Mike Bloomberg's private empire intersecting with his public empire

I love these photos. I think they are beautiful and also very haunting. Just beautiful the diverse women walking up the stairs like ballet dancers on stage but I just caught them being New Yorkers but so upsetting because I used to write the OPED section about NYC really being an oligarchy and also my fear one day we would see advertisements like this on the State of Liberty.

Mike Bloomberg seems to confuse his private empire with his public empire and sadly the city council speaker Christine Quinn acts like she works for his private empire.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-5zmHtdSZNw The off-shore mayor....Mike Bloomberg from Governor's Island to the Caymans

and http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=H_QI9yQZGIo Christine Quinn along with other high ranking NYC gov staff get free rides on Bloomberg's private plane...


When Mike Bloomberg says "progress", he means get your moving van.
A Suzannah B. Troy-ism

Thinking about Memorial Day New York

From downtown NYC to Millerton NY:

I am posting a photo of the sculpture I used to sometimes include in long runs downtown  around by the WTC; this artwork above somehow survived although damaged from the WTC attacks 9-11.  The art work has been moved to Battery Park with an Eternal Flame that burns in front of it.

I think of Sept. 11 on Memorial Day. I am part of a group that feels the rescue workers that ran downtown that day and gave their all literally should be honored with their rank and department. It was the largest loss of rescue workers in our City, State and Nation’s history and many were also highly decorated serving in the military and within their dept.  Here is my letter in The Wall Street Journal "Betrayal at Ground Zero".  The betrayal has grown exponentially.


I think of a fireman that wasn’t my lover but made me feel loved and  clearly admired by passion and intensity who died downtown that day and he was highly decorated by the FDNY and also a Viet Nam Vet who remembered how they were treated on their return home.

I was in Millertown, New York today and there there was an American flag every few feet, a parade and a somber speech given by a soldier who served in Iraq. He made reference to Sept. 11 and it was very serious, not a day about shopping, sales or barbecues but about serving your Country and also it is hard not to think of all those now and in the past lost.

It is all heart breaking the loss of life, military, civilians and truly it is a somber day and a day of respect.

I also think of my Dad who served in World War 2. He understands fully the seriousness of this day. If he had not survived World War 2, clearly I would not be here writing to you now and I also know how lucky I am that he is alive today. (One day I have quite a story to tell you about that in regards to my life and almost losing my Dad just before I sold my home under the most sick and disturbing of circumstances.)

Today is a day to thank your blessings if you are loved ones are here and mourn the many who have died in the line of duty...mourn them and prayers for all their loved ones as well and of course those injured as well.

The above Memorial is for the Korean War and at the exact time that peace was obtained the sun shines thru the art work as a sun dial honoring Peace. I find this one of the most moving unique memorials because the missing space -- the artist term "negative space" -- the solder is missing and that empty space goes on for eternity....it is not definable.

When the Parks Dept. mistakingly planted trees that would obscure the sun dial aspect of the Memorial I wrote them and I received a letter back telling me that I and a bunch of Korean War Vets had written and the trees were removed.

Rest in Peace...truly courageous souls and all that loved them...

Dennis Hopper dies family battles Hollywood news

He is most famous for Easy Rider and Blue Velvet.  I happen to have a large soft covered book of his photos as well as a poster from an art show of his in Soho from a long time ago.   They had plastered the posters all over the downtown area and I was able to take one home and frame it.  I had the Dennis Hopper poster by my bed of a biker couple huddled closely together in a diner.  When I moved under the most disturbing and awful of circumstances of which I still have not recovered, I sold or gave away most of my book collection but for some reason I did keep his book.  “Dennis Hopper Fotografien von 1961 bis 1967”.   I have the poster some where along with my own art work that I have yet to unpack.  I see NYC as losing it’s soul along with it’s historic buildings, small businesses and mass displacement of people either shifted or completely moved out of NYC....so why bother unpacking.  That is life under a developer’s mayor, Mike Bloomberg.

Clearly I liked Dennis Hopper’s photographs  of the  art scene and counter culture era very much in sync with his Easy Rider fame.  Supposedly Hopper resisted Jack Nicholson and wanted Rip Torn for the film but Nicholson in true form shined and greatly contributed to the film and of course there was  Peter Fonda.

What many people may not know is Jack Nicholson had done a biker film “Hell on Wheels” with the Hell’s Angels and Sonny Barger was hired as a consultant,   made 2 years before Easy Rider.  Some how I have a feeling Jack Nicholson spending some time with the Angels had a big  influence on “Easy Rider” which is  globally iconic still.

