Bloomberg Update: Fire and Ice (Part I)

On Monday, at NYU’s Robert F. Wagner Graduate School for Public Service, Mayor and mayoral candidate Michael R. Bloomberg addressed a large group mostly consisting of individuals from the city’s nonprofit organizations, spending 21 minutes telling them about the ways in which they were going to be getting money from his administration. The title of the address was: “Nonprofits In NYC: Facing the Challenges.” We say “mayoral candidate” Bloomberg because there is no one else campaigning with anywhere near the kind of financial presence of Mr. Bloomberg. Yes, Mr. Bloomberg, the man who became the city’s richest resident while he was mayor, taking his wealth up from about $2 billion to about $20 billion. And it hasn’t yet been two terms. Bloomberg wants a third. During his remarks he joked with casual aplomb about going for a “twelfth term.”

Updates While Looking at the Mayoral Campaign

We are going to use this occasion of the Mayor’s talking to those assembled from the nonprofit community as a chance to talk about the unfolding campaign for mayor and to provide updates to the portrait we painted when looking into the workings of the Bloomberg administration at the beginning of February (Monday, February 2, 2009, The Good News IS the Bad News: Thanks A lot for Mayor Bloomberg’s “Charity.”)

In other words, we will write here about a man of unfathomable wealth who is dedicated to remaining in power and who in the process abuses charities, process and conflicts of interest. Unfathomable wealth? Well you can conclude from what we write further on whether it is possible that Bloomberg is, in fact, so unfathomably wealthy that Bloomberg recently lost $4 billion in personal wealth in a matter of months without the press even noticing when reporting on the subject of the stats of his net worth. In the end, none of this is healthy for the city. We conclude by looking at how the Bloomberg administration’s mismanagement is leaving us with barren salt-sown earth in our urban environment.

The updates here illustrate in a time-microcosm the same concerns we previously wrote about. (For the macrocosm refer to our previous piece.)

Bloomberg Campaign Proceeds Apace Financially With a Ubiquitous Bloomberg Face

Bloomberg’s face is everywhere these days. His campaign advertisements are appearing all over on the back of community newspapers like Chelsea Now. (Click on image.) A Brooklyn Paper story accompanied by Bloomberg’s picture on the front page begins: “Mike Bloomberg wants YOU — to volunteer for his race for a third term. To make it easier, the billionaire mayor opened campaign offices in all five boroughs last weekend . . .” (See: Billionaire Bloomy needs you to volunteer for his campaign, by Gersh Kuntzman, March 30, 2009.)

(Click on images to enlarge, this one from the front page Brooklyn Paper story.)





Bloomberg’s publicists seem to have done good work. If you were riding Amtrack this past month, Bloomberg’s face would have been staring at you from the many covers of Amtrak’s Arrive magazine, slapped onto a story about harnessing wind power that seemed to have very little to do with the expensive high-end picture portraits of Bloomberg incorporated into the magazine.

(BTW: We must acknowledge that in some recently appearing photographs Bloomberg looks pretty good. Is he working out? Losing weight? Are old archived photos being exhumed? Nobody seems to be alleging that he has had any `work done.’)













Bloomberg, Bloomberg everywhere, but you see almost nothing of the opponent candidates. This is partly attributable to the terrific degree to which Bloomberg is outspending his challengers, See the recent New York Times story on the three million his campaign has already acknowledged spending: Bloomberg Spends $3 Million on TV Ads in Mayoral Race, by Michael Barbaro, April 7, 2009.

The $3 million cost of the ads exceeds the combined spending by all of his Democratic rivals since the start of the current election cycle, in 2006.

And it represents nearly half of what the city’s campaign finance laws allow each of his challengers to spend on the race between now and their party’s primary in September.

Without money others may be in the political doldrums, but Bloomberg is pursuing endorsements. He has gotten endorsements from the Independence Party and from the Staten Island Republican Party. The Independence Party’s endorsement is part of a calculated bid to get enough votes to keep its line on the ballot in the future. The fortunes of that party are fading and part of the deal for the party’s endorsement is that “in return for the support. . . that the mayor had offered, among other things, to help pay the costs of promoting him as the party’s candidate.” (See: Bloomberg Is Endorsed by Independence Party, by Fernanda Santos, April 5, 2009.)


Masterful Mayor on Monday

In his remarks on Monday, the mayor, introduced as a “hugely strong supporter of non profits,” did not, for the most part, say that nonprofits were going to get more money from the city. He spent his time talking about the procedural details of the nonprofits continuing to get the money they are already getting. Apparently, there will be less paperwork and procedures will be streamlined and brought up to date with more computer- and web-based support mechanics. (The city also stands ready to help nonprofits save money by conserving energy, group purchasing, and taking advice from the city on better management.) The mayor also did not mention his own substantial private flow of funds to nonprofits.

The mayor’s remarks were masterfully delivered. He seemed supremely confident. We thought about this. To us it seemed the confidence of someone totally in control and who intends to give up none of that control. After his remarks the Mayor sauntered off the stage and an announcement was made on his behalf that he was leaving because he `had no time to answer questions.’

FIRE and ICE

Clearly focused upon on Monday was the new importance of “ICE.” ICE is what we are going to get in the winter of our discontent now that our FIRE is sputtering out. Expect to hear a lot more about it. (For instance: Wednesday, March 11, 2009, With Houses Divided And Revenue Reduced, How Can Legislature Agree on Any Budget? By Henry J. Stern, March 10, 2009)

FIRE, standing for “Finance, Insurance and Real Estate,” is that sector of the economy that has always most preoccupied Bloomberg. It is that sector of the economy where he made his money. It is that sector for which he primarily envisioned building. It is that sector of the economy that, with bubble economics, was driving other sectors out of existence in New York. And now that the bubbles have burst we, as a city, have found ourselves in the lurch. Now we are hearing a new term used to talk about that sector of the economy that is expected to pick up the slack, ICE for “Information, Culture and Education” (or, alternately, until a consensus develops, “Intellectual, Cultural and Educational.”) Other cities that were not so tied to FIRE, cities like Savannah, knew about ICE a long time ago even if it had not yet been so christened. For NYC residents it is just beginning to be talked up, but this has always been an important part of our economy, especially since it includes science, health care and medical schools.

There is also the very peculiar way that the real estate industry has always valued culture, as in “artists.” Artists are viewed as the vanguard that create value in transforming neighborhoods though they then get kicked out when they are out-bid by higher-paid FIRE arrivals.- That’s grist for further rumination to discuss in another article at another time.

Reference to ICE was made in the introduction by New York University President John Sexton that prefaced the mayor’s remarks. Mr. Sexton took responsibility for coming up with the term “ICE.” We think we can recognize an advertising campaign when we hear one, political or not. Not only do we come from a family that included a good many advertising professionals but our aunt, Kay Daly, is credited with coming up with the original Revlon “Fire and Ice” campaign of the `50s, renowned in advertising circles. (See: Fire and Ice, by Andrew Tobias.)

