Following the murder of a 32-year-old man on Friday night in Manhattan, local officials and gay rights groups will rally Monday night to demand an end to hate crimes.

City Council Speaker Christine Quinn and other elected officials will join LGBT groups and other community members to march to the site of Friday’s shooting and denounce hate violence.

Marc Carson, 32, was shot and killed in the West Village at about midnight on Friday. The suspected gunman, 33-year-old Elliott Morales, allegedly shouted anti-gay slurs at Carson before pulling out a gun and shooting him in the face near the corner of West Eighth Street and Sixth Avenue.

Friday’s shooting follows a recent uptick in anti-gay hate crimes in the city. Two men were attacked by a group of men who hurled anti-gay remarks at them near Madison Square Garden earlier this month.

A march will begin Monday at 5:30 p.m. at the LGBT Center located at 208 W. 13th St. and end at the corner of Eighth Street and Sixth Avenue. A rally will follow at 6 p.m.

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Assemblyman Vito Lopez will resign in June, according to news reports.

But his promise to step down at the end of the session only ignited more calls for him to leave  – immediately.

In a statement today, he said he would resign June 20.

According to The New York Times, Lopez suggested he would finish this session in office then run for the City Council.

The move comes after Assembly Speaker Sheldon Silver said he would recommend expelling Lopez from the legislature.

Lopez was censured last year after sexual harassment allegations surfaced. This week, a new report detailed his alleged behavior, including accounts of incidents with multiple women who worked for him. The report detailed asking staffers to give him massages and wear revealing clothing, among other requests.

Many have criticized Lopez as well as other lawmakers’ actions regarding him, including reported secret settlements after the allegations.

Gov. Andrew Cuomo said today that the situation required “a zero tolerance policy.”

“We must now send a clear message that this behavior is not tolerated,” Cuomo said. “Vito Lopez should not spend another day in office, let alone a whole month. He should resign effective immediately and if he does not, he must be expelled.”

The National Organization for Women released a statement saying he should be expelled immediately “to ensure a sexual predator is removed from office.”

“Sexual predators should not be casting votes on legislation that impacts women’s lives,” the group said.

And city officials said he will not have an easy time running for City Council. The Speaker, Christine Quinn, told the Times his candidacy was “one of the most offensive things I have ever seen happen in New York City politics.”

His rival Council candidate,  Antonio Reynoso, added,  ”Vito Lopez clearly does not deserve to hold public office.”

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Officials urged gay men to get vaccinated against meningitis after an outbreak in the city.

The Health Department reported that 17 cases have been reported since 2012, and 22 cases since 2010.

Seven of those cases were fatal, according to the Health Department.

Officials are worried that the danger will spread further.

“The meningitis outbreak in New York City is literally a life and death matter,” Assembly member Micah Kellner said.

LGBT advocates and elected officials are urging people to get vaccinated immediately

“Men who have sex with men should protect themselves from this potentially fatal disease,” City Council Speaker Christine Quinn said.

To find a location to get vaccinated, call 311.

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New Jersey and New York might not agree on a lot of things, but they now agree on what age people should purchase tobacco.

New Jersey legislators will also attempt to raise the minimum age requirement to buy tobacco products from 19 to 21, as New York lawmakers promised to do last month.

City Council Speaker Christine Quinn said preventing youth smoking is now “a regional effort.”

New Jersey state senator Richard J. Codey, who will sponsor the bill, said the joint effort would make it impossible to cross state lines to purchase cigarettes underage.

“Neighboring states need to work together and that is what we are doing today,” he said.

About 14 percent of New Jersey high school students smoke, according to a 2010 study. In New York, the youth smoking rate has been at 8.5 percent since 2007.

“I am grateful that New Jersey is taking our proposal a step further to protect youth from the harmful health effects of smoking,” Quinn said.

The Council is expected to approve the bill this summer, officials said.

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Red Hook will welcome a free ferry service between its businesses and Manhattan this summer.

The free Red Hook Summer Ferry service will begin May 25, running from Pier 11 in Manhattan to Van Brunt Street and then to IKEA, officials announced today.

“Every weekend all summer long, folks can hop on the IKEA ferry for free and hop off at a brand-new stop in Red Hook to spend the day and night sampling the neighborhood’s great small businesses,” Quinn said.

When the program launched, it only ferried people between IKEA and Pier 11. With the expanded service, officials expect a ferry to arrive every 25 minutes, less than the 40 minutes now.

Hopefully, officials say, this will bring more residents to Sandy-affected businesses in Red Hook.

“Hurricane Sandy hit the Red Hook community hard, and that’s why we’re making it easier than ever for New Yorkers to get to small businesses in the area,” Mayor Michael Bloomberg said.

The service starts at 10 a.m., running through 9 p.m. on Saturday and Sundays from Memorial Day weekend through Labor Day weekend, including holiday Mondays.

Local business owners lauded the new way to bring visitors, from the five boroughs or even overseas, to their doorstep.

“We learned that the East River can bring heartache, devastation and loss of business, but if the ferry lands at VanBrunt Street this summer, the East River will also be responsible for bringing profits back to businesses and the assurance of survival and progress,” said Triciann Botta, who owns Botta di Vino in Red Hook.

The expansion comes the same week that the popular East River Ferry will reach 2 million total riders this week, officials said.

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When James Polite, now 20 years old, was 13, his family kicked him out for being gay.

His mother told him he deserved to be disowned, he told DNAinfo.

He probably could not have anticipated the degree to which a chance encounter with Christine Quinn a year later would change his life.

The story came to light in an unrelated DNAinfo interview with Polite about homeless LGBT youth: Polite, always passionate about politics, met Quinn when he was volunteering at an LGBT event for Obama in 2007. She was reportedly struck by his his love of politics and immediately gave him an internship at the City Council. Since then, Quinn says, he’s become the