NEW YORK — It is unlikely anyone could have predicted what would happen in the last months of 2012 — and how it would shape the civic conversation among New Yorkers.

In late October, Superstorm Sandy devastated coastal communities in New York and New Jersey, stoking the public debate over the need to rethink housing, hospitals and other critical infrastructure — with some people even raising the possibility of rolling back waterfront development. And, days before Christmas, there was the mass killing of children and staff at an elementary school in Newton, Conn., that, while not in New York, was expected to galvanize support for gun control in Albany.

But these were just the most recent, sharpest events of a year that was marked by policy debates over the police department's "stop, question and frisk" tactics, paid sick leave, the size of sugary drinks, ethics in Albany and the role of money in elections.

What is ahead in 2013? In large part, the public conversation in New York City will be defined by the response to Sandy and the elections that will bring to office the first new mayor in over a decade as well as a new roster of lawmakers to the City Council and other elected offices. There will also be much talk about gun control, at least early in the year, with Gov. Andrew Cuomo and other state lawmakers promising a new push on stricter laws in January's session.

As usual, we reached out to elected officials and thought leaders to get their forecasts on the coming year. Besides city elections and Sandy recovery, our aspiring soothsayers made bold predictions about state politics, the transit system and campaign finance reform — as well as the prospects of the Buffalo Bills and the New York Knicks.

But, before we get to the 2013 predictions, here's a quick look at the scorecard for last year.

Colin Campbell of Politicker was among the winners, getting one big prediction right when he said, “All hope for independent redistricting will turn out to be mere naive wishfulness — redistricting will be just as partisan next year as it's always been.”

State redistricting was just as partisan as any year — we even saw the addition of a Senate seat in upstate New York that is at the center of a still contested race weeks after the general election: Only 30-something votes separate Democratic candidate Cecilia Tkaczyk and Republican Assemblyman George Amedore. A judge has certified the race for Amedore, but Democrats have appealed.

The New York Public Interest Group’s Bill Mahoney and Gene Russianoff of the Straphangers Campaign also got some predictions right.

Mahoney predicted that the much-ballyhooed Joint Commission On Public Ethics would miss a deadline for setting rules for independent expenditures, which it did. Meanwhile, Russianoff not only predicted the return of poetry to subway cars but also the fare hike that came as an unwanted Christmas gift to millions of New Yorkers.

“Sadly, the fare will go up at the end of 2012,” Mahoney said last year. “That's the MTA plan." And so it went: It was announced that the base fare would go from $2.25 to $2.50, the 7-day MetroCard $1 to $30 and the 30-day MetroCard $8 to $112.

Others did not do not score so well. Councilman Ydanis Rodriguez predicted a "huge surge" of activity from the Occupy Wall Street movement once the weather got warm and that state Sen. Adriano Espaillat would win elections to the U.S. House of Representatives — neither of which came true.

Instead, OWS mobilized for hurricane relief as Occupy Sandy, becoming one of the most high-profile (and some would say effective) groups to respond to and provide on-the-ground help to traumatized communities (to be fair to Rodriguez, he wasn't the only one to predict a rejuvenated OWS — John Petro of the Drum Major Institute said Occupy "mass protests" in 2012 would "dwarf" the previous autumn's.)

Meanwhile, Espaillat lost a tough race to incumbent Congressman Charlie Rangel, after a protracted battle over the tallying of votes by the city's Board of Elections. Espaillat instead won re-election to the state Senate.

Perhaps because of the very tenuous nature of predictions, some elected officials and policymakers declined requests to comment. While some people who were contacted agreed to be interviewed in the late weeks of December, others provided statements. Those statements have been edited only for style and clarification. — David Howard King and Cristian Salazar

2013 Predictions

Council Speaker Christine Quinn

1. Council hearings on city response to Sandy results in improved storm preparedness.

2. Volunteers participating in the Council’s Clinic Protection Project help to increase New Yorkers' access to healthcare.

3. Council passes law that rejects quick fixes and holds landlords accountable for repairing underlying conditions, leads to real improvements for tenants.

4. New York Jets announce the release of Sanchez and Tebow in favor of rookie quarterback sensation Jimmy Oddo of Staten Island.

Bill Thompson, 2013 mayoral candidate

Thompson said that rebuilding after the hurricane is “going to be a big part of next year’s discussion,” especially “how we rebuild.”

He also said that the storm emphasized the need for a serious discussion of fairness and equity in the city.

“I think that one thing you are going to hear about a lot in the mayoral election … [is] about the need to be one city,” Thompson said in a recent interview. “I think a number of communities after the hurricane, and also last year in the snowstorm, felt that they were abandoned.”

Turning to sports, Thompson said “it would be nice to see the Mets in the playoffs this year.” But his most ambitious prediction was for the Knicks: “We could be hoisting a championship banner in the Garden ... If they blend everything together, the Knicks could be awesome.”

New York City Comptroller John Liu

•New York City will become the most financially transparent municipality in the country when Checkbook 2.0 is unveiled.

•We will continue to strive to recoup the millions in fraudulent billing on the 911 call center upgrade.

•The Economic Development Corp. will finally have some sense of accountability as a result of new contract provisions negotiated by our office.

•The city’s own “fiscal cliff” will continue to loom because of the mayor’s failure to negotiate in good faith with labor.

•The pension funds will help finance the rebuilding of our city in the aftermath of Superstorm Sandy.

•The mayor will realize that city taxis should be accessible to all New Yorkers.

•As a dad, I will be negotiating the NYC public high school admission process for my son.

•As if my schedule isn’t hectic enough, I predict it will be even busier in 2013.