Cold and Clammy Thoughts About ICE

It is not that in paying attention to the ICE sector Bloomberg is switching his attention to something he has never heeded before. The sector is filled with nonprofits and, going back to a time not long before he first ran for mayor, he started making “charitable” contributions to a vast number of institutions in the sector. At last report there were 1,221 recipient groups showing up in his 2008 tax return and that probably leaves out many others receiving his “largesse” via other means, such as the taxpayer-financed gifts from the city or the Mayor’s Fund charity, controlled through City Hall.

It is actually pretty scary to think that FIRE and ICE are considered the two major sectors of the economy and that Bloomberg’s ties to each are so significant. Our wealthiest resident privately does business with most of the firms in the FIRE economy while simultaneously dispensing critical discretionary City Hall favors throughout that sector. That is not to say that Bloomberg doesn’t also do business with many in the ICE sector. The largest nonprofits have substantial endowments to invest and it also seems to be increasingly fashionable for the large nonprofits to think in terms of making killings in real estate. That seems a temptingly easier path to funds than pursuing their missions in more traditional ways. (See: Nonprofits Look for Cash, ‘Salvation' in Real Estate, by Michael Stoler, March 8, 2007 and How Real Estate Bolsters Nonprofits, By by Michael Stoler, May 10, 2007)

Hot and Cold

There is the famous Aesop’s fable of the Shepherd and the Satyr from which comes the phrase to “blow hot and cold in the same breath.” The fable is a tad more enigmatic than some other of Aesop's, founding its inexplicability upon the foreignness of two creatures, one of them mythical, each hailing from a different world. (Notably, the mythical creature, the satyr, has the higher standards while the human, is just, well, just human.) The fable can leave some room for how it is interpreted but most often it is considered to refer to a man who cannot be trusted. It is not the same thing as “running hot and cold” which refers only to simple vacillation. Instead it bespeaks an untrustworthiness born of a devious duality of purpose. What that duality involves or how it problematically undermines the hope of depending on someone to act in accord with a declared purpose is left to be fleshed out by the specific situation when the phrase is applied.

We point out the aptness when, dealing with FIRE and ICE, of applying the “blows hot and cold in the same breath” phrase to Bloomberg who, in the case of both sectors, has a substantial dualities of purpose. He governs the FIRE sector while making his living from it. When it comes to the ICE sector, anyone who receives the “gift” of his “charity,” as we will discuss further, should wonder about the extent to which it should actually be considered a “gift.”

When it comes to Bloomberg, we find ourselves with the satyr, we “will have nought to do with a man who can blow hot and cold with the same breath."

What Did Bloomberg Need to Say to Get His Campaign Message Across With ICE?

We thought it was interesting what the mayor did not have to say on Monday, starting with what we observed about how what he was saying was not about giving the nonprofits MORE of the city’s taxpayer money that flows through the Bloomberg administration. It was sufficient for campaign purposes for Mr. Bloomberg to focus only on the “procedures” by which members of the assembled audience would get money. The mayor never mentioned the funds that he personally gives out (actually or potentially) to these same organizations. Did he need to? Consider this: It was featured news at this initiative-announcement/press conference/campaign event that “returnable” money or possible temporary bridge loans from the city were being increased by $12 million. It was the dollar figure mentioned in terms of new funds being made available. Compared with that, Bloomberg privately is now the source of $235 million or more per year in funds that can be kept as “gifts” and not returned.

Here is what the handout said about the funds for “short-term” use:

The city will more than double the size of the New York City Returnable Grant Fund from $8 million to $20 million- a 150 percent increase - for the next two fiscal years.

(See also, Bloomberg Outlines Initiatives to Assist Nonprofits, 07 April 2009.)

Mr. Bloomberg concluded his remarks by conspicuously informing all of the nonprofit community guests assembled that their point person on dealing with his administration on funding should be First Deputy Mayor Patricia Harris. We have previously written about Ms. Harris (see again: Monday, February 2, 2009, The Good News IS the Bad News: Thanks A lot for Mayor Bloomberg’s “Charity.”) and we have more to say here. Ms. Harris, who came with Mr. Bloomberg from his private sector operations, seems to have problems understanding conflicts of interest and seems to be in the thick of some very disconcerting qui pro quo-ing. Her responsibilities overlap some dangerous areas of concern: charities and big real estate.

Devoiding the Field of Alternatives to Bloomberg

We would hope that checks on the power of Bloomberg as the city’s wealthiest resident would include alternative mayoral candidates with viable campaigns to run against the mayor. There are candidates, but their numbers are declining. Those that exist are having problems raising the funds necessary for the public to find out about them, funds they also need to have good campaign staff and support. More on this later. First, some explanation why.

Mayor’s Abuse of Charities to Deprive Opponents of Political Funding

We previously wrote about how Bloomberg leveraged his “charitable” contributions for political purposes. We wrote about phone calls from high up in the Bloomberg administration scolding the recipients of Bloomberg “charity” for providing financial support to Bloomberg’s political adversaries. (See: Monday, February 2, 2009, The Good News IS the Bad News: Thanks A lot for Mayor Bloomberg’s “Charity.”)

Such high-level discouragement of financial support for his political opponents came from the same deputy mayor, Patricia Harris, entrusted simultaneously with responsibilities for Bloomberg’s“charitable” largesse and overseeing important city and City Hall-influenced decisions significantly affecting the economics of big-developer real estate deals. When last we wrote, we cited the New York Times. Here, as a supplement, is a link to an Observer article we missed that is about the Bloomberg City Hall administration’s use the “charities” to discourage contributing the mayor's political opponents. (See: A Deputy Mayor Hits Culturati On Giff Giving, by Lizzie Ratner and Ben Smith, May 30, 2004.) Yes, that article focuses on First Deputy Mayor Patricia Harris (“Pattie Harris”).

The Observer article covered, if allegations are to be believed, multiple contacts by Ms. Harris. Since essentially the same reported language was used in the case of the two of the three situations where the reporters talked directly to individuals threatened, it is likely Ms. Harris was working from what was essentially a script to make a comprehensively orchestrated set of contacts. Support for Bloomberg’s opponent (Gifford Miller) was viewed as “unfriendly or disloyal" “anybody who donates to Gifford is going to be viewed as disloyal" and “ the Mayor wasn't happy.” (General background: There has also been an article in the New York Post publicly reporting that the mayor was ‘livid’ with those on the list of contributors to Miller.)

Bloomberg administration spokesman, William Cunningham, defended rather than denied the allegations:

He said there was nothing inappropriate in the deputy mayor's questions. "You have a right to ask a question, 'Did you really give money to someone who's working against us? We've been with you for years,'"

Apparently, the implied threat aspect of this (technically denied by Mr. Cunningham) applied both to Bloomberg’s private charitable funding going back for years as referred to above and also, according to those recipients speaking to the reporters, to public funding over which Bloomberg (and Deputy Mayor Harris) did not start exercising control until he assumed the office of mayor in January 2002.

In the article, Gene Russianoff, a senior attorney with the New York Public Interest Research Group, commented:

Ms. Harris' conversations with the Miller contributors could "chill contributions" to Mr. Bloomberg's opponents. "If true, it's inherently coercive for a government employee to be doing that," he said. The City Charter bars deputy mayors from soliciting political contributions, but contains no explicit prohibition on their discouraging contributions to others.

