A short time back I took City Councilmembers Steve Levin and Brad Lander to task for, what seemed at the time, a casual decision to defund the Doe Fund's clean up efforts in Park Slope. I particularly took them to task for misleading statements and for denigrating the Doe Fund overall, which I found difficult to stomach because the Doe Fund is one of the most successful (among the ONLY successful) organizations for reducing recidivism among parolees.

Steve Levin has shown no interest in this issue...or any issue in the district from what I can tell. I guess as long as he has the backing of corrupt Party Boss Vito Lopez (his mentor) he feels he can cruise along with no problem...particularly since he also managed to get the formerly decent Working Families Party backing him as well, creating a nasty and disgusting alliance between the Vito Lopez machine and a Working Families party that at BEST skirted the law, and in reality had to scramble to avoid prosecution after breaking some campaign finance laws for the likes of Steve Levin.

But Brad Lander, who I have had some serious disagreements with, seems different than Steve "Vito's Kid" Levin. Brad Lander HAS been involved with the community, even if I disagree with him on the Doe Fund's role in the community, and he took the time to respond to my article taking him to task.

Let me begin by reviewing what I wrote before, then quoting Councilmember Brad Lander responding to my article, then giving something of a rebuttal from myself and giving a different opinion from Councilmember Daniel Dromm.  read more »

I want to preface this article by saying that Councilmember Brad Lander has been doing some good things recently which I want to acknowledge before I lay into him on this issue. In particular I want to re-emphasize the good work Brad Lander has been doing with the Center for Anti-violence Education (which my wife teaches at) to get self-defense classes for women in the areas where there have been a spate of assaults on women. I should note fellow Councilmember Steve Levin has NOT been involved in helping the community on this issue. Councilmembers Brad Lander, Sara Gonzalez, Tish James have and they deserve credit for it.

But there is another issue where Brad Lander and Steve Levin have made, in my mind, a serious error.

It all started with my building's resident Yenta (by her own admission) asking me why 7th Ave is no longer being cleaned up. Until recently, she observed, men in blue outfits (a collaboration between the city and the Doe Fund aimed to help the homeless and parolees transition back into society and employment) would help the city empty the garbage and clean the streets. Recently those blue-uniformed men disappeared from 7th Avenue and in their place garbage piled up everywhere adding to what my wife already referred to as the "7th Ave. Stink." I have to say 7th Ave. smells worse on average than any other street I personally walk down in Brooklyn or Manhattan. And now that the Doe Fund people have disappeared from 7th Ave. the stink is getting worse.

To me this is not, however, primarily about the cleanliness of our neighborhood. It is about a program that is one of the most successful in the nation in getting homeless and parolees back into society. Here is the description of the Doe Fund from their website:

Ready, Willing & Able is The Doe Fund's holistic, residential, work and job skills training program which helps homeless individuals in their efforts to become self-sufficient, contributing members of society. Ready, Willing & Able has helped more than 4,500 men and women become drug-free, secure full-time employment, and obtain their own self-supported housing. The program targets the segment of the homeless population considered the hardest to serve: single, able-bodied adults, the majority of whom have histories of incarceration and substance abuse. Criteria for acceptance into the program is that the applicant be ready, willing and able, both physically and mentally, to work and maintain a drug-free lifestyle.

Folks, this kind of program saves taxpayers money in the long run. Like vaccinations and education, programs like this are one of the best investments society can make with taxpayer money. And, like cutting education, cutting this program is one of the dumbest moves a government can make because it will COST us all money in the long run.  read more »

So here I am taking a break from some pretty heavy efforts to head off an imminent return of Bush-republicans to office to comment on the most recent, and extremely predictable, scandal here in NY State.

As I scan most of the country, including NY State, I see a Republican Party awash in corruption, scandals, racism and intolerance. When Carl "Horse Sex" Paladino and Christine "Mouse Brain" O'Donnell are your poster children, you have serious problems and whatever happens November 2nd, the bulk of the Republican Party candidates this year are either scandals in progress or scandals waiting to happen. And the thing is this has been the case now for more than a decade and it was these scandals that led to Republicans taking such a beating throughout the country in 2006 and 2008 and I believe will deliver them a beating again soon. It seems corrupt Republicans cannot or will not learn their lesson. (for a nice rundown on Republican Corruption, visit the good folks at Liberals Like Christ).