Kathryn Wylde, Partnership for New York City

In 2013, many important players in the city's leading export industries — financial services, media, professional services, fashion and design — will decide whether to recommit to New York or relocate significant numbers of jobs and even headquarters to more business-friendly locations. Decisions will be based on both local and global factors. Of critical importance will be the election of a mayor who is prepared to work with the business community, maintain a healthy economy, and hire great people to manage the city. A clear plan for insulating the city's power, transportation and communications infrastructure against weather and other causes of failure will also impact decisions. Finally, the actions of Gov. Cuomo's recently appointed tax commission will signal whether New York will be a more competitive place from which to run a business, or not.

Decisions made in Washington are equally important, starting with a satisfactory solution to the country's fiscal and debt crisis that does not terribly disadvantage New York taxpayers.  Similarly, employers will be watching for reform of U.S. immigration policies so that they can recruit and retain global talent.

My prediction is that, regardless of campaign rhetoric, no New York City mayor will want to preside over an exodus of jobs and industry leaders. On Nov. 7, we are likely to see whomever is elected reach out for managerial expertise and policy input from business, and I am confident that the city's business community will be willing to help. On the other hand, when it comes to Washington D.C., it is harder to predict a good outcome. On every critical issue, New Yorkers better be prepared for a fight!

Michael McKee, Tenants Political Action Committee

Gov. Andrew Cuomo will recognize that the transactional deal that he has made with the State Senate Republicans and the Kleiniacs has positioned him too far to the right. The governor will give an interview to Fred Dicker in which he will admit that he was wrong to allow the Senate Republicans to draw their own district lines, he was wrong not to endorse Democrats running on a genuine progressive agenda such as Cecilia Tkaczyk, Justin Wagner, and Ted O’Brien (especially as their opponents were, to put it kindly, extreme right wingers), and that he was wrong to refuse to use his talents and power to unify the Senate Democratic conference following the November 6 election. The next day’s headline in the Daily News: “A bad case of buyer’s remorse.”

Constantly demonstrating dignity and integrity, Andrea Stewart-Cousins will become a statewide media star as impatient reporters and editors increasingly seek to cut through the spin normally produced in the state capitol.

Jeff Klein will give back all the real estate campaign contributions he has collected, and will finally become a sponsor of Sen. Stewart-Cousins’ bill to repeal vacancy destabilization.

During 2013, the irreverent Albany press corps will invent four new coinages similar to “the Kleiniacs” and “Skleinos” to describe the ever-shifting landscape on Planet Albany.

Andrew Cuomo will see the handwriting on the wall and will become co-chair of the “Draft Hillary in 2016” committee.

Karen Scharf, Citizen Action

The November election results are proof positive that New Yorkers are no longer willing to accept elections dominated by CEO campaign contributors. New Yorkers elected new legislators who ran on the need to reform our broken campaign finance system and for publicly financed fair elections.  I expect before the end of the legislative session, these new Senators and Governor Cuomo will succeed in getting the Senate to join the Assembly in passing publicly funded Fair Elections.

Gene Russianoff, NYPIRG’s Straphangers Campaign

1. The next MTA Chairman will resign after four days, setting a record for the shortest time in that post. When interviewed about her short tenure, she said, "Whoops, I had no idea how unpopular you'd be."

2. The City Council will pass legislation mandating that employers offer their workers the option of having transit costs excluded from their income. Both employers and employees will save significantly.

3. The candidates for mayor will all pledge to expand Select Bus Service around the city. SBS — now in operation on four routes — speeds buses by 20 percent or more through such features as paying your fare in advance at the bus stop, a painted exclusive lane and camera enforcement of the lane.

4. The number of stations with "countdown" clocks will increase substantially in 2013.

Linda Sarsour, executive director, Arab American Association of New York

Sarsour predicted that mayoral hopefuls will need to make police reform a part of their platform. She emphasized that the Community Safety Act, a package of legislation currently before the City Council, has immense support from communities of color. Among other changes, the Act would mandate a police inspector general to oversee the department.

“Every candidate better have something to say about police reform ... Particularly so communities of color feel safe. And if it is not something you are talking about or prioritizing–you won’t get our [Arab-American] vote,” she said.

Assemblyman Brian Kavanagh

Assemblyman Brian Kavanagh said he predicts that a package of legislation on gun control will be signed by Gov. Cuomo in January because after the shootings in Connecticut the issue for stronger gun laws has become even more urgent and hopefully state senators have reached a consensus that it is “time to act.”

“In light of yet another tragedy we are prepared to get these bills passed. We think we have a new coalition and a Governor who is really working with the Senate to pass these bills to make stronger gun laws,” he said adding, “We will make it priority to get these bills to the floor of both houses of the Legislature, and get it to the Governor to be signed by January.”

Bill Mahoney of NYPIRG

New Yorkers will finally see the realization of two long-sought goals: Campaign finance reform will pass both houses of the Legislature and the Buffalo Bills will make the playoffs.

State Sen. Jose Serrano

1. I predict that Senate Democrats will unite in Albany to pass a progressive agenda that reflects the will of the voters — an agenda which includes increasing the minimum wage, real campaign finance reform, and most importantly, gun control.  

2. I also predict this will be a banner year for tourism in New York State with the arts and parks leading the way. This will be done thanks in part to Gov. Cuomo, who continues to invest in parks which provide a five-to-one return on investment, and the state Legislature, which actually passes my “pennies for parks” legislation to help our environment and expand our wonderful parks system.

State Sen. Mike Gianaris

I can tell you what we hope to get accomplished — whether we do relies on people other than us. But we’re looking forward to getting the economy back on track, getting people more jobs, increasing the minimum wage so those jobs are good paying jobs, enacting the progressive agenda that we got elected on, campaign finance reform, protection of reproductive health rights, protections for women in the workplace and, of course, sensible gun laws that are needed to make our streets safer and our schools safer. So, its an ambitious agenda, but we’ve got a governor who is on board with it and we are looking forward to making it happen.

Billy Easton, executive director, Alliance for Quality Education

1. The New York City mayoral election will prove to be a referendum on the Bloomberg school reform agenda. Weary of continuous school closings, divisive rhetoric bashing teachers and dismissing parents and students, voters will provide a clear mandate for a change of direction.  This will be welcome news for students and families because after 12 years of this agenda only one in four students, and 13 percent of black and Latino students, are college-ready.

