City & State Magazine_10102016

NEW FEATURE

BOCHINCHE & BUZZ Exclusive insider gossip from

GERSON BORRERO

WHY THE

GOP

NEEDS THIS

HOW CAN CITY HALL FIGHT HOMELESSNESS IF NEW YORKERS WON’T LET THEM? SUPERFUND HEROES: INSIDE THE DEC

CIT YANDSTATENY.COM

@CIT YANDSTATENY

MAN TO

WIN IF CHRIS JACOBS LOSES, IT’S ALL OVER FOR SENATE REPUBLICANS

October 10, 2016 CIT YANDSTATENY.COM @CIT YANDSTATENY

Thursday, October 27th • 8:00am - 12:00pm New York Academy of Medicine • 1216 5th Ave • New York, NY 10029

Dr. Howard A. Zucker, Commissioner of Health for New York State

Jackie Cornell, Regional Director, U.S. Department of Health and Human Services

Letitia James, Public Advocate, City of New York

Kemp Hannon, Chairman, State Senate Health Committee

Presented by:

Richard Gottfried, Chairman, State Assembly Health Committee

Dr. Ram Raju, President & CEO, NYC Health and Hospitals Corporation

RSVP at CityAndStateNY.com/Events

For more information on programming and sponsorship opportunities, contact Lissa Blake at lblake@cityandstateny.com

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10/7/16 4:19 PM

City & State New York

October 3, 2016

EDITOR’S NOTE / Contents In July of 2015, the New York Post’s John Podhoretz penned a column on the troubling rise in homelessness. “If you’ve been out and about in Manhattan over the past six weeks and you have eyes and ears, you know something’s happening – something worrisome,” he wrote.

Mayor Bill de Blasio shot down the columnist’s observations. “Well, I think that’s factually wrong, so let me differentiate what I think is a valid concern from, I think, inaccurate portrayal of the facts,” the mayor said. “Homelessness is not going up, thank God.” Since then, it’s become clear that homelessness is, in fact, going up. But even as more and more people pack into the city’s overcrowded shelters or camp out on the city’s streets, locals are quick to attack new shelters proposed in their communities. Instead of cooperating, elected officials are quick to shift blame. Editorial boards demand easy solutions to a complicated problem.

In this issue, we take a closer look at how the city got to this point and how it just might make something else happen – something encouraging.

JON LENTZ Senior editor

6.

BOCHINCHE & BUZZ

8.

The latest gossip from Gerson Borrero.

STATE SENATE STANDOFF

Why the GOP needs Chris Jacobs to win.

14.

OFF THE STREETS How can New York City solve the homelessness crisis?

30.

AGENCY FOCUS: DEC

An insider’s guide to the state Department of Environmental Conservation.

38.

SLANT

Nicole Gelinas on how Scott Stringer is borrowing ideas from Bill de Blasio.

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CityAndStateNY.com

October 10, 2016

LAST WEEK’S ROUNDUP

BACK& FORTH

TRUMPED-UP TAX RETURNS Donald Trump hasn’t released his tax returns, but a mysterious source did release one – right into the mailbox of the Times’ Susanne Craig. Though the documents were limited, one page of a 1995 New York state return suggests Trump may have avoided paying federal income taxes for 18 years. Legal, but not a good look for someone who complains about the sorry state of infrastructure.

SOAM / VOLLEY

4

CUOMO-CHRISTIE COORDINATION IN QUESTION Former Port Authority official and Christie “fixer” David Wildstein testified that he was told the governors of New York and New Jersey agreed to sweep under the rug the 2013 Bridgegate scandal, making the “traffic study” line a Cuomo-sanctioned lie. Cuomoland pushed back immediately, saying it didn’t happen and branding Wildstein a lying felon – but like it or not, the scandal has crossed the Hudson.

A Q&A with LEAH CANTOR,

EXCELSIOR CONSERVATION CORPS’ professional development coordinator C&S: WHAT’S YOUR ELEVATOR PITCH FOR THE ECC? LC: Excelsior Conservation Corps was created as Gov. Andrew Cuomo’s initiative in wanting to create a modernday Civilian Conservation Corps. We work with a lot of partners, but our big partners are DEC and New York State Parks, and then Morrisville State College is where we’re based. These members go around and they camp for 10 days straight on what we call 10-day “hitches” and they’re either working for DEC or New York State Parks at the time. They can go anywhere across the state, and they’re doing conservation work while they do that.

C&S: WHAT ARE SOME EXAMPLES OF THE WORK THEY’RE DOING? LC: You have some random work like trail work, building trail structures like rock work or doing timber work with either dimensional lumber of rustic timber, so stuff we get from the hardware store or stuff that we chainsaw down and use to build.

There’s also GIS/GPS work, stuff like that, so it really varies. It could be something ever so glamorous that they love, like invasive removal (laughs) or they could be building this giant rock staircase that goes up somewhere. It really depends on the project partner and what they’re looking for.

C&S: THIS IS THE FIRST YEAR. WHAT HAVE THE BIGGEST CHALLENGES BEEN? LC: Digging in the dirt during the winter, because there’s too much frost! Frozen ground, you use your foot wedge to give you the extra power! I think working with the seasons and learning about all the different parks and all the DEC land and trying to figure out the priorities of what we wanted to do this year as opposed to what we can do next year – figuring out those right projects and getting those done.

This interview has been edited for clarity. You can read the whole interview at cityandstateny.com .

PHANTOM TOLL BOOTHS Cuomo actually had some good bridge news on Wednesday, unveiling a plan for open road tolling with no booths or barriers on MTA bridges and tunnels like the Verrazano and the Queens Midtown. Work is set to be finished by the end of next year, but with an L train tunnel literally catching fire Thursday morning, some transit advocates think the money is better spent elsewhere.

POLITICALLY INCORRECT

“ WE WANT TO GIVE THE

“

APPEARANCE OF DOING BETTER, WHILE ACTUALLY DOING BETTER.

”

THE CRAZIEST THINGS OUR READERS HAVE OVERHEARD IN THE POLITICAL WORLD:

IF YOU THINK I SOUND WEIRD, YOU SHOULD SEE MY WARDROBE. HAHA, I’M JUST KIDDING, I DRESS VERY NORMAL.

”

YOUR TURN: What’s the most ridiculous thing you’ve heard someone in the political world say this week? We won’t publish any names (yours or theirs). Send submissions to features@cityandstateny.com.

THE

Kicker

“I’VE GOT NO USE FOR A RIGHT-WING RAG THAT ATTACKS PEOPLE WHO ARE GOOD PUBLIC SERVANTS AND TRIES TO UNDERMINE THEIR REPUTATIONS.”

– New York City Mayor Bill de Blasio on his refusal to acknowledge a Post reporter, via the Post.

Get the kicker every morning in CITY & STATE’S FIRST READ email. Sign up at cityandstateny.com.

City & State New York

October 10, 2016

DID YOU MISS IT? CELEBRATING STATEN ISLAND The “forgotten borough” is forgotten no more!

At Snug Harbor, one of the island’s overlooked gems, City & State hosted a reception to celebrate its latest special edition on Staten Island – while honoring 50 of the borough’s most influential leaders.

FROM THE WEEKLY PODCAST

CUOMO & CHRISTIE: UNLIKELY ALLIES NY1 POLITICAL REPORTER

ZACK FINK

ON THE TWO GOVERNORS

In a highly polarized election year, a certain Democratic governor appears to enjoy palling around with his Republican peer across the Hudson … and now they can share notes on what it's like to have key members of their inner circle accused of illegal actions. NY1’s Zack Fink has covered both of them, in Trenton and in Albany.

Staten Island Borough President Jimmy Oddo

Phoebe Boyer, president and CEO of The Children’s Aid Society

Sal Cassano, former FDNY commissioner, now at Pitta Bishop Del Giorno & Giblin Have photos from an event you’d like to see here? Send them to features@cityandstateny.com.

THIS WEEK’S EVENTS TUESDAY, OCT. 11 8:30 a.m. – NYPD Commissioner James O’Neill discusses public safety and quality of life efforts at an Association for a Better New York breakfast. O’Neill succeeded Bill Bratton last month, and on his first day on the job he had to respond to the Chelsea bombing. Expect O’Neill to talk about the blast as well as his experience with neighborhood policing.

Roosevelt Hotel, Grand Ballroom, 45 E. 45th St., Manhattan.

FRIDAY, OCT. 14 8:30 a.m. – New York City Mayor Bill de Blasio also speaks at an ABNY breakfast event, making him the organization’s second major speaker this week. The mayor is set to discuss “critical education issues” facing New York City. On education policy, de Blasio is known for expanding pre-K and battling with charter schools.

Hilton Hotel, Trianon Ballroom, 1335 Sixth Ave., Manhattan

Upcoming events: Planning an event in the next few weeks that our readers should know about? Submit details to editor@cityandstateny.com. We’ll pick the most interesting or important ones and feature them in print each week.

Have photos from an event you’d like to see here? Send them to features@cityandstateny.com.

5

“These scandals are such difficult things for both of them to swallow and explain away because they have always set a tone that, ‘First and foremost, you keep me in the loop, you talk to me, you let me know what’s going on, I don’t want any surprises ever.’ In both cases, both men are saying, ‘I had no idea what’s going on.’”

“There’s a long history here of these two working together for political expediency. … It was dormant there for a while. They were both surrogates for their respective presidential candidates. They didn’t want to be photographed together, they wanted to be on opposite ends of that. And now, it’s almost like, what have they got to lose? … There’s a kindred spirit between the two of them.”

Listen, subscribe and review this week’s podcast by searching for “New York Slant” on iTunes, Stitcher or your favorite podcast app.

6

CityAndStateNY.com

July 18, 2016 October 10, 2016

L E G N A R HUH, ?

R E S I A R D N FU IF HE’S NO LONGER going to be in Congress, why is Rep. Charlie Rangel having a fundraiser on Nov. 17? It’s being billed as a celebration of his 50 years of public service. The buzz from two insiders is that Charlie wants to stay in the game by raising funds he will transfer to some congressional colleagues. Or he may want to grant some scholarships for CUNY students.

WHILE THE GOP IS being obliterated nationwide by a native New Yorker, the buzz is that New York City Republicans are setting their political sights on City Hall. Bad news for the few Republicans who’ve said they want to take on the incumbent mayor is that the Republican county chairs are looking to billionaire John Catsimatidis to say whether he’s running again or who he’s going to support.

Part of the bochinche is that Cats will only support Ray Kelly. Problem is that it’s not clear if the former police commissioner still has any interest. And then there’s Adele Malpass. She’s the Manhattan County chair who’s not going to roll over for what the four macho chairs from the outer boroughs decide. Younger Republicans around the city like her and the buzz is favorable among middle-aged Republicans who think they can have a stallion in the 2017 race, so Malpass should have a big say in picking the candidate.

REPUBLICAN

REMAKE

City & State New York

July 18, 2016 October 10, 2016

7

IT MAY TAKE

OVARIES WHILE SEVERAL TIMID DEMOCRATS continue to parse their words when it comes to whether they’ll be challenging Mayor Bill de Blasio, an unexpected entrant into the Democratic nomination pool could be a political neophyte.

She’s never run for any office. But she does know politics.

Well, at least as a spectator sport. Her name isn’t known by a majority of neoyorquinos in the five boroughs, and yet her connections to established leaders in many of the social, business and community sectors has some grounding.

The wannabe’s interest in exploring a challenge to Bill de Blasio is real. For about six weeks, she been talking to folks whose opinion she considers important. The multiethnic businesswoman is still asking and listening. In the meantime, bochinche has it that she’s floating her interest as a way to dissuade others from challenging the mayor.

That kind of buzz could inflict major damage to a novice.

STIFFING

POL

TALK ABOUT AFFORDABLE HOUSING. A certain elected in New York City (you know who you are) didn’t pay his landlord rent for six months and then just walked away. This is how it happened.

The election was almost guaranteed for this overconfident first-timer. But he didn’t want to wait for the victory to move into the district. One of the operatives in the campaign got a friend to rent an apartment to the almost-anointed elected. After the election, the newly minted pol had some financial problems and started to fall in arrears with the rent.

The person got into disputes with the landlord and then just abandoned the flat. The bum took off like a bandido in the night without settling the bill.

Damn! The landlord didn’t sue the pol, fearing that the elected would use the power of the office to make trouble. Donald Trump would be proud of this stiffer pol.

