Hunley-Adossa's campaign treasurer, Charlene Nimmons, regarding her dubious nonprofit's ties to FCR is also dismaying.
That's the bigger picture.
Meanwhile, the Brooklyn Paper completely misses a story about an appeal to the recent Atlantic Yards environmental review case and the Courier-Life coverage gives the last word to Forest City flack, Joe DePlasco.
The Brooklyn Paper, which once deemed a Forest City Ratner lie about Frank Gehry's birthplace worth of page 1, ignored this week's news about the plaintiffs seeking an appeal in the case challenging the Atlantic Yards environmental review.
The Courier-Life covered it, with Witt drawing significantly from a Develop Don't Destroy Brooklyn press release. He then gave the last four paragraph to Forest City Ratner mouthpiece Joe DePlasco, who declared, "There is is nothing new to say about Daniel Goldstein's court cases."
By suggesting that a case involving 26 organizations, including Develop Don't Destroy Brooklyn (for which Goldstein is a spokesman), is somehow one person's case, "Dark Genius" DePlasco is apparently reverting to Tactic #3: Reality Be Damned.
As I wrote 11/1/05, DePlasco sometimes makes outlandish claims, almost daring reporters to make the effort to find a counterargument. When the Courier-Life's main rival, the Brooklyn Paper, simply punts on the story, readers are ill-served.
Posted by steve at April 4, 2009 7:26 AM