 I can’t help but think the infamous Hell’s Angels deeply influenced Hollywood and infact still do considering how many TV and films seem to “borrow heavily” and Jesse James has a YouTube stating the Hell’s Angels greatly influenced him.   Sonny Barger is reported to be in talks with Tony Scott to make a Hell’s Angel film about his life and Mickey Rourke is being considered for the role of Barger.  Even Harley Davidson acknowledges the mystique of the Hells Angels driving their sales.  The infamous Angels were known to “acquire” motorcycles one way or another and make-them over,  which drove the creativity and beauty that is now called motorcycle art.   You can see the Hell's Angels motorcycle creative influence  coming threw in Easy Rider as well in the multi-million dollar success of bike builder Jesse James and James openly admits it.  By the way, I am anti-Nazi but even in Dennis Hopper’s photos of bikers from the 1960’s you see Nazi imagery which is upsetting but it seemed that bikers and surfers of that era adopted the symbols and memorabilia perhaps as shock value.

 (Side note: I keep talking to you about my short story, “Chopping the Street, one mega-million dollars, at a time".  It is about a woman that takes over an infamous international biker club and transforms them into a financial service firm on wheels.  I wrote it in 2003 and it is about White Collar Crime above the radar costing the tax payers billions whether they are caught, successfully or not prosecuted.)

I remember finding Hopper startling in Blue Velvet.  He continued to have success and his voice will be heard as a wolf called Tony in an animated film, “Alpha and Omega”,  yet to be released.

He was clearly a troubled person and was married 5 times.  The latest marriage clearly with someone to young for him ended with him trying to divorce her on his death bed and he was unsuccessful.  It became a struggle over what she would inherit and what he felt she was actually entitled to.  They have a young daughter who must be very sad and perhaps this animated cartoon will be some small solace for her.

Hopper has three adult children from previous marriages and his oldest daughter is 5 years older then his widow he was desperately trying to divorce from his death bed.

A lot of older men want a younger trophy wife and perhaps this is a cautionary tale.

In The New York Post, a reporter asks Hopper’s son Henry how he is doing.  The son handed the reporter a white rose.  He than gave him the finger and said this is how I am doing.  No DNA testing to know Henry is truly Dennis Hopper’s son.

Note:  I am deeply focused on corruption and the economic catastrophe here in New York.    I am also horrified at the on going environmental catastrophe now washing up on New Orleans.  This oil spill is killing sea life which is a travesty that may be beyond comprehension for most people  and will have long range damage to Mother Earth beyond what is understandable right now.   The oil spill has killed untold sea life and  is devastating to all life on this planet in ways we don’t understand yet.  It is hard to write about celebrity news with these concerns.

David Seifman reports on an ex-Bloomberg Staffer that says we needs a public advocate and more!

http://www.nypost.com/p/news/local/pal_breaks_ranks_to_advocate_against_I6L5gtJgpBUDxoD2lO0M7N


Bravo David on reporting this. I just wrote the Public Advocate and left a voice mail for John Liu regarding CityTime and the mega-millions in spending heading to the billion dollar mark to supposedly bring the city a techno-time clock yet seems really about filling the deep pockets of consultants many getting close to half a million if not more and there are hundreds of consultants from what I have read. There also appears to be conflicts of interests including one I can't figure out. Is Joel Bondy working at City Hall and getting paid huge bucks as well as a consultant. His ex-employee collecting a city pension I read some where got a million for consulting. I call CityTime with high priced consultants a Titanic to the tax payers as welcome as Mike Bloomberg hiring his campaign staff with 6 figure salaries after the election. No wonder he doesn't want watch dogs. He doesn't want his coming and goings and his investments tracked and again I am told he has left early Friday morning to fly to Bermuda on his public jet. I also don't understand how the pensions were so mishandled and exploited when Bloomberg had his own people on a board over seeing them and Bloomberg is suppose to be a financial whiz. His tech obsessions are the tax payers nightmare and truly we need more watch dogs not less. 

Mike's Bermuda Trips to Cayman Island investments not forth coming +CityTime billion dollar scam to supposedly track city workers every move

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-5zmHtdSZNw Mike Bloomberg "the off-shore mayor" Brooklyn Bridge Park, Governors Island to Caymans + Steve Rattner.

I wrote this in response to a comment on YouTube. YouTube above has many links in blog posting exposing Mike Bloomberg. Mike wants to keep track of lower tier city workers with hand prints yet he sneaks out of NY, Friday morning to go to Bermuda. HIs connected consultants for CityTime, 2 who have worked for the City of NY & one I think is still employed at a very high level so that makes two jobs with no time clocks like consultants have no time clock and charge as much as 40,000 a month, one ex-city gov 1million for year

Make sure to read the blog link of mine on CityTime

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_Tz4eMcP2LU

Mike Bloomberg "Off-Shore Mayor" Brooklyn Bridge Park & Governors Island to Cayman + Steve Rattner

http://noticingnewyork.blogspot.com/2010/05/looking-gift-horse-in-mouth-examination_24.html Above link part 1 Looking a Gift Horse in the Mouth? An Examination of Brooklyn Bridge Park in Terms of the Politics of Development

Monday, May 24, 2010
Looking a Gift Horse in the Mouth? An Examination of Brooklyn Bridge Park in Terms of the Politics of Development, Part II


http://noticingnewyork.blogspot.com/2010/05/looking-gift-horse-in-mouth-examination.html

Monday, May 24, 2010
Looking a Gift Horse in the Mouth? An Examination of Brooklyn Bridge Park in Terms of the Politics of Development, Part III
http://noticingnewyork.blogspot.com/2010/05/looking-gift-horse-in-mouth-examination_21.html


by Michael D. D. White. You will learn why Michael calls Bloomberg the off-shore mayor from Governors Island to the Cayman Island and his links in his blog are extremely revealing or as much as they can be when it gets to the mayor's finances and other tidbits.

