Community Magazine September 2009

126 CoMMUniTy MagazinE White Males Excluded From City Contracts New rules set by the mayor’s Office of Contract Services will require city agencies to restrict longtime vendors from bidding on city contracts between $5,000 and $100,000 unless they’re certified to be at least 51 percent minority- or female-owned. Since 2005, agencies have filled small contracts by allowing a computer to randomly generate 10 potential bidders, five minority and five non-minority. Agencies were also allowed to add favored vendors to the list, using firms with which they had pre-existing relationships. The new rule forbids this policy unless the firms are minority or women-owned business enterprises (M/ WBEs). The new rules come in the wake of a study showing that the M/WBEs weren’t getting enough government business. – CORRESPONDENT DAVE GORDON Renter Harassment Law Upheld The Tenant Protection Act, which gives renters the right to sue their landlords in Housing Court for using threats or other disruptive tactics to try to force them out, was upheld in a recent ruling filed in State Supreme Court. The Rent Stabilization Association had claimed that the law violated the state and federal constitutions and unlawfully expanded the jurisdiction of the city’s Housing Court judges. The law made harassment a housing code violation and allowed a judge to impose civil penalties of $1,000 to $5,000. It defined harassment as the use of force or threats, repeated interruptions of essential services, the frequent filing of baseless court actions and other tactics that “substantially interfere with or disturb the comfort, repose, peace or quiet of an apartment’s lawful occupant.” Previously, tenants who took their landlords to Housing Court could do so only for problems with essential services or the physical conditions of the units. Public advocacy groups fear that the law will backfire, shrinking the number of affordable housing units as more landlords seek to avoid becoming subject to the city’s already onerous laws concerning residential tenants. Demonstrating the potential abuse, landlord David Shalom cited that of the nearly 540 harassment cases that have been filed under the law, according to the Department of Housing and Preservation, only 21 – or less than four percent – have been deemed credible enough to actually warrant any civil penalties. – CORRESPONDENT DAVE GORDON NYC Prepares for Anthrax Attack New York City is getting ready for a massive anthrax attack – even if there’s no specific threat that one will ever happen. The Department of Health conducted a drill on August 15th in the gymnasium of the Marta Valle Secondary School on the Lower East Side, to assess the city’s ability to quickly distribute antibiotics and vaccines to a large number of people. During a major public health emergency or outbreak of disease, 200 sites, such as schools, would be used as POD’s (Points of Dispensing) with about 100 health professionals and volunteers assigned to each site to administer the necessary care. City Health Commissioner Thomas Farley said that the city has been perfecting its response since 2001. – CM STAFF NYC Council Staff Gets a Raise A month after Mayor Bloomberg gave his staff a raise, the New York City Council has followed suit and given its employees back-to-back raises: four percent retroactive to March 2008, and another four percent retroactive to last March. The mayor’s raises for 6,700 managers and nonunion workers will cost the city $45 million this year. The council’s raises, affecting 550 council aides and central staffers, are expected to cost about $3.9 million. The council decided to provide the cost of living increases after they were enacted by the mayor for his staff. The raises do not apply to council members, and are based on salary increases negotiated last year with District Council 37, the city’s largest municipal union. Some have questioned the timing of the raises as salaries in the private sector have shrank and the city faces cutbacks in services and higher taxes amid the lingering recession. The offices of the district attorneys and borough presidents have or are expected to enact similar raises. – CORRESPONDENT DAVE GORDON Life in the Big City  ” 