[NYtenants-online] West Siders Deceived by Quinn-Restuccia Agenda

[Tenant]

NYtenants Online/TenantNet                                3/13/04
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IN THIS ISSUE ...

1. West Side Update - the Quinn-Restuccia Cabal
2. International Flat Swap
3. SCRIE Income Limit raised
4. Brooklyn Tenant Program Hog-Tied by Marty Markowitz

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WEST SIDE UPDATE

Council Member Christine Quinn, with State Senator Tom Duane and Assembly 
Member Richard Gottfried are continuing their attempts to deceive 
Westsiders over the Bloomberg administration's plans for a stadium and 
bulldozing up to 90 blocks in Chelsea and Clinton/Hell's Kitchen.

The three created a "fake grass-roots" operation known as Hell's 
Kitchen/Hudson Yards Alliance (HKHYA) that is controlled by the politicians 
and their agendas, not the community, and primarily funded by a bank which 
stands to benefit from the construction of many skyscrapers West of Eighth 
Avenue from 14th to 43rd Streets.

While claiming to be against the proposed Jets/Olympic stadium, they are 
trying to deflect attention away from the most onerous aspects of the plan 
-- 40 million square feet of office towers and luxury residential 
skyscrapers, and a subway that would bring those skyscrapers -- and instead 
are concentrating on just the stadium.

But even with that, Quinn is doing little to stop the stadium and is 
concentrating on her campaign to succeed Gifford Miller as City Council 
Speaker.

What these elected officials are not telling West Siders is that they and 
the HKHYA are actually supporting most of the Mayor's plans, which would 
result in displacement of residents and businesses and traffic congestion 
on a scale much larger than any stadium could bring.

To run this "Astroturf" group (as these organizations are called), they 
called upon one of the West Side's more notorious landlords, Joe Restuccia 
of Clinton Housing Development Company (CHDC). Restuccia is reportedly 
strong-arming his tenants to join the HKHYA without telling them that they 
are supporting most of the Bloomberg/Doctoroff plan.

A fair number of Restuccia's tenants reside in "supportive housing" 
atmospheres and may not have the ability to adequately distinguish the 
issues or the deception. Restuccia stands to benefit in his efforts to 
gather-up unknowing tenants and Westsiders in that he is often rewarded by 
the administration for "delivering" the community.

However, many West Siders (and many beyond the West Side), recognized this 
ploy by Quinn and Restuccia. The WEST SIDE COALITION is comprised of 38 
legitimate and pre-existing community groups from all over Manhattan, and 
is fully opposed to the Mayor's Central Business District, including the 
sea of skyscrapers being supported by Quinn, Duane and Gottfried. A year 
ago, when Quinn finally understood that the community did not want the 
equivalent of 14 Empire State Buildings being constructed on the West Side, 
she boycotted a West Side Coalition news conference and instead a month 
later, formed the HKHYA with Restuccia.

The WEST SIDE COALITION is at http://www.hellskitchen.net/westsidecoalition
Individuals and organizations may join by using the "contact us" link.

Information and updates on the entire plan is at either:
http://www.hellskitchen.net or http://www.tenant.net

The West Side Coalition recently appeared on the WBAI/Met Council Housing 
Notebook show where an overview of the West Side issues -- and the 
Quinn-Restuccia deception -- was discussed. Listen to that show (via Real 
Audio) at: 
http://www.hellskitchen.net/radio/housingnotebook/HousingNotebook040301.html

Lastly, we urge our readers to sign our online petition at 
http://www.savethewestside.org (our petition site) and then proceed to the 
WSC at http://www.hellskitchen.net/westsidecoalition

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FLAT SWAP!

The International Tenants Union at http://www.iut.nu tells us about its new 
"Flat Swap" service, allowing individuals to get in touch with each-other 
and make private arrangements for short-term homeswaps. If you wish to 
spend a week or two in another city or country, and are willing to allow 
someone to use your apartment for the same time, this can operate as a 
clearinghouse. The IUT, however, makes it clear, that it is simply putting 
people in touch with each other and is not operating as a brokerage and 
does not accept any commercial proposals.

However, this does raise a few caveats:

1. by placing your email address on any webpage, your address is likely to 
be picked up by spambots. We would suggest getting a temporary email 
address at Yahoo or Hotmail just for this purpose and not releasing your 
real email address to the web.

2. in New York City, landlords often look for information on tenants that 
might be out-of-town (even if only for a few weeks) in order to hit them 
with an illegal subletting charge or non-primary residency claim. By 
posting their real email address, tenants could open themselves up to legal 
proceedings.

3. There are commercial services that do the same thing. Some might be 
good; others might be rip-offs. So it's buyer beware. Some services claim 
to make sure the apartments to be swapped are in good condition and offer 
what is claimed, so the commercial services might have added value and 
remove the risk. Without this, the tenants on both side of the arrangement 
assume a certain risk. On the other hand, we believe those posting to the 
ITU are probably of higher caliber.

