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City Council Stated Meeting - March 22, 2006


Every two weeks the New York City Council meets for its Stated Meeting to introduce and pass legislation. As a regular feature, Searchlight covers these meetings and posts a summary of the bills passed.

QUOTE OF THE DAY:
"The fact that it took my staff over 20 minute to print my remarks because the system kept freezing over is ample reason for the overhaul.” - Queens Councilmember David Weprin on the council's plan to spend nearly half a million dollars to upgrade its computer system.

MEETING SUMMARY:
Nearly two months after the City Council began its session and elected Christine Quinn as its new speaker, the legislative body's focus continues to be its own internal issues. This week, it proposed its own operating budget and remembered a former council member.

THE COUNCIL'S $50 MILLION BUDGET
The City Council proposed its own $50.7 million operating budget for the coming fiscal year. The budget covers salaries for council members, staff, office rent, and equipment. The council plans to increase spending by 2.5 percent - or a $1.2 million more than last year.

The number of staff employed by the council (278 people) will remain the same, and individual members will continue to make the same $90,500 base salary (although those who serve as committee chairs also get stipends ranging from $5,000 to $25,000).

Speaker Quinn said the additional money will be spent in three areas.

The council has allocated $303,000 for the creation of "Council Stat," a system for compiling constituent complaints from all 51 district offices. The database will be modeled after other initiatives like Comp Stat, the police department's system for monitoring crime. The goal is to track calls to individual members so that the council can better respond to community needs.

"We need to know what New Yorkers are calling us about so we can make sure we are doing the best job we can to solve their problems and also to see what the trends are citywide and boroughwide," said Quinn.

The council believes that its system will not replicate the 311 call line, arguing that people who call a council member are seeking help from a local government representative, not just a city agency. Speaker Quinn also noted that Mayor Michael Bloomberg does not share the data from 311, so it does not help the council in its role of serving constituents.

The council will spend $467,000 to upgrade its computer system, which members and staff complain is woefully out of date. The council staff currently uses three different e-mail systems and the Web site crashes on a regular basis.

"The fact that it took my staff over 20 minute to print my remarks because the system kept freezing over is ample reason for the overhaul," said Queens Councilmember David Weprin.

Finally, the council plans to spend a total of $281,000 more for rent for the main office at 250 Broadway and for individual members' district offices. Over the past two years, the cost of rent for district offices has increased by 14 percent.

In a break from the past, Speaker Quinn promised that she would not add more money to the council budget later in the year, as has often been the practice. Last year, after approving its budget in July, the council added an additional $2 million a few months later in November.

"We are committing to operating the council within that budget allocation and not to increase our spending mid-year," said Quinn.

RENT PROTECTION
The council passed only one new bill (Intro 118) which takes the first step in extending the current rent stabilization laws in New York City for another three years. The matter, however, is not fully within the council's control. The bill fulfills the city's responsibilty for continuing the regulations, but the State Legislature has ultimate authority on the matter.

So it also passed a resolution (Res 79) urging the State Legislature to repeal the Urstadt Law, which took control of rent regulation out of the hands of the city government and gave it to the state legislature in 1971.

"It is outrageous that we have to be subject to upstate laws that dictate the affordability of rent in the City of New York," said Manhattan Councilmember Miguel Martinez.

The measures passed by a vote of 48 to 2. Two Republicans - Andrew Lanza and Dennis Gallagher - voted "no;" the third Republican James Oddo was absent.

REMEMBERING ROBERT DRYFOOS
The majority of the meeting was dedicated to rememberances of former City Councilmember Robert Dryfoos, who died on March 2, 2006.

Dryfoos served in the council from 1980 to 1991, representing the Upper East Side. Members praised him for his efforts to save Radio City Music Hall from demolition, for developing educational TV programs such as "Live From Lincoln Center," and for his dedication to children's issues.

Dryfoos, however, was best known for a vote he cast in 1986, when he defied the Manhattan and Brooklyn Democratic political bosses to support Peter Vallone, as the first speaker of the council. Dryfoos had promised the leaders that he would support a Brooklyn representative, but at the last minute he gave his support to Vallone, handing him a victory by a vote of 18 to 17.