REMEMBER, GENTE, IT’S ALL BOCHINCHE UNTIL IT’S CONFIRMED.

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CityAndStateNY.com

October 10, 2016

WHY THE

GOP

NEEDS

CHRIS JACOBS

TO WIN

The Erie county clerk is the GOP’s best chance to pick up a seat in the state Senate. If he loses, there’s little chance the party can keep Democrats from retaking the chamber – and dominating statewide politics.

By JUSTIN SONDEL Photos by JOED VIERA

City & State New York

October 10, 2016

ON A WARM SEPTEMBER evening, Erie County Clerk Chris Jacobs stood in a narrow window-front office in Buffalo’s revamped Theatre District, calling his victory over attorney Kevin Stocker in the primary for the Republican line in the race for the 60th state Senate District.

Holding a commanding 50-point lead with about 42 percent of the votes counted, Jacobs acknowledged that while nothing was official, he was ready to send his supporters, family and staffers home – it was 9:40 p.m., and Jacobs felt that it was “getting late.” Tall, slim and blonde, the 49-year-old has little in his personal or professional life that political strategists see as a vulnerability.

In a brief stint as secretary of state in the Pataki administration, as a candidate for lieutenant governor, as a Buffalo school board member and now as county clerk, Jacobs has maintained a relatively low profile. Party insiders use words like “spectacular” and “phenomenal” to describe his prospects as a candidate.

“I just want to thank everybody for being here and everybody for helping in this effort,” he said, making a point to acknowledge his mother and each member of his campaign team.

Without boasting about his drubbing of Stocker, Jacobs asked the room to help him press on as he looks forward to the general election.

“Primaries are challenging. I’ve never had one before,” he said. “The good thing is it gets us out there and it gets us engaged with our constituents. I think I’m a better candidate now than I was three, four months ago to begin the primary.”

State Senate Republicans certainly hope that Jacobs is the better candidate on Nov. 8. The conference currently is one seat away from holding an outright majority, and only kept its tenuous grip on power this past session thanks to state Sen. Simcha Felder, a Brooklyn Democrat who caucuses with the GOP, as well as a partnership with the breakaway Senate Independent Democratic Conference. A number of tossup races in Long Island and the Hudson Valley could tip the balance either way, but Jacobs is widely seen as the Republicans’ best chance to pick up a Democratic seat. If no other seat changed hands, a victory by Jacobs would give the GOP absolute control of the chamber.

On the flip side, there’s little chance that Republicans can hold the line in the Senate if Jacobs falls short. A loss by Jacobs would have to be offset by pickups in tougher Senate races, and that won’t be easy in a

presidential year, when greater turnout tends to benefit Democrats. If the GOP fails to win a numerical majority, it would have to persuade Felder and state Sen. Jeff Klein’s IDC to stick with them. Failing there, the last bastion of Republican power in the state would be relegated to the minority.

ABOUT FOUR MILES north of Jacobs’ primary night victory party, Amber Small was celebrating a victory of her own at her storefront campaign office in the increasingly diverse working-class Buffalo neighborhood of Black Rock. Tucking her long brown hair behind her ear, she greeted a supporter with an excited hug, both of them cheering as they embraced.

TALL, SLIM AND BLONDE, THE 49-YEAR-OLD HAS LITTLE IN HIS PERSONAL OR PROFESSIONAL LIFE THAT POLITICAL STRATEGISTS SEE AS A VULNERABILITY.

Small, the 30-year-old executive director of the Parkside Community Association who has never held elected office, had soundly beat political veteran Al Coppola by 34 points in the Democratic primary.

Now, she was Jacobs’ only opponent – a remarkable development given the district’s recent history of crowded races with minor-party-line competitors and unpredictable results.

Small told her supporters that their efforts gave her a chance to carry their voice to Albany. “The work is only getting

9

started, but I’m so incredibly confident that we’re going to do this,” she said.

While Small was charming and warm with the people who had gathered to congratulate her, she was all business when asked about her opponent. Some of Jacobs’ supposed advantages – name recognition, the ability to self-finance his campaign – could actually be weaknesses, she said, for a “career politician who’s backed by a personal and family wealth of billions of dollars.”

The Democrats’ first choice as a candidate was Assemblyman Sean Ryan, who has a strong reputation in the district. But after he declined to run, party members touted Small as a young and energetic candidate who can bring fresh perspective to a Legislature set in its ways. She speaks with the polish of a politician who has been at it for decades, a skill no doubt honed through her involvement with Women Elect, an organization that encourages women to run for elected office.

The people of the 60th, she said, want someone with a proven track record of working directly with communities.

“I’m excited that I’ve been able to earn the trust of voters in the 60th,” Small said.

“But I need to earn it all over again and on a bigger scale.”

AT THE NORTHERNMOST point of 60th Senate District, a few thousand feet before the Niagara River crashes over the edge of the world-famous Niagara Falls, suburban Grand Island splits the waters. A few miles south the district snakes through north and western Buffalo, comprising mostly white neighborhoods – all but cutting out the city’s East Side, a collection of mostly black neighborhoods. The district then continues along the shoreline of Lake Erie, jutting into Republican-leaning southtowns suburbs, before reaching its terminus in lush farmland, where antiSafe Act lawn signs outnumber those supporting any particular candidate.

The 60th, which not so long ago was one of the most reliably Democratic state Senate districts, has confounded political analysts and granted power to unlikely candidates in recent years. It has played a pivotal role in the balance of power in the chamber. Now, for the first time in three election cycles, only two candidates are on the ballot. And this year, it could again determine which party holds the majority.

When most politicos talk about the shift of the district from a Democratic stronghold to the frenetic and unpredictable scenarios that have played out in recent elections,

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CityAndStateNY.com

October 10, 2016

they point to the most recent round of redistricting. The redrawn lines cut the registration advantage for Democrats over Republicans from almost 5-to-1 to less than 2-to-1.

But that shift was predated by Republican Mark Grisanti’s upset of Democratic state Sen. Antoine Thompson, who held the seat from 2006 to 2010. Grisanti, riding a wave of anti-Albany sentiment following the infamous 2009 Senate coup and a series of Thompson blunders, was able to steal away a district that most state GOP prognosticators had initially written off.

Thompson had been skewered for using his Senate budget to print out a stack of 100-page books promoting his accomplishments and missed session days to attend what he described as a trade mission to Jamaica. But Thompson had an enrollment advantage of 126,545 Democrats to 26,256 Republicans. His stunning loss cost Democrats the majority.

John McArdle, a consultant and former GOP staffer who spent two decades working in the Senate, said it wasn’t until two Republican power brokers – former Erie County Executive Joel Giambra and then-state Sen. George Maziarz – took a closer look at the race that the leadership began to believe that Grisanti had a shot.

Enough factors worked in Grisanti’s favor – Thompson’s implosion, voters’ desire for change – to allow the Democratturned-Republican to win a seat that would normally never be in question. The newly elected Erie County Republican Committee Chairman Nick Langworthy,

who was initially skeptical, recalled that Grisanti was “lightning in a bottle.”

Langworthy also credited Carl Paladino’s insurgent gubernatorial campaign.

“Had Carl’s candidacy in ’10 not been so successful in Western New York,” Langworthy said, “there never would have been a Mark Grisanti.”

ONE OF THE worst-kept secrets of the partisan gerrymandering in 2012 is that Grisanti’s district was redrawn for him to hang onto the seat. He faced a tough re-election fight, despite the advantages of incumbency, because of Republicans’ massive enrollment deficit in the district.

Several sources, including one who was in the room where redistricting decisions were discussed, confirmed that Grisanti was going to get as many Republicans as possible drawn into his district. Other Western New York Republican senators took on more Democrats. Maziarz took Niagara Falls, a Democratic island in mostly rural Niagara County. State Sen. Michael Ranzenhofer took part of Rochester. State Sen. Patrick Gallivan added Democrats to his suburban and rural Western New York district.

For one cycle, it worked. Democrat Mike Amodeo and longtime Democrat Chuck Swanick, who ran on the Conservative Party line, split the ticket, and Grisanti won by 20 points, despite having been one of four Senate Republicans to vote to legalize same-sex marriage.

But Grisanti was not able to hang on a second time. After voting in support of

the Safe Act, a gun control bill deeply unpopular with many Republicans, he lost the confidence of his party. The Erie County Republican Committee did not endorse a candidate that year. Gov. Andrew Cuomo, who had benefitted from Grisanti’s bipartisanship on two signature bills, did not publicly endorse him, either.

Democrats and their labor allies smelled blood. The state’s powerful teachers’ union ran ads attacking Grisanti from the right, calling him a “RINO.” The state party committee infused cash into Democrat Marc Panepinto’s campaign.

Grisanti lost to Stocker in the primary, but continued to run on the Independence Party line. This time the split worked to Panepinto’s advantage, allowing him to win with only a third of the vote.

Indeed, the district’s primary matchups have made it one of the most unpredictable in recent years, with candidates continuing minor party bids after missing out on a major party line. “When you have primaries and candidates running on third party (lines),” McArdle said, “you don’t know what could happen.”

IN THE COMING WEEKS it will be seen how committed state parties and their allies are to this race. Despite a significant voter enrollment gap – 90,791 Democrats to 52,480 Republicans, according to the most recent Board of Elections data – many observers believe Jacobs, with his political experience, wealth and name recognition, has the edge, which could divert resources to other Senate Republican candidates.

The 60th’s senators

2003 - 2005

Byron Brown

Buffalo’s first African-American mayor was the third city executive in a row to make the jump directly from the state Senate to the second floor of City Hall. Having held the 57th District in his first term as a state senator, he was in the 60th after the 2002 redistricting. He left halfway through his third term in the Senate after being elected mayor of Buffalo.

2007 - 2010

Antoine Thompson

After being snubbed by Democratic headquarters as Brown’s chosen successor for his Senate seat in the special election to replace him, Thompson went on to beat Marc Coppola and his cousin, Al Coppola, in a three-way primary. Thompson was being groomed for higher office during his time in the Senate, with some speculating that he might succeed Brown as mayor as well. But after a series of high-profile blunders, Thompson had one of the most secure Democratic districts in the chamber stolen away by Democrat-turned-Republican Mark Grisanti.

City & State New York

October 10, 2016

There’s no doubt that Jacobs, who has proven his crossover appeal in winning a countywide seat in Erie County, which has similar enrollment numbers to the 60th, has advantages. As a scion of the family that owns Delaware North Cos., the food services giant that has contracts with state and national parks and entertainment venues around the world, he has access to almost all the capital he would ever need as well as business and personal connections through the company. Jeremy Jacobs Sr., his uncle and the company’s chairman, owns the Boston Bruins and has strong ties to the University at Buffalo. The family name will adorn the university’s new medical school, nearing completion in the heart of Buffalo’s medical campus, a collection of higher learning institutes, medical technology companies and health care providers often trumpeted by politicians as a sign of progress in the city.

In 2014, the three-way race between Panepinto, Grisanti and Stocker saw more than $4 million spent, one of the most expensive races in Western New York history. While it remains doubtful that spending will reach that level in 2016, this cycle is shaping up to be costly.

Jacobs spent more than $242,000 during the primary and was the beneficiary of mailings paid for by the state GOP committee and radio advertisements bought by outside groups, while Small spent a relatively paltry $80,000. But Small could have significant money spent on her behalf after picking up the endorsement of the New York State United Teachers,

WHILE SMALL WAS CHARMING AND WARM WITH THE PEOPLE WHO HAD GATHERED TO CONGRATULATE HER, SHE WAS ALL BUSINESS WHEN ASKED ABOUT HER OPPONENT.

which spent more than $1 million to help Panepinto win office two years ago.

And the Democratic Senate Campaign Committee was another heavy contributor to Panepinto’s campaign last time around, and could be again this year, depending on where the party sees its best chances to take back seats.

State Sen. Michael Gianaris, who oversees the Senate Democrats’ statewide campaign efforts, said the party is optimistic about Small. While Jacobs may have fundraising advantages and better name recognition, Small will benefit from the presidential year down-ticket voting, especially given Hillary Clinton’s bid to become the country’s first female president, he said.

“We think Amber is very dynamic and represents the future,” Gianaris said.