Personally, we doubt such activities by the Bloomberg administration do not transgress the line of what is legally permissible. (In spring 2004, still preoccupied by 9/11, we think that Bloomberg was still in an unexamined honeymoon period with the press.) If the law actually permits Bloomberg such latitude then the problem is that the law is not strict enough. Remember that we are talking about the man who is currently, far and away, the city’s wealthiest citizen who by virtue of being mayor also controls extraordinary public funding. Mr. Russianoff was not clear that Bloomberg was legally home safe with respect to his conduct. His comment extended to include this:

However, the city's Conflicts of Interest Board has been known to censure officials who violate the spirit of the charter's rules.

Given the above we wondered exactly what was meant when we read that the Bloomberg’s Deputy Mayor Edward Skyler, in charge of administration, threatened city’s comptroller, William C. Thompson Jr., a candidate running for mayor against Bloomberg, with “the Gifford [Miller] treatment.” (See: Mayor Trusts Youngest Deputy to Run the City, by Michael Barbaro, April 9, 2009.) It is not clear form the context of this recent Times story what that threat was intended to mean, but however it was intended one must also wonder how it was interpreted by the recipient.

No Rescue in the Times?

While the New York Times has reported on Bloomberg’s abuse of charities for political purposes as front page news, the Times has not yet editorialized directly against it. The Times editorial page nevertheless appears to be very well able to perceive the critical importance of keeping politics and charity separate and has called for appropriate conduct characterizing the following as one in a list of “stunners”:

For more than 50 years, it has been against the law for charities to contribute to politicians. This news appears not to have reached Albany. Danny Hakim and Jeremy Peters recently reported in The Times about how more than 80 tax-exempt charities have been doling out money to helpful state politicians.

Some of the charities said they simply “goofed,” even though they appear to have received favors from politicians they supported. Charities should know better; the illegal money, meanwhile, should be returned.

(See the editorial: Albany Syndrome, March 20, 2009 and see also the story to which it referred: Charities Give to State Campaigns, Despite Law, by Danny Hakim and Jeremy W. Peters, March 16, 2009.)

Speaking in general terms, the concerns the Times editorial confronted involved quid pro quo exchanges between politicians and charities wherein a charity forsakes its obligation to benefit the public in a nonpolitical, neutral fashion. When charities abandon their obligation to benefit the public nonpolitically and neutrally as a result of such quid pro quo exchanges, there is an amplification of concern because, with special privileges to avoid taxes, the quid pro quo exchanges can have disproportionately large economic impacts. This applies to the Bloomberg situations as well.

The Times editorial which had a few other complaints about conduct and failure to clean house in New York bemoaned: “The news from Albany these days is filled with evidence of dysfunction and allegations of full-blown illegality.” But if the New York Times as the paper of record presides over dysfunctional politics in New York perhaps it bears much of the responsibility itself by not reporting what it should and by not calling for appropriate conduct as and when it should.

We have previously pointed out that by prematurely supporting a third term for Bloomberg in ill-considered fashion, the Times editorial page is now often in the feckless position of calling for better conduct from Bloomberg after the fact. (See: Saturday, November 15, 2008, The Mayor, The Times’ Timing, and a Proper Ordering.) We have been accumulating a growing list of such too-late editorials chasing after the mayor. If the New York Times ever does editorialize against Bloombergian abuse of charities it seems we will just have to add that editorial to the list.

Might It Be Goose and Gander With Ms. Harris?

If charities are abused this way by Ms. Harris to downwardly manipulate contributions to Bloomberg opponents, we must necessarily speculate about how impartially Ms. Harris handles City Hall’s ability to make discretionary decisions with respect to large real estate projects since this is also a responsibility assigned to her purview. We view it as problem that so much of local New York City politics is funded by the political contributions of real estate developers. We view it as a problem, but is nonetheless a reality that such political contributions sort of set the bar in terms of what people expect. People have come to expect the well-funded well-staffed kind of campaigns they see when campaigns are taking money from real estate developers. But if Ms. Harris can dissuade real estate developers from making contributions to Bloomberg’s opponents, then you won’t see them running those kinds of campaigns.

Other Mayoral Candidates: Those Who Are NOT Taking Contributions From Real Estate Developers

One of the candidates running against Bloomberg, City Councilman Tony Avella, is not going to have the problem of Bloomberg or Patricia Harris dissuading real estate developers from making contributions to his opposition campaign. Candidate Avella does not take contributions from real estate developers. He made this point at the March 7, 2009 15th annual Historic Districts Council (HDC) conference, Communities and Cornices: Preservation in a Political World, where all the mayoral candidates were invited to speak. (Mr. Bloomberg didn’t avail himself of the invitation and Comptroller William Thompson also did not come.) We were there. In the Q&A session, after Mr. Avella made the point that he was the only major candidate to that didn’t accept contributions from real estate developers except for Mr. Bloomberg, we corrected Mr. Avella: We pointed out that Mr. Bloomberg essentially does take political contributions from real estate developers since Bloomberg causes real estate developers to contribute to charities he designates and he then uses those charities for political purposes. (See: Monday, October 20, 2008, “Charity?” We Begin to Groan.)

There is another candidate who is not taking money from developers, Billy Talen, better known as Reverend Billy.

Tony Avella can run a campaign on the merits, pointing out the fact that he is consistently on the right side when it comes to development issues. He is on the right side even when that means taking a lonely position and he is on the right side of other important issues such as opposing the repeal of term limits in the fashion it was done. While he can run a campaign based on these merits, he is not running a very well-financed campaign and that probably causes many to judge him as running what looks like a campaign that could be higher profile and better run.

Reverend Billy’s core positions are probably not so different than Councilman Avella’s. He is a robust critic of the venality in the real estate industry. We hope that Reverend Billy can make up for, with showmanship, what must also be a very small campaign purse.

Other Candidates in the Somewhat Devoided Field of Alternatives to Bloomberg

The other candidates running against Bloomberg were Anthony Weiner and William C. Thompson.

As noted, William C. Thompson, City Comptroller and the candidate viewed as the strongest opponent to Bloomberg, didn’t speak at the HDC conference.

Mr. Weiner spoke earnestly, addressing himself to preservation issues, but he left without a Q&A session. This was ascribed to a lack of time, but we wondered whether it should be attributed to an unease about whether the audience would be friendly. Among other things, it has been predicted that Mr. Weiner would, as mayor, be on the wrong side when it came to preserving a viable Coney Island amusement park.

More on our mind when Mr. Weiner spoke was the predication we had heard that he was about to drop out of the race. We were told by people apparently in the political know that he would drop out because Senator Schumer was telling him to, telling him it was not his time (and perhaps clearing the way for Bloomberg?). We can’t vouch for the accuracy of what we were told, but only a few days later Mr. Weiner did drop out as predicted.

(For other reporting on the candidates’ remarks at the conference see: Saturday, April 11, 2009, A few mayoral candidates (but not the big two) on historic preservation, plus more from the HDC conference.)

No Strong or Real Choice in the Field of Candidates?

The New York Times described Mr. Weiner’s dropping out more technically as a “move to the sidelines” since Mr. Weiner said he could possibly resume his campaign months from now. (See: Political Memo: Bloomberg and the Incredible Shrinking Mayor’s Race, by Michael Barbaro, March 13, 2009.)