"It wasn't a vote for me," said the former Speaker Vallone, who made an appearance to honor his friend. "It was a vote for the independence of the council."

After leaving the council in 1991, Dryfoos founded a political lobbying firm called the Dryfoos Group, where he represented after-school programs, educational organizations, and the New York Junior Tennis League, which organizes tennis programs at schools across the city.

In recent years, Dryfoos was often at City Hall, and council members said that when it came to passing the budget there even was a list of programs that everyone referred to as "Dryfoos items."

"Soon we are going to be passing a bill that bans lobbyists from being on the floor of the council during a Stated Meeting," said Brooklyn Councilmember Lew Fidler. "But in spirit, Bob Dryfoos will always be on the floor of the council."

YANKEE STADIUM VOTE ON APRIL 5
The next Stated Meeting is scheduled for April 5, 2006, when the council will vote on the proposal to build a new stadium for the New York Yankees in the Bronx.

For information on the issues surround the stadium, visit Gotham Gazette's Land Use Links in the News. To read about the parks involved in the stadium plan, see Yankee Stadium Parkland Swap.

 

 

Stem Cell Research: Medical Miracle or Moral Morass?


A microscopic look at a lab dish whose contents are derived from human embryonic stem cells

They have been likened to the dot at the top of an “i” and to tiny soccer balls. Some see them as the beginning of life, others as building blocks for medical miracles and still others as medical debris. And while most politicians would be hard pressed to define or spell blastocyst, these tiny bits of matter sit at the center of one of the most contentious policy disputes of our time – the fight over embryonic stem cell research.

Now the fight has come to New York. Ever since President George Bush banned most federal funding for most embryonic stem cell research in 2001, some states have sought to pick up the slack and so entice researchers and possible new industry. New York seems a likely location for this kind of research. Almost 55,000 people in the state work in the pharmaceutical and bio-tech industries, and the city is home to many top research institutions. With the construction of a new bio-tech center on the East Side, the Bloomberg administration hopes many private companies will bring their cutting-edge bio-tech businesses to New York.

To keep New York in the forefront of bio-technology, some members of the state legislature, including most prominently Assembly Speaker Sheldon Silver, hope to obtain state funding for embryonic stem cell research. On the other side, the Catholic church, which has spearheaded opposition to embryonic stem cell research here, argues that embryos used for stem cell research are a form of human life. The governor, meanwhile, remains somewhere in the middle – in favor of biotechnology in general but reluctant to support embryonic stem cell research explicitly.

As New York continues to mull the issue, some of its neighbors have moved ahead, threatening New York’s future as a center of bio-technology and, some say, delaying the day when sick people will get cures they desperately need.

WHAT IS STEM CELL RESEARCH

Although embryonic stem cells have not yet cured a single disease, it is hard to overstate the hopes that many experts have for them. Supporters of the research liken it to where antibiotics were 50 or 75 years ago. No one knows when, how, where – or even if – the major breakthroughs will come. But said Robin Elliott, the executive director of the Parkinson’s Disease Foundation, who also serves as chairman of New Yorkers for the Advancement of Medical Research, “The same could be said of any frontier of medicine…This is an area of science that is potentially one of the most exciting in the history of medicine.”

The controversy over embryonic stem cell research involves balancing hopes for improving the lives of millions against fears of a Brave New World Society where human beings will be just another manufactured product.

Most embryonic stem cells used by scientists today are a byproduct of in vitro -- literally “in glass” -- fertilization, which has led to the births of hundreds of thousands of babies since 1978. The process involves surgically removing mature eggs from a woman – generally she takes drugs to enable several eggs to mature simultaneously – and joining the eggs with sperm in a laboratory rather than in the woman’s body. The fertilized egg is then implanted in a woman’s uterus where, if all goes well, it will develop into a healthy baby about nine months later.

Women trying to become pregnant through in vitro fertilization often have to undergo several implants before the procedure works. So most women store surplus fertilized eggs, and today thousands, perhaps hundreds of thousands, of these small spherical blastocysts remain in clinics around the country.