2011 - 2014

Mark Grisanti

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Grisanti, as a Republican, was able to overcome a near 5-to-1 enrollment disadvantage to Thompson, pulling off an enormous upset. He lost the seat in 2014 after failing to gain the endorsement of the Erie County GOP, a rebuke of his vote in favor of Gov. Andrew Cuomo’s SAFE Act, he lost in a primary to attorney Kevin Stocker.

He stayed in the race on the Independence Party line, but in splitting the vote with Stocker, Democrat Marc Panepinto was able to take advantage and take the seat.

“We’re excited about her candidacy.” The Democratic enrollment advantage should also have a big impact in a year when there are only two party-supported candidates to vote for, he said. Jacobs’ advantages “only gets it to the point of making it a competitive district. It doesn’t put it in the bag for them,” he said.

State Democrats’ support for Small will come down to how well she performs in coming weeks, but she is “on the radar,” Gianaris added. “We’re constantly looking at the full board and making decisions about resources as the races show themselves to be more or less competitive.”

WHEN CANDIDATES BEGAN to come forward for the 60th District race this year, the contest was shaping up to be another wild one. The Democratic side

2015 - 2016

Marc Panepinto

Panepinto, given a split ticket to the right, was able to win the district with just a third of the vote. His only term was tarnished after news reports suggesting he was voting on bills that could benefit his private law practice surfaced. He had stated his intention to run for reelection, but called off his campaign days before nominating deadlines.

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CityAndStateNY.com

October 10, 2016

THE SHIFTING 60TH:

HOW THE DISTRICT RADICALLY CHANGED OVER THE YEARS

BUFFALO

1992-2002

60th District party enrollment, 2000-2016

160,000 120,000 80,000 40,000

BUFFALO

2002-2012

0 District was a non-city, east/ west district

2000 2001 2002 2003 2004 2005 2006 2007

Redistricted as an urban, north/ south district

Last election Brown won in the district before becoming mayor

Thompson first wins district

160,000 120,000 80,000 40,000

BUFFALO

2012-present

0 2008 2009 2010 2011 2012 2013 2014 2015 2016

Grisanti beats Thompson

DEMOCRATS REPUBLICANS

Grisanti wins re-election

City & State New York

October 10, 2016

of things looked to be a three-way race between Small, Panepinto and Coppola.

But Panepinto, who had been dogged by accusations that he had voted on bills benefitting his private law practice, announced just days before the deadline that he would not run, despite already securing his party’s endorsement. The senator said he wanted to spend more time with his family, though rumors of sexual misconduct between staffers in his office were also circulating.

On the Republican side, Stocker was viewed as a legitimate threat to Jacobs after his 2014 upset of Grisanti. But Jacobs won, and Stocker also failed to secure the Conservative Party line, preventing a third-party campaign that likely would have hurt Jacobs’ chances.

Now, Jacobs and Small have a few short weeks to win over voters. Compared to other recent candidates in the district, they both have clean slates. Grisanti was blasted for his votes on same-sex marriage and gun control, while a NYSUT mailer suggested his no vote on the Women’s Equality Act was tantamount to being complicit in domestic abuse in 2014. In 2010, Grisanti was attacked for defending people accused of drug dealing and murderer as a private attorney. Panepinto’s 2001 election fraud conviction was highlighted in mailers and advertisements. Thompson was blasted for his spending on mailers and his trip to Jamaica.

Jacobs is a supporter of charter schools, which he promoted as a city school board member, and is a founder of the Bison Fund, a charitable organization that provides scholarships to private schools for low-income families. Beyond that, he has steered clear of controversial issues.

“It’s not my place to tell a parent where they should send their child to school,” Small said at a recent event. “But, we have a system that is set up to siphon money out of district schools and make them weaker.”

In addition to teachers unions, Small has defended same-sex marriage, women’s reproductive rights and a host of other progressive issues, but has no record to attack given her newcomer status.

Still, some punches have already been thrown. Small last month sent out press releases tying donations from people charged in U.S. Attorney Preet Bharara’s wide-ranging bid-rigging criminal complaint to Jacobs, noting that he had received campaign money from developer Louis Ciminelli and his brother, as well as companies they own and other related

businesses. The Jacobs campaign fired back that Ciminelli has donated to politicians of all stripes over the years, including Erie County Executive Mark Poloncarz, who has in turn donated to Small’s campaign.

Advertisements attempting to link Small, who has in no way been linked to the purported investigation, to news reports that federal investigators are questioning people at the Erie County Democrats’ headquarters have begun showing up in social media feeds.

While aware of the challenges she faces, Small is hoping that the skills and relationships she has built through her nonprofit work will help her. As she sees it, her candidacy represents an opportunity to reject the notion that money and connections are qualifications for elected office.

“We’ve got a lot of dark money in these races now, groups and PACs that have really glossy names, but they stand for things that

AS JACOBS SEES IT, HIS MISSION IN THIS RACE IS TO KEEP DOWNSTATE DEMOCRATS FROM LEAVING WESTERN NEW YORK HIGH AND DRY.

13

our community does not stand for,” Small said. “It’s deceptive, and it’s just not right.”

During a campaign stop to talk about community schools, Jacobs said that while experts’ prognosis that he has an edge in the race is encouraging, he has a hard road ahead of him.

The man the GOP has put up as one of their best chances to win a pivotal seat and help secure an outright majority is familiar with tough races, having lost as William Weld’s running mate in his 2006 gubernatorial bid after serving as the secretary of state under Gov. George Pataki.

As Jacobs sees it, his mission in this race is to keep downstate Democrats from leaving Western New York high and dry.

“I just think it’s so critically important for this area to keep this Senate seat, to be part of keeping the majority as it is,” he said. “If we lose the Senate voice for upstate and Western New York, that’s going to be very, very detrimental.”

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OFF 14

CityAndStateNY.com

October 10, 2016

THE

ST

CONTENTS

16

DE BLASIO ADMINISTRATION CONFRONTS COMMUNITY BACKLASH AS IT TRIES TO INTRODUCE SHELTERS

In New York City, more and more people have no place to call a home.

The growing numbers have frustrated everyday New Yorkers. The political fallout has buffeted city and state leaders. The scramble for additional housing options poses yet another challenge for a desperate and vulnerable homeless population.

Mayor Bill de Blasio, who initially denied there was any problem, has belatedly taken steps to address the situation, ordering an in-depth review, putting different city officials in charge, and trying new tactics.

But the going has been slow. Just this month, the city reported that the number of homeless people living in

26

HOUSING PROVIDERS STRUGGLE TO BUILD CONSENSUS FOR NEW SHELTERS

City & State New York

October 10, 2016

15

TREETS 22

NEW YORK CITY’S HOME-STAT PROGRAM TRACKS THE NUMBERS – AND NAMES – OF THE HOMELESS

28

FRANK G. RUNYEON

KAREN HINTON ON WHY CUOMO, DE BLASIO AND BANKS CAN’T SOLVE HOMELESSNESS BY THEMSELVES

shelters had reached nearly 60,000 – and that doesn’t even include those living on the streets.

The criticism has not abated, either. The New York Post wrote this summer that the mayor “still doesn’t get NYC’s homeless problem.” The Daily News recently called it a “losing battle.” Gov. Andrew Cuomo said that the crisis is “getting worse” – although some argue that the governor is part of the problem, too.

In this special section, City & State takes a closer look at the problem, explaining how the city got to this point, assessing the de Blasio administration’s latest efforts and identifying better strategies to site controversial homeless shelters.

What a 16

CityAndStateNY.com

October 10, 2016

HOMELESSNESS

CLUST AS THE DE BLASIO ADMINISTRATION PROMISES TO SHIFT AWAY FROM CLUSTER SITES, IT FACES A BACKLASH FROM OPPONENTS OF TRADITIONAL HOMELESS SHELTERS.

By SARINA TRANGLE

PACKED ONTO A large commercial bus bound for a protest, dozens of passengers chanted about the politicians who had failed to halt a planned homeless shelter in Maspeth, Queens. They gleefully shouted about the September primary loss of their longtime assemblywoman, Margaret Markey. “No more Markey!” they chanted.

And as the bus drove toward the Brooklyn home of the commissioner overseeing the city’s homeless services, they turned their attention to his boss, Mayor Bill de Blasio.

“One-term mayor!” they repeated.

Outside Social Services Commissioner Steven Banks’ Windsor Terrace home, about 150 people blared horns, blew whistles and bellowed about plans to convert the Maspeth Holiday Inn Express into a shelter for 115 all-adult families, while Banks’ neighbors spilled out onto their stoops to watch the spectacle.

One of the rally organizers, Robert Holden, told City & State the security plan for the facility made it seem like a gi-

ant, jail-like warehouse, one without the kitchens he believed were legally required.

Holden said the city would have more luck with smaller houses that blend in with the neighborhood.

“You don’t warehouse the homeless.

Let’s face it, we’ll gladly accept one- and two-family homes that will fit into our housing stock,” Holden said. “If you put them in a small room, what’s going to happen? They’re not going to get better.

They’re going to go out into the community with their problems. It’s a recipe for disaster.”

DAYS AFTER THE protest, Banks said the Holiday Inn Express site in Queens would meet mandates for its targeted population of adult-only families. He recited statistics showing the city does not have the luxury of prioritizing neighborhood preferences and perceived shelter shortcomings. New York City officials are grappling with an explosion in homelessness

and their legal obligation to provide shelter for all who need of it. Over the past two decades, homelessness has increased by 115 percent, and an all time-high of nearly 60,000 people stay in city shelters.

Traditionally, the city has contracted with nonprofits to run Tier II shelters, which meet state guidelines for housing 10 or more families in private rooms and providing three nutritional meals a day, child care, health services and help preparing for permanent housing. Over the years, the city has also partnered with nonprofit-run shelters that follow this traditional model, but did not formally get the state Tier II designation. The city has also used hotels, booking rooms for the homeless in establishments that remain open to the general public and converting other hotels into more permanent shelters that provide needed services.

Additionally, the city has rented private apartments for homeless families. When using these so-called cluster sites, the city

City & State New York

October 10, 2016

17

SARINA TRANGLE

TER! RESIDENTS OF MASPETH, QUEENS, PROTEST A PLANNED SHELTER IN THEIR NEIGHBORHOOD.

“THERE ARE SOME COMMUNITIES THAT HAVE MORE SHELTERS. THERE ARE SOME THAT HAVE EITHER NONE OR VERY FEW. I SUSPECT THAT TO THE EXTENT THAT THERE ARE COMMUNITIES THAT HAVE POLITICAL INFLUENCE, THEY ARE ABLE TO REACT IN A WAY THAT RESULTS IN LESS DEVELOPMENT.” -FREDERICK SHACK, CEO of Urban Pathways tasks social service providers with helping the families, though they may have to travel to meet case managers, social workers and others paid to help them.

Despite a consensus that booking hotel rooms or renting private apartments for the homeless is a poor substitute for traditional shelters, architects of today’s

shelter system did not dramatically shift away from those tactics while expanding to accommodate demand during the past dozen years. This lack of evolution has fueled speculation that the city’s reliance on the private market has been a way to avoid the drawn-out and politically-fraught battles sometimes stirred

by opening a Tier II shelter.

The de Blasio administration has pledged to steer the city’s portfolio toward these more traditional models while phasing out its use of apartments and hotels. This shift, however, has not been well-received by a number of communities where new shelters are proposed.

18

CityAndStateNY.com

October 10, 2016

And as opposition mounts, some politicians say City Hall’s lack of collaboration and poor communication with them and their constituents has hindered its reform efforts.

APART FROM a surge in the number of private apartments rented for homeless families, the makeup of the family shelter system has not changed significantly over the past 13 years for which City & State was able to find comparable data. (The city has not consistently tracked what types of homeless facilities were used for single adults.)

Between 2003 and 2006, the city’s use of cluster sites appeared to drop off, as apartments went from 20.6 percent of shelter units available to families to just 3.4 percent. By 2016, apartment use was back up, comprising about 22.6 percent of the system. During that period, Tier II units never accounted for much more than half of family shelters, and hotel units hovered between 21.2 and 28.2 percent of the system. The figures were pulled from two data sources: the department’s historical critical activities reports and its current shelter repair scorecard system. When asked to comment on the figures, the city Department of Homeless Services responded that it could not

confirm them.

The figures likely do not represent all shelters, given that some operators are paid daily rates to house the homeless on an as-needed basis, which are unlikely to be accounted for in the city’s reporting.

