St. Vincent's Rudin Probe

Manhattan District Attorney is investigating St. Vincent's ''go-for-broke plan'' that has supposedly enriched the Rudin Managedment Company, which has been waiting in the wings for the hospital to flatline.

St. Vincent's Hospital is under investigation by the Manhattan DA's office for allegations that the Rudin Management Company has been planning a real estate harvesting/luxury condo conversion plan of the shuttered hospital.

St. Vincent's closed on April 30, 2010, after it laid off many of its employees. Many employees later learned that the hospital was not paying into the state's unemployment fund, so those who were laid off were not eligible for unemployment benefits.

Ever since it closed, the impacted community of the Lower West Side of Manhattan has been calling for investigations into what lead to the hospital's sudden closure. The hospital failed to file a closure plan, as it was required to do, with the New York State Department of Health.

From an article in The New York Post :

Going broke allowed the hospital to get an OK from the state Health Department to sell to the Rudin family, which is building luxury housing on the site. Without bankruptcy, state officials would not have been permitted the hospital to shut down, the sources said.

"This was a well-thought-out plan," said Tom Shanahan, a lawyer for a group of former St. Vincent doctors and nurses suing St. Vincent's. "They wanted out and had to justify it to the state. They were running it into the ground."

DA Cy Vance's team is looking into whether vendors double-billed for services, gave kickbacks for contracts and hired relatives of hospital employees, sources said.

Quinn NYT Infomercial Fluff

To find out how real journalists assess City Council Speaker Christine Quinn's record, one needs to look no further than the sensibility expressed in this blog post on True News From Change : NYT Sets the Definition on How To Judge and Pick the Next Mayor and It Fits Quinn

In his blog post, the journalist Gary Tilzer makes many astute observations about David W. Chen's infomercial fluff piece about Speaker Quinn, and perhaps this is the most sharpest of Mr. Tilzer's criticisms : ''It was the publisher of the NYT, along with the NYP and Daily News, that used their papers to support changing the term limits law to allow Bloomberg and Quinn to run for a third term. Mr. Chen does not challenge Quinn when she brushes off her term limits and other critics as 'naïve' ideologues.''

It's already been documented how Christine Quinn bluffs her way through important social issues.

What Speaker Quinn is doing by making her ''unapologetic'' ''move to the middle'' is selling out the working class families of New York City. Her policies favour real estate developers -- and come to the detriment, suffering, and mass displacement of working class New Yorkers. Speaker Quinn's vision of New York City is a continuation of Mayor Michael Bloomberg's vision : more glass and steel luxury condos and less hospitals, firehouses, public schools, and senior centers. Speaker Quinn wants to make life so unbearable to the average wage-earning New Yorker that we all pick up and leave town.

How do we know that Christine Quinn has sold out her values and beliefs and still find herself to be in a place of denial about it, so much so that she accuses her critics of being “naïve” ideologues ?

Speaker Quinn's ideas about leadership in New York, by supporting the luxury condo conversion of St. Vincent's Hospital, which used to be the only full-service hospital with a Level 1 Trauma Center below 14th Street, is like GLAAD publicly supporting the proposed AT&T/T-Mobile merger. Not only would AT&T be in an even stronger position to undo net neutrality, but what is GLAAD doing by meddling in a telecom merger approval process with the FCC ? Likewise, why is a ''supposedly!! celebrated LGBT third-term politician like Christine Quinn rushing toward the ''middle'' of the political spectrum, if it means that she has to abandon her idealistic beginnings and instead now oppose paid sick leave and a living wage bill ?

"AT&T was one of the companies whose local representatives sits on the board of directors of the Tennessee chamber of commerce," wrote John Aravosis at Americablog. "You remember them, the group that endorsed and actively lobbied for the measure repealing gay and trans rights ordinances in the state, mandating it so that no trans person can ever change their birth certificate gender in the future, and banning any future civil rights ordinances for anyone in the future. That AT&T."