2. Statewide there will be a big fight over the relationship between the state education budget and the quality of education as parents, students, teachers and administrators from all parts of the state simply can no longer tolerate the continuous cuts to effective educational programs that are the result of inadequate state school aid. While such fights have traditionally been focused on large urban communities primarily represented by Democrats, small cities and rural areas represented by Republicans will play an increasing role in demanding fair and adequate school aid. This will result in greater pressure on upstate Republican Senators. Ironically, the new coalition between the Independent Democrats and the Republicans in the Senate will create an atmosphere where it becomes increasingly difficult for school aid debates to be strictly partisan affairs as pressure mounts for senators to work across party lines for the benefit of high need schools in all regions of the state.

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Additional reporting by Kamelia Kilawan.

NEW YORK — City Comptroller John C. Liu called for raising the minimum wage, leveling the playing field for small businesses and making higher education more affordable for New Yorkers in a wide-ranging speech yesterday — his second state of the city address — in front of hundreds of people, including several elected officials.

With a showy introduction that included singing elementary school children performing  “We’re all in this together” from the High School Musical and a contemporary dance performance, Liu’s speech was the ambitious, sweeping kind you might expect from someone who has made his ambitions to be the next mayor well known — not the talking points of the city’s “chief financial officer.” Liu is the only comptroller in the city’s history to deliver a state of the city speech.

“New York should be a city where working men and women can afford to make ends meet,” Liu said, striking a populist tenor that seemed to put him on the progressive side of the Democratic Party. “We have to continue to speak up for the working poor.”

The elected officials in the crowd included Borough Presidents Scott Stringer, Ruben Diaz Jr. and Marty Markowitz; Assemblymen Guillermo Linares and David Weprin; state Sen. Kevin Parker; and Council members Daniel Dromm, Gale Brewer, Robert Jackson, Jumaane Williams and Ydanis Rodriguez.

“For me he touched on concrete issues that are important to our community,” Rodriguez said after the 50-minute speech.

The New York Post said of Liu’s speech: “All that was missing from John Liu’s campaign-style ‘state of the city’ lollapalooza at John Jay College yesterday were fireworks and a balloon drop.” The newspaper continued, “He needs to just go away, and to stage his circuses on his own dime.”

A cloud of scandal overshadows Liu’s presumed ambitions to run for mayor in 2013 after federal authorities began investigating fundraising improprieties by his campaign. A fundraiser for Liu and his campaign treasurer have been arrested and are facing trial.

The scandal went unmentioned by Liu. And there was plenty of policy substance to Liu’s speech, even if there is very little he could do to channel them into actual law.  “All of these proposals can’t be done locally. They must be approved by Albany,” said Doug Turetsky, of the city’s Independent Budget Office.

Even so, Liu has shown a knack for using his bully pulpit as the comptroller to push for his agenda, from reforming the NYPD dress code to allow Sikhs to wear long beards and turbans to improving high school graduation rates.

“In times like these it’s not just managing our money,” Liu said during the speech delivered at John Jay College. “It’s managing the impossible. But New Yorkers deserve it and the people of our city are counting on it to make our lives easier, better, and fairer. Every dollar does something so every saving means something.”

Here are three of Liu’s major policy proposals:

Increase the minimum wage by $4.25

Some in the audience applauded in unison after Liu called for an increase in the minimum wage. “If you are serious about narrowing the wealth gap, we need to have the courage to pay all New Yorkers a livable minimum wage,” Liu said.

Though he also pointed out that he supports legislators in Albany were working to raise the wage to $8.50 an hour, he said the cost of living in the city is much higher and that that amount of pay “buys a lot more in Buffalo and Rochester than it does in the Bronx and Brooklyn.”

Eliminate the city’s taxes for some businesses

Liu announced his proposal to eliminate the city’s general corporations tax for businesses with less than $5,000 in assets, which would help roughly 240,000 businesses. He also proposed that 25,000 businesses —  such as neighborhood pizza stores, dry cleaners, vegetable grocers, and home repair contractors — be exempt from the unincorporated business tax, costing the city $100 million.

Liu said he proposed offsetting the cost of saving small businesses by closing corporate loopholes. The comptroller plans to require insurance companies, which are currently exempt, to pay the general tax, and private equity firms to pay a tax on all profits from assets held as investments.

He also said he wanted Madison Square Garden to start paying a property tax, which he says costs the city $15 million a year.

“I love the Knicks even though they sent Jeremy Lin to Houston, but the Garden should be kicking in its fair share just like everyone else,” Liu said.

Turetsky said what is particularly unusual about the property tax exemption on Madison Square Garden is that it is on privately owned land, unlike places like Citi Field, Yankee Stadium and the Barclays Center. “It’s unusual for that kind of tax break to be done without an expiration date,” he said.

Making education more affordable

Liu also proposed making tuition free for all students of the city’s public colleges as he cited the Macaulay Honors College program — a highly-selective honors program throughout the city’s public colleges offering free tuition and academic scholarships to students. Liu said the tuition for the city’s public colleges should be free for the top 10 percent of students from public high schools bringing the City University of New York at the “level of a competitive prize” while also acting as a life-saver to working families.

Elvia Martinez, 17, a senior from the Abraham Lincoln high school in Coney Island, Brooklyn who is applying to two CUNY colleges said the proposal for free tuition for the best high school students was a good idea.

“More people would have the opportunity to go to college,” said Martinez, who said she hopes to become an accountant like Liu someday, though her parents also have to pay college tuition for her two sisters and brother.

Councilman Rodriguez, who is also chair of the Council’s committee on higher education, said he was happy to hear the comptroller’s focus on “concrete initiatives” like building partnerships with high schools and public colleges and guaranteeing free tuition for the best students from public schools.