One thing Mr. Weiner did very well when he was running was to speak eloquently against the way the mayor maneuvered to extend term limits against the public’s wishes. The above Times article begins by pointing out:

It was a central argument by Mayor Michael R. Bloomberg for re-engineering the city’s term limits law last year: Allowing him to seek re-election would give voters a bigger pool of candidates from which to choose . . .

“If anything, the public has more choice because there will be more candidates, at least one more in the mayor’s race,” he [Bloomberg] said the day after the City Council voted to rewrite the rule.

It then notes that choice was, instead, eliminated:

“We now know what Bloomberg meant when he said ‘choice’ — he meant himself,” said Bruce F. Berg, chairman of the political science department at Fordham University.

Rewriting term limits, Mr. Berg said, “has stifled choice. And if Thompson drops out, he may well have eliminated choice.”

An aid to a Republican interested in getting into the race:

. . . expressed bewilderment over Mr. Bloomberg’s contention that altering the term limits would create a wider pool of candidates. “Historically, in any race, you will see more candidates when it’s an open seat than when there is an incumbent,” he said.

The article concludes:

“The power of the mayor’s incumbency, coupled with the power of his money, makes a smart politician think, ‘Maybe I should take a pass on this,’ said Steven A. Cohen, a professor of public affairs at Columbia University.

And Bloomberg clearly wants the field to himself. This week a story has come out about Bloomberg’s fervor to eliminate Weiner as opposition even as Weiner was dropping out of the race. According to the Times, Mr. Bloomberg commissioned a telephone poll last month that spread derogatory information about Weiner. (See: ‘Survey’ Calls Attack Bloomberg Rival, by Raymond Hernandez, April 6, 2009.)

Speaking of the calls which were confirmed to be part of Bloomberg’s campaign:

One of the Congressman’s [Weiner’s] aides said that the calls seemed suspiciously like push-polling — a technique disavowed by reputable pollsters in which phone calls disguised as survey research are used to spread negative information about an opponent.

Joel Benenson, a senior campaign adviser to Mr. Weiner, described push-polling as “one of the most discredited and dishonorable forms of negative campaigning.”

Back to the article, “Bloomberg and the Incredible Shrinking Mayor’s Race,” we think it incorrectly experiments with giving Bloomberg credit, aside and apart from his money, for being the currently more popular candidate. It does so by offering a side-by-side comparison of Mr. Bloomberg to Governor Corzine of New Jersey:

Money alone does not explain his popularity, they said, even if it helps. After all, in New Jersey, another wealthy businessman-turned-politician, Gov. Jon S. Corzine, faces an uphill re-election race, no matter how much he is willing to spend on a campaign.

But Mr. Bloomberg’s popularity ratings, which dropped to the low 50s in February after being in the 60s last year, are higher than Mr. Corzine’s.

From this the article infers the Bloomberg may have governed better than Corzine. Comparison to Corzine is a worthwhile exercise, but is should be done with the proper rigor.

Yes, Corzine spent heavily on his own campaign, but Corzine’s wealth is measured in mere millions. Corzine’s total net worth is less than half of what Bloomberg “gives” away every year to “charity.” Bloomberg’s charitable giving is used to manipulate politics and public opinion, so Corzine’s total net worth is way below what Bloomberg spends on such manipulations each year.

Bloomberg has ongoing personal business affairs that routinely create conflicts of interest while he is stockpiling astronomical wealth. Bloomberg fails to recuse himself when he should. Corzine simply has no such comparable conflicts of interest.

To compare Bloomberg’s billions to Corzine’s paltry millions is simply to illustrate that you have seriously lost track of how outsized and beyond most people’s comprehension of Bloomberg’s wealth actually is.

Losing track of Bloomberg’s Incomprehensible Wealth: And Did Bloomberg Lose $4 Billion?

Here is an example of just how blithely inept we are at keeping track of Bloomberg’s wealth. The Times ran an article in March saying that Forbes was reporting that Bloomberg’s wealth went up this year- - to $16 billion. (World’s Richest Aren’t So Rich Anymore, Forbes Says, March 12, 2009.) It reported that to be a $4.5 billion dollar increase in Bloomberg’s net worth but, if it had been keeping track, it could likely have reported a $4 billion loss instead.

Indeed, in March as part of listing of the world’s richest men, Forbes did report Bloomberg’s wealth as $16 billion making him the 17th most wealthy man in the world. But only six months before in September of 2008 as part of listing of America’s richest individuals, Forbes reported Bloomberg’s wealth as $20 billion, making him the wealthiest New Yorker and the 8th most wealthy U.S. citizen at that time. (As of March he was the 5th wealthiest person in the country.) So when the Times reported his wealth was going UP despite hard economic times, did they miss what was actually a decline in the last six moths? The Forbes article did say that those whose wealth had declined only 20% in the past year were doing well. That may or may not apply to Bloomberg since the basis for setting the figure for his wealth at $20 million was only established in July so the decline is not for a full year.

There are plenty of possible reasons for Bloomberg’s wealth as reported in Forbes to have gone down and plenty of questions to be asked in connection with them. Did Forbes quietly evaluate the wealth of a campaigning mayor more conservatively? Or did Bloomberg actually start losing billions at a good clip just recently? $4 billion in six month loss would annualize to $8 billion over a year, something on the order of 40% or double the loss that would put Bloomberg in the lucky category in this downturn. That would comport well with the idea Bloomberg didn’t see this financial crisis coming and that he isn’t a financial genius.

We don’t know the answers that explain it, but we don’t even see anyone asking the questions. Has anyone besides us actually noticed that Bloomberg’s wealth figure went down? Is Bloomberg’s wealth now so stratospherically beyond our comprehension that noticing this eludes us? The Post and the even the Wall Street Journal simply reported the March story the way the Times did, as if Forbes was reporting another increase in Bloomberg’s wealth rather than a $4 billion decline. (See: Bloomberg Is the Richest Man in NYC: Mayor Raking it in - but Nobody Else is, by Kirsten Fleming, March 11, 2009 and, The Wealth report: These Billionaires Actually Got Richer in 2008, by Robert Frank, March 16, 2009.)

For our own quick reference with collected figures tracking Bloomberg’s wealth see: Bloomberg’s Increasing Annual Wealth: 1996 to 2008 (Tuesday, February 3, 2009). (We need to do an update to show that most recent Forbes reported decrease.)

(Click here to continue to Part II of this article.)

Brian Lehrer Takes Stock of the Building Boom: We Ask Some Coulda, Shoulda Questions About the (AOL) Time Warner Center

The Brian Lehrer program launched a new project on Wednesday (April 1st) that could prove interesting. (It was not an April Fool’s joke.) Taking advantage of the hiatus the economy has afforded in the recent breakneck building boom, on Wednesdays through the month of April the program will have segments taking stock of the changes in our built environment. (See: The Brian Lehrer Show, Cityscapes: New Landmarks, Wednesday, April 01, 2009.)

What the Series Involves: Wednesday’s Guests and Videos

The series is inviting radio listeners to call in or post comments on the program’s web page about what best defines their changed experience of New York as a result of the building boom. This Wednesday such a call prompted an impromptu evaluation of the (AOL) Time Warner Center that really got us thinking. More on this and a trip down memory lane will be the main focus of our article after we dispense with preliminaries.