Unfortunately, here in NY State it seems Democrats and other leftists also have trouble learning the same lesson.  read more »

Next to the 39th City Council district, the 33rd district is also among the most closely contested races in the city. I personally know all the candidates in the 39th. In the 33rd I know some very well, have met another, and with one, Isaac Abraham, have only heard him speak, not actually met him. I want to discuss this race based on my own experiences with the candidates. This race is a critical one in the fight against corruption in Brooklyn, as outlined in the Village Voice. Brooklyn Party Boss Vito Lopez is trying hard to take this seat and reformers are divided. Here's what the Village Voice has to say about this race:

Power Plays by Party Boss Vito Lopez

The Lord of Brooklyn, a Democratic powerbroker who is flexing his
political muscles these days like a gym rat pumping the free weights

By Tom Robbins - September 01, 2009 - The Village Voice

Say this for Vito Lopez, the Brooklyn Democratic powerbroker who is
flexing his political muscles these days like a gym rat pumping the
free weights: He is not one to let a few silly scandals knock him off  read more »

I recently wrote about the fierce competition between corrupt Party Boss Vito Lopez's aide, Steve Levin, and social conservative Isaac Abraham for the conservative votes in the 33rd City Council district while progressive reformers Jo Anne Simon and Ken Diamondstone fight over the majority progressive votes. Interestingly, my piece got picked up by several Hasid-targeted blogs as a way of plugging Isaac Abraham among the conservative voters. (The other part of the article covered the 39th district where a parallel fight between Dov Hikind-endorsed Brad Lander and social conservative John Heyer is taking a similar course with progressive reformers Josh Skaller and Bob Zuckerman battling over the progressive majority votes).

Here's what I wrote (in part) about the 33rd District race:

In the 33rd district, Isaac Abraham is a Satmar Hasid who is running on a combined platform of opposition to Vito Lopez (hence technically reform) and what, for the district as a whole, would be extreme conservativism. Isaac Abraham has been a supporter of Connectitcut Senator Joe Lieberman, the former Vice Presidential candidate who became a McCain supporter in 2008. Abraham, who is running in the Democratic primary, has gone on record urging Jewish Democrats to re-register Republican. Abraham supports tax-payer funded school vouchers for private schools, a tradtionally Republican stand. Abraham is also opposed to gay rights and is anti-choice. These stands put him at odds with most of the voters in the district but is in sync with the orthodox Jewish and old-school Catholic neighborhoods. I have met Isaac Abraham and he is a dynamic community activist and entertaining speaker. So he combines a certain odd charisma with activism and...extreme social conservativism.

Competing with Abraham for these conservative votes is the machine candiadte Steve Levin whose boss, Vito Lopez, has connections in the conservative neighborhoods and is pulling strings to get the conservative vote for Levin over Abraham and is exploiting personality conflicts among the Hasids to siphon away votes from Abraham. So Hasids have the choice of voting their values (and so voting for Abraham) or voting according to political alliances and exchange of political favors (and so voting for the machine's Steve Levin). It should be noted that Levin's boss has had a history of supporting Republicans over Democrats before he became Party Boss, and even after that has had a history of actively discouraging challenges to Republicans in Brooklyn, so Vito Lopez certainly has his connections to conservatives. For those who aren't familiar with the Brooklyn machine, keep in mind that the former boss, Clarence Norman, is in prison for corruption and Vito Lopez should also be in prison. Steve Levin, as Vito Lopez's right hand man, cannot have been innocent of the corruption Vito Lopez is known for (for more info, see here here, and here)...

Meanwhile the true progressive reformers, like Jo Anne Simon and Ken Diamondstone in the 33rd...compete over the majority of the district with eachother and with the machine candidates who try to downplay the scandals their respective machines are associated with.

The Villiage Voice has an article that goes into some detail about Steve Levin's candidacy and how it represents a power play by Party Boss Vito Lopez. Here's what they have to say about this race:  read more »