“I am very thankful to the comptroller for his position on everything but especially the college readiness piece. I believe the city will move in the fastest way if we prepare our men and women to be the new leaders.”

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US Government

Image of John Liu by Runs With Scissors, used under Creative Commons license.

NEW YORK — The City Council passed a bill yesterday aimed at helping homeowners whose property was seriously damaged or rendered uninhabitable by Superstorm Sandy.

The bill extends the deadline for homeowners to pay their next property tax bill, from Jan. 1, 2013, to April 1, 2013. The extension is interest-free. Only those homes that the Department of Buildings has determined require major structural repairs or must be demolished are eligible.

"This is a small thing we are doing to help Hurricane Sandy victims, but it goes a long way," said Councilman Vincent M. Ignizio, a Republican from Staten Island whose district is still reeling from the damage caused by the storm.

The bill was one of a handful passed by the Council at its regular stated meeting yesterday, including one to extend the landmark biotechnology credit created in 2009, and another that calls on new buildings to set aside space for recyclables.

A number of bills also were introduced, including one that critics say would give unions and corporations unfettered ability to spend money to influence elections. The bill, backed by Quinn, was introduced without remarks.

PROPERTY TAX RELIEF

Staten Island Councilmen James Oddo and Ignizio proposed the bill extending property tax relief to Hurricane Sandy victims. The Republicans represent some of the coastal communities hardest-hit by the storm.

"The genesis of this is a business owner on Staten Island," Oddo told the Council. "On top of everything else he's going through, [he] pointed to his business and said, 'I have a $13,000 tax bill I have to pay." While the current bill won't bring him relief from his business tax, Oddo said it will help provide property tax relief for his home "that was wiped out."

Ignizio said the property tax relief would also help his constituents: "I just wanted to give voice to some of my constituents, in this case Mike Abruzzo, who has lost his home totally, to nothing. In fact if you walk where his home is today, it's just his kitchen floor which managed to survive because it was built on a slab. And there's absolutely nothing there."

"Throughout the process of working with Mike," Ignizio continued, "he said to me, "I'm down on my luck, everybody wants to help and I know in a couple months we're going to be sent a property tax bill, and if anybody can help with things like that it would be appreciative.'"

He said he hoped that there would be a more "robust conversation" around commercial property taxes for owners "who are getting bills for $15,000 to $20,000, for businesses that no longer exist."

The bill was announced by Mayor Michael Bloomberg, Quinn and Finance Department Commissioner David M. Frankel on Nov. 29. They also said at the time that they would push for a rebate to homeowners on their property taxes to better reflect post-Sandy values. That measure would require the support of the state Legislature, which is tied up in a squabble over who will control the Senate.   

A separate piece of legislation sponsored by Oddo and passed by the Council yesterday seeks to make property tax bills more transparent for residents, by requiring the Department of Finance to create a brochure to explain tax bills, as well as abatements and exemptions available to property owners.

BIOTECHNOLOGY TAX CREDIT AND RECYCLABLES

The Council also voted to extend the biotechnology tax credit, until Dec. 31, 2015. The credit, created under state legislation passed in 2009, aims to encourage investment in the biotechnology sector. Capped at $3 million per year, the credit has been criticized for being underwhelming compared to incentives dangled by other states and counties looking to horn in on the biosciences industry.

Councilwoman Jessica Lappin, the sponsor of the bill, said the biotech credit had been "successful in keeping small businesses in the city."

Another measure passed at the Council meeting would require new buildings to make space for recyclables as they do for refuse. The bill aims to divert waste from landfills.

"We hope to make the act of recycling as built into our daily routines as brushing our teeth is in the morning," said Councilman Dan Garodnick, the sponsor of the legislation.

CAMPAIGN FINANCE BILL

Already the subject of debate among policymakers since it was announced last week, Council members introduced a campaign finance bill that would make it possible for unions and corporations to to spend unlimited amounts of money in coordination with candidates for political office.

The bill, sponsored by Councilwoman Rosie Mendez of Manhattan, is backed by Quinn, an expected candidate for mayor next year.

The city's Campaign Finance Board has said the bill "would open a gaping loophole in a system routinely praised as a national model for reform" and would "allow unions and corporations to operate above the law."

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Image of Speaker Quinn and NYPD Officer Lawrence DePrimo, by William Alatriste. The Council honored DePrimo at the stated meeting Dec. 10, for giving a homeless man a pair of boots — a benevolent act that was caught on camera.

NEW YORK — Earlier this year, restaurant owners gathered before the City Council to lament ever-increasing fines levied against their businesses under the letter-grading system. After hearing the testimony, members of the Council vowed to do something about it.

Speaker Christine Quinn said recently that the Council would, indeed, do something about it — by working to pass legislation this fall that would reform the system of issuing letter grades to restaurants.

It is one of many policy priorities of the Council that could spark conflict with Mayor Michael Bloomberg's administration in the months ahead. This year will also mark the last legislative hurrah for Council members who won't be able to run for re-election in 2013.

Interviews with the legislative directors of some key Council members, and Council members themselves, highlighted some of the other possible ways that lawmakers will be contributing to potentially contentious policy discussions surrounding paid sick leave, gun violence and police reform.

But addressing restaurants owners' complaints about the letter grading system is expected to be a top priority.

"We have heard a lot of complaints from restaurateurs about skyrocketing fines," Quinn said last week. "In the first year or so of the grading system, we had something like three quarters of all restaurants getting an A. But we saw fines go up." She said it was difficult to fathom how that was possible.

She said that the legislation that the Council would introduce in the next month or two would help create a system that is "clear," "understandable" and "focused on public health, not revenue generation." She emphasized that the Council would not be "trying to undo letter grading."

A major policy innovation of the Bloomberg administration, the letter grading system — where the Health Department gives an A, B or C according to how restaurants score during inspections — went into effect in July 2010.