For years, there was little use for most of the embryos, and ethicists debated what to do with them. Then in November 1998, James Thomson, a biologist at the University of Wisconsin, Madison, reported that he had isolated human embryonic stem cells. These stem cells could renew themselves, by dividing again and again. With each division, scientists could create one differentiated cell – a blood cell, say, or a brain cell – and one stem cell, which could then be used to generate more cells. These related cells -– the offspring of the original cell -– constitute a group of cells, which scientists call a "line", that share the same DNA.

To create these lines, scientists have to separate the embryo into individual cells, thereby destroying it. They must then put the individual cell in a dish and provide it with nutrients and growth factors that will both encourage it to divide and create the differentiated cells. According to one count, there are about 240 human embryonic stem cell lines around the world.

Scientists hope the lines’ ability to create specific types of cells will enable researchers to understand a variety of diseases and eventually treat illnesses that entail lost or damaged cells, such as diabetes, some cancers, Alzheimer’s disease, and spinal cord injury.

For example, in people with Parkinson’s disease the cells of their brains cannot produce enough dopamine, which is essential to the functioning of the central nervous system. Brain cells created from embryonic stem cells could replace the deficient cells, enabling the patient’s brain to again produce dopamine and the nervous system to resume functioning normally.

This potential for possible cures has won embryonic stem cell research some prominent supporters, including Nancy Reagan, whose husband had Alzheimer’s disease; Michael J. Fox, who has Parkinson’s disease; and the late Christopher Reeve, who was paralyzed as the result of a spinal cord injury.

Since the 1970s, scientists have been studying adult stem cells, extracted from blood and bone marrow, as well as from organs taken from dead bodies. Working with such cells is not particularly controversial, and they are already used in areas such as bone marrow transplants and in treating eye injuries. But these older stem cells may be more set in their ways – scientists differ (in pdf format) over how versatile they might be -- and so unable to develop into some other types of cells. And the supply of these cells, particularly those from donated organs, is limited.

Because embryonic stem cells can keep dividing and renewing themselves for long periods of time, they could exist in greater supply. The problem, though, is where to get them in the first place. For now – and this is where in vitro fertilization enters the picture – most embryonic stem cells derive from blastocysts, several-day-old embryos that have not been implanted in a uterus. And these blastocysts come from in vitro fertilization clinics.

Scientists are trying to develop other methods to produce cells with the properties of embryonic stem cells. But for now, the cells come from embryos that are destroyed in the process.

THE ETHICAL ISSUES

This troubles many people, including leaders of the Catholic Church, members of the Christian right, and some, though certainly not all, anti-abortion advocates. They see the blastocyst as a human life and believe that destroying it – even to save someone from disease — is wrong. “We don’t think a human life should ever be a means to an end,” said Dennis Powst, director of communications for the New York State Catholic Conference. “It’s not an ethical way to go about curing disease.”

To underscore the link between the blastocysts and human life, President George W. Bush last year hailed the birth of 81 children from “adopted” embryos – dubbed “snowflake babies” -- and told a gathering of the families, “There is no such thing as a spare embryo. Every embryo is unique and genetically complete, like every other human being…. These lives are not raw material to be exploited, but gifts.”

The blastocyst legally belongs to the family that created it. A small number of these families turn their embryos over for adoption or for more medical research. But most of the embryos are now simply destroyed. Supporters of stem cell research argue that using the blastocysts to help find a cure for debilitating diseases would be far more ethical than just throwing them away.

Opponents of embryonic stem cell research also fear that the need for a steady stream of stem cells for research and treatment could lead scientists to try to create human embryos by cloning. “If cloning is not part and parcel of embryonic stem cell research,” said Powst, “we question why human cloning research is part of every bill” supporting embryonic stem cell research.

While most advocates of stem cell research say they oppose cloning for reproductive purposes they do support so-called “therapeutic cloning.” In this procedure, the nucleus of an adult cell is placed in an unfertilized human egg. Development would advance until the egg became a blastocyst but, advocates say, could go no further. There is, they stress, no way such an egg could ever become a human being.