Lehrer’s discussion this Wednesday involved as guests the New Yorker's architecture critic Paul Goldberger and architect Hugh Hardy, founder of H3 Hardy Collaboration. The series also incorporates videos posted on the site, including videos done by Mr. Hardy.

Some Commentary You Would Expect

The commentary on Wednesday struck some notes that, while they were what one would expect, were interesting nonetheless. (But feel free to skip to the next section if you are pressed for time.)

What Isn’t being Built

Mention was made by Mr. Goldberger (3:25 ) of the importance of what isn’t now happening. That ties in with our April Fool’s joke of that same day concerning the Ratner Beekman tower near City Hall which has halted construction at about half its projected height. That halted construction is now the perfect epitome for an ongoing public debate: Given that it was going to be enormously tall and Gehry-esquely bizarre leaning over City Hall, how many people would actually prefer that the building’s construction never resume to make it any taller?

Mr. Goldberg also specifically mentioned the disappointing inactivity at Ground Zero.

Variation Obliterated by “Whole-block Buildings” of Oversized Scale

The conversation really got underway with the subject of scale. In an excerpt from one of the videos (4:38) Mr. Hardy presented the example of a “major” new development down on Houston Street that involved “one block with a single building” as opposed to the variety of different buildings in the neighborhood from an earlier era. In the video Mr. hardy comments: “That was the scale of 19th century New York. Here’s the scale of 21st Century New York. Heaven knows what’s going to follow.” Describing to Mr. Lehrer what was lost with the single large-scale building (4:48):

. . an entire block has been dedicated to fairly mundane stuff; mundane because it just repeats and repeats and repeats without any specific point of view and it’s right next door to the lower east side jumble from the 19th century in which each plot had a different owner and a different attitude about what architecture was.

Mr. Hardy and Mr. Lehrer thereupon extemporized to create the term “whole-block buildings” to describe what they were talking about. Mr. Hardy continued exchanging with Mr. Goldberger (5:30):

HH: And every now and then there is gesture made to the past by pasting on a piece of masonry but it’s fairly half-hearted and no one is fooling anyone that somehow it fits into the context.

PG: It becomes, unfortunately, a new context.

HH: I’ll say.

PG: So the context we are trying to fit into is harder and harder to find. Hugh, I think you make a really wonderful point because in a lot of ways part of the problem today is that sites get bigger and bigger . . . It’s not just that buildings get taller. That’s almost the least of it. It’s that building plots get bigger and bigger and that variation you’re used to on the streetscape that makes it so wonderful to walk down a great old block in New York . . (“Exactly,” chimes in Mr. Hardy) . . IS GONE!

Glass Stampede Revisited

There was discussion of the “glass stampede,” about which Justin Davidson had an article so titled in New York magazine. (See our: Tuesday, September 23, 2008, Getting out your squeegees! A quick reference and Atlantic yards Reports’ Friday, October 03, 2008, "The Glass Stampede," Downtown Brooklyn, & Atlantic Yards.)

BL: (7:30) So why, if you find. . If, Paul, you find the new glass, steel and big block buildings so much more ugly, are they coming to predominate new construction? Is it. . Is it money and scale or is it that aesthetics have changed and you guys are out of touch? Or, what is it?

PG: I think it’s a little bit of everything actually. There is no question, by the way, that the predominant change in the cityscape in this whole boom is not any single building project but the collective impact of all this glass. You know glass was really very beautiful when it was in contrast to stone. When they built the Seagram building and you had this glass gem with old stone buildings around it it was absolutely wonderful. It was like a jewel. Now, however, . . You can’t build a whole city out of glass. Something feels so brittle about it. And that’s where we seem to be going.

Discussion followed about how Chicago had done a better job constructing with glass to generally higher architectural standards. They also discussed the extent of the market demand for glass buildings which is viewed as more pronounced for commercial buildings and is being questioned when it comes to residential.

Glorious Street Life and Acknowledging the Street Grid

Discussion of the desirability of glass buildings led into commentary by Mr. Hardy about the importance of street life and acknowledging the grid (10:15):

What Paul was saying before about street life here- Streets are the glory of the city. It is the experience you treasure. And I think there is a different experience at street level than there is when you view these things at a distance. And, by and large they are critically received only as objects in the distant view whereas, in fact, you experience them when you walk about the street. And there is a tremendous difference when buildings acknowledge the grid and play with it and those that do everything possible to violate it.

“Delight of Brooklyn” Evoked When Callers Jump In On Oppressiveness of New Larger Scale Manhattan Buildings

The discussion returned to the topic of scale again (11:42) when the first two callers received sympathetic reaction to their dissatisfaction with or ambivalence towards the new larger-scale buildings going up mid-Manhattan, the first talking about the loss of lower-scale buildings in what used to be the flower district that are being replaced by larger buildings, creating a canyon-like feel. Mr. Hardy commented (13:40):

Well, I think it is important to keep both the small-scale stuff and the larger. It’s the juxtapositions that are so characteristic of New York. I’ve always enjoyed big tall buildings next to little tiny building. It’s the uniformity I think we are all objecting to. You don’t want to walk down a street and have it the same at the end as it was at the beginning. That makes journeys around here extraordinarily long and depressing. The parts of the city where everything is uniform, you don’t associate as Manhattan or any, any. . . That’s why movement to Brooklyn and the small scale of Brooklyn is such a delight after you’ve been confronted with the developments here. It’s the juxtaposition that we, I think, need, and of course, the way landmarks works its either/or.

Assessment of the (Erstwhile AOL) Time Warner Center

Now we get to what we most want to talk about.

Caller “Marsha in Manhattan” (at 15:18) made a point, initiating a conversation about the AOL Time Warner Center that got us thinking. She had actually called to complain about a building on Union Square:

I was all prepared to hate the Time Warner Center before it went up but I must say I think it has done really a great job of making that area a focal point in the city, and a real magnet, and that’s not only because I come down on the A Train and that’s the first place I do a lot of things. So, that’s a great thing. I think it’s an elegant building despite all the glass. But the thing that disturbs me is the hideous kind of. . . I can’t even call it Bauhaus. . faceless stuff that’s going up like that one skinny building, I think somebody referred to, on Union Square; Union Square which had a couple of absolutely exquisite buildings. It’s not that one wants uniformity. You can’t build the same kind of building but it would be nice if there were some kind of harmony rather than this gaudy cheap stuff.

Brian Lehrer seized upon the mention of the Time Warner Center, saying that they had just been talking, off the air, about its impact (in contrast to the Hearst building). He handed things off to Paul Goldberger who said (16:14):

I think the Hearst building is a much better piece of architecture, but I have to admit that the Time Warner has, as Marsha said, had a pretty positive effect on things. So it’s that frustration architecture critics always have when they have to admit that real life sometimes trumps quality architecture.

Hugh Hardy commented:

Well, Time Warner, of course, has something, public access and in the Hearst Building you don’t. It’s an extraordinary interior, but you can’t get in to see it if you are just walking down the street.

Impromptu Assessment of TW Center Disregards What Could Have Been

We have a problem with this impromptu assessment of the Time Warner center.