PAID SICK LEAVE

The Council spent the better part of the year bucking Bloomberg by passing laws that he opposed and then overriding his vetoes. The mayor even sued the Council when it overrode his vetoes of prevailing and living wage bills.

Another potential conflict with the Bloomberg administration could arise if the Council were to pass a bill requiring some employers to give their workers paid sick leave.

Quinn first shelved the bill  in 2010, arguing that it would destroy small business; when it was reintroduced into the debate earlier this year, she again referred to the flagging economy in her refusal to bring it to a vote.

But paid sick leave (Intro 97-A) is a priority of Councilwoman Gale Brewer, who previously told the Gazette that the full Council was "going to get a bill." It has a veto-proof majority, but some changes to the measure are expected in order to get Quinn to sign off on it.

GUN VIOLENCE

After a summer of high-profile shootings, including outside the Empire State Building, gun violence continues to be a subject of interest for the Council.

This past week, a resolution was introduced into the Council in support of state legislation that would strengthen gun laws, including creating a 10-day waiting period for firearm purchases; the creation of universal background checks; regulation of ammunition sellers; and more.

The Council's own Task Force to Combat Gun Violence, co-chaired by Councilman Jumaane Williams, also is continuing to work on assessing programs to target neighborhoods where shootings are prevalent.

"We are hopeful and excited to be talking about some developments soon," said Williams' spokesman, Stefan Ringel.

The Council earmarked $4.8 million for anti-gun violence initiatives in its discretionary budget earlier this year. Some of that money has been directed toward setting up programs modeled after the CeaseFire model that has been nationally recognized for reducing shootings in other cities. The model calls for approaching gun violence as a public health threat.

POLICE REFORM

Another potential source of discord between the Council and the Bloomberg administration could center around efforts to pass legislation that would create new oversight and regulation of the New York Police Department.

Introduced in response to police monitoring of Muslims and the tactic of street stops that critics say unfairly targets Latinos and blacks, the package of legislation that supporters refer to as the Community Safety Act.

The package includes a measure that would prohibit "bias-based profiling by law enforcement" (Intro. 800); another would require police to "provide notice and obtain proof of consent to search individuals" (Intro. 799); and a third would establish an inspector general independent of the NYPD with the authority to review police policies and make recommendations (Intro. 881).

Councilwoman Rosie Mendez said that Council members met with Commissioner Ray Kelly over the summer to voice their concerns about stop-and-frisk and other policing practices.

"We're not in agreement," she said of the meeting with Kelly, in a phone message.

The NYPD has stridently opposed calls to increase regulation or oversight of the department, arguing that plenty of safeguards currently exist.

Supporters of the Community Safety Act plan to hold a rally in front of City Hall on Sept. 27.

THE BUDGET

Last week, the Bloomberg administration said the city's agencies would need to save $2 billion over the next 18 months. The budget office had been counting on hundreds of millions of dollars in revenue from the sale of 2,000 new outer-borough taxi medallions, but the plan got held up in court.

Council members and their staff said that dealing with the budget gap would be an ongoing issue for the next several months.

Councilman James Vacca, the chair of the transportation committee, said it was unlikely that the Council could get involved in the medallion sale legislatively.

However, he said that if the mayor loses the court case, "We may have to involve the state, and go back to the drawing board."

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Photograph by William Alatriste, of the City Council

NEW YORK — Longtime Brooklyn Democratic party boss Vito Lopez has been stripped of his committee chairmanship and his seniority after an ethics panel determined that he had sexually harassed two women this past summer.

An Assembly ethics committee found allegations by the women "credible," including that he made "repeated comments about physical appearance, their bodies, their attire and their private relationships," according to a letter addressed to Lopez and released by Assembly Speaker Sheldon Silver earlier today. The committee also found that allegations of "unwelcome" physical conduct were believable, including that he put his hand between one woman's legs during a trip to Atlantic City.

Silver announced that Lopez would be removed as chairman of the Assembly Committee on Housing, banned from any other committee chairmanship or leadership position and that his staff allocation would be reduced through attrition to the amount of a first-time member. Lopez is also mandated to undergo sexual harassment training. His office will be prohibited from employing staff under 21 years old or interns.

“The Assembly has a zero tolerance policy when it comes to sexual harassment and we are committed to ensuring a safe and respectful workplace for all our employees,” Silver said in a statement.

Lopez didn't respond to a request for comment left at his office.

The letter from Silver to Lopez contains graphic detail of the allegations against Lopez.

According to Silver's letter, the Assembly committee unanimously found that the allegations were "credible," including that Lopez forced one staffer to accompany him on a trip to Atlantic City in July, where he "attempted to kiss her, that she struggled to fend you off before you stopped, and that on the drive back from Atlantic City you again put your hand between her legs."

Fellow elected officials and good government groups have called on Lopez to resign from the Assembly and as the county chair of the Brooklyn Democratic Party, including Council Speaker Christine Quinn.

"There must be zero tolerance of sexual harassment in all workplaces, always," Quinn said in a statement.

First elected to the Assembly in 1984, Lopez founded the Ridgewood Bushwick Senior Citizens Council, a community service agency in Brooklyn. From his base in the scrappy Bushwick neighborhood, he has become a kingmaker in the borough, helping to choose which candidates get the favor of the party and which don't. Fellow politicians often seek out his favor.

That has led some reform-minded groups to form a coalition of in recent months to oppose Lopez's power in the borough.

Meanwhile, Lopez has dodged other scandals, including two federal investigations into his community service agency and a Department of Investigation probe.

Image from "I Got Arrested" courtesy of the artist, Danica Novgorodoff, and the Center for Urban Pedagogy.

NEW YORK — He struggled to make sense of what the probation officer was talking about.

It had something to do with his upcoming court appearance, but after a night in jail and with his mother beside him, he was having trouble focusing on the man's words.

“It wasn’t fun. I was hungry. I was impatient and angry," said the teen, who was 14 at the time of his arrest on a misdemeanor. "I wanted to be outside with my family, that’s all I could think about."