What does the intersection of St. Vincent's Hospital/Rudin Family Luxury Condo Conversion and the GLAAD/AT&T T-Mobile mega deals have to do with Christine Quinn and New York City politics ?

In each case, you see the erosion of core values of fighting for an activist's central reason for being : serving their constituency. But once you get to be so big, you can blow off you constituency as “naïve” ideologues (or drop the F-bomb on them, the way that one of her administrative assistants did).

If, throughout our nation's history, our goal has been to distribute power and authority equally among voters, then the voters, who have less choices on election day, get their voices muffled. Who is going to challenge GLAAD to focus once again on its original intention ? Who is going to put pressure on Christine Quinn to deliver on the community’s demands to stop all the hospital closings that are happening across New York City ?

It is not too much to expect that the people, who you elect to City Council, start to deliver something tangible for New York City voters.

• If you disliked how City Council members extended term limits without a voter referendum, then let her know : quinn@council.nyc.ny.us
• If you agree, that Speaker Quinn needs to hear the voices of communities, who are demanding that hospitals stop closing all across the five boroughs, then let her know : quinn@council.nyc.ny.us
• If you can no longer accept a weekly threat by Mayor Bloomberg to layoff teachers and firefighters, and to close schools and firehouses, then let her know : quinn@council.nyc.ny.us
• If you want Speaker Quinn to shut down her $50 million slush fund, then let her know : quinn@council.nyc.ny.us
• If you refuse to settle for City Council members, who take tens of thousands of campaign donations from real estate developers in exchange for what seems like pay-to-play real estate development deal approvals, then let her know : quinn@council.nyc.ny.us
• If you believe that Speaker Quinn betrays the LGBT community, then let her know : quinn@council.nyc.ny.us
• If you have your own issue, that you'd like to bring to Speaker Quinn's attention, then let her know : quinn@council.nyc.ny.us

Speak now, or forever hold your peace.

Alec Baldwin Christine Quinn

Alec Baldwin exposes Christine Quinn for Term Limits Scandal

From The New York Times :

Mr. Baldwin suggested that the term-limit issue would hurt the electoral prospects of the City Council speaker, Christine C. Quinn, who went along with the mayor’s move. “I think it absolutely, positively disqualifies her,” he said. “She totally betrayed a huge constituency here in the city.”

Quinn Plaza Hotel Protest

Christine Quinn - Plaza Hotel - Gays Against Quinn (Protest Video)

Over 20 activists gathered outside the Plaza Hotel in a demonstration against City Council Speaker Christine Quinn. Watch as protesters speak against Christine Quinn to former Mayor David Dinkins' entourage and hand anti-Quinn literature to Assembly Speaker Sheldon Silver.

Some of us were there because of Speaker Quinn's use of a $50 million slush fund during a time when we live under constant threat by Mayor Bloomberg, that he is going to lay off teachers and close down fire houses. Others were there, because Speaker Quinn pushed through a controversial extension of term limits, allowing Mayor Bloomberg, herself, and others, to run for a third term in office. Still yet others were there because of Speaker Quinn's complete abdication of full civil rights for LGBT New Yorkers, do-nothing record over hospital closings, horrible animal rights record, and use of city staff for campaign work.

Please join us for a Third Anniversary Protest of the Term Limits Extension at 2 pm on Sunday, October 23, at City Hall.

Please also join our Facebook group : Gays Against Christine Quinn.

Politicians and Protesters call for an investigation of Medisys official Robert Levine over Peninsula Hospital closing

Peninsula Hospital closure draws outraged calls for a state investigation from almost everybody, excepting for Christine Quinn, of course, naturally, it should go without saying.

From The New York Daily News :

Local pols on Sunday called on state officials to investigate the planned closing of Peninsula Hospital in Queens. During a protest that drew dozens of hospital workers and Rockaways residents, State Sen. Malcolm Smith urged Health Commissioner Nirav Shah not to approve the closing plan for the century-old Far Rockaway hospital without conducting a formal investigation of its finances first. "The Rockaways cannot afford for Peninsula to not be there," said Smith (D-Queens), noting its emergency room provides care for more than 30,000 patients per year. At the rally outside the state Health Department's office in Lower Manhattan, protestors chanted, "Keep the hospital open" and waved signs saying, "Rockaway Needs Peninsula" and "Investigate Before Closing." ....

