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March 14, 2011
Lobbyist for Forest City Ratner, New Rochelle's Echo Bay Developer, Indicted for Bribing Elected Officials in Brooklyn
Talk of the Sound
by Robert Cox
A lobbyist for a real estate developer with ties to New Rochelle Mayor Noam Bramson has been indicted in a federal public corruption probe.
Richard Lipsky, a lobbyist employed by Forest City Ratner, has been indicted on allegations of paying bribes to New York State Sen. Carl Kruger (D-Brooklyn). Vice President of Governmental Affairs and Public Relations Bruce Bender is also identified in the complaint for his role in seek funds from Kruger last December for three projects....
Forest City Ratner is the developer behind the Echo Bay Development project in New Rochelle which recently received an extension of a Memorandum of Understanding. Mayor Noam Bramson aggressively pushed through the M.O.U. after a series of secret meetings with City officials and refusing to allow public comment on a revised development plan. Bramson has received thousands of dollars in campaign donations from the Ratner family. Bramson also receives tens of thousands of dollars a year in payments from Rep. Nita Lowey (D-NY) who has, in turn, also received funds from the Ratner family. Bramson has been the most vocal proponent for the Forest City Ratner plan to develop Echo Bay.
In a similar scheme, Yonkers officials were indicted in 2010 for their involvement in a bribery scheme involving a Forest City Ratner project in Yonkers.
Posted by eric at March 14, 2011 11:36 AM