Then the officer gave the teenager a comic about a boy who, like him, had gotten in trouble with the law.

Flipping through the pages, the teen read about how the boy spent a night locked up, like him, and had met with a lawyer, too. The boy in the comic also got sent to probation.

"It helped me understand," said the teen who is now 18 and asked to be identified by his initials, S.N.J., because he had been a juvenile during his arrest. "The same thing happened to me."

The comic book was produced by the Center for Urban Pedagogy, a Brooklyn-based nonprofit that works with artists and designers to help the city's diverse population understand, through visual aids, how government works.

Its latest project, Public Access Design, aims to give community organizations and advocacy groups the opportunity to use visual tools to address social justice issues as soon as they arise.

Proposals are due August 6, and will be considered in December, as well as in February, April and June 2013.

"We use visual communication to improve civic engagement, especially when certain people are excluded from city planning conversations," said Clara Amenyo, a program manager at CUP.

To create the comic that tells the story of how the criminal justice system works, in 2010 CUP teamed with a graphic novelist, the Department of Probation and youth leaders from the Center for Court Innovation. Their goal was to offer clear, engaging instructions for teens that have recently been arrested.

Ryan Dodge, a spokesman for the DOP, said when a teen is arrested and enters the probation office he or she is handed the comic.

“Oftentimes they don’t know what they are in store for. The comic gives a one-on-one overview in an understandable and accessible form,” he said.

Joshua Pacheco, a youth leader for CCI, said young people need more information when they get arrested. “The comic book is the solution,” he said.

For the Brooklyn-based designer of “I Got Arrested," Danica Novgorodoff, dealing with the unfamiliar terminology of the criminal justice system was one of the challenges. But she said each page has a vocabulary box explaining terminology in a simple way for teenagers.

“I think that graphic novels are a great way to explore material that can otherwise be overly dense or dry," she said.

For the center's latest project, six organizations will be chosen over the course of the year. The issues can range from breaking down a specific policy or organizing a particular cause. Projects will be chosen by a panel of artists and community advocates.

The end result of the project will be an “organizing tool” — either a printed book of images, a web interactive, animated video or a pocket-sized graphic.

CUP will support the entire research and design process and provide 1,000 copies of the print materials to the organization to distribute directly to those who need it. The project is funded through a grant from the Rockefeller Foundation's NYC Cultural Innovation Fund.

Amenyo said this project is different from previous initiatives because of its shorter development time and a smaller scope.

Typically, she said CUP's posters are made over six to eight months. The new project will take just three to four months, allowing community groups to respond immediately to social justice issues as they arise.

The idea for this latest project came out of working alongside advocacy groups. In the past, the group has worked with the Brennan Center for Justice to create a colorful guide on redistricting and with the Urban Justice Center's street vendor project on a manual that explains city regulations.

Matthew Shapiro, staff attorney with the street vendor project, said the manual helps vendors understand complicated regulations that can be difficult to understand, particularly for vendors with limited English skills. The manual is available in multiple languages, including English, Spanish, Bengali and Chinese.

“The manual has been a great guide for vendors,” Shapiro said, adding that it is sometimes used to clear up confusion with police officers who ask questions about vendors' activities. "Many times vendors show the police the manual.”

At a time when every tax dollar is precious, New Yorkers should never have to question the integrity of how decisions are made to spend public funds on discretionary programs.

They need to be assured that the allocation of public monies to non-profit groups are part of an open and transparent process based on merit.

For all these reasons, I want to discuss the results of a new budgetary program my office launched this year – a process that fundamentally reforms the way member items are given to community organizations.

We must always remember that budgetary decisions have a profound impact on the many neighborhoods and communities of our City, not to mention the daily lives of 8.1 million New Yorkers.

The distribution of member items affects thousands of non-profit organizations that are struggling to make ends meet, and on whom countless New Yorkers rely for services – ranging from parks and recreation to education, health and aging programs.

For many of these groups the decision to grant public funding, or withhold support, can spell the difference between a thriving program and one that is forced to shutter its doors. How well we distribute these funds, and screen the requests for them, are some of the most important choices elected officials will ever make. 

When I first took office, in 2006, we moved quickly to sharpen and expand the process of reviewing such requests. I empanelled various departments within my office—including Policy, Community Affairs and Budget—to screen applications and recommend groups that served the community, had measurable results, and demonstrated excellence.

We were also among the first elected officials to post online the names of organizations that not only received discretionary funding from our office, but had applied for it as well.

This year we decided to expand the process even more, bringing additional voices and community-based perspectives into the mix.

Under our Community Grants program, I created specialized, independent panels to review all applications for expense funding received by our office--and empowered them to make recommendations for distribution.

These five-member panels voted on allocations to be administered by the Departments of Education, Aging, Parks and Recreation, Corrections and Health.

They were composed of knowledgeable experts in their respective fields, representatives of City Council members and Community Boards. The City Council participants represented members who either chair or are members of the committees that focus on these five areas.

The goal was to create a serious, deliberative process that focused on the merits of each request for funds.

We unveiled our new program with an op-ed in the New York Daily News, spelling out a plan to bring community and neighborhood concerns more directly into our budgetary process. And the first year’s results are encouraging: All told, our new panels awarded 167 grants totaling $911,298, after reviewing 232 applications. Out of 43 new applicants, 20 received funding.

As part of the process, we created a budget website – www.transpareNYC.com â€“ that invites the public to participate in our Community Grants program and explains how it works. I especially want to thank Council Members Jessica Lappin, Melissa Mark-Viverito, Inez Dickens, Robert Jackson and Elizabeth Crowley, who helped make the program a success.

The push to reform the member items process in New York City has been gathering momentum, and there have been several successful efforts in recent years to increase transparency. Several good government groups, including Citizens Union and Common Cause among others, have made thoughtful recommendations for increased objectivity in decision-making and other reforms.