Peninsula Hospital Closing Protest

Peninsula Hospital Center - Protesters Take Over Lobby - Hospital Closings in NYC

Approximately 200 union employees, residents of Far Rockaway, in Queens, and local officials, gathered in the rain outside Peninsula Hospital Center, across the bay from JFK Airport. Peninsula Hospital Center has filed a plan to shut its doors. The hospital’s owner is embroiled in a political and financial scandal, but employees and residents are worried about the threat to public health, should the hospital’s closure plan be approved.

Attendees of the rally braved the rain, then, once the rally had ended, stormed into one of the lobbies of the hospital, until hospital officials called the police, to clear the lobby of its own employees.

In the time that Christine Quinn had been speaker of the City Council, eight hospitals (not counting Peninsula) have closed. If Peninsula closes, it would mark the ninth hospital to close under Speaker Quinn's watch.

This week, President Obama agreed to severe budget cuts to social safety net programs, that underpin the social contract we make with our government and amongst ourselves. More budget cuts to Medicaid and Medicare will lead to a further collapse of our healthcare system. Is Christine Quinn in Bermuda with Mayor Michael Bloomberg each time a hospital closes in New York City ? Is President Obama surfing in Hawaii each time a hospital closes in America ?

If we obediently listen to people, who are in power (the same people who work for us, the very same people who are closing our hospitals), telling us to leave the lobby of a closing hospital, then it just makes it that much easier for the New York State Department of Health/Christine Quinn to keep closing hospitals.

William Rudin Peninsula Hospital

Is the Rudin Family eyeing their next real estate harvesting operation on the dead carcass of the Peninsula Hospital Center in Queens ?

After he's done with St. Vincent's Hospital, it has been heard on the street that William Rudin is considering another real estate harvesting operation, this time at the Peninsula Hospital Center in Queens.

Everybody Is Gay

Op-Ed ! Everybody Is Gay

Ian McKeevor is homophobic, not only that, but he freely used gay as a pejorative against activists. I cannot reconcile how City Council Speaker Christine Quinn, who is out as a lesbian, can support the horse-drawn carriage industry, not only because of the way that horses are treated, but also because of the homophobia that some of the horse owners practise. But for Christine Quinn, all it takes is campaign contributions for her to look the other way. I will never vote for Christine Quinn.

Collapse of the Social Safety Net in New York City

Queens' Peninsula Hospital Center set to close ; New York Downtown Hospital putting patients on stretchers in the hallway to accommodate unmanageable influx of emergency patients.

"Sources say the Far Rockaway, Queens, hospital will shutter after owing millions to vendors and falling behind on its union benefits funds payments; the closure would cost the area about 1,000 jobs," reported Crain's.

The Queens Crap blog published a post today, indicating that Peninsula Hospital Center had filed a 90-day closure plan, a requirement under the law that was violated when St. Vincent's Hospital closed on April 30, 2010. Meanwhile, the Real Deal blog reported that once the Peninsula Hospital Center closes, all healthcare emergencies are going to overwhelm St. Johns Episcopal Hospital, which will become the only healthcare facility servicing the distant Queens neighborhood of Far Rockaway. Separately, the True News From Change NYC blog linked the collapse of Peninsula Hospital Center with political corruption and possible kickbacks.

Is our social safety net not too big to fail ?

Does nobody in City Council have any concern about the financial collapse of so many hospitals across all five New York City boroughs ?

Does Mayor Michael Bloomberg not care, either ?

Meanwhile, following the illegal closing of St. Vincent's Hospital last year, there reamins only one hospital south of 16th Street in Manhattan, New York Downtown Hospital, which The New York Post has reported as being ''overwhelmed,'' and is leading to an ''emergency-care crisis,'' the newspaper reports.