Please take the time to read Michael's expose and for me the way Mike Bloomberg has handled real estate and this ruthless tsunami of community crushing development as reckless and stupid as what brought the implosion of Wall Street is about the mayor wanting to do what he wants unchecked.

Steve Rattner thought he could do what he wanted to do unchecked and he has been busted.

You will have to go to the blog links above to read all the installments and also don't forget my piece on Mike Bloomberg's techno-dream is the tax payer's Titanic as in CityTime.

Carolyn Green Garden activist from Coney Island to the East Village her heart in two places loving the history and saving the gardens

Michael Schwartz, winner of Brooklyn Historical Society grant, author, actor on why Henderson Hall home to Marx Brother's early performances must be saved!!!!!!

http://www.saveconeyisland.net/ Save historic Coney Island and that includes this building you can't see behind Michael Schwartz. Michael grew up in Luna Park Housing in Coney Island. Schawrtz is the winner of the Brooklyn Historical Society's "interpreting Brooklyn" grant for his writing. Schwartz is writing a book of mostly Coney themed short stories, monologues, and poems. He has been performing them all over the city including WKCR FM radio, at the Museum of the City of New York, the Puffin Room, and the Brooklyn Book Festival at the Coney Island Museum and more! Mikes Schwartz is a writer, director, acotr and writing and acting teacher. http://www.marx-brothers.org/acting/vaude_detail.htm?show_id=4 http://amusingthezillion.com/2010/04/29/photo-of-the-day-interior-of-coney-islands-doomed-henderson-music-hall/

Lola the famous mover and shaker Coney Island T-shirts Coney Island wear, activism and roller derby

http://www.lolastar.com/

http://lolastaar.wordpress.com/

Coney Island Gauguin

Suzannah B. Troy exhausted takes free ride from Mike Bloomberg to Bermuda w/top city gov staff or the subway to Coney Island you guess

I am wearing my recession bikini I bought on Broadway, 6 dollars for the top and 6 for the bottoms and http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yuW2iUG_LvI you can see me wearing the top protesting Christine Quinn trying to pass herself off as Jane Jacobs but in reality she is in bed with developers and does Mike Bloomberg's bidding.

She has also taken plane rides on Mike's private jet.  http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=H_QI9yQZGIo

Suzannah B. Troy exhausted basketball star wins kitty cat Coney Island

Besides shooting hoops and winning a prize, I got to ride up in the very front of the Cyclone and it was soooooooooooooooo much fun!!!!!!!!!

I also went with very cool people and enjoyed free rides in the new Luna Park. All rides were free until 1:00!

Christine Quinn forgives billion + in ECB fines? Fleet Week super hotties! Quadrangle for Sale? Andrew Stein busted is anyone surprised?

First let us get the super hotties out of the way!!!!!!!!!!!!! Sizzling hot men have invaded NYC...it is Fleet Week!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Now to depressing news....Heard on the street.....Christine Quinn bragged she collected 15 million in uncollected ECB (Environmental Control Board) Fines but the only problem is according to what I heard on the street -- not Wall Street but the streets of New York -- the city was owed 1 Billion plus (add another 1/4 Billion) so she forgave a BILLION dollars and we are in a budgetary crisis.  Is this true?  Could this be......?

Look no one wants to stop a shady landlord, developer, contractor good friends or someone nice enough to grease palms so why collect BILLIONS owed and don't forget the mega-millions DOB is owed but if you get parking tickets and don't pay up expect your car to be seized....

It is like Mike Bloomberg wanting to have lowly city workers hands scanned to track their comings and goings but Mike has no records of when he gave Christine Quinn and others free rides on his private jet.
Speaking of which, The Financial Times writes:

"Quadrangle, the US private equity firm co-founded by former Obama administration car tsar Steven Rattner, is hiring bankers to consider options that could include a sale of the company, people familiar with the matter said on Wednesday. The move follows the firm’s agreement in April to pay $12m to settle investigations by the Securities and Exchange Commission and the New York Attorney-General’s office into 'pay to play' practices in the New York state pension system."
"Quadrangle, which settled without admitting or denying the charges, was accused of funnelling fees to a political consultant to secure investments from the state’s biggest pension fund. The case involved executives who are no longer at the firm."

By the way does anyone know the name of the new firm Steve Rattner created to manage Mike's 6 Billion dollars for charity? Is it Quadrangle 2 like Oliver Stone's sweet Wall Street flick Wall Street 1 and Wall Street 2?