One of the major projects constructed during the boom, the (AOL) Time Warner Center may be thought of as having greater importance because it is the first major building to be completed in Manhattan after the September 11, 2001 attacks (though it was under construction beforehand).

When you look at something like the Time Warner Center, which we don’t particularly like, you have to evaluate it not in terms of what it is, but in terms of what it could have been. This is something that is hard to do.

Yes, the Time Warner Center is a net positive over the Coliseum that it replaced, but its bland generic mallishness is nothing like the much greater net positive that it could have been. That comparison is necessarily the real yardstick against which to measure of its success. For instance, we consider that the Brodsky Organization’s design to replace the Coliseum, which lost out to Related’s bid to build the AOL/TW Center, would have provided a better base design with which to start.

We do admit, however, that the TW Center, at 750 ft, is superior to what was previously proposed to replace the Coliseum. The MTA had it in mind to go up to 130 stories. (See: Supertail Buidlings: Dreams and Realities, by Michael Decourcy Hinds, September 30, 1984) Donald Trump said he wanted to go even higher with a 137-story building on the site. People ought to remember that developer Mortimer B. Zuckerman (Boston Properties) planned to build two 68-story (925 feet) Moshe Safdie-designed needle/prism towers at the southwestern corner of Central Park that would have transformed the park into a giant sundial. That plan, with an unusually high 18 FAR (though later reduced several times) was defeated after significant public opposition led by the likes of Jacqueline Kennedy Onassis and the Municipal Art Society.


Memory of AOL Time Warner Center’s Genesis

The AOL Time Warner Center, whose construction “topped out” in February of 2003, is the product of the re-bid of the site where the aforementioned Brodsky Organization’s bid lost out to the Related Companies’ bid. The original name of the center, now known as the “Time Warner Center,” was the “AOL Time Warner Center.” If you remember, at the peak of the tech bubble AOL was the company that was going to take over the world and was more important than Time Warner with which it merged. Now, of course, just a few short years later, it is as if AOL hardly still exists.

Though the 750-foot Time Warner Center is an improvement over the 925-foot Moshe Safdie-designed needle/prism towers that were not built, the center is not so substantially different than the final downscaled version of that proposed Zuckerman project last on the table before redevelopment of the site was re-bid. This is perhaps not surprising since architect David Childs of Skidmore of Skidmore, Owings & Merrill LLP, eventually got involved in reworking the Safdie design for Mr. Zuckerman and, thereafter, when Related bid in the new round of competition, Mr. Childs, was working for working for Related.

We note that Mr. Childs, is the same architect who was called in to “fix” the design for the building once referred to as the “Freedom Tower” at Ground Zero and, ironically in this context, he was recently appointed chairman of the board at the Municipal Art Society, the same organization that was important in opposing the original Zuckerman designs for the Columbus Circle site. Ah, the ironic insights that become possible when remembering back in time!

(Moshe Safdie)

(Skidmore, Owings & Merrill and Elkus/Manfredi)

Memory of the Better-Design Bid: A Twist

What we have referred to above, based on our memory, as the Brodsky Organization’s bid was actually a coordinated submission from three developers: Bruce C. Ratner, Daniel Brodsky and Peter M. Lehrer. The architects were Schuman Lichtenstein Claman Efron also worked with Cesar Pelli & Associates. We like to remember that we were rooting for this submission because we regard the Brodsky Organization as one of the finest and most reputable developers in the city, but, facing facts, this takes us back to a time when we were actually rooting for a Ratner proposal. That despite the fact that we don’t currently regard Ratner as a good developer and, in fact, view him as more of subsidy collector than a developer.

Want to see what we think was the better design? Try and find it on the web. We don’t think you can.

What’s Missing: What’s Available to Permeate Our Consciousness of What Could have Been

Concluding that the Time Warner Center should be evaluated more in terms of what it could have been rather than what it is, we went in search of what there is to permeate people’s consciousness in terms of what might have been instead, both good and bad. We would have loved to provide more visuals for this article. There is much less readily available than you would suspect, especially given that the contest over what would be constructed when the Coliseum site was redeveloped was a 15-year process that involved a lot of public contentiousness. Zuckerman’s Boston Properties original proposal was 1985. Demolition of the Coliseum did not occur until 2000.

It is almost as if those 15 years of contentious public and political evaluation have disappeared. Maybe there is little that now permeates our consciousness helping us remember what could have been, but if we cannot remember, what could have been, then we are ill-equipped to assess the admittedly major impact the 2.8 million square foot Time Warner Center has had on the city.
If you want to read one of the few evaluative efforts we find on the web that is accompanied by (a limited number of) images, you see: Where's Humpty-Dumpty? The New Coliseum Fiasco, By Carter B. Horsley, 7/30/98. That article contains the following images respecting only some of the second set of competitive designs being considered back then. It also includes the Skidmore rendering in the section above.

(Helmut Jahn)

(Robert A. M. Stern and Costas Kondylis)

Our New “Digital Brains”

We have couched this discussion in prejudicial terms. If you go to a sufficiently comprehensive library, you will be able to pull up out of archived periodicals past discussions of what should or could have been built at the old Coliseum’s Columbus Circle site. You can find images. If you are that kind of human being who (perhaps less bombarded by constant topical media and e-mails) just remembers things, then what we are writing here will not be unfamiliar. Still, for many of us the internet supplies us with our new digital brains, memory and consciousness.

The bad news is that anything that occurred relatively recently, but before a certain date, now seems almost as if it no longer exists. A good example is New York magazine: Although New York magazine in on the web you can browse issues only as far back as 1998. Perhaps the good news is that the future will not be as susceptible to forgetting.

No one in the future will ever forget or lose access to all the details of the Atlantic Yards fight when you have forever afterwards all of Atlantic Yards Report, No Land Grab and Develop Don’t Destroy’s websites, including many other permanent assets like Bob Guskind’s Goawanus Lounge. The plans like the Unity Plan and the Pacific Plan which are better far better alternatives to the Ratner designs for Atlantic Yards will not fade away as they will remain easily accessible on the web. By the same token, all the ways that the Ratner/ESDC lack of proper public process shortchanges the public will remain just a click or two away.

It is doubtful that were the monstrosity of Atlantic Yards ever built, Paul Goldberger and Hugh Hardy would have a blithely forgetful conversion on Brian Lehrer’s program only eight years after the end of a development battle of so many years running. To be fair though, Atlantic Yards is bigger, much worse than the Time Warner Center since it is a net negative for the public rather than a net positive. Also, so far, unlike the AOL Time Warner Center, Atlantic Yards involves no competitive bids an no compromises from the developer!

A “Time Warning” Question: Will We Be Different in the Future by Having a Different Past?

Our take-away point with respect to the (once-AOL) Time Warner Center is that it is amazing that something from just a few years ago is so remote when we seek to refresh our memories in order to gain perspective on the present. We note, however, that things are changing with the new capabilities of the internet. With those new capabilities, we wonder whether the future will unfold in such a way that we have a quite different relationship with the recent past.

In the future, perhaps 15 years from now, you might even find your perspective on what could have been versus what is shaped by revisiting the current Brian Lehrer series taking stock of what is happening to the built environment in the city. You may find your future perspective shaped when, listening to the series in the far future year, you are reminded that, in the month of April 2009, you phoned in or commented on the program’s web page to express your hopes about what the city could be.