Quinn Slush Fund Report

Manhattan Borough President Scott Stringer Blasts Mayor's Race Opponent Chris Quinn

Manhattan Borough President Scott Stringer took an apparent swipe at his mayor's race opponent, calling for an end to pork spending by local lawmakers.

JULY 20, 2011 4:09 PM

Our Reuven Blau reports:

Stringer criticized City Council Speaker Christine Quinn and the other 50 members for their $49 million in earmarks that neglects to reach the city's poorest neighborhoods.

"We have a system where some districts get a lot more than others and politics is the only reason," Stringer told reporters yesterday.

Quinn is an early frontrunner in the mayoral election with the largest war chest of more than $4 million. Yet one of her major challenges in her expected run is the so-called slush fund scandal that erupted in 2007.

-- Excerpted from the Daily Politics blog by Celeste Katz on The New York Daily News.

2011 07 Xx Christine Quinn Slush Fund Member Items Report

Real Estate Industry Asks Christine Quinn to End Rent Regulation in NYC

The Business Establishment wants Christine Quinn to be your next mayor, so that she can keep denying you each of paid sick leave, a living wage, and a full-service hospital that might save your life.

Real estate developers are feverishly working to appoint Christine Quinn to be the next mayor of New York City, so that Christine Quinn can end rent regulation and turn all apartments into market-rate rentals. Real estate executives are mainly impressed with how Speaker Quinn shut down St. Vincent's Hospital in Greenwich Village, which Robert Moses was unable to demolish and ram through a cross-town highway decades ago.

For years now, Speaker Quinn has subjugated herself to the misogynistic male sexist domination of Mayor Michael Bloomberg, who has been on a scorched earth campaign to destroy the social safety net by trying to close firehouses, shut down senior citizen centers, cut childcare, layoff teachers, pretend like votes don't go missing, build luxury condos on the hallowed ground of St. Vincent's Hospital, make money from government information, and end Progressive Era reforms, we are left to wonder. When will the focus of irresponsible real estate development at the expense of the middle class spark a voter backlash, that will lead to mass protests at the city's legislature, or a revolution of the likes that have been happening elsewhere ?

What will be the spark that will trigger mass protests in New York ?

Tony Simone to City : ''F#ck You''

City Council speaker Christine Quinn's director of community outreach Tony Simone tells New York City Voters : ''F#ck You!''

Monday, July 18th 2011, 4:00 AM
Bryan Smith for News

City Council Speaker Christine Quinn's director of community outreach dropped a few F-bombs at a local fundraiser last week.

Christine Quinn needs to rein in her director of community outreach Tony Simone.

The City Council speaker's office has issued an apology after Simone reached out to protesters outside a Quinn fund-raiser last Monday by lobbing a few F-bombs their way.

Documentary maker Donny Moss tells us that the protest outside the Dream Downtown hotel, which drew close to 30 people, was one of several that he and others will organize "between now and the mayoral election," to urge voters to "look beyond" Quinn's "identity" as a gay politician "to her actual record."

Moss addresses the issue in a 10-minute YouTube film called "Christine Quinn: Behind The Smile," in which he outlines a number of instances where, he contends, Quinn has "betrayed the gay community behind the scenes since becoming speaker."

Perhaps that's why Simone didn't have anything good to say when he encountered the protest at the Dream Downtown on Monday night where Quinn was having an $11-a-head fund-raiser for her 2013 mayoral campaign. (Quinn avoided her critics by using a back entrance to the hotel.)

According to Moss and another witness, Simone — who's a former Goldman Sachs portfolio analyst— approached the demonstrators, who were stationed on 16th St. between Eighth and Ninth Aves. outside of the hotel's entrance.

There, Simone asked one protester if Moss was present. Told that the filmmaker was indeed among the group, Simone responded: "Tell him to go f--- himself."

Moss says Simone then spotted longtime gay rights activist Allen Roskoff, and shouted "F--- you" at him before heading inside to the fund-raiser.