Oh, and is anyone surprised about Andrew Stein getting busted?  He is one of many vain men so the worst punishment for him is if he has to go to jail and they won't let him where his toupee.  He had this Jeffrey Epstein wannabe kind of thing happening.... Has anyone asked Ron Pearlman for a comment on Andrew Stein or Shirley McClaine?

Suzannah B. Troy calls John Liu refers him to her piece City Time Tax Payers Titanic

I left a voice mail for City Comptroller, John Liu, referring him to the piece I wrote....

http://suzannahbtroy.blogspot.com/2010/05/mike-bloombergs-citytime-is-tax-payers.html

mayor Mike Bloomberg, did he buy condo building in Williamsburg near The People's Firehouse that he shuttered?

I was given a tip, with the specific address and told he bought it.

I don't know if it was for his public empire or private empire and the way some of his staff and he operate it is hard to tell the difference some days.

Why?  Is that ethical?

He pushes a reckless tsunami of development that communities city wide resisted and than he buys...is it the entire building and if so why?

We know Mike is not accountable to the laws that govern people.

What are his motives and if this is true will he change or get around the laws for his purposes business as usual.

How extra vile that the address is very close to the People's Fire House.

I don't have a private investigator and a press pass so I sent a long to some news reporters but I have been talking about the need for private investigators for quite a while on issues regarding conflicts of interest, local politics, real estate lawyers, SLA etc.
                                                                    ----------------------

Williamsburg has had buildings collapse and I don't understand how that happens.  Was DOB not doing their job or was someone getting paid off....I don't understand how does that happen.  Where too many permits passed out, DOB couldn't police but couldn't stop giving out permits like a drunk can't resist a bottle of booze and this was and is  a city wide problem where people have paid with their lives.

How do you close a firehouse and than push population growth.
How do do push population growth and not address infrastructure concerns.

How do you push population growth and not do anything to expand subway services and even garbage cans.   People are furious there are not enough garbage cans.

People are furious to be standing in dangerous crowds 5 rows back from subway car doors opening or worse passing them by so Mike would be the least welcome person in Williamsburg unless it's the Bowling Alley and it's a private party.

Hasn't stop Bloomberg from giving the green light to more reckless builds.   Bloomberg' popularity continues to sink like the Titanic.

Mike Bloomberg's CityTime is Tax Payers Titanic and most be stopped from being renewed this September

Mike Bloomberg’s obsessional love for technology is bankrupting NYC.   Some would even debate costing lives with the FDNY dispatch system, a multi-billion dollar  flawed system and “CityTime”  -  a state of the art Orwellian time clock on it’s way to being a billion dollar scam unless we can get the State Attorney General’s Office, the DA, John Liu, some higher power or 60 Minutes to investigate SAIC and consultants that oversee’s CityTime.   There are way too many “consultants” earning staggering salaries, some with possible red flags for conflicts of interest even though as we know the Conflict of Interest Board rarely finds anything a conflict of interest. 

Something must be done to prevent the renewal of CityTime aka “the tax payer’s Titanic” this  September, 2010.  Read my work which is hugely dependent on Ali Winston’s investigative work on SAIC which ties SAIC to Federal scandals, all the more reason  why we need nation wide attention focused here on CityTime.

I include Juan Gonzalez’s superb work as well because he has been tenaciously reporting on this disaster for the people of NY, that is, unless you are a consultant for CityTime, a true money pit black hole and in the midst of this recession that might become a depression, all the reason the mayor needs to pull the plug on CityTime now.

In fact can we get the tax payers a refund?

King mayor, Mike Bloomberg, the little emperor that denied us a referendum, the nanny mayor, wants union workers comings and goings tracked starting with swiping in with your hand print.  Of course Unions are resisting this and Local 375 has taken this issue to court breaking new ground.  The local Supreme court has rejected Local 375’s request for an injunction to stop palm-screening and the union is appealing the courts decision. http://www.citylimits.org/news/articles/3513/a-show-of-hands  as pointed out in Ali Winston’s piece, March 3, 2008.

Personally I think it is a scam and a sham.  These supposed state of the art hand  scanners look like throw aways from a factory sale from the 1950’s made-over with one goal and that is too make the rich companies and their special consultants even richer.

Remember Mike Bloomberg’s real goal was to be President of The United States of America?  Since he realized he couldn’t win he made up his mind he was going to buy himself a third term and did with the most expensive and humiliating win.

Let’s stick with “expensive” and “humiliating” to describe this techno-obsessed mayor’s bad choice to thrust “CityTime”, a company run by Science Applications International Corporation (SAIC, San Francisco based) on New Yorker’s like a third term we didn’t want.   His wild spending of his own personal fortune or in this case the tax payers money is making a small group of people very, very rich.

To give you just one example of this technological nightmare  and flim flam rip-off to the tax payers let me quote Joan Gonzalez from his powerful piece written December 4th, 2009 

A private consultant assigned to CityTime - the high-tech computerized payroll system that tracks the hours of city employees - billed taxpayers $47,250 for his services last June.