THE POLICY HISTORY

In 2001, the Bush administration came down on the side of those opposing embryonic stem cell research. The federal National Institutes of Health said that it would only fund embryonic stem cell research using existing, self propagating lines of cells. But many of those lines turned out to be contaminated, leaving less than two dozen available for research. No federal money could go to create new lines.

The move did not ban embryonic stem cell research, but since the National Institutes funds most medical research in this country, particularly in areas where commercial applications remain years away, the action had quite an impact. “It’s mind boggling to researchers that the federal government has taken this action,“ said Maria Mitchell, president of AMDeC Foundation, a nonprofit consortium of New York medical schools and health care and research organizations.

The federal action discourages “an entire generation of young scientists from even going into the field,” said Susan Solomon of the New York Stem Cell Foundation. NIH bars research institutions from using any federally funded facilities for embryonic stem cell research. ”It’s a kind of McCarthyite environment,” Solomon said. “There’s a potential that since NIH is an executive branch creation that someone could come in and withdraw federal funding” from a lab doing work with embryonic stem cells.

Other countries, including England, South Korea and China, have continued to push ahead. And in the United States, individual states have begun to try to fill the void left by the national government. “Washington dropped the ball in our view. That’s the only reason this is coming up,” said Elliott.

In 2004, California passed a referendum, setting up its own agency that could provide $3 billion over the next 10 years for embryonic stem cell research. So far no money has been handed out because the measure is being challenged in court. Other states, including New Jersey and Connecticut, also have moved to provide money for stem cell research.

NEW YORK AND STEM CELL RESEARCH

A Hub for Research

In many respects, New York City seems a promising place for stem cell research. It is home to 49 teaching hospitals, eight major medical schools and eight medical institutions that are among the top 80 recipients of NIH research funds, according to a 2002 report by the Center for an Urban Future.

“New York is blessed with a real wealth of bio-medical research institutions and talent, “ said Ross Frommer, a spokesman for Columbia University Health Sciences. “Cutting edge research should be done at a place that’s good at doing cutting edge research.”

The Bio-Tech Business

Even though any commercial application of stem cell research is years, if not decades away, many leaders in medicine and research say the state cannot afford to be left behind. If New York does not fund stem cell research while its neighbors do, the state will lose the best scientists, research funds and, eventually, commercial opportunities. “In one word, it’s competition,” said Mitchell. “Not being involved in one of the most promising areas of research would put us at a huge disadvantage.”

If New York is seen as less than friendly to medical research, the state could lose out on more commercial aspects of bio-technology as well. Today biotech and pharmaceutical companies together employ almost 55,000 people in the state and pay $3.3 billion in wages, according to the New York Biotechnology Association. But New York State, and particularly the city, have lagged behind other areas in attracting commercial bio-tech jobs. In the past decade, says Maria Gotsch, of the Partnership for New York City, a business group, that situation began to change.

The City’s Effort

Both Mayor Rudolph Giuliani and Michael Bloomberg tried to attract bio-tech to the city. As part of that, the city is moving on the East River Science Park in Manhattan, which will provide 870,000 square feet of lab and other space for start-up bio-tech companies. In the past, businesses have cited the real estate crunch – and the lack of laboratory space at any price -- as impediments to bringing bio-tech jobs to the city. “There’s no lab space because there’s no industry and no industry because there’s no lab space,” Gotsch said. “We believe the project will provide the critical mass to get the industry going.”

The first two buildings should be complete and open for business by 2008. According to Gotsch, the project is expected to create 4,000 construction jobs and, when complete, 2,000 permanent jobs.

The state has also worked to attract bio-tech, although most of its programs have been focused outside of the city. But without support for stem cell research, such efforts could be for naught. The state has put money into technology and now is in a position to see the benefits of those investments said Robin Gelburd, general counsel for AMDeC Foundation. But, she added, “a failure to move with stem cell research would be an impediment to reaping those seeds.”