I also want to commend Mayor Bloomberg and Cultural Affairs Commissioner Kate Levin for creating an exemplary process in which funding decisions for cultural programs are based on panel recommendations. My office carefully studied this process, in which our staff participates, and it helped shape both the goals and structure of our newly-launched Community Grants program.

At the outset, for example, we created a three-step screening process for our panels. The first was a pre-review of applications for funding done by individual members. During their first meeting, panelists rated each proposal based on the quality and content of the applications before them. In a second meeting, panelists determined funding amounts for community organizations based on a distribution formula each group decided on it own.

I believe that this process – and others like it – could become models for other citywide agencies in the years ahead.

They are all potentially major steps toward ensuring that discretionary funding becomes part of a robust, community-focused process.

There is still much more to do, but I am optimistic that we can achieve this worthy goal if we work together and remember that the distribution of public funds is not just an opportunity, but a responsibility to taxpayers that every City elected official must respect.

Photos by William Alatriste.

NEW YORK – City Councilwoman Elizabeth Crowley ran for Congress -- and some say it just might have cost her district hundreds of thousands of dollars.

A review of data on discretionary funding for the 2013 fiscal year released last week shows that, out of 51 council members due to get a serving of what is commonly referred to as pork, Crowley fell 33 spots to the second-lowest position -- right above Councilman Larry Seabrook, who is currently on trial accused of embezzling discretionary funds.

Crowley’s share was cut by $286,394, leaving her with only $378,000 to dole out to community organizations in her Queens district. Two years ago, Crowley’s district was in a similarly low place, but last year she bounced back up to the 17th spot.

A spokesman for Crowley said he didn’t know how to explain the drop, but he had an idea. 

"The only thing that she did was run for a congressional office," said spokesman Eric Yun. "That's the only thing that she's done recently that might have angered [Speaker Christine] Quinn.”

Quinn, who helps determine the distribution of funds in consultation with her council peers, endorsed Crowley’s rival for the 6th Congressional District, Assemblywoman Grace Meng -- who ultimately won. Crowley’s own cousin, the leader of the Queens Democratic Party, also threw his support behind Meng.

DATA DUMP

Do you want to take a closer look at how much your council member received in discretionary funding?

We've put together two handy spreadsheets and made them available through Google Drive that summarize both expanse and capital funding for years 2009 to 2013. 

CAPITAL | EXPENSE

Looking for the original budget documents? Find the expense budget here. The capital budget is here.

A spokeswoman for the City Council, Maria Alvarado, said that allocation of discretionary funds is based on a number of factors, “which results in a broad-based citywide distribution of funds.”

But council members and political observers have long raised questions of whether politics and the speaker play too large a role in how discretionary funds are allocated -- a process that is murky at best.

“The speaker's power in allocating discretionary funding has often been based on political loyalties as well as on the makeup of the population in each member's district,” said Flora Davidson, a professor of political science and urban studies at Barnard College.

Councilman Charles Barron, whose district has been consistently at the bottom of the rankings in discretionary funding, said the money is allocated “based upon being in good favor with the speaker.”

"I think we are suffering from a dictatorship of the speaker," said the councilman, who represents parts of East New York, Brownsville, East Flatbush and Canarsie. Barron said he feels districts in what he calls "the gravest need," like his, deserve a bigger share of the budget.

He said he plans to present a resolution at the next Council meeting to revamp the discretionary funds allocation process, basing it solely on factors such as poverty and unemployment rates.

Councilman Peter Vallone, Jr., is similarly frustrated -- his District 22 received the fourth-most discretionary funds in 2009, but now sits in 22nd place after $350,000 in cuts over the past two years. Vallone said he sees this as a punishment from Quinn for not supporting renaming the Queensboro Bridge after former Mayor Ed Koch two years ago.

"I think it's clearly retribution for my opposition to taking the Queensboro Bridge away from the people of Queens," Vallone said. "It clearly has nothing to do with the way that I allocate funds."

Quinn has said she disagrees with the view that she has an inordinate influence over how discretionary funds are distributed. “If you look at the system that we have in place, the system that we have greatly reformed …. We basically went from a system we inherited here that was kind of an honor system to a verification system," Quinn said at a news conference.

Elizabeth Crowley’s spokesman said that the councilwoman and her staff will “keep working for our constituents,” with the hope that next year they see another bounce-back.

In stark contrast to Crowley’s fortunes, Councilwoman Helen Diane Foster moved up 20 spots in the ranking of discretionary funding. Her district will receive close to $600,000 in the 2013 fiscal year. That’s a gain of $220,000 more in discretionary funds this budgeting cycle.

In previous years, Foster’s relatively small serving of pork demonstrated discretionary funds not correlating with a district’s poverty level. Her district includes some of the poorest communities in the South Bronx, West Bronx, Morrisania, Highbridge and Melrose, and received the second-to-least amount of funding last year.

She declined to comment about the change in discretionary funding for her district. While the tides seem to be turning for Foster and her district, Republican Councilman Daniel Halloran’s district has ranked at the bottom of the discretionary funding list since 2009. This year he has continued to move down the ranks to number 48 out of 51.

“The district is pretty underserved by the government,” said spokesman Steven Stites. “In the 2008 and 2009 fiscal year we got the least ... almost nothing, but in the past two years there has been a considerable increase, almost twice, combined of what the district got in previous years.”

Stites said there is a misconception that people in the upper middle class do not need assistance. But he said that Halloran had done much for his community, including saving a public pool and the Engine 306 fire station. Stites said that the amount of discretionary funding the district receives does not reflect the amount its residents dole out in taxpayer dollars.

“People pay a lot in taxes, but they are forgotten about,” he said.

Although the decision process behind distributing discretionary funds remains unclear, Councilman Dan Garodnick is working to make at least part of the system easier to understand. He now posts meeting schedules and letters from those requesting funds on his website.

“My office took steps to shine more daylight on the budget process this year," Garodnick said in a statement. "We felt that posting our meetings and budget request letters online is a natural next step for budget transparency, and can be a useful precedent going forward."