The city has also relied on emergency contracts, which may not be included, either.

For years, these unorthodox procurement practices of paying landlords per-diem rates and issuing emergency contracts for shelter have been criticized as fiscally irresponsible and as prone to finding poorly maintained spaces. As early as 2003, then-City Comptroller William Thompson Jr. raised concerns about the city not signing contracts with shelter operators and about safety concerns in their facilities.

A decade later, City Comptroller John Liu, Thompson’s successor, detailed how few shelters went through the traditional land use review process. His office said arrangements meant to temporarily provide the city with flexibility, like paying nightly per-diem rates or issuing a contract under an emergency declaration, had become a de facto path to establishing permanent shelters.

As recently as 2015, the city Department of Investigation released a report showing these expensive practices left DHS with fewer options to financially pe-

nalize negligent landlords or to contractually obligate them to address problems. The city was paying an average monthly rate of $2,840 for each family in a hotel, which often had building and fire code violations, according to the Department of Investigation. And the city spent an average of $2,451 a month to put families in private apartment buildings where the market monthly rent ranged from $528 to $1,200.

Besides the markup, the report found cluster sites were the worst maintained and did not consistently connect homeless families with the case management services they needed.

SETTING ASIDE CONCERNS about the quality and availability of such services, some experts say there can be political advantages to using hotels and private apartments. Opening a Tier II shelter is a more time-consuming process, and communities tend to be be more aware of the proposal – and have more time to try to thwart it. These traditional shelters are also a more visible reminder of homelessness – and how well any given administration is handling it, according to Ralph da Costa Nunez, president of the Institute for Children, Poverty and Homelessness. The Bloomberg administration “didn’t want to have these more state-regulated facili-

Family shelter units in New York City TIER II UNITS

CLUSTER SITE UNITS

HOTEL UNITS

Tier II shelters are typically run by nonprofits and follow state guidelines, where families are given private rooms and access to three nutritional meals a day, child care, health services and help moving toward permanent housing.

ADULT FAMILY RESIDENCE UNITS

16000

4,291

Hotel units are rooms available in former hotels that have been converted to shelters.

12000

Tier II units

3,411

Cluster site units are individual apartments in private buildings that the city uses to shelter the homeless.

Hotel units

6000

1,907

Adult family residences are shelters reserved for families that do not include minors.

Adult family residence units

2003

2006

2011

2016

City & State New York

October 10, 2016

11

Family shelter units

by City Council district, October 2014

10

14

12

15

16 9

7

13

18 17

8

MORE THAN 800 UNITS

6

601 – 800 UNITS 401 – 600 UNITS

5

19

22

4

201 – 400 UNITS 1 – 200 UNITS

2

0 UNITS

21

26

3

25

23

33

1

20

29

30

34

24 27

35

36

39

41

38

28

37 32

42

40 45

43

46

44

47 The 5 council members with the most family shelter units in their district, October 2014:

31

48 32 49 50 51

Melissa Mark-Viverito, 8th District

953

units

Inez Dickens, 9th District

739

units

Maria del Carmen Arroyo, 17th District (now Rafael Salamanca Jr.’s district)

738

units

Vanessa Gibson, 16th District

700

units

Mark Levine, 7th District

587

units

ties because it makes the issue much more visible,” de Costa Nunez said. “So they expanded the cluster sites and the hotel sites.

And what’s happened is that became the norm. They’ll put people there because it’s easy. They’ll put people there because they really don’t always get counted.”

Having helped Mayor Ed Koch open shelters, de Costa Nunez said he knew how difficult it was to find available, appropriate spaces for homeless people. He said this made the city reluctant to back away from identified locations, even in the face of immense public resistance. De Costa Nunez said that only very rarely did the backlash reach a point that City Hall decided to drop its shelter plans. However, Josh Goldfein, an attorney with the Legal Aid Society’s Homeless Rights Project, said that he had heard of nonprofits getting pressured out of proposed sites.

Even supportive housing, which is gen-

19

erally viewed as more palatable because it provides long-term homes and stabilizing services, has fallen victim to community backlash. For instance, Frederick Shack, CEO of Urban Pathways, said that near the end of Bloomberg’s final term, the nonprofit was asked by the city agency providing funding for a supportive housing project in Riverdale to pull its application.

“There are some communities that have more shelters. There are some that have either none or very few,” Shack said. “I suspect that to the extent that there are communities that have political influence, they are able to react in a way that results in less development.”

EVEN THOSE WHO believe the shelter system has been shaped by politics acknowledge the de Blasio administration’s decisions are chiefly driven by an acute need for shelter space. Meeting this demand is so pressing that the city has had to go to extraordinary lengths to open shelters where they probably would have preferred not to, according to Catherine Trapani, executive director of Homeless Services United, a group representing nonprofit shelter and service providers.

“When you need to open up a shelter immediately, commercial hotels are often the most expeditious thing to get online because the city can just master lease a block of rooms,” Trapani said.

And for years, a legal mandate to provide shelter to all who need it has overpowered local opposition, according to Giselle Routhier, policy director for the Coalition for the Homeless. “If you look back, over the de Blasio, over the Bloomberg administration and way back, I mean most of the time, if a shelter needs to be opened, it gets opened,” she said.

Banks said he could not speak to the motivation of past administrations, but that the city needs hotels and shelters so desperately that calls to reject them cannot be heeded. For instance, he said protesters who rallied last month against using hotels as shelters near the Queens-Long Island border would leave youths without a roof over their heads. “That’s not a result that we can have, particularly for young children, who would end up on the streets,” he said.

Philosophically, the de Blasio administration agrees with those arguing against putting the homeless in hotel rooms and has pledged to eventually stop this practice. But Banks said hotel rooms fill a crucial need as the city recalibrates its shelter system. Based on what Banks called the

CityAndStateNY.com

October 10, 2016

SARINA TRANGLE

20

THE RESIDENTS OF MASPETH, QUEENS, BOARDED A BUS AND CONTINUED PROTESTING OUTSIDE THE HOME OF CITY SOCIAL SERVICES COMMISSIONER STEVEN BANKS IN WINDSOR TERRACE, BROOKLYN.

“IF YOU LOOK BACK, OVER THE DE BLASIO, OVER THE BLOOMBERG ADMINISTRATION AND WAY BACK, I MEAN MOST OF THE TIME, IF A SHELTER NEEDS TO BE OPENED, IT GETS OPENED.” -GISELLE ROUTHIER, policy director for the Coalition for the Homeless

first review of the homeless system in two decades, the city announced it would phase out its use of cluster sites by the end of 2018. The commissioner said DHS prioritized pulling out of cluster sites because reserving them for homeless families exacerbates the shortage of low-rent apartments partially fueling the homelessness crisis.

Building by building, Banks’ team has been attempting to convert cluster units into rental homes that are in good condition and made available to their most recent occupants. So far the city has shut down 250 cluster units, he said, while officials have identified another 295 for closure. Meanwhile, the city is working to expand the number of Tier II units and similar spaces by converting hotels into more permanent shelters run by nonprofits and by sorting through responses to a related request for proposal.

BUT IN SEVERAL communities where the city has sought out shelter space, local

residents have not been quick to welcome the homeless. Jose Rodriguez, 53, a former substance abuse counselor whose health problems forced him to stop working, said the East Harlem community has shunned those in the shelter where he resides – and when police and neighbors treat the homeless like criminals, it only adds to their struggles. A local Chelsea newspaper reported that upset New Yorkers “chased” an assistant DHS commissioner out of a community board meeting. An Elmhurst resident who launched an effort to aid people in a controversial shelter had security escort him away from a protest, according to DNAinfo. Many outraged by shelters have complained that the city moves people in during the night.

Following the Department of Homeless Services review, Banks said the city has committed to giving communities at least 30 days notice before opening a space routinely used as a shelter. He said the city is also considering what notification

steps it could take when an unanticipated shortage of shelter space compels officials to rent commercial hotel rooms. Beyond highlighting homeless New Yorkers’ needs and the city’s robust homelessness prevention efforts, Banks said the city has found community advisory boards helpful in dispelling concerns and weighing suggestions for shelters. He did not seem fazed by the furor displayed outside his home – or elsewhere. Rather, he said he has seen residents acclimate and accept shelters that were once controversial.

“When all of these facilities were opened, there were concerns raised and over the course of time, those facilities have become an integral part of the community in which they’re located. And that’s the story that repeats itself throughout time across the city,” he said. “I think ultimately New Yorkers want to help their fellow New Yorkers, and see it’s a citywide problem. That’s not to say that, as we proceed, there aren’t differences in opinion.

City & State New York

October 10, 2016

And we try to address those concerns as we proceed.”

City Council Committee on General Welfare Chairman Stephen Levin said he has seen communities come around, too.

Initially, Levin said he opposed a 200-bed assessment center planned in his north Brooklyn district. But since it opened, he said the organization running it has proven to be a strong community partner. And in his community, Levin said the Department of Homeless Services has helped integrate shelters by coming out to discuss plans and progress and by responding to residents’ requests for assistance, like extra peace officers.

But a number of elected officials complained about City Hall’s lack of collaboration and poor communication about shelter sitings. About a year ago, City Councilman Andrew Cohen said he advised the administration against sheltering the homeless in a Riverdale motel that once served as an institutional home for mentally ill adults. Despite saying they would not use the location, DHS moved homeless adults in without notifying Cohen, according to the councilman. “When you’re not com-

municating what the facts are, when there is a lot of mystery and speculation,” Cohen said, “that is undermining to the work that they’re trying to do.”

STATE SEN. JOSEPH Addabbo said he and other Queens officials were called to City Hall in 2014 and told they would be getting shelters in various locations because the borough had fewer shelters than its counterparts. The administration’s plans would have been more well received, he said, if City Hall worked with elected officials to find vacant properties, foreclosed homes and other locations to provide shelter. “It’s one state, so you call the governor and you say, ‘What else do we have? What state-owned properties or facilities do we have? … Where can we properly house these individuals in an area that may be lower cost of living?’ But this mayor can’t call the governor,” said Addabbo, who represents areas in Maspeth, Glendale and Ozone Park where shelters have been proposed. “A little more planning, and a little bit more cooperative effort would have addressed the problem much better.”

Banks said he fielded and reviewed al-

ternative shelter locations suggested by Addabbo and his constituents, but their recommendations would not have helped the city meet its capacity needs before the winter. Maspeth residents were miffed that the city did not communicate with them about these insufficiencies.

Regardless of the perceived slight, many in Maspeth seem empowered by their unified opposition to the shelter and by the threat they believe they pose at the polls.

Several elected officials said it is impossible to ever identify one issue as the decisive factor in an election. But they acknowledged that the proposed shelter likely played into the Assembly primary outcome.

And that has provided precedent enough for those in Maspeth.

“Markey’s the first casualty, but others will fall because of this,” Holden said. “I don’t want to have people come into my neighborhood and have all sorts of health problems – mental problems – and walk the streets of our neighborhood and endanger our city, our citizens. That’s a natural reaction – you’re seeing this from people from all over the city. And we’re going to band together.”

■

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CityAndStateNY.com

HOMELESSNESS

October 10, 2016

City & State New York

October 10, 2016

A

23

Story and photos by FRANK G. RUNYEON

N EERIE ORANGE glow lit the 170th Street underpass in the Bronx. There, among the old grocery bags, dirty papers, shards of lumber and shreds of clothing, a bedraggled man with wispy hair lay hidden between a steel girder and a cement barricade.

It was just before 6 o’clock on an early fall evening and commuters’ cars washed by as Juan Rivera and his two outreach workers made their pitch to the man, asking if he needed anything. He didn’t want the city’s help, he told the workers in Spanish, at least not today.

Rivera, who leads the homeless outreach team for BronxWorks, took the brush-off in stride. “The people who are out there, they're seeing us more often,” said Rivera, citing a recent increase in funding for their outreach work that has enabled them to double their staff.

“So, even if they say no now, they know that we're around.”

The city estimates that of all the street homeless people contacted in recent months, only about half of them accept city assistance, such as a shelter bed. But meanwhile, the total number of people living on the streets continues to rise – a DHS official told City & State they will soon be releasing data that shows an increase between May and August.

Mayor Bill de Blasio has come under a torrent of criticism over his handling of the homelessness

crisis in New York City. In response, this April the mayor announced the launch of HomeStat – the Homeless Outreach and Mobile Engagement Street Action Teams. Home-Stat is an alliance of homeless service providers and city agencies aiming to better track and offer services to the city’s growing homeless population.