Read more: http://www.nydailynews.com/ny_local/2009/12/04/2009-12-04_time_to_punch_this_clock.html#ixzz0p4M9h7Rg

Read more: http://www.nydailynews.com/ny_local/2009/12/04/2009-12-04_time_to_punch_this_clock.html#ixzz0p4M3C9ia

And that was for just one month's work.

For the entire year, consultant Mitchell Goldstein of Spherion Corp. is on track to charge $490,000, payroll records show.

Three of Goldstein's fellow project managers on the CityTime contract, Srinivas Talasila, Mark Mazer, and Jacques Lucian, will each get more than $400,000 from the city.

The top 11 consultants Spherion has supplied to the city are billing an average of $307,000 for this year, and are expected to do so until 2012, the records show.

Welcome to one of the truly astounding consultant boondoggles in New York history.

Read more: http://www.nydailynews.com/ny_local/2009/12/04/2009-12-04_time_to_punch_this_clock.html#ixzz0p4LiT6Ib

There is also a staggering piece on this topic from Ali  Winston in City Limits, “A show of hands; City Workers resist tracking” which I have been referring to as well.  I will directly quote her because again I think of Mike Bloomberg and his eye on the White House when believe it or not Ali Winston takes you to the Pentagon where SAIC had big time problems as well SAIC staffers pleading guilty to EPA superfund sites.

 Let’s rewind

to the staggering costs Bloomberg’s techo-obsession and his control freak desires have cost people .  This is from Ali Winston’s article “The concerns, however, aren't confined to privacy issues. CityTime critics like State Assemblyman Alan Maisel (D-59th District, Brooklyn) are worried about the cost of the entire program, which also includes developing a computer network for data transfers. "I have a hard time understanding it," Maisel says. "There is so much money available for the Mayor's gadgets." The CityTime budget from 1999 to date outstrips this year's proposed budget cuts of $324 million and $95 million for the Department of Education and the NYPD, respectively.

Besides the size of the CityTime budget, there are questions about the companies who've been contracted under it. Science Applications International Corporation, a San Diego-based consulting firm founded in 1969, is the main contractor for CityTime, under a deal currently worth $348 million (up from the original contract value of $68 million). The company is responsible for research and development for the biometric readers, as well as implementation of the scanners and accompanying network. SAIC is a major government contractor, ranking among the top 10 federal vendors for at least the past four years and raking in $4.4 billion in contractors with the U.S. government in 2007 alone.
~      

But SAIC has also had high-profile problems over the years. In the early 1990s, the company and six of its employees pleaded guilty to making false statements in their handling of work at EPA Superfund sites.

 In 2004, the Pentagon's inspector general faulted SAIC's performance on a contract to rebuild the Iraqi media. The following year, the FBI blamed SAIC for botching the development of the bureau's new "Trilogy" information management system (although the Justice Department inspector general said the FBI deserved much of the blame). And the company was still wrangling into 2007 with the Greek government over whether SAIC deserved full payment for a security system it developed for the 2004 Athens Olympics.

http://www.citylimits.org/news/articles/3513/a-show-of-hands

According to Ali Winston’s piece there is another big fat conflict of interest and this get rich billing the tax payers a fortune which of course the famous “Conflict of Interest Board” ruled not a conflict of interest for OPA chief Joel Bondy to launch his own consultancy and work as a subtractor for Spherion on City Time from 2002-2004.

 Hey, why don’t we all do that?  So what is not the conflict of interest? .  Oh, it is that Joel Bondy  is the Executive Director of the office of Payroll Administration and so  he could also  be a consultant although Ali Winston points out it is Bondy’s work is never mentioned on the OPA website. http://www.nyc.gov:80/portal/site/nycgov/menuitem.047d873163b300bc6c4451f401c789a0/index.jsp?pageID=nyc_photo_slide&catID=1194&ndi=8&cc=unused1924&rc=1194&doc_name=%2Fhtml%2Fom%2Fhtml%2Fadmin_officials%2Fadmin_officials_2.html  You can see Joel Bondy’s photo on NYC gov website.  It gets worse. http://www.nydailynews.com/ny_local/2010/01/13/2010-01-13_payroll_guy_cashed_in_extech_boss_padded_250g_city_salary_by_lobbying_mike_for_c.html

Sal Salamone, a former City Hall Technology chief, recieved millions of dollars from the city over the past decade as a private consultant according to Juan Gonzalez’s investigative work.  Salamone reported directly to Joel Bondy so you know what I am confused...Did Bondy have two jobs at once and Salamone collects a NY pension and a fortune as a consultant.  Nice work if you can get it.

In this piece by Gonzalez, the mayor admits City Time is a disaster and guess who’s name comes up....Joel Bondy but not as a city employee but as OPA Director one of many firms, entities and individuals the city pays a fortune to for consultants.  Talk about too many chefs breaking the bank....