--Research assistance contributed by Rachael Fauss, policy and research manager at Citizens Union Foundation. 

NEW YORK -- Every year, as the City Council goes about its business adopting a budget that it largely had no control over creating, it also repeats a widely observed parallel ritual.

It decides how it will dole out tens of millions of dollars in discretionary funding -- or what some refer to derisively as pork.

The Council made public a list of the groups and projects that it planned to fund last Thursday, before it voted to adopt a $68.5 billion budget.

Though it amounts to less than one percent of the budget, the distribution of discretionary funds is among the only ways the Council has an influence on funding priorities for the city.

While some good government groups argue that such discretionary funding is ripe for corruption, other organizations that analyze the budget disagree.

"Pork is not necessarily bad," said James Parrott, of the independent Fiscal Policy Institute. "Community services do get served."

There are two major types of discretionary funding -- expense and capital.

Expense Funding

The City Council approved $50 million in expense funding for the fiscal year 2013 budget despite numerous scandals surrounding the cash the members get to dole out to nonprofits and organizations in their districts.

The money went to sports programs, theaters, cultural events, historical societies and much more.

Councilman Dan Garodnick, who ranked 42nd of all Council members in discretionary funding this year, is calling for increased disclosure despite recent changes to increase transparency.

Garodnick’s office is making public all of the letters he received from community groups asking for Council cash as well as all the meetings he had with lobbyists and others looking for cash.

Garodnick told the New York Daily News that he thinks it should be common practice for all Council members. While Garodnick only got to dole out $464,464 to groups this year, other members had much larger amounts.

DATA DUMP

Do you want to take a closer look at how much your council member received in discretionary funding?

We've put together two handy spreadsheets and made them available through Google Drive that summarize both expanse and capital funding for years 2009 to 2013. 

CAPITAL | EXPENSE

Looking for the original budget documents? Find the expense budget here. The capital budget is here. 
 

The top five allocations, released as part of the city budget approval process last week, went to powerful council members Domenic Recchia, Lew Fidler, Leroy Comrie, James Oddo and Joel Rivera. All brought home over a million a piece to their districts.

Good government groups and other observers see discretionary funding as a way for the Council president to reward loyal members who vote with the Speaker and punish those who do not.

“If you look at the system that we have in place, the system that we have greatly reformed …. We basically went from a system we inherited here that was kind of an honor system to a verification system," Speaker Christine Quinn said at a news conference before Thursday night's budget vote "We work closely reviewing all of the different distribution.”

When asked again about whether she had undue influence over the process of doling out funds, she replied: "I disagree."

Since 2008, when investigators announced they had discovered that millions in discretionary funds were being directed to sham organizations, Quinn has led the Council to adopt various reforms to bring greater scrutiny and transparency to the selection of beneficiaries.

Politically-connected groups continued to be beneficiaries of the Council's goodwill for fiscal year 2013.  

Council members Erik Dilan, Steve Levin, and Recchia all allocated funding to the The Ridgewood Bushwick Senior Citizen’s Council, Inc., founded by controversial Assemblyman and Brooklyn political power broker Vito Lopez.

The nonprofit was the target of a state and federal investigation for submitting fraudulent claims.

The council still allocated it $873,589 in the 2013 fiscal year budget.

Capital Budget

Far larger and the subject of far less scrutiny is the city's $489 million capital budget for fiscal year 2013. These are big-ticket items -- from upgrades of entire departments at hospitals to the reconstruction of streets.

The Speaker awards capital funding at her discretion, with projects sponsored by members, borough delegation and the Speaker herself. But budget experts say it is unclear what criteria is used to choose projects.

"We don't know what kind of vetting goes on to award capital money to these organizations," said Maria Doulis, the director of city studies for the Citizens Budget Commission.

Unlike discretionary funding, the capital budget is not made available as a searchable database on the City's website.

A review of records made available Thursday show the sponsors of projects with the most funds earmarked from them are the same Council leaders who get the most in discretionary funds. But there are also major differences.

For instance, for fiscal year 2013, Councilman Albert Vann, was among the top ten sponsors of projects in the capital budget, with $9 million to his name. But he was ranked 13th in expense funding.

Among the projects sponsored by Vann in the capital budget: $3 million for a tennis center at Crotona Park in the Bronx and $1 million for a technology upgrade for a classroom at Boys & Girls High School in Brooklyn.

--Research assistance contributed by Rachael Fauss, policy and research manager at Citizens Union Foundation. 

Quinn speaks to the Council about the budget at last night's stated meeting. Photograph by William Alatriste

The City Council overrode the mayor's veto of the living wage bill and adopted a $68.5 billion budget at last night's stated meeting.

The Council overrode three of Mayor Michael Bloomberg's vetoes, but perhaps the most contentious was the decision to buck the mayor on the living wage bill.

The bill would require companies that receive $1 million or more in city subsidies to pay $10 an hour with health benefits or $11.50 an hour without them.

Bloomberg has said he would sue to block the bill from becoming law, calling the proposal “a throwback to the era when government viewed the private sector as a cash cow to be milked, rather than a garden to be cultivated.

Speaker Christine Quinn said at a news conference before last night's meeting that she didn't understand "why the mayor would sue" but was confident the Council would win the legal fight.

The Council voted 46-5 to override the mayor's veto.

The lawmakers also overrode the mayor's vetoes of a banking measure that would require more disclosure of community investment by financial institutions and a collective bargaining law that tries to change how contract disputes are handled.

The Council also voted 50-1 to adopt the fiscal 2013 budget, which preserves funding for child care and after school programs and avoids layoffs.

Fiscal policy experts say the budget also makes the risky assumption that the the city will reap hundreds of millions of dollars in revenue from the sale of taxi medallions. The sale has been held up in court.

"I believe we will get the medallion money," Quinn said, but also added that the court ruling would only be one step in the process.