News, information, and campaign updates about New York City Mayor's race in 2013.
"The mass incarceration of African American men may have made us safer, but it leaves us with generation after generation of broken families that are uneducated that have multiple barriers to employment," said Doe Fund founder and Republican mayoral candidate George McDonald this morning at a Crain's forum. (Capital New York)
What do you think of Mr. McDonald's statement about the mass incarceration rates of African American men ?
#myopinioncounts is a new hashtag and @informedvoting is a new Twitter account launched to support community organising in New York City leading up to the 2013 mayoral election.
To support community organisers across the five boroughs of New York City, the blogger and activist Louis Flores has launched a new Twitter account, @informed voting. He has also launched a related hashtag, #myopinioncounts, to support reforms to improve the democratic participation of citizens in our own governance.
This Twitter account will follow the activists and citizens in Brooklyn, the Bronx, Manhattan, Queens, and Staten Island. This Twitter account will highlight areas, were we can find common ground and link up together, to bring about reforms in our government. For example, how did "stop and frisk" become the only acceptable answer to crime prevention, when the solution all along is passing stricter gun control laws ? The same thing goes for hospital closings : why are so many major hospitals closing, when Congress just expanded healthcare to tens of millions of Americans ? Cutting costs to healthcare are unacceptable, and yet where do politicians find the legitimacy to close down hospitals across all five boroughs ?
"If we are going to change the system, we need to organise. This means taking action together. With this new Twitter account and the related hashtag, I will support the work that others do," said Louis Flores.
Time is also running out to reach our goal for the Kickstarter project to support the publication of Roots of Betrayal : The Ethics of Christine Quinn, a work-in-progress survey of the political ethics of the New York City Council Speaker. Funding ends on August 16, and for this book to inform voters, the community must come together to support this project. Please make a pledge and help spread the word. Thank you for everything that you do.
What Does Christine Quinn Do to Stop Mayor Bloomberg's scorched earth plan to Keep Laying Off More and More Police and Firefighters ? Nothing, as usual.
In newly-released plans of how the New York City plans to cut important services that underpin public safety and public health, a growing outrage is being expressed that Mayor Michael Bloomberg's budget cuts are going too far.
''The city's Independent Budget Office projected yesterday that by June 30, 2012, the Police Department will have shrunk to 34,413 uniformed personnel, a record low since the 34,825 that were on the force on that same date 20 years ago when crime rates in the city were near epic highs,'' reported The New York Post.
"Crime statistics show there is a breaking point, and we're at it," City Councilman Peter Vallone, Jr., chairman of the council's Public Safety Committee, told The Post. "We can't absorb any more public safety cuts."
''The IBO further reported the Fire Department will have 10,282 uniformed personnel on June 30, 2012, down from 10,911 this year, and the lowest level since at least 1980, when the IBO first started tracking the numbers.''
Everybody seems to be outraged by the proposed budget cuts, and the impact it would have on teachers, police, firefighters, and even the City Morgue. But nobody is doing about the tens of millions of dollars disappearing into the shady black holes of IT contracts. Or what about the failed $2 billion Unified Call Taker-911 dispatch and emergency call system ? Who is the only person in New York City government, who can stand up to Mayor Bloomberg and Gov. Andrew Cuomo ? If you are counting on Speaker Quinn, better go looking for another champion, because she doesn't do anything to stand up for essential city service cuts. Just look at how Speaker Quinn has done nothing to even save St. Vincent's Hospital from turning into luxury condominiums.