The Private Effort

Even without federal or state money, embryonic stem cell research is taking place in New York, much of it funded by foundations and individual donors. Using private money, Weill Cornell Medical Center hopes to launch a facility to develop and maintain embryonic stem cells for research. Memorial Sloane Kettering Cancer Center investigators are studying whether embryonic stem cells could some day repair damage caused by radiation treatment for brain tumors. A Columbia University embryology professor seeks to learn how cells taken from embryos would behave in adults. At Mount Sinai, The Black Family Stem Cell Institute hopes to use findings about embryonic stem cells to develop new therapies for degenerative diseases.

“The private money is absolutely very, very welcome,” said Elliot. “But private money is never going to be enough.”

Looking to Albany

And so supporters of embryonic stem cell research want the state to become involved. In November, New Yorkers for the Advancement of Medical Research urged Governor George Pataki to include $100 million for stem cell research in his budget for the next fiscal year. And earlier this year, leaders of 17 research institutions in the state called on Albany to establish a fund to support stem cell research. “If New York fails to act, we risk losing our place as one of the leading, if not the leading, location for biomedical research,” the study said

Assembly Speaker Sheldon Silver, who proponents say has been a champion of stem cell research, has proposed a bill that would provide $300 million in state funding for stem cell research, including embryonic stem cell research, between now and June 30, 2007. The bill passed the Assembly last year but stumbled in the Senate. The Assembly approved it again this year.

In his State of the State speech, Governor George Pataki called for a bio-tech initiative that he said could generate $800 million in public and private funding. It might finance stem cell research and then again it might not. The plan does include a bio-ethics board that that would provide guidance on “ethical, moral and public policy issues” arising from the proposed projects. That panel could be “a wonderful thing,” said Robin Elliott, but it could also be “a veiled fist for an ideological agenda.”

Although a spokesperson for the governor said last year that he is “supportive of the concept of stem cell research,” Pataki has not spoken out explicitly for it. But deadlocks between Silver and Pataki are a familiar story in Albany and one that often leads to nothing being done at all. Silver said that Democratic gubernatorial candidate Eliot Spitzer supports his bill but Spitzer’s office has not confirmed that.

Meanwhile, Mayor Michael Bloomberg donated $100 million to Johns Hopkins University, with the apparent understanding that much of it would go for embryonic stem cell research.

Opponents says that, instead of focusing on embryonic stem cell research, the state should support adult stem cell research and make effort to collect and use umbilical chord blood, said Powst. “They’re providing benefits now, but embryonic research is still a theoretical proposition,” he said.

But stem cell proponents worry that, without a specific provision for the research it could get lost among hundreds of competing – and worthy – demands. And, because of the federal ban on funding embryonic stem cell research, they say the state must step in. “Stem cell research is an area where there’s a real void in federal funding,” said Ross Frommer from Columbia University. “Somebody has to step up and fill that void.”

FOR MORE INFORMATION

Organizations and web site

Do No Harm
A coalition supporting medical technologies that do not involve destruction of human embryos, the group advocates adult stem cell research.

New York Biotechnology Association
A trade association that advocates development and growth of New York State based biotechnology related industries and institutions

New York State Catholic Conference
The position on embryonic stem cell of this group, which represents the state’s bishops on public policy issues.

New York Stem Cell Foundation
A non-profit organization dedicated to furthering human embryonic stem cell research to advance the search for cures of the major diseases of our time.

New Yorkers for the Advancement of Medical Research
A coalition of New York State-based disease advocacy groups, university research centers and biotech industry leaders that have assembled to lead a charge to achieve legislation that would affirm and support scientific research involving embryonic stem cells and other DNA therapies

Reports and Articles

The California Stem-Cell Gold Rush” (New York Magazine)
New York risks losing its best scientific minds as well as billions of dollars to other states that are investing in stem cell research.

New York and Stem Cell Research
A report by leaders of 17 state research institutions analyzing the scientific, therapeutic, and economic issues related to stem cell research in the state and calling for the state government to fund more research.

The Stem Cell Debate (Boston Globe)
Pulitzer Prize winning coverage of many aspects of the issue.

Stem Cells: Scientific Progress and Future Research Directions (National Institues of Health)
A review of the state of the science of stem cell research as of June 17, 2001. Included in this report is subject matter addressing stem cells from adult, fetal tissue, and embryonic sources.

