Does anything linked to the Deutsche Bank building happen on time?
City Council Speaker Christine Quinn and Deputy Mayor Ed Skyler last week rolled out a legislative package to improve safety at demolition sites — the better part of two years after two firefighters were killed battling a blaze at the toxic Ground Zero structure.
But perhaps their late action is only fitting: After all, the likely result of the plan is to slow down citywide construction even more.
True, the package — which seeks to codify in law city regulations issued last year — includes some common-sense measures for streamlining agency communication.
But it also calls for layers of added red tape — including, tellingly, a prohibition on performing asbestos cleanup and building deconstruction at the same time without pre-clearance from three separate agencies.
New Yorkers have already seen the cost of what such indulgences can produce: The Deutsche Bank building is still standing, largely because of officials’ insane decision to scrub the whole thing with toothbrushes before taking down a single floor.
Look for the new regs to gum up the city’s recovery even more.
And all the more aggravating is that none of this is even needed.
Assigning responsibility for the 2007 tragedy, after all, is no great mystery: Those in charge fell down on the job.
Fire Department rules called for mandatory inspections of buildings under demolition every 15 days.
That didn’t happen; thus, no one knew that the standpipe that would have delivered water to firefighters Joseph Graffagnino and Robert Beddia had been severed — or that the building’s stairwells had been walled off.
The two suffocated.
Mayor Bloomberg could have fixed the problem the day after the fire — by demanding the resignation of Fire Commissioner Nicholas Scoppetta.
Scoppetta is a dedicated public servant, but the department’s failure occurred on his watch — and holding top management to account is the quickest way to get everyone else to do their jobs.
Instead, it’s taken Bloomberg and the Council two years to manufacture even more red tape.
Typical.