The city is placing a nearly $30 million bet on the new approach, budgeting $7 million in 2016 and $22.9 million for 2017, hoping to better understand both who is living on the streets and how to get them off the streets and into housing.

“Generally speaking, in the past, the focus was on the numbers and a one-size-fits-all approach,” said Steven Banks, commissioner of the city’s Department of Social Services and the Human Resources Administration. “The aim of Home-Stat was and is to focus on the numbers of New Yorkers on the streets as individuals.”

“We’re focused on names, not numbers,” Banks said.

The initiative aims to create a list of names and locations for all the homeless people living on the street so the city can better track who is out there and what they need. The new approach, the commissioner said, means a more inclusive homeless outreach program. Previous policies limited services to the “chronically homeless,” a subset of homeless individuals who have been on the street for many months. The

24

CityAndStateNY.com

“THE AIM OF HOME-STAT WAS AND IS TO FOCUS ON THE NUMBERS OF NEW YORKERS ON THE STREETS AS INDIVIDUALS. WE’RE FOCUSED ON NAMES, NOT NUMBERS.” – STEVEN BANKS, New York City social services commissioner

October 10, 2016

hope is that Home-Stat could help more temporarily homeless people before their situation becomes that dire.

“It’s in no one’s interest to have people remain on the streets until they reach a rigid definition,” Banks said. “Our providers for years have been focusing on chronically homeless individuals and now they have the ability to focus on anyone who’s on the street and to provide services immediately.”

Recent estimates all show the city’s homeless population continues to climb.

The Department of Homeless Services reported that some 59,918 people slept in city shelters on Sept. 29, an increase of 4.6 percent from the same day last year. Coalition for the Homeless, which includes other specialized shelter beds in its monthly average count, showed a similar 4.7 increase between August 2015 and August 2016, when the total reached 61,464 sheltered individuals.

Outside the shelter system, HomeStat’s first two quarterly counts also showed an increase in the number of street homeless between May and August – up from 2,535 last spring – a DHS city official told City & State. The increase may be due to seasonal variations, outreach groups noted. The data from the August count is due to be released to the public later this month.

However, those numbers are slightly lower than the federally mandated Homeless Outreach Population Estimate (Hope) count, which found 2,794 street homeless individuals using a different methodology.

The Hope count has been routinely criticized as inaccurate and flawed by homeless service providers.

Home-Stat has also tasked teams of canvassers – operating separately from the nonprofit outreach groups – to survey the city on foot, block by block, between Canal Street and 145th Street in Manhattan, as well as select “hot spots” throughout the city. The canvassers, who wear clearly marked official uniforms, observe and note anyone who appears to be homeless in an effort to better target outreach efforts.

But on a recent evening at 125th Street and Park Avenue in Harlem, a half dozen street homeless individuals camped near the Metro-North overpass said they had never seen the city canvassers or anyone in official uniforms who weren’t police officers. At the nearby office of Picture the Homeless, a homeless advocacy group, three senior members said they had not seen or heard of any Home-Stat canvassers, either.

“Being that they're doing this canvassing

City & State New York

October 10, 2016

from Canal to 145th, from the East River to the Hudson River, you would assume that we would have seen them out day and night,” said Al Williams, a leader at Picture the Homeless. “I’ve never seen any organization doing the canvassing.”

Commissioner Banks maintained that the Home-Stat canvassers were walking their routes in “very clear official garment.”

But while the canvassers may not have been visible to some of the city’s street homeless, it doesn’t mean they aren’t out there.

“I can understand why people might be saying, ‘I haven't even seen them or I don't know who they are,’” said Brenda Rosen, executive director of Breaking Ground, a nonprofit providing homeless outreach for all of Queens, Brooklyn and midtown Manhattan. Home-Stat canvassers don’t necessarily engage with people on the street, since their job is solely to observe and report back to the city, she said. “If they see someone bedded down on the corner, they are going to relay the information to make sure that it gets to the appropriate outreach team.”

Rosen’s organization has received helpful information from the canvassers, she said, alerting her outreach team when they see homeless individuals on their route. And thanks to Home-Stat’s funding, Breaking Ground has been able to double its outreach staff in Manhattan and triple it in Queens and Brooklyn, so the group has the capacity to go out and offer services to those street homeless.

“We didn't have the time or the resources to spend with most of the episodically homeless and short-term homeless,” Now, Rosen said, they do.

But locating and bringing the city’s street homeless indoors can still be daunting for the nonprofits tasked with the job.

“It's difficult, but you can't look at the entire borough,” Rivera said, referring to an oversize map in his BronxWorks office.

BronxWorks is the only city-contracted homeless outreach group in the borough, which makes Rivera’s 17 outreach workers responsible for an area twice the size of Manhattan. “You have to zone in on particular areas where you know things are happening. Then you branch out little by little to see what else is happening.”

At any time of day, BronxWorks has two cars on the road – one east of the Bronx River Parkway and another to the west.

The cars enable them to cover more ground and interact with about 30 to 40 homeless people a day. Calls to the city’s 311 information line about homeless Bronxites

25

THE BRONXWORKS HOMELESS OUTREACH TEAM SEARCHES FOR PEOPLE LIVING IN THE 170TH STREET UNDERPASS IN THE BRONX.

feed directly to BronxWorks – and the organization prides itself on responding within the hour.

“It’s a big job, of course,” Rivera said.

“It’s tough work, but I think we have a formula that works."

Five months in, the city feels confident in a certain degree of progress with Home-Stat. One early success, Banks said, is how Home-Stat now directs resources toward places service providers weren’t able to reach, such as libraries and hospital waiting rooms.

In addition, Banks said, outreach efforts “over the last five months have provided us a list of 1,200 people who we know by name and we're engaging and had success in bringing some of them in,” although he noted that “a comparable universe of people” have been contacted who have not yet accepted the city’s help.

Ultimately, measuring the success of Home-Stat may be difficult simply because it’s so unique.

“The breadth of the approach is new.

Never been tried before,” Banks said.

Homeless outreach groups often caution against simple solutions, explaining that finding housing for homeless New Yorkers only solves part of the problem.

It’s a story that Willie Baez, 48, can tell from experience.

At the corner of Tremont and Third Avenue, Baez sat with his friends on the stoop of a long-abandoned brick building that serves as a congregating place for some of the men in the neighborhood.

“At first I was very elated, I was so happy,” Baez said after he was placed in supportive housing last year. But then, he said, the newness of the gift wore off and a cloud of doubt settled in.

“I have mental illness, so I am constantly depressed,” Baez explained. “I constantly worry that I'm going to lose the place or that I don't deserve it – that it’s not for me.

I constantly get thoughts and visions that I'd be better off back in the streets.”

Without enough employment, Baez said, his life lacks purpose.

“I’m just a leaf,” he said. “Blowing in the wind.”

Juan Rivera overheard Baez’s words and walked over. The men have known each other for three or four years.

“Come see me tomorrow, OK?” Rivera said, adding that Baez should bring his homeless friend along.

“I will. That’ll put a great feeling in my heart,” Baez said, chuckling for the first time.

Baez showed up the next day, Rivera said, but it looks like his friend is still out there on the street.

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26

CityAndStateNY.com

October 10, 2016

HOMELESSNESS

NEW

TO THE

NEIGHBORHOOD

Housing providers strive to reassure communities as they open new shelters.

A FEAR AMONG neighborhood residents that new homeless shelters will bring unfamiliar people – some of them desperate or addicted to drugs or mentally ill – into their community is not a new phenomenon. But with the ranks of the homeless sleeping in shelters in New York City nearly topping 60,000 – a record high – nonprofit housing providers are under increasing pressure to build more housing.

And more than ever, that also means building consensus in the neighborhoods that will host these sites.

Providers must notify elected officials about the size and scope of the facility, both when proposing a project and immediately after being awarded a contract, as well as make an attempt to meet with the local community board. The city weighs those concerns as well as the number of similar facilities nearby when making a final determination.

While there seems to be no magic bullet, advocates say transparency, adaptive design and strong community roots can increase the chances that a project will win community approval.

In recent months, however, that approval has been hard to secure. An East Harlem

HOMELESS SERVICES UNITED

By DAN ROSENBLUM for NEW YORK NONPROFIT MEDIA

community board slammed the Department of Homeless Services last month, saying the agency neglected to prioritize local residents in filling a new homeless shelter. Residents in Bushwick and Bed-Stuy fought against the opening of facilities in their neighborhoods.

And community opposition led the city to drop a proposal to open a Bronx shelter for people with HIV. In the most high-profile recent confrontation, residents of Maspeth, Queens, fought against the conversion of a local hotel to a shelter and protested outside the Brooklyn home of Social Services Commissioner Steven Banks.

The nonprofit agencies that develop homeless shelters and supportive housing have also been met with opposition.

“Whenever they see that there’s a nonprofit sponsor, somebody like Samaritan

Village, or BRC, or whatever it is, laypeople, average people, don’t understand the difference,” said Nancy Wackstein, who led United Neighborhood Houses until last year when she became director of community engagement and partnerships at Fordham University. “They just see it as a big, bad old city shelter.”

She said many people also don’t understand the difference between emergency shelters and supportive housing. Many cities and nonprofits are focused more on building permanent supportive housing, which offers individuals a long-term residence along with help getting jobs, managing illnesses and advocating for benefits and other services. Facilities vary in size and focus on a range of people, such as those with HIV/AIDS, domestic violence victims, single men or families.

City & State New York

October 10, 2016

At this point, the fears are largely unsubstantiated. Recent research about whether supportive housing or shelters correlate with lower property values or higher crime in New York is limited, but earlier data suggests the consequences of locating a shelter in a neighborhood are less dire than some would suppose. A 2008 report by the Furman Center for Real Estate and Urban Policy found that the typical supportive housing development actually increased real estate values within 500 feet. The research team – which included Vicki Been, the current commissioner of the Department of Housing Preservation and Development – also found a temporary drop in prices for properties further away, but those prices rose shortly after the development opened.

Catherine Trapani, executive director of Homeless Services United, said that shelter facilities are in new, highly regulated buildings with social services for the occupants.

“Very often, if I’m going for a site visit and I’m looking for one of my members’ buildings, I just look for the best looking place on the block and I’m going to find it.”

Trapani said she has talked with her members, about 50 nonprofits that operate shelters, about how to reassure communities where they seek to open facilities. She said successful operators can allay concerns by assuring residents that suggestions will be addressed and highlighting features such as security, lighting and designated smoking areas to keep residents from congregating on stoops.

The city has also tried to distribute facilities more equitably – away from poor neighborhoods like the South Bronx and East New York and into other neighborhoods across the city, citing economic justice issues and pure logistics.

Race and gender biases also come into play. Programs like a women’s shelter at an armory spark fewer concerns because homeless women are perceived as less dangerous than men. “I can’t tell you the number of times when everything gets turned into ‘Homeless drug addicts are going to be on our street,’” Wackstein said of the media coverage. “And usually if it’s homeless black men, it’s worse.”

Earlier this year, former City Council Speaker Christine Quinn (who in 2011 objected to a proposed 328-bed facility in her home district of Chelsea, Manhattan) told reporters that New Yorkers needed to “get over themselves” about fearing the homeless. Quinn, who now heads the nonprofit Women In Need, said tabloids trafficked in stereotypes by publishing “racist shots of single men – they've purposely picked men

of color who are put on the cover to seem scary and 'them, not us.’”

Coalition for the Homeless Policy Director Giselle Routhier said that protesters would be more productive if they looked at the bigger picture.

“I would urge folks who are angry about shelters in their neighborhood to think about the larger problem and to sort of direct their anger toward permanent solutions, because that’s really what’s going to work,” she said.

“If a neighborhood is welcoming, we don’t want to wear out our welcome,” Trapani said. “We have to make sure that we’re really taking into account the ability of any neighborhood – for any residential project, by the way – to absorb new residents.”

Lauren Gray, a spokeswoman for the Department of Homeless Services, echoed Trapani’s point.

“Homelessness is a citywide issue that re-

27

quires citywide solutions,” Gray said in an email. “Each community must do its share.”

The department tracks neighborhood saturation of shelters and is moving toward what it calls a “more borough-specific” approach to keep displaced individuals and families closer to their neighborhoods. The de Blasio administration has also increased security near shelters, while the NYPD has reviewed shelter security measures and started training more DHS peace officers.

