State Assembly Speaker Sheldon Silver now has a proposal of his own to fix New York's ethics oversight commission. He's calling for four separate commissions to oversee state government. As the Times put it, the plan would "preserve the Legislature's tradition of regulating itself." Since Silver is at odds with the governor and State Senate leader Malcolm Smith, nothing is likely to happen soon. The governor says he hopes to take the issue up again in the fall.
According to the New York Post, celebrations after the NYFD's "Medal Day" got a little out of hand yesterday. A woman named Rebeca Izquierdo claims, as the Post paraphrased it, "A party bus blasting hip-hop and reggaeton music pulled up at Allen and
Stanton streets on the Lower East Side as 30 of New York's Bravest
stumbled out. Izquierdo said, "They were all in uniform with open containers and they were soliciting
young girls to get on the bus." A Fire Department spokesman says they are looking into the situation.
A coalition that includes the United Federation of Teachers, the Alliance for Quality Education, the
NYC Coalition for Educational Justice and the Campaign for Fiscal Equity will hold a rally at City Hall today at noon. They'll urge Mayor Bloomberg to restore money cut from the the Dept. of Education budget. Yesterday, we reported how the New Design High School is coping with the budget cuts. The group will also protest the elimination of funding for community-based after school programs. We profiled the Educational Alliance's Teen Program, which is among the organizations set to lose its city funding.