 

Divorce, New York-Style


For most New Yorkers, contact with the court system is limited to combat with a landlord or combat with a spouse – i.e. divorce. But to members of the bar and the bench, divorce has always lacked the cachet of other branches of the law such as contracts or real estate. Perhaps this is because it involves human lives and relationships, with emphasis on the needs of children and "non-monied spouses,” usually women.

But now a Matrimonial Commission appointed by Chief Judge Judith S. Kaye, to study the legal problems of divorce New York style, has issued a report (in pdf format) with findings and recommendations. If the recommendations are adopted, the commission predicts a change in the culture and proceedings of the "matrimonial parts" of state Supreme Court, and also the city's Family Courts.

The commission, chaired by Associate Appellate Division Justice Sondra Miller, and comprised primarily of lawyers and judges, recommends a series of changes which are designed, in part, to move divorce to a higher level of judicial priorities.

The bar, the bench and the public have welcomed most of the recommendations, which include:

  • more emphasis on mediation
  • streamlined court procedures
  • the hiring of social workers
  • parent education
  • sensitivity training
  • and changes in terminology -- for example, “visitation” would become "parenting time."

There is one recommendation, though, that is highly controversial. The commission says it is time for the New York state legislature to enact "no fault divorce."

38,000 Divorces A Year In NYC

In New York City, 26,152 uncontested actions for divorce were filed, and 11,505 contested divorces in 2004, the year for which most recent statistics are available.

These figures can be misleading, however, since the so-called uncontested divorces have often been fought out between lawyers and litigants for years beforehand.

Still, many of the uncontested actions are brought by those with little or no property and therefore no property to fight about. In these cases, which often involve poor and sometimes middle class couples, most issues (such as support, custody and visitation) are heard in Family Court, where it is common for litigants to appear pro se – without lawyers to represent them.

But the actual divorce is different. It can only be heard and granted in Supreme Court -- and some grounds have to be alleged.

Wrong Doing Required For A New York Divorce

New York has never recognized "no-fault divorce," or divorce based on "incompatibility," and remains the only state that requires grounds for divorce. That is, some type of wrong doing must be proven. The plaintiff must allege and prove, for example, "She refused to have sexual relations," or "He went out for the newspaper and never returned," or "He slapped me in front of the children." Until 1967, the only grounds for divorce was adultery. Now, other grounds include cruel and inhuman treatment, abandonment (for one year), imprisonment (for three years).

Some judges try to avoid what they consider a charade, or even perjury, by proving a case which is established by prearrangement and without dispute or contest. One spouse will testify that she was "constructively abandoned" by the other's refusal to engage in sexual relations for a period of one year. To protect the dependent spouse and children, some judges refuse to enter the judgment of divorce until the matters of equitable distribution of property, child support, maintenance for the non-monied spouse (almost always the wife) can be adjudicated or agreed upon.

Advocates for women have long argued that no-fault divorce is harmful to women, that women will be hurt if their husbands can get divorced without the economic and support issues being resolved first. The fear is that a husband can simply go to court, and essentially say "I divorce thee," and go on his way without any court orders for property division, support, or child custody.

Other Recommendations

As confirmed by the report, there are differences in the proceedings involving affluent litigants whose cases are in the state Supreme Court, or poor and often middle class people who appear in Family Court. The commission recommends that the court provide counsel in certain limited situations, urges the legal profession to do more pro bono work, seeks greater funding of such groups as Legal Services and Legal Aid Society (Civil Division), but does not say there is or should be a right to counsel in a divorce.

At the same time, the members endorse an effort to eliminate or reduce the activity of "divorce mills," which are often non-lawyers, even travel agents, filling out stacks of legal forms.

In a little noted recommendation, commission members seek a new statute which would eliminate any right for a non-monied spouse to share in the potential of her partner's income as a result of his special training or enhanced ability to earn money. But she would not lose her interest in, for example, his medical license if she helped put him through medical school.

There is some irony to the timing of this new attention to what some say is a previously neglected field of the law. The number of divorces are declining, as are the number of marriages.

Emily Jane Goodman is a New York State Supreme Court Justice 

 



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