Routhier was heartened recently when her neighborhood of Kensington, Brooklyn, was mostly welcoming of a family shelter run by CAMBA, another nonprofit organization. “The neighbors really seemed to use it as an opportunity to get together, not just for this negative reason, but also for a positive reason: to come together and put together care packets and to welcome families,” she said.

■

“IF A NEIGHBORHOOD IS WELCOMING, WE DON’T WANT TO WEAR OUT OUR WELCOME. WE HAVE TO MAKE SURE THAT WE’RE REALLY TAKING INTO ACCOUNT THE ABILITY OF ANY NEIGHBORHOOD TO ABSORB NEW RESIDENTS.” – CATHERINE TRAPANI, executive director of Homeless Services United

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CityAndStateNY.com

A Product of

City & State’s opinion content is edited

by Nick Powell. Read more at nyslant.com.

October 10, 2016

HOMELESSNESS

WHO OWNS THE

HOMELESSNESS PROBLEM?

By KAREN HINTON

ARGUABLY NO PUBLIC OFFICIALS today are more qualified to address New York City's homeless problem than Gov. Andrew Cuomo, Mayor Bill de Blasio and city Social Services Commissioner Steven Banks.

Why, then, do we still have so many homeless New Yorkers?

Despite aggressive new programs and policies and more funding, the number of men, women and children swelling our shelter system is not dropping.

WHEN I WORKED AT CITY HALL, PEOPLE OFTEN DEMANDED I TELL THE MAYOR “GET THE HOMELESS OFF THE STREET!” Homelessness is a tough nut to crack in a city where 1) it’s not getting any cheaper to live; 2) nobody wants a homeless hotel, shelter or subsidized housing in their neighborhood; and 3) affordable housing plans are being scuttled over arguments about what level of rent is considered “affordable.”

The homeless population didn’t reach 60,000 overnight, either. It’s been growing steadily since 2011, when funding that helped people either avoid eviction or find subsidized housing came to a screeching halt.

Unfortunately, it may take just as long for the number to shrink as it did to surge.

While the vast majority of the city’s shelter residents are homeless because

they are jobless or underemployed, some are also struggling with domestic violence, mental illness and drug abuse – problems that can’t be solved with a bigger paycheck or lower rent.

Critics often complain that either one or all three of Cuomo, de Blasio and Banks don’t know what they are doing, but that’s wrong. The people in charge have the street cred to do the job.

Cuomo and de Blasio both worked at the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development, the federal agency that develops policies to combat homelessness.

In 1986, Cuomo started HELP, a housing initiative that focused on the causes of homelessness.

That program won Harvard's prestigious Kennedy School of Government Innovations Award during Cuomo’s tenure at the federal agency.

As HUD representative for the northeast region, de Blasio worked with cities, helping them implement the HELP model. Not long after his election as mayor, he increased funding to combat homelessness, hired more lawyers to prevent illegal tenant evictions, put into place important policy changes, focused on services for homeless who are mentally ill and/or drug addicted and, most importantly, appointed Banks – a highly respected homeless advocate – to oversee all of these efforts.

Banks has dedicated his entire professional life to helping the homeless through his work with the Legal Aid Society. The New York Times described him as “the most relentless and determined advocate for homeless people that the city had ever faced.”

So what gives? Well, New Yorkers’ impatience, for one.

When I worked at City Hall, people often demanded I tell the mayor “get the homeless off the street!” Fair enough – he’s the mayor, and that’s his job. But New Yorkers are a smart crowd. Many are masters of their own special universe. We also should be asking each other, “What are our big ideas? How can we be part of the solution?” Here are mine.

• Say no to NIMBYism. Speak up about resolving differences when the NIMBYists show up to protest with “all or nothing” arguments.

• Say yes to de Blasio’s affordable housing plan.

Even if you think his definition of affordable isn’t affordable enough, building apartments with lower rents opens up other low-income housing. Unfortunately, gentrification is an inevitability, and I prefer a little good-government oversight with my brownstone and latte bar.

• Urge the governor and mayor to work together more closely.

Heck, they don’t even have to like each other. Regular people work with people they don’t like every day. There’s a 421a affordable housing program that needs fixing, and a promised $20 billion in state funds for supportive and affordable housing that needs to be put to good use.

• Understand that “chasing the homeless away” or throwing them into Rikers Island jail – as former Mayor Rudy Giuliani has recommended – is not a solution. Most of our homeless shelters are filled with women and children. On the street are people who are largely mentally ill, drug addicted or both, and it’s against the law to imprison or hospitalize them

October 10, 2016

City & State New York

29

unless they are harming themselves or others or breaking a law. So even if the mayor suddenly lost his mind and shooed them all away, he would be sued in a New York minute. Alternatively, we could shoo Giuliani instead.

• Ignore sensational media coverage and call 311 or 911 to help the street homeless.

They may not agree to come off the street the first time they are approached, but they might the third, fourth or fifth time.

• Hire the breadwinner from a homeless family in your company. Train the breadwinner in a skill. Contribute a nice chunk of change to a homeless shelter provider.

If you don’t like my ideas, take yours to the next public housing hearing or send them to City Hall or Albany or even a City & State reporter. Crowdsourcing innovative ideas can be the bedrock of good government.

We all have to own this problem, not just the three men in charge.

MICHAEL APPLETON/MAYORAL PHOTOGRAPHY OFFICE

?

■

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Karen Hinton is a communications consultant and the former press secretary to Mayor Bill de Blasio.

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CityAndStateNY.com

October 10, 2016

AGENCY FOCUS:

NEW YORK STATE DEPARTMENT OF ENVIRONMENTAL CONSERVATION All across the country, states are dealing with mounting concerns about water quality and the impact of climate change, such as increasingly common natural disasters in recent years.

In New York, the state Department of Environmental Conservation’s mission is to conserve and protect the state’s natural resources and environment while combating water, land and air pollution.

It’s no small task. For example, New York is the home to Adirondack Park, the largest publicly protected area in the continental U.S. And in the last few years, the state has taken momentous steps – banning high-volume hydraulic fracturing, moving toward greater reliance on green energy and dealing with fallout of the high-profile water contamination at Hoosick Falls – which have put the state agency at the forefront of several high-profile political discussions. Just this past summer, Gov. Andrew Cuomo set an ambitious target to generate 50 percent of the state’s electricity from renewable energy by 2030.

In this section, City & State takes a close look at the environmental issues facing the state with a Q&A with DEC Commissioner Basil Seggos, an infographic displaying the state’s superfund sites and an analysis of the DEC’s budget and finances.

CONTENTS

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A Q&A WITH COMMISSIONER BASIL SEGGOS

32

THE STATE’S SUPERFUNDS

34

THE ORG CHART: DEC’S TOP DEPUTIES

36

DEC BUDGET ANALYSIS

City & State New York

October 10, 2016

31

AGENCY FOCUS: DEC

ENVIRONMENTAL

INVESTMENTS

A Q&A with DEC Commissioner Basil Seggos C&S: What’s been the most challenging part of the job since you came on last November?

BS: I think without a doubt the water crisis has been the most challenging part of the job. When I started, that’s about the time really the nation started grappling with the idea of clean water and drinking water and the problems associated with lack of infrastructure investment over the years and toxic contamination. I would say I have been working for 20 years on water issues, but I didn’t expect the water situation to have become so front and center right at the beginning of my tenure. I think in many respects we had prepared for this point thoroughly, in terms of ensuring adequate funding and resources for all of our programs.

The biggest change was the in the public’s awareness of the problem, and

that is a good thing. We want the public to be aware of the problems that are out there and ultimately that helps us carry out our mission. Literally the day or the hour after my hearing down on Long Island, I got a note from my wife that our school (that his children attend) tested high for lead. I’m seeing both at work and at home and it’s really no different from anyone else now who’s concerned about the air they breathe and the water they drink or the land that they play on.

C&S: What could the state have done better in responding to water contamination in Hoosick Falls ?

BS: When the Hoosick Falls story broke and we were leading some of the earlier solutions on that, I was blown away by our ability to respond to a situation like this that required creativity across the board. We ramped up very quickly, found a way to regulate a chemical that wasn’t well known, that we hadn’t formally regulated. We identified polluters very quickly and began holding them accountable and we launched probably one of the most ambitious pollution response in the agency’s 40-plus history. We had over 100 people from the agency at any given time for weeks on end – 24 hours a day, seven days a week – in Hoosick Falls, doing installations of private treatment systems in people’s homes, something that had literally never been done at any scale anywhere and certainly not that quickly.

C&S: Yet many people remain upset with the state’s response. How does the state move forward from this?

BS: The governor launched early in February the Water Quality Rapid Response Team, and that team was created to break down barriers between agencies and help us work more efficiently together to identify gaps in our laws and our regulations and our policies, to apply funding more expeditiously and effectively to get us to respond more quickly and more aggressively when needed.

Probably the best example of that playing out was earlier in the year in the city of Newburgh

where we had the Rapid Response Team, we plowed through data on file with the (U.S. Environmental Protection Agency) and got ahead of it in a very expeditious fashion – switching the city’s water supply over to a clean drinking water source, identifying a polluter, tracking the pollution back to the pollution source and hopefully reversing the fortunes of this community in the process.

C&S: How is the state moving toward green energy and what role do you believe natural gas and nuclear energy will have in that future?

BS: I may be partial, but I believe New York has one of the most ambitious – if not the most ambitious – programs to reduce carbon in the U.S. We have a very ambitious goal to reduce emissions – a 40 percent reduction by 2040, 80 percent by 2050. The governor has set forth the Clean Energy Standard, which would mandate that 50 percent of our energy is from renewables by 2030.

We’ve been working very hard for many years, for 10 years, on lowering emissions from the power sector through the so-called Regional Greenhouse Gas Initiative. Now, we’re taking a look at the transportation sector, as well. Clean cars, zero-emission vehicles, working with other states on how to coordinate a strategy to reduce emissions from all types of transportation. We have dedicated $1 billion to solar in the next decade and, anecdotally, the early returns are very impressive: a 500 percent growth in solar from 2005 to 2015. Wind energy – we’re on the verge of a very ambitious build-out of the wind energy sector. We just put out an offshore blueprint and there are several very exciting proposals in the works on that. Through the Environmental Protection Fund, we are dedicating millions to communities that want to reduce their emissions through improvements to their infrastructure. The governor also set out a no-coal goal in the last State of the State.

That’s something we’re working on now.

Our overall carbon emissions, I’m very excited about the programs we have right now to reduce our carbon footprint.

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CityAndStateNY.com

October 10, 2016

AGENCY FOCUS: DEC

THE STATE’S SUPERFUNDS THE ONGOING INVESTIGATION into the Hoosick Falls water contamination scandal has many New Yorkers worried about their health. Gov. Andrew Cuomo has recently said General Electric has not done enough to clean up the Hudson River even after seven years of dredging for toxic chemicals.

Hazardous waste can cause serious physical and environmental harm to a community. New York state uses its Inactive Hazardous Waste Disposal Site program to identify, investigate and clean up sites found with “consequential amounts of hazardous waste” – or state Superfund sites.

The state Department of Environmental Conservation uses five different classification codes to identify these sites, based on severity:

Gowanus Canal in Brooklyn (Class 2)

CLASS 1: The Superfund site has contamination that constitutes a significant threat to public health and the environment and presents an imminent danger of causing irreversible or irreparable damage to the environment.

New York has never had a Class 1 Superfund site.

Hudson River PCB contamination (Class 2)

CLASS 2: Disposal of hazardous waste has been confirmed and it or its breakdown products represent a significant threat to public health or the environment. This classification can also apply to sites where hazardous waste disposal has not been confirmed, but the site has been listed on the Federal National Priorities List.

New York has 450 Class 2 sites.

Love Canal in Niagara (Class 4)

CLASS 3: The Superfund site does not currently constitute a significant threat to public health or the environment. This classification does not apply to sites where insufficient data is currently available to make a definitive decision concerning the level of the threat.

New York has 51 Class 3 sites.

Brookhaven National Laboratory in Suffolk County (Class 2)

OTHER CLASSIFICATIONS: There are also four other classifications for non-registry sites, which are sites that are being investigated and remediated in a brownfield program or any other environmental remediation program.

Non-registry sites may pose a significant threat, but usually they do not.