Jane Jacobs Atlantic Yards Report Card #17: Avoidance of Harmful Parking Lots? NO

This is evaluation item #17 (of 47) of the Jane Jacobs Atlantic Yards Report Card

Avoidance of Harmful Parking Lots? NO


(Picture: Rendering by the Municipal Art Society- for its Atlantic Lots- showing the teardown of the neighborhood the project plan involves -Original Aerial Photograph by Jonathan Barkey.)

Jane Jacobs viewed parking lots as negatives for cities from two standpoints. In a neighborhood, she viewed them as dominating and disorganizing. More generally she viewed high levels of cars being a net subtraction from the benefits of city life and she viewed accommodations of cars that encouraged their use as promoting a vicious cycle which erodes the balance of pedestrian activity in favor of vehicular activity. Plans for Atlantic Yards involve a hurried rush to create parking lots, in some cases demolishing historic buildings. It can readily be alleged that the reason behind the hurry is to remove the demolished buildings from the public’s consciousness together with the possible ingredients for an alternative future. The parking lots that replace them may be in place for twenty to thirty years. If parking lots are in place long enough people will be inclined to judge the Ratner buildings by a lower standard,- - whether they are improvement over a parking lot. Twenty years of parking lot can be a long time. If one is old enough, it could be a good portion of one’s remaining life.

JJ Cites: [ . . . Visually, they are disorganizing to streets, and so dominating that it is hard- - sometimes impossible– for any countering sense of order to make much impression. P. 234 The problem is how to cut down drastically the absolute number of vehicles using a city. P. 345 Erosion of cities by automobiles entails so familiar a series of events that these hardly need describing, The erosion proceeds as a kind of nibbling, small nibble at first, but eventually hefty bites. . . . More and more land goes into parking to accommodate the ever increasing number of vehicles while they are idle. No one step in this process is, in itself, crucial. But cumulatively the effect is enormous. P.349 the more space that is provided cars in cities, the greater becomes the need for use of cars, and hence for still more space for them. P. 351 all this duplicate parking lies idle for much of the time. P. 356 Attrition of automobiles operates by making conditions less convenient for cars. Attrition as a steady, gradual process . . would steadily decrease the number of persons using private automobiles in a city. P. 363]


(Picture: Rendering by the Municipal Art Society showing the teardown of the neighborhood the project plan involves -Original Aerial Photograph by Jonathan Barkey.)

Jane Jacobs Atlantic Yards Report Card #16: Will There Be a Concentrated Diversity of Use? MAYBE NOT

This is evaluation item #16 (of 47) of the Jane Jacobs Atlantic Yards Report Card

Will There Be a Concentrated Diversity of Use? MAYBE NOT

Jane Jacobs suggested that diversity of use needs to be sufficiently concentrated in a close area so that people need only walk to get most of what they needed. Not doing so, she argued, would put people into their cars. Atlantic Yards has a mixture of uses, office, retail, residential and the arena. The arena and the catchment area for its attendance are on a scale that puts it outside of this local balancing of concentration. The retail is proportionately small to the residential. How well it could serve is uncertain but one would hope that neither Metrotech nor the Ratner Atlantic Centers operations would be examples.

JJ Cites: [Lack of wide ranges of concentrated diversity can put people into automobiles for almost all their needs. . . In dense, diversified city areas, people still walk. . . P. 130]

Jane Jacobs Atlantic Yards Report Card #15: Project Has Building Age Diversity with a Close-Grained Mingling? NO

This is evaluation item #15 (of 47) of the Jane Jacobs Atlantic Yards Report Card

Project Has Building Age Diversity with a Close-Grained Mingling? NO

Jane Jacobs stressed that an essential part of providing diversity successfully was having an environment with a range of rents and choices fostered by having buildings of different ages mingled together in as closely grained fashion as possible. Atlantic Yards misses the opportunity and does the opposite by unnecessarily tearing down worthy and viable old buildings. Its huge density adds to the overpowering and one-sided nature of its mistakes. It tears down buildings which Jacobs points out cannot be recreated, while replacing them with replicated buildings of no special value that could easily be replaced.

JJ Cites: [The district must mingle buildings that vary in age and condition, including a good proportion of old ones so that they vary in the economic yield they must produce. This mingling must be fairly close-grained. P. 150, 151. Old ideas can sometimes use new buildings. New ideas must use old buildings. Even the enterprises that can support new construction in cities need old construction in their immediate vicinity. Otherwise they are part of a total attraction and environment that is economically too limited- - and therefore functionally too limited to be lively, interesting and convenient. Flourishing diversity anywhere in a city means the mingling of high-yield, middling-yield, low-yield and no-yield enterprises. P. 188 large swatches of construction built at one time are inherently inefficient for sheltering wide ranges of cultural, population, and business diversity. They are even inefficient for sheltering much range of mere commercial diversity. P. 191 One-age construction in city areas is sometimes protected nowadays from the threat of more efficient and responsive commercial competition. This protection- - - which is nothing more than commercial monopoly- - -. . .. P. 192 Cities need a mingling of old buildings to cultivate primary diversity mixtures, as well as secondary diversity. In particular, they need old buildings to incubate new primary diversity. P. 195 Neighborhoods built up all at once change little physically over the years as a rule. The little physical change that does occur is for th worse- - gradual dilapidation. P.198 The economic value of new buildings is replaceable in cities. It is replaceable by spending of more construction money. But the economic value of old buildings is irreplaceable at will. It is created by time. P. 199.]

(More to be torn down to build Atlantic Yards.)

Jane Jacobs Atlantic Yards Report Card #14: Project Creates Population Diversity? NO

This is evaluation item #14 (of 47) of the Jane Jacobs Atlantic Yards Report Card

Project Creates Population Diversity? NO

(Above chart shows the minor portion of units in Atlantic Yards referred to as "affordable." Click to enlarge.)

Jane Jacobs suggests that is important for cities to provide population diversity. She also points out that large projects can be tremendous wasters of such diversity. Atlantic Yards is conspicuously at the large project end of the spectrum.

Atlantic Yards will abruptly displace the diverse and longstanding populations in the neighborhoods (including residents with historic ties) and replace them, on a regimented basis, with a brand new set of “sorted” residents. Replacement will not occur until after the substantial vacancy period (likely decades) required to redevelop the 22 acres. Very-low-income families and individuals will be displaced but there will be little provision for them to return. The project will house the minimum number of low-income tenants required under the United State tax code in order for the developer to take away special benefits. There will, however, be no place in the project for the relatively low income families and individuals whose incomes are just above the low income level (see chart).

Most of the developer-envisioned 6,430 units will be for that part of the“luxury”end of the market for people interested in renting or buying in this area of Brooklyn and will not be subject to the more precise income-sorting called for by the regulatory agreement. A total of 2,250 units will be subject to the more particularized income sorting called for by the regulatory agreement requirements. Those units, which will all be referred to as “affordable housing,” will go to people with incomes up to $122,899.20 a year (see chart). Since this will be in the future, actual incomes will be higher. Though sorted into a number of permitted income bands, many of those regimented bands will likely overlap with the incomes of people in the neighborhood who reside in market rate apartments. (Note, however, that any overlap will be apart from families with incomes of a certain range ($38,407 to $46,086.20) who are being afforded no entree into the project. The figures from the chart are for families of four. Families of other sizes may find themselves ineligible for the project if they have incomes at higher or lower levels.) Rents for the “affordable” units will be up to $2,880.45 in 2008 dollars. Since this will be in the future, that figure will be higher.