Roskoff, who's also been critical of Quinn, is president of the Jim Owles Liberal Democratic Club and co-author of the nation's first gay rights bill.

When we ran this story by Quinn's office, her communications director Jamie McShane told us Simone had gone to the fund-raiser "on his own time," where he was "repeatedly verbally abused by protesters. Tony lost his cool and should not have. He apologizes for his actions."

"That's a patent lie," replied Moss, who insisted "no one even recognized" Simone until he hurled his epithets.

"I didn't even say a word to him after he said I should go f--- myself," said Moss. He added that he and Roskoff were "mesmerized" by the city employee's behavior and said nothing.

Moss said he also didn't react when, he claimed, Simone approached him at another protest in summer 2009 and "shouted in my face, 'Loser!'

"I'm more interested in exposing Quinn's record than engaging with people who are invested in her success," he said.

Christine Quinn Trivia Quiz

Pop Quiz on Christine Quinn's Record as Do-Nothing City Council Speaker

Q. What has Christine Quinn done about giving us an APP to track the mayor's whereabouts during blizzards ?

A. _________________

Q. What has Christine Quinn done to save/restore a full service hospital with Level 1 Trauma Center to replace St. Vincent's ?

A. _________________

Q. What had Christine Quinn done to end the practice of using City Council slush funds to unduly exert influence over other councilmembers?

A. _________________

Q. What did Christine Quinn do to stop the controversial third term limits extension ?

A. _________________

Q. What has Christine Quinn done to pass paid sick leave in NYC ?

A. _________________

Q. What has Christine Quinn done to pass paid sick leave in NYC ?

A. _________________

Q. What has Christine Quinn done to stop NYU tearing down landmark structures in its reckless expansion through the Village ?

A. _________________

Q. What has Christine Quinn done to investigate $600 million CityTime fraud ?

A. _________________

Q. What has Christine Quinn done to save the scores of hospital closings all across the city in the past 10 years ?

A. _________________

Q. What has Christine Quinn done for LGBT Civil Rights ?

A. _________________

Q. What did Christine Quinn do to stand up in 2005, back when Mayor Michael Bloomberg ordered the appeal of a landmark gay marriage ruling ?

A. _________________

Q. What has Christine Quinn done to investigate NYPD sexual orientation profiling at gay bookstores ?

A. _________________

Q. What has Christine Quinn done to investigate the illegal Gay Pride Raid at the Eagle ?

A. _________________

Q. What has Christine Quinn done to put pressure on federal legislators to repeal DOMA ?

A. _________________

Q. What has Christine Quinn done to put pressure on federal legislators to pass ENDA ?

A. _________________

Q. What has Christine Quinn done to support Bradley Manning ?

A. _________________

Q. What has Christine Quinn done to end de jure and de facto discrimination based on sexual orientation and gender identity ?

A. _________________

SAIC RICO Triple Damages

SAIC RICO Bloomberg Protest - Suzannah B. Troy Speech

Artist, blogger, and political commentator Suzannah B. Troy gave a speech today outside the New York City offices of SAIC to demand a RICO refund of triple damages against SAIC for their role in the organised crime that took place to rob taxpayers of over almost $1 billion in CityTime project costs.

Union representatives from Local 375 and DC 37, community activists, New York City taxpayers, and others gathered at 1250 Broadway in a demonstration against the technology company known as SAIC.

For years, newspaper and television reporters, bloggers, and whistle blowers have been reporting details of a massive taxpayer fraud perpetrated by New York City officials, by employees of SAIC and of another company known as Technodyne, and possibly by lobbyists in connection with the scandalous CityTime project.

The CityTime project began with an original budget of approximately $60 million, but has since ballooned to over $700 million.

The U.S. Attorney's Office has begun an investigation, but nobody yet knows how high this scandal, and other technology consultancy contract scandals, may go up the Bloomberg administration.

Stay tuned.

CityTime Protest Rally Today