These are broken down as active (A), completed (C), potential (P) or no further action at this time (N).

WHO PAYS FOR THE CLEANUP? When a Superfund site is designated as a Class 2 site, the state DEC undergoes an environmental investigation to determine if there is a responsible party.

When there is a known responsible party, they often pay for and perform the investigation and evaluation of cleanup options. When the responsible party is unknown or unwilling to pay for the damage, the state pays for the investigation using funding from the 1986 Environmental Quality Bond Act. The state may also try to recover costs from the responsible party after the investigation.

Municipal landfills in Hoosick Falls (Class P)

CLASS 4: The Superfund has been properly closed, but requires continued maintenance or monitoring. One example is when a groundwater extraction and treatment system has been installed, but the groundwater standards have not yet been achieved.

New York has 394 Class 4 sites.

CLASS 5: The Superfund site has been properly closed and requires no further action.

New York has no Class 5 sites.

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JEFF STEFANKO DEPUTY COMMISSIONER FOR ADMINISTRATION

Jeff Stefanko began his career at DEC in June 2014. Stefanko directs all staff and programs within the Office of Administration. He also serves as the primary liaison with the Division of the Budget and the Office of Information, Technology Services.

Additionally, Stefanko is the commissioner’s designee on the board of directors for the Olympic Regional Development Authority and Natural

DEPUTY COMMISSIONER AND GENERAL COUNSEL

Thomas Berkman oversees more than 80 environmental attorneys.

He joined the DEC in 2011, and has focused on the Clean Water Act and New York’s State Pollutant Discharge Elimination System program; the Clean Air Act, solid waste, state land issues (including acquisition and management); wetland regulations; coastal erosion hazard area and stream disturbance issues (including storm

Kathy Moser was appointed deputy commissioner in December 2011 and is responsible for DEC’s portfolio in Lands and Forests, Fish and Wildlife, and Marine Resources. Moser works on wide-ranging policy issues such as forest products development, marine fisheries, Adirondack and Catskills forest preserve conservation, habitat restoration, invasive species control, endangered species restoration and freshwater

DEPUTY COMMISSIONER FOR NATURAL RESOURCES

KATHLEEN MOSER

Kenneth P. Lynch was appointed executive deputy commissioner of NYSDEC in March 2016. He assists Commissioner Seggos with oversight of all DEC programs across New York State. Previously, he served as DEC’s Region 7 director since 1997. Lynch’s work has included implementation of the 1996 Clean Water/Clean Air Environmental Bond Act, negotiation and implementation of the Amended Consent Judgment to address Onondaga Lake wastewater issues, and negotiation of a Consent Decree with Honeywell to implement the remediation of hazardous waste in Onondaga Lake. He has also worked on the implementation of several brownfields projects in Central New York. Lynch has represented the DEC commissioner and the governor on the Susquehanna River Basin Commission, Erie Canalway National Heritage Corridor Commission, and Onondaga Lake Partnership.

EXECUTIVE DEPUTY COMMISSIONER

KENNETH P. LYNCH

CityAndStateNY.com

Jim Tierney has management responsibility for all clean water programs, including sewage and industrial wastewater treatment plants; programs to address polluted runoff from condensed animal feeding operations, construction excavations and urbanized areas; water quality standards; stream classifications; and water quality assessments. This includes the management of multiple grant programs and coordination with the En-

DEPUTY COMMISSIONER FOR WATER RESOURCES

JAMES TIERNEY

Peter Walke serves as the chief of staff to Department of Environmental Conservation Commissioner Basil Seggos. Prior to joining DEC, he was the assistant secretary for the Environment in the Office of Gov. Andrew Cuomo. Walke entered state government through the Empire Fellowship program in 2013. Before entering state service, he served for nine years as an intelligence officer in the U.S. Navy from 2004-2013. He deployed twice in support of operations in Iraq and Afghanistan.

CHIEF OF STAFF

PETER WALKE

THOMAS BERKMAN

COMMISSIONER

BASIL SEGGOS

The key players behind the scenes

THE ORG CHART

AGENCY FOCUS: DEC 34 October 10, 2016

Heritage Trust and serves as the designee and chairman of the board of directors for the Environmental Facilities Corporation.

He previously spent 17 years at the state Division of the Budget. The majority of that time was spent managing the budgeting responsibilities of agencies and public authorities in the environment, recreation, energy and agriculture areas.

CHRISTIAN BALLANTYNE ASSISTANT COMMISSIONER FOR PUBLIC PROTECTION AND REGIONAL AFFAIRS Christian Ballantyne oversees law enforcement, forest protection, emergency management, permitting and regional affairs. Prior to joining DEC in July 2007, Ballantyne worked in the nonprofit sector serving as executive director of the Fund for Lake George, and as the Northeast regional representative for the Sierra Club. As such, he represented the Sierra Club on the governor’s Hudson River Task Force and the EPA’s Hudson River PCB Superfund Site Community Advisory Group. Ballantyne is co-founder of the New York State Apollo Alliance, a coalition of organizations representing labor, environmental advocacy, environmental justice, business and faith organizations supporting increased employment, energy independence and environmental protection.

response procedures); protection of natural resources; endangered species; brownfields; Superfund sites; Resource Conservation and Recovery Act; and law enforcement and energy issues.

Prior to his appointment at DEC, Berkman spent three years as an assistant attorney general in the Criminal Division of the New York attorney general’s office and has worked for national law firms in New York City and Washington, D.C. He also served as an assistant district attorney in Queens.

JARED SNYDER

DEPUTY COMMISSIONER FOR AIR RESOURCES, CLIMATE CHANGE & ENERGY

Jared Snyder oversees New York’s development and implementation of clean air programs and climate change strategies, including programs to build resilience to climate change and to reduce greenhouse gas emissions, including the Regional Greenhouse Gas Initiative. He also represents the department in statewide energy planning efforts. Snyder is currently chairman of the Ozone Transport Commission and vice chairman of RGGI Inc.; he represents the department on the Board of the Climate Registry and has served as co-chairman of the International Carbon Action Partnership. Prior to joining DEC in 2007, Snyder managed air and climate litigation in the New York attorney general’s office, and worked for the U.S. Department of Justice handling environmental enforcement matters from 1990-95.

As deputy commissioner for the Office of Remediation and Materials Management, Martin Brand oversees the operation of the Divisions of Environmental Remediation, Materials Management, and Mineral Resources. He also has a leadership role in the state response to emerging water quality issues. Previously, Brand was the regional director for DEC’s Region 3 headquartered in New Paltz, where he led all DEC efforts and programs in the Hudson Valley and Catskill Mountains area. He also served as DEC’s regional materials management supervisor, where he executed statewide policies and regulations for solid waste and materials management.

A geologist by education and training, he has more than three decades of experience in a variety of areas including environmental remediation, solid and hazardous waste regulation, and oil and gas exploration.

DEPUTY COMMISSIONER FOR THE OFFICE OF REMEDIATION AND MATERIALS MANAGEMENT

MARTIN BRAND

vironmental Facilities Corporation.

His portfolio also includes dam safety, levees, flood plain mapping and management, and the coastal erosion hazard area program – an overall area of responsibility that expanded dramatically after Superstorm Sandy. This includes the full array of flood mitigation and coastal hazard projects undertaken within New York in conjunction with the Army Corps of Engineers. Tierney also oversees water supply assessments and permits, the Great Lakes St. Lawrence River Compact, reservoir releases and drought monitoring, and the like.

Julie Tighe oversees the Office of Legislative Affairs, as well as intergovernmental and external relations. Tighe was previously director of legislative affairs, helping to secure significant reform of the Brownfield Cleanup Program and a 10year, $1 billion Superfund authorization, legislation establishing the Climate Smart Communities program in the EPF, and adoption of two constitutional amendments and the Electronic Equipment Recycling and Reuse Act. Prior to joining DEC, Tighe was the associate director of the Committee on Assembly Insurance, where she drafted legislation related to health insurance and health policy, and deputy director of advocacy and outreach for the New York State Association of Health Care Providers, where she managed state and federal legislative affairs and grass-roots advocacy, and developed the largest state home care political action committee in the country.

ASSISTANT COMMISSIONER FOR INTERGOVERNMENTAL AND LEGISLATIVE AFFAIRS

JULIE TIGHE

fish hatcheries.

Prior to DEC, she worked as managing director for strategic initiatives at the World Wildlife Fund. Moser held various senior positions at The Nature Conservancy in New York and in their international program from 1992 to 2009.

October 10, 2016 City & State New York 35

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CityAndStateNY.com

October 10, 2016

AGENCY FOCUS: DEC

THE

DEEP DIVE An analysis by CITY & STATE

By JON LENTZ

THE NEW YORK State Department of Environmental Conservation is tasked with conserving, improving and protecting the state’s natural resources and environment and preventing and reducing water, land and air pollution. The goal of the department, which was created in 1970, is to ensure the health, safety and welfare of all New Yorkers, as well as their economic and social well-being.

Among its wide range of duties are monitoring pollution in state waterways, issuing air pollution permits to power plants, managing wildlife populations, regu-

lating mining and oil and gas extraction, administering millions of acres of public lands and cleaning up contaminated sites. Over the years the agency’s responsibilities have increased, including addressing such matters as the transport of crude oil through the state, studying new kinds of oil and gas drilling and developing policies to implement state and federal legislation to combat climate change.

BUDGET BASICS Most of the DEC’s funding comes from the state, the bulk of it from tax revenues through the state’s

City & State New York

October 10, 2016

general fund and a smaller amount from fines, licenses and permits.

The DEC also receives some federal money, which has traditionally provided a smaller share of the agency’s budget but shot up temporarily due to an influx of federal stimulus funding.

Indeed, by some key measures the DEC’s budget actually rose in the aftermath of the Great Recession. The agency's state operating budget rose from nearly $500 million in the 2007-08 and 2008-09 fiscal years to around $515 million for two years, but it was significantly reduced starting in the 2011-12 fiscal year. Earlier this year the DEC’s total state operating budget was set at $462 million, well below the $500 million baseline a decade ago – and even lower when accounting for inflation.

ENVIRONMENTAL PROTECTION FUND The Department of Environmental Conservation also administers several dedicated funds, including the Environmental Protection Fund, which provides capital funding for land conservation, waterfront revitalization, inva-

37

sive species prevention and other various projects.

During the state legislative session earlier this year, a highlight of the final budget agreement was $300 million for the EPF, a $123 million increase. This year’s state budget also included $350 million to implement the Water Infrastructure Improvement Act, an increase of $150 million. Environmental groups applauded the new investments, but some have raised questions about how the EPF levels will be maintained in coming years given that much of the increase comes from a onetime cash influx.

STAFFING Environmentalists have also continued to raise concerns about stagnant funding elsewhere at the DEC, especially the low staffing levels. As the state grappled with severe budget deficits in the wake of the Great Recession, the department’s workforce was slashed. Staffing levels are currently at just under 3,000, well below a peak of 3,775 in the 2007-8 fiscal year. Environmental groups have warned that the staffing cutbacks have reduced inspections and enforcement, potentially putting communities at risk of air pollution and other health threats.

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A fresh perspective on opinions/ Edited by Nick Powell

IF HE WANTS TO BE MAYOR, STRINGER CAN’T JUST DOUBLE DOWN ON DE BLASIO’S IDEAS

By NICOLE GELINAS

ith less than a year before the New York City mayoral primary, Comptroller Scott Stringer is flirting with the idea of challenging Bill de Blasio. If Stringer does want to try for it, he’ll have to come up with better ideas than he proposed at a major speech last month.

Part of Stringer’s predicament is any potential challenger’s predicament: life in New York is not bad. Stringer’s Sept. 22 speech to the Association for a Better New

October 10, 2016

LEV RADIN

A KATZ

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York didn’t mention crime – because crime remains at near record lows. This year, murders are down 3.7 percent and shootings are down 10.9 percent.

The economy, too, is doing well. As Stringer told ABNY, “our economy has seen seven straight years of growth,” with “nearly 550,000 private-sector jobs, and a higher percentage of our population … employed than ever before.”

Stringer did warn that growth has slowed, but nobody wins the mayoralty warning that we might have a recession – especially since, as the city’s chief financial steward, he offered no insight into how to cut spending.