None of this regimented occupancy is consistent with the interactive strengthening and mutually reinforcing diversity Ms. Jacob’s talks about getting when “visitors sniff out where something vigorous exists already, and come to share it, thereby further supporting it."

JJ Cites: [City diversity itself permits and stimulates more diversity. P. 145 The visitors sniff out where something vigorous exists already, and come to share it, thereby further supporting it. At the other extreme, huge city settlements of people exist without their presence generating anything much except stagnation and, ultimately, a fatal discontent with the place. . . .Apparently there is no limit to the numbers of people in a city whose potentiality as city populations can thus be wasted. P.149 The district, and indeed as many of its internal parts as possible, must serve more than one primary function; preferably more than two. These must insure the presence of people who go outdoors on different schedules and are in place for different purposes, but who are able to use many facilities in common. P. 150 Effectiveness means, second, that the same people using the same street at differing times must include, among them, people who will use some of the same facilities. P.163.]

City Hall’s Call: Why Forest City Ratner’s Gehry Beekman Tower Will Only Be 50% of Originally Planned Height- It’s Structural

Nobody knew what to think when the news went out on that the Frank Gehry-designed Forest City Ratner Beekman Tower now under construction might cease construction at about half its originally planned height. (See and hear: WNYC's Downtown Housing Complex May Downsize, by Matthew Schuerman, March 19, 2009.)
NNY City Hall Speculation

We speculated:

It is amusing to toy with the idea that the building might have been stopped by the mayor himself when he realized how the immensity of the building in his own City Hall backyard might stand as a symbol to influence the debate over his administration’s sell-off of the public realm.

(See: Thursday, March 19, 2009, Willets Point Lawsuit Points Out . . .)

HDC Says “Pretty Straight Forward”

A spokesperson for the New York City Housing Development Corporation, the state authority financing the Beekman, told Norman Oder’s Atlantic Yards Report that building the project to half height was not such a big deal (emphasis supplied):

I asked NYC HDC spokesperson Catie Marshall yesterday how much the developer would be allowed to spend. "The funding for a project such as the Beekman is generally done in tranches, thus it is phased (sort of pay-as-you-go)," she responded. "In the case of the Beekman, the bonds are variable rate and only the first two tranches have been issued. In general terms, if a project is altered and does not need all of the funding, the remaining tranche(s) will not close. It’s pretty straight forward."

(See: Friday, March 20, 2009, If FCR's Beekman Tower faces 50% cut, what does that say about Atlantic Yards promises (and designs)?)

FCR Explanation: Penny Saving

Meanwhile, the Forest City Ratner organization was denying that the project wasn’t going to reach full height, attempting to convey the idea that they were stopping construction midway as some sort of typical approach to rebid or “value engineer” the project midway to save money. (See: Monday, March 30, 2009, Forest City Enterprises announces losses, asserts that AY arena is one of only two new projects to launch in 2009.)

Leaks the Answer?

Mentioning the “value engineering” of a Gehry project got us off and thinking about the problems with leaks the building might have (Monday, March 30, 2009, Gehry Leaks) and that the cessation of construction might even have something to do late-found flaws in this regard.

Answer Finally Leaks Out: A City Hall Call

Well, it turns out that we were partly right in our first speculation and partly right in our last speculation. The answer combines both. The halt to construction was called for by City Hall itself because of structural problems. Not structural problems directly in the Beekman, but structural problems caused by the Beekman in a neighboring property. The surprise is that the neighboring property is City Hall itself which is just a block away from the Beekman with pretty much the distance of City Hall Park between them.

The problem came to light just days ago when:

Engineers have discovered dangerous cracks in 200-year-old wooden beams right above Mayor Bloomberg's desk in City Hall, leading to an emergency $5.5 million contract to stop the roof from falling in.

The complicated repairs are being made in attic space above the "bullpen," where the mayor and his top aides have their work areas.

(See: Friday, March 20, 2009, Beam above Bloomie is broken.)

A Historic Challenge to Link and Identify the Problem

It took the esteemed engineering firm of Robert Silman Associates, which is handling renovations at City Hall, to diagnose the problem and recognize its relationship to the Beekman. It took very astute work on their part and a knowledge of history. The Beekman itself, which was planned to be the tallest residential structure in the city, would not itself have been a problem except for the manner in which the Brooklyn Bridge was constructed by the Roeblings. The problem is an obscure one but familiar to professional engineers who, when working with historic old buildings, should always remember to consult the profession’s site interrelationship exchange tables.

City Hall was constructed from 1803 to 1812. The nearby Brooklyn Bridge, one of the oldest suspension bridges in the United States, began construction in 1870 and was completed in 1883. The Roeblings, first John (who succumbed to infection after a construction-related accident), then his son, Washington Roebling, and eventually Washington’s wife Emily constructed the bridge using caissons so that underwater construction would be possible. As those familiar with the decompression sickness (Caisson disease) that sidelined Washington Roebling will likely know, this method of construction involves pressurized caissons where air is pumped with pressure high enough to displace, in this case, the surrounding waters of the East River.

Air Blown Under Pressure

The many years of pumping pressurized air into the river’s seabed created unstable site situations that have translated into the Beekman’s construction affecting City Hall so as to dislodge the 200-year-old beams there. It would not have been a problem for a normal-size building, but the Beekman at a planned 76 stories (it has now reached a height of 38 stories) is not your normal-size building. Its super large size pushed the compressed air from the 1870s back across City Hall Park, thus affecting City Hall.

Realizing that this was a problem on the Manhattan side of the river, engineers quickly called for an assessment as to whether similar problems will beset the unprecedentedly large Dock Street project on the Brooklyn side of the bridge. Because it would be built so close to the Brooklyn-side tower of the bridge it should be particularly susceptible to exactly the same problem. There is as yet no definitive word on whether there will be caisson air pressure site unstabilization problems affecting the two too-tall projects on both side of the river. Apparently, the proposed inclusion of a school in each of the two projects is exacerbating the problem. Asked about this, Assembly Speaker Sheldon Silver, who helped push through the Gehry-designed Ratner tower at first asked: "I have to listen to this? He then said: “What’s the matter? You don’t like Silver linings?”

No Bull-i-On: The Problem Could Have Gone Undetected But For Ratner

Thankfully, the structural weakening at City Hall was noticed earlier than it might have been, coincidentally because of Forest City Ratner’s Bruce Ratner. Mr. Ratner is a frequent contributors to Mayor Michael Bloomberg’s charities, which the mayor has been using to advance his political goals. The initial cracking in the City Hall beams was detected when Ratner stopped by City Hall to make another charitable donation to the mayor. Ratner was delivering a heavy load of gold bullion to an office safe above the mayor’s bullpen when the weight of the gold interacting with the weight from Beekman across City Hall Park apparently just became too much to bear.