Ali Winston’s piece and Juan Gonzalez’s series of investigative reports  are a must reads to learn more about the financial quick sand or black hole , the nanny mayor,  control freak, Mike Bloomberg’s  obsession with technology is costing the tax payers.  We are heading towards the billion dollar mark -- fortune to do almost nothing except make some pals with White House connections or  just plain greedy ambitions very rich.

The original idea was to save the City money but it would take maybe a 100 years to do that if the city doesn’t go completely bankrupt first and soon at the rate we are going.

Bloomberg treats tax payer money like the 110 million he spent to win or steal a third term...free and easy with what I call sub-zero trickle down...meaning where did all that money go....just to a privileged circle of deep pockets like the  CityTime tax money guzzler.

Juan Gonzalez writes, “... the city is paying some 230 consultants an average salary of $400,000 a year for a computer project 7 years behind schedule and vastly over budget.”  http://www.nydailynews.com/news/2010/03/26/2010-03-26_city_pours_722m_down_consulting_contracts_black_hole.html

State Attorney General Andrew Cuomo has announced he is running for Governor and his choice for a running mate, Robert Duffy signals Cuomo will be tough on unions but NYC needs him or someone in his office to be tough and investigate this CityTime, SAIC nightmare and all the consultants involved.

I spoke to some union workers and they told me  you may have a small percentage of people that might not be ethical but this billion dollar disaster was not the answer.  It is a catastrophe to tax payers especially now.  

As I understood it, CityTime actually docks workers, so if they sign in at 9:05, you don’t get credit until 9:15 and if you sign out at 5:10 it will round off in the city’s favor so you are losing a half hour and you can sign in at your desk but it means turning on your computer, putting in you password and by the time you actually get to CityTime you have lost minutes.  I was also told if you sign in the first time wearing a ring and you don’t wear the ring it doesn’t work.  A union worker told me CityTime is computer smart and computer stupid.

How degrading it is and it makes me think of that TV show on Sunday Nights on Channel 2 where the boss has to go undercover and deal with low tier work and I have seen bosses cry.  Mike wouldn’t shed a tear but he wouldn’t tolerate having to sign in CityTime.  He doesn’t even keep a record of who flies on his private jet and some are city officials. 

The Unions are fighting saying big brother or Mike Bloomberg has gone too far but whether you welcome an Orwellian future where your comings and goings are technological documented or not, we the people can’t afford this massive financial guzzler of mega bucks.

This is as crazy as Mike Bloomberg hiring his campaign staff after the election in the midst of a budgetary meltdown that could take NYC from a recession to a depression but that didn’t stop king Mike from giving them all 6 figure salaries and The  New York Post estimated will cost  tax payers 2 million.

CityTime, SAIC, Sperion, Bondy’s consulting fees, etc. all are costing tax payers a fortune and so far this technology Bloomberg would thrust on us like he did his 3rd term denying us a referendum is costing the people of NYC  BigTime.  We can’t afford a big brother technology program put forth like the Titanic.

You would think Christine Quinn would be leading the charge to stop this but as always she is assisting the mayor as if she worked for his private empire instead of his public one.

Mike Bloomberg’s techo-dreams are the NYC tax payers worst nightmares....

Articles from the Daily News

Gonzalez: 'Consultants' getting $722M from city for doomed computer project

Posted on 03/26/2010 09:53:06 AM

The city is paying some 230 "consultants" an average salary of $400,000 a year for a computer project that is seven years behind schedule and vastly over budget.

Bloomberg admits $722M CityTime system to replace paper timesheets has been 'a disaster'

Posted on 03/01/2010 08:46:05 PM

Mayor Bloomberg acknowledged Monday the $722 million CityTime system has "been a disaster" - but offered no plans to fix it.

Gonzalez: Liu says big bucks stop here for wasteful, hi-tech payroll system

Posted on 02/11/2010 10:47:20 PM

City Controller John Liu is refusing to approve a new $8 million contract the Bloomberg administration has awarded for the city's controversial payroll and timekeeping system.

Gonzalez: City payroll guy cashed in

Posted on 01/12/2010 08:55:49 PM

Sal Salamone, a former City Hall technology chief, received millions of dollars from the city over the past decade as a private consultant helping to devise a controversial new timekeeping system for city workers.

Gonzalez: City to probe costly time-clock company

Posted on 12/17/2009 09:18:57 PM

Why has CityTime, a high-tech timekeeping and payroll system for city workers, ballooned in cost from $63 million to $700 million and fallen years behind schedule?

More Joel Bondy Articles from the Daily News

Read more: http://www.nydailynews.com/topics/Joel+Bondy#ixzz0pBOFgdXw

Rally in Harlem Against Racism in Arizona

The Bail Out The People Movement Urges you to Participate in 2 events united events in Harlem, a post Katrini/Rita Awareness walk and a Solidarity Rally Against Racism in Arizona THIS SATURDAY, MAY 29

While thousands march against SB1028 in Arizona
RALLY IN HARLEM AGAINST RACISM IN ARIZONA
STOP SB1020- LEGALIZATION NOW!

3pm, at 116st Street & Lexington Ave., In East Harlem (El Barrio, Home to a large Mexican & Immigrant Community)

For Information Call 212 633-6646


……BEFORE THAT, JOIN THE


POST KATRINA/RITA AWARENESS WALK
10am, St. Mary’s Episcopal Church, 521 West 126 St, Walk To Marcus Garvey Park (Madison Ave. between 120th & 124th St.) then to the Rally In El Barrio

For More Information about Post Katrina/Rita Awareness Walk Call: 866.264.1157 - Facebook/Post Katrina Rita Awareness Walk  - 

China community crushing development people's shocking actions

http://www.nytimes.com/2010/05/27/world/asia/27china.html?pagewanted=1

FYI

To Suzannah B. Troy fans, followers, friends thank again for all your support!

Big hugs and love,
S

New York Blood Center needs your donations

http://www.nybloodcenter.org/index.jsp

I have a donor card some where that says "Gallons of Blood".  I have donated red blood cells which is quick for me -- maybe 10 minutes.

I have donated platelets sometimes giving double donations because the nurse would give me a sad song about how much they needed them and I happen to be able to give double...story of my life...

Platelets took me 50 minutes to an hour...a double obviously longer.  You have a needle taking your blood out and shunting it in to a washer type machine and the machine separates the blood and takes the platelets which looks yellow like straw.






Here I am donating platelets.




I have donated white blood cells twice. You go to the NY Blood Center you are taken to a more private section and
for me it was two hours of being completely still with a needle in both arms. I am not one for sitting still.


I am so proud to know I was part of a group of complete strangers have come forward to give to help complete strangers...
the first a little girl with Non-Hodgkins and the 2nd time I did it for a Hispanic male in his 20's fighting lymphoma and again I am so proud especially in a city where rich people give with their check books and people that don't give, just take --
I gave -- two hours....each time and towards the end you get really cold...you really feel some vital part of your life force
leaving... the kind nurse that spends two hours with you gives you blankets and warmed soft gels to hold to keep your
hands warm.


You can only donate white blood cells 12 times in your life and you do replenish them.


I don't donate anymore.


Why?


My lawyers, dear friends, activists, NYPD officers, medical doctors that know about what I have endured know.  
It took a toll on my body. When you are traumatized your body gets flooded with adrenal
and cortisol and you get stuck there --- there are all kinds of side effects and I have had plenty of them...


I have been told by my MD who has been with me since my early 20's and my acupuncturist who tells me if energy is a
bank account yours is on empty to not give blood but take care of me.


So please donate blood because I have donated huge amounts over the years and I am just too tired and run down
to do so.

Jesse James Nightline Ratings High - I don't think he is a racist but a big mess

Nightline saw it’s best rating since it’s relaunch in 2005 with Jesse James interviewed by Vicki Mabrey and she did a great job.  I didn’t tune in and just watched segments.

I don’t believe Jesse James is a racist.  Here in NYC , I have seen photos posted by an elderly, grossly overweight white man of a middle aged African American  woman, homeless, poverty level, drunk out of her mind in the park  and with no tools or resources to climb out of her destructive cycle and worse has some white man with a camera photographing her topless out of her mind and posting on the internet -- in my opinion that  is racism,  misogyny and  a terrible double standard because I have seen that white man drunk and he had the luxury of a home to go close a door and he doesn’t want anyone to photograph him including without his shirt.  Jesse James hasn't done anything near as heinous as that.

It is easy to think James is a racist and he is flat out in denial or stupid to consider the Hitler gear as a joke.  It is no joke.  It is repulsive as is his treatment of his wife and everyone involved but is he the most hated person in the world?  Is he a racist or plain stupid?  When it comes to Hitler gear - I pick plain stupid.   No he is not the most hated person in the world or the brightest.  He is good at making motorcycle and lots of money.   The global audience  have their  lives and they are way too busy to think about him for more than a moment...he is “media fast food”, consumed, not digested and done with.  

I have said and continue to say he will continue to do really well with his career.  After all his career is based on the bad boy brand.  He comes across as sincere at moments but if he himself admits he is a liar why would he suddenly find truth and clearly he is in denial.  Just his talk about the Hitler gear.  I don't think he should have done this interview right now but he did and the ratings were very good so all the power to him as long as it isn't white power.  America loves redemption but looking at his failed marriages before none of this is a big time shocker except that Sandra Bullock was clueless.

As I understand it, Janine was pregnant with Sunny when Sandra and Jesse started dating which was a huge red light  and James was not involved in Sunny’s life until she was 3 years old when Janine was heading to Federal Prison for tax evasion.  Maybe I am wrong but that was what I heard....

I feel most sorry for Sunny because she has been through too much too soon in her short little life and hopefully Sandra Bullock will stay involved in Sunny’s life.  

Janine has blocked her twitter page to only her inside circle of friends.  She really wants to be in Sunny’s life and she will be in court to attempt to make it a legal reality as reported by TMZ.

Janine and Jesse has two things in common.  Sunny their child and the reality they both have to work on their lives, as we all do, but if not for themselves than for Sunny and their kids from other marriages as well.

Note: I think Janine is self-destructive and has to come to terms with her demons.  I also think there is something compelling about her and wished she could have been cast as the stripper in The Wrestler.  That way at the very end, when Randy the Ram, Mickey Rourke is talking to her before he goes in to the ring, you would have to think, wait Randy don't do it.  Janine would have made that scene before he walks out just rip!    If Janine could clean up her act, I could see her crossing over in to main stream film.  

I keep predicting James will be married again because he is they marrying kind and the marriage I predict will be open because I don’t see him being faithful.  What ever he has been doing has aged him and clearly has not been agreeing with him.  He looks much older and he may go the Hollywoo-woo way of getting some surgery to make himself look younger or do a radical change in what ever he has been doing but he looks like hell for now.  Not a poster boy for bad boy who makes  deals with the devil as in  Oscar Wilde's Dorian Gray but a warning to guys the bad bot life style is not all it's cracked up to be.

James has a following that love him and his family and a successful career...I am sure more drama to come.

“Jesse James The Brand” will continue on with success despite his repulsive misdeeds and  Nightline’s ratings are proof.  Just most women would not want to date him not that will in anyway change the number of enthusiastic women that will continue to hit on him because in the biker bad boy world it is no big deal.

I write about this because I know people are interested but I am gearing up for a “grown-up” piece on NYC politics that I am far more excited about coming to you soon.

Looking a Gift Horse in the Mouth? An Examination of Brooklyn Bridge in Terms of the politics of Development. Noticing New York

Hot off the presses (enjoy):

Monday, May 24, 2010
Looking a Gift Horse in the Mouth? An Examination of Brooklyn Bridge Park in Terms of the Politics of Development, Part I
http://noticingnewyork.blogspot.com/2010/05/looking-gift-horse-in-mouth-examination_24.html

Monday, May 24, 2010
Looking a Gift Horse in the Mouth? An Examination of Brooklyn Bridge Park in Terms of the Politics of Development, Part II


http://noticingnewyork.blogspot.com/2010/05/looking-gift-horse-in-mouth-examination.html

Monday, May 24, 2010
Looking a Gift Horse in the Mouth? An Examination of Brooklyn Bridge Park in Terms of the Politics of Development, Part III
http://noticingnewyork.blogspot.com/2010/05/looking-gift-horse-in-mouth-examination_21.html 

NJ & NY big win The Super Bowl plus dish on Sanchez, A-Rod and Suge Knight accused of playing "Godfather"?

New Yorkers and New Jerseyites football fans are celebrating the breaking news which is 2014 Super Bowl will be played at the New Jersey Meadowlands Stadium in New Jersey.   This is good for both NY and NJ who are in dire straits with economic budget problems and that is understating the problems.  Thanks to 1010 Wins for the scoop.

Mark Sanchez, the gorgeous quarterback for the NY Giants is now a regular fixture on Page 666, oops, Page 6 of The New York Post and is now rumored to be dating Jamie-Lynn Sigler.   Sanchez looks just too wholesome and sweet to pull an "A-Rod".  A-Rod famous for kissing his own reflection has made it clear he can't settle down and no woman can compete with his own love for himself.  I hear there is a tattoo on his chest that says warning, date at your own risk!  Just joking...


If you haven't watched the dark indie The Fan time to rent the DVD. 

I tend to visit TMZ to see what breaking news they have.  Harvey Levin is always found surrounded with a young diverse group of people including one "beautiful" blonde boyish guy I use to think was gorgeous until I heard him speak about women.

Harvey has a law degree which is very important when attempting to understand what is going on in current events and even gossip because celebrities seem to get in trouble with the law.  Harvey is one of the elite group of people in TV land that actually reads books.  Most people refer to movies instead of books but today he talks about Abraham Lincoln and says he has read books on him....just so rare except on a few grown up shows and even than they have "talking heads"  as opposed to well read.

On TMZ, the latest in Suge Knight and it is exactly as I wrote in my piece about him watching The Godfather way too much.

He is now accused of ordering a hit!  If you haven't watch Nick Broomfield's documentary on Tupac and B.I.G.

TMZ has new news about Jesse James supposedly thinking the Nazi "wear" was funny and let us face it -- it is not.  Again Jesse James is just better when he doesn't talk about anything but motorcycles.  He is not the most hated men.  Most people don't even think of him and have forgotten him if they even knew about him.  Jesse James has a strong following of fans and they don't care about whether he is lying about being related to the historical  Jesse James and if he lied, cheated, robbed Sandra Bullock of her Oscar win joy, etc.  They love him because he is a bad boy.  It is that simple.  Speaking up is not a good idea because he doesn't say anything that will endear him.  You can watch him tonight on Nightline and decide for yourself if you care at all.