And Stringer himself has contributed to one of the biggest problems a recession would pose. The comptroller signed off on the agreements de Blasio brokered with public-sector unions in his first year in office. Under those deals, the city is paying workers $2.7 billion, spread out until October 2020, for work that those workers already did before 2010, as the comptroller’s staff detailed in a 2014 report. Even if future tax revenues fall, the city must use future tax dollars to pay for past work.

Stringer’s best accomplishment so far is spearheading some genuinely interesting reports, on everything from how millennials are faring in New York compared to the previous generation (not great) and how crowded New York City’s housing is (crowded). These reports are a public service – but not exactly a launching pad for a mayoral campaign.

So instead, Stringer is echoing de Blasio’s bugaboo: inequality. “Make no mistake – a lot of people are better off because of this growth,” Stringer said. “But it’s just not true for all New Yorkers.”

Stringer’s marquee solution is subsidized housing. Slamming de Blasio’s plan to build or preserve 200,000 apartments over a decade as too slow, he proposed a “land bank” for 1,100 city-owned vacant lots. “My office estimates we could add up to 57,000 units of permanent low-income housing on this land,” he said, getting “New Yorkers off the waiting lists” for public housing, “off the streets, and out of our homeless shelters.” Stringer cited public housing as a model, noting that Depression-era NYCHA developments have grown “to house 400,000 New Yorkers in permanently affordable apartments.”

Yet Stringer is proposing what de Blasio is already doing, just more of it, and faster. In a response to a February audit by Stringer’s office, de Blasio’s staff said that of the properties Stringer catalogued, “ap-

City & State New York

39

PART OF STRINGER’S PREDICAMENT IS ANY POTENTIAL CHALLENGER’S PREDICAMENT: LIFE IN NEW YORK IS NOT BAD. proximately 670 are suitable and feasible for residential development,” with buildings going up on 400 starting in the next two years.

It’s hard to see how the city could move any faster. Because of neighborhood opposition, getting even a few hundred new subsidized apartments built takes months.

And unlike de Blasio, Stringer emphasizes low-income housing, rather than moderate- and middle-income housing. Low-income tenants – such as NYCHA residents – cannot pay for the monthly upkeep on their apartments once the apartments are built. They need higher-income residents to carry those costs, and building 57,000 low-income apartments would require either tens of millions of dollars in permanent annual tax subsidy, or the construction of tens of thousands of even more expensive apartments to subsidize the lower-income units.

But such density would intensify community opposition. And if Stringer intends to use most of this housing for homeless New Yorkers, the city would have to spend even more on mental health services, addiction rehab services, security costs and other expenses that go with a troubled population.

The other big idea Stringer presented in his September speech was to triple the city’s earned income tax credit. This program supplements a federal tax program

under which poorer working New Yorkers pay negative income taxes; that is, federal, state and local taxpayers who earn more redistribute their income to lower-earning New Yorkers. The program is successful in that it encourages people to work at low-wage jobs. Stringer’s increase would add $220 to the average recipient’s nearly $3,000 in extra annual income.

Expanding the earned-income tax credit is a fine idea – but it would cost $200 million annually. Stringer hasn’t proposed a way to pay for it. Yes, it’s easy to find an extra $200 million amid $54.6 billion in city tax revenues when the economy is booming. As with the housing idea, though, this strategy is to take de Blasio’s method of operation – give a little bit more of the ever-growing budget each year to each of the city’s key constituencies – and do more of it.

New Yorkers could benefit from a competitive primary race. But if Stringer wants to be his competitor, he’ll have to differentiate himself from de Blasio, not try to be a better version of the current mayor.

■

Nicole Gelinas is a contributing editor of the Manhattan Institute’s City Journal.

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Notice of Forma LLC. Art SempreLei LLC. Art. Of Co. LLC address c/o or Org filed with Secy.

Org. filed with SSNY Ganfer & Shore LLP, 360 of State of Ny (sony) 6/8/2016.

Office: NY Lexington Avenue 13th 0n 10/20/2015. Office County. SSNY designated Flr., New York, NY 10017. location: NY county. agent upon whom process SSNY designated as SSNY designated agent may be served and shall agent of LLC upon whom upon whom process may mail copy of process to process against it may be served and shall mail business address: 246 be served. SSNY shall copy of process against Mott Street, NY, NY 10012. mail process to: Ganfer & LLC. to: Us Corp. Agents, Purpose: any lawful act.

Shore LLP, 360 Lexington Inc. 7014 13th Ave, Set. Ave., 13th Flr, New York, 202, Brooklyn, NY 11228 NY 10017. Purpose: any Notice of Formation of Purpose: any lawful act. lawful activities.

Belnord Holdings LLC.

Arts. of Org. filed with Notice of Formation of NK NOTICE OF FORMATION NY Dept. of State on Grant Writing & Nonprofit of GRS Lab USA LLC. 7/19/16. Office location: Consulting LLC. Arts Arts of Org filed with Secy.

NY County. Princ. bus. of Org filed with Secy. of State of NY (SSNY) addr.: 209 W. 87th St., of State of NY (SSNY) on 8/5/2016.

Office NY, NY 10024. Sec. of on 7/1/2016.

Office location: NY County.

State designated agent of location: NY County.

SSNY designated agent LLC upon whom process SSNY designated agent upon whom process may against it may be served upon whom process be served against LLC and shall mail process to: may be served against to: US Corp. Agents, Inc. Belnord Holdings LLC, c/o LLC to principal business 7014 13th Avenue, Suite Talbert & Talbert LLC, 80 address: 308 W. 103rd 202, Brooklyn NY 11228.

Maiden Lane, Ste. 1506, St., #10E, NY, NY, 10025.

Purpose: any lawful act.

NY, NY 10038. Purpose: Purpose: any lawful act. all lawful purposes.

NOTICE OF FORMATION Notice of Qualification OF Slow Sugar, LLC. Art. Notice of Formation of of Comprehensive of Org. filed with SSNY on Belnord Hotel Operating Hospitalists of Florida, 07/15/16. Office location: NY LLC. Arts. of Org. filed LLC. Authority filed with County. SSNY designated with NY Dept. of State on Secy of State of NY agent upon whom process 7/19/16. Office location: (SSNY) on 7/7/2016. Office against it may be served.

NY County. Princ. bus. location: NY County, LLC Principal business address: addr.: 209 W. 87th St., formed in FL on 5/13/11.

860 Park Avenue, NY, NY NY, NY 10024. Sec. of SSNY designated agent 10075. Purpose: any lawful State designated agent of upon whom process may purpose.

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whom process may be Pine Island Rd, Plantation, served and shall mail copy Name of LLC: SIGN FL, 33324. Purpose: any of process against LLC to: Networks LLC. Arts. of lawful act.

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with Secy. of State of against it may be served Notice of Formation NY (SSNY) on July 18, and shall mail process of Broadsheet 2016. Office location: NY to: James P. Healy, Jr., Communications LLC. Art. County. SSNY has been 200 E. 10th St., Ste 719, of Org. filed with SSNY designated as agent upon NY, NY 10003, regd. agt.

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engage in any lawful act or NY (SSNY) on 7/18/2016.

Notice of formation of activity.

Office location: New York

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Office location: NY (SSNY) on August 17th, in Delaware (DE) on Purpose: any lawful act or 111 Eighth Ave., NY, NY NY County.

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NY 11222.

Principal Corporation Agents, Inc., M.D., PLLC Arts. of Org. be served. SSNY shall of Form. on file: SSDE, business address: 607014 13th Ave, Suite filed with Secy. of State of mail process to the LLC, Townsend Bldg., Dover, 40 56th Drive, Maspeth, 202, Brooklyn, NY 11228.

NY (SSNY) on 09/07/16.

125 Cambridgepark Dr., DE 19901. Purp: any NY 11378. Purpose: any Business address: 412 E Office location: NY Ste. 301, Cambridge, MA lawful activities. lawful act.

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NY 10029. Purpose: any PLLC: 406 Massachusetts Incorporating Services, Notice of Qual. of 500 lawful act.

Ave., Arlington, MA 02474.

NOTICE OF FORMATION Ltd., 3500 S. Dupont Seventh Funding LLC, SSNY designated as OF LIMITED LIABILITY Hwy., Dover, DE 19901.

Auth. filed Sec’y of State agent of PLLC upon whom COMPANY. NOBLE Cert. of Form. filed with Notice of formation of (SSNY) 8/5/16. Off. loc: NY process against it may be HOUSE USA LLC Articles Secy. of State, John G. Sara Byworth LLC. Art. Co. LLC org. in DE 8/3/16. served. SSNY shall mail of Organization were Townsend Bldg., 401 Of Org. filed with SSNY SSNY desig. as agent of process to c/o Abrams filed with the Secretary of Federal St., Ste. 4, Dover, on 31st May 2016. Office LLC upon whom proc.

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Office Bldg., Dover, DE 19901. designated for service LLC upon whom proc. manufacture, sales and location NY County.

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Reg. Agt. upon whom Set 202, Brooklyn, NY St, Ste 3200, New York, Org. filed with Secy. of of State of NY (SSNY) proc. may be served. DE 11228. Principal business NY 10022. Purpose: Any State of NY (SSNY) on on June 6, 2016. Office off. addr.: 160 Greentree address: & E 14th St. lawful purpose.

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NY County. Princ. office County. SSNY has been 19904. Cert. of Form.

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Bowery LLC. Articles of LLC upon whom process OF Trep Spirit, LLC. 7014 13th Avenue, Suite ver Organization filed with against it may be served.

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CITY & STATE NEW YORK MANAGEMENT & PUBLISHING Chairman Steve Farbman, President/CEO Tom Allon tallon@cityandstateny.com, Vice President of Strategy Jasmin Freeman, Comptroller David Pirozzi dpirozzi@cityandstateny.com, Business & Sales Coordinator Patrea Patterson, Junior Sales Associate Cydney McQuillan-Grace cydney@cityandstateny.com

Who was up and who was down last week

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LOSERS TODD KAMINSKY – The governor tends to take the “distant father” approach to helping other Democrats get elected – supporting from afar, but not really getting his hands dirty.

But after promoting several liberal initiatives this past legislative session, Cuomo will host a fundraiser for state Sen. Todd Kaminsky, a Long Island Democrat running for re-election in a key race. Drinks are on the governor!

OUR PICK

OUR PICK

WINNERS

Three straight weeks on the wrong side of our Winners & Losers list must be getting to the Gov’s head. He told the Daily News’ Mike Lupica “I am not a politician!” We all want to run from our problems sometimes, but a man with such keen political instincts shouldn’t deny them. We’re sure he’ll disagree on this, too, but he’s a loser – at least this week.

EDITORIAL - editor@cityandstateny.com Editorial Director Michael Johnson mjohnson@ cityandstateny.com, Senior Editor Jon Lentz jlentz@ cityandstateny.com, Albany Reporter Ashley Hupfl ahupfl@ cityandstateny.com, Buffalo Reporter Justin Sondel jsondel@cityandstateny.com, City Hall Reporter Sarina Trangle strangle@cityandstateny.com, Managing Editor Ryan Somers, Web/Engagement Editor Jeremy Unger, Editorial Assistant Jeff Coltin

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ED COX – The New York GOP chairman issued a threat to the moderator of the vice presidential debate last week, warning CBS News’ Elaine Quijano in a widelypanned missive that to fact-check the candidates’ statements would be “career suicide.” In spelling her last name “Quijado,” it became evident why the chairman was so concerned about any undue scrutiny.

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Vol. 5 Issue 39 October 10, 2016 NEW FEATURE

BOCHINCHE & BUZZ Exclusive insider gossip from

GERSON BORRERO

THE BEST OF THE REST ROB ASTORINO – blasts Cuomo,

THE REST OF THE WORST ANDREW CUOMO – accused of

Christie for Bridgegate collaboration

conspiring with Christie on a cover-up

JOHN KATKO – up 19 points in

JEFFREY DINOWITZ – tied up

swing congressional district

in Bronx school discrimination

DAVID KATLESKI – new state tax

allegations

credit good news for brewmeister

DENNIS J. MARTIN – NJ Transit head

STEPHANIE MINER – scandal

has headaches over Hoboken crash

bolsters Syracuse mayor’s fight with

ERIC SCHNEIDERMAN – blasted

developer

for targeting Trump and helping Hillary

WINNERS & LOSERS is published every Friday morning in City & State’s First Read email.

Sign up for the email, cast your vote and see who won at cityandstateny.com.

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