4. In NYC especially, some landlords or supers might give an arriving 
visitor a hard time (even with a key and authorizing letter).

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SCRIE INCOME LIMIT INCREASED

The new official income limit for the Senior Citizen Increase Exemption 
(SCRIE) program is $24,000 and is retroactive to September 1 of last year. 
Seniors, 62 or older, who live in rent regulated apartments (including 
Mitchell-Lama and hotel tenants) may apply to have their rents frozen if 
their household income is $24,000 or less and their rent is 1/3 or more of 
their income. There is no limit on assets, and income taxes, payroll taxes, 
and court-ordered support payments may be deducted). SCRIE covers increases 
for renewal leases, fuel, landlord hardship, major capital improvements, 
and Maximum Base Rent (MBR) increases.

How to apply

Request an application for SCRIE from the NYC Department for the Aging by 
calling 311 or visit the agency's website at: 
www.nyc.gov/html/dfta/html/16benefits.html and scroll down to the SCRIE 
section.

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BROOKLYN PUBLIC ACCESS TV PROGRAMS HOG-TIED BY MARKOWITZ

A Brooklyn tenant activist and public access television producer is taking 
on Brooklyn Borough President Marty Markowitz over government programming 
cablecast on the public access channel.

Ronin Amano, producer of "Rent Wars News" (www.Rentwars.com) filed a 
petition with the Public Service Commission March 11th asking that it 
reduce or eliminate programming produced by Markowitz.

Amano alleges that Brooklyn Community Access Television (BCAT), which is 
controlled by Markowitz, is illegally allocating channel time in a manner 
inconsistent with state law by giving away large blocks of channel time to 
Markowitz, his designees, and other favored programmers. In this way, Amano 
claims, Markowitz limits the ability of those with alternate shows or 
viewpoints from having adequate access and therefore exercises illegal 
editorial control over the content of programming on the public access 
channels.

BCAT normally allows public access producers one 28-minute show with two 
repeats every week. But with the appearance of the Marty Markowitz show, 
"Everything Brooklyn," running one hour with eight weekly showings, many 
public access shows have been cut back to only one playback each week.

State law and state cable regulations prohibit local governments from 
exercising editorial control over public cablecasts, and also require 
public access channel administrators to allocate channel time on a 
first-come, first-served nondiscriminatory basis.

Thomas Hillgardner, general counsel to the Association of Cable Access 
Producers (ACAP) and also Amano's attorney, said "Marty Markowitz' 
programming should be cablecast on the government access channel, NYC-TV. 
The Office of the Borough President should not be expending public funds to 
produce programming with the intent of breaking state law by illegally 
cablecasting government programming on the public access channel."

Hillgardner also stated, "What BCAT needs to do is obey state law and 
allocate channel time on the public access channel to all users on a 
first-come, first-served nondiscriminatory basis, and on no other basis. 
Marty can have some time but he needs to wait his turn and share the 
channel with all other users on an equal basis."

Amano likened Markowitz' television gluttony to the Brooklyn Borough 
President's efforts to take private land via Eminent Domain for Bruce 
Ratner's Nets Arena near Prospect Heights. "He won't stop. Once he had 
thirty minutes over the allotted time. Now he has 8 hours over. He's trying 
to take people's homes and now he's trying to take control of the airwaves."

About Public Access

Public, educational and governmental (PEG) access channels are channels 
provided by cable companies to local governments in exchange for the grant 
of the cable franchise and the right of the cable operator to run its 
cables through city streets and provide cable television service to all 
city residents. In New York City, the cable franchise agreements requires 
Time Warner Cable of New York City and Cablevision to provide four public 
access channels and five governmental access channels.

Public access channels are often the video equivalent of the speaker's soap 
box or the electronic parallel to the printed leaflet. They provide groups 
and individuals who generally have not had access to electronic media with 
the opportunity to become sources of information in the electronic 
marketplace of ideas.

NYC-TV is the name given to the five governmental access channels by the 
City of New York. The flagship channel (74) is now devoted to pop culture, 
traffic cams, mayoral events, and with a splash of city council 
proceedings. Formerly known as Crosswalks TV, the flagship channel used to 
carry wall-to-wall coverage of government-at-work. The dilution of coverage 
of government proceedings is seen as an attempt by the Bloomberg 
administration to limit coverage of governmental operations.

Rent Wars News (www.rentwars.com) is dedicated to tenant advocacy. It 
interviews politicians, community leaders, covers housing-related events 
and produces mini-documentaries. The Rentwars website includes a Judicial 
Rating System which monitors the treatment of the unrepresented by judges 
in Housing Court.