Where’s Blommy?!
Residents of a Manhattan Beach blasted Mayor Bloomberg for ignoring their neighborhood at a town hall meeting last Wednesday night, putting his detachment on display with a piece of art: an empty chair with a sign that read “Mayor Bloomberg.”
Manhattan Beach Community Group President Ira Zalcman said that the mayor never responded to his invitation to the summit, which was scheduled so that residents could gripe about the city’s handling of the Dec. 26 blizzard, and didn’t even send a representative.
“The mayor has thousands of city workers and he couldn’t find one person to come and speak to us?” Zalcman exclaimed. “But he came to a Manhattan Beach meeting when he was running for reelection in 2004.”
District Attorney Charles “Joe” Hynes did show up, and used the occasion to dis the city’s head honcho.
“He’s totally disengaged,” said Hynes. “What happened to this city [after the blizzard] was outrageous.”
The 100 or so snow summit attendees agreed that the city’s lackluster clean-up of the snowpocalyspe in Southern Brooklyn, which was one of the area’s hit hardest by the snow, was just the latest example of the city giving their area the shaft.
“The snow fiasco was a symbol of something a lot larger,” said Ed Jaworski at the meeting, which was held in the auditorium of PS 195 on Irwin Street. “Hearings should be held on many other topics, like parking, police presence and sanitation.”
Speakers then turned their attention toward other complaints with the mayor, such as his apparent disdain for motorists.
“We have lost more than 25,000 parking spots under this mayor because of added parking restrictions, bus lanes and bike lanes,” said Steve Barrison, spokesman for the city’s Small Business Congress which, along with many Southern Brooklynites, has long opposed city-issued measures like a bus lane along Nostrand Avenue and the bike lane along Oriental Boulevard.
“We live in forgotten communities,” cried state Sen. Carl Kruger (D–Brighton Beach), a frequent critic of the mayor. “We pay some of the highest taxes but receive the least amount of services.”
Residents also took shots at Public Advocate Bill De Blasio, another invite who failed to RSVP — he, too, had an empty chair with his name on it.
“I’m still waiting for his response,” Zalcman said.
The Manhattan Beach’s Community Group Town Hall won’t the last of the borough snow summits. A City Council-sponsored hearing will take place on Jan. 26 at IS 279 on Stuart Street in Marine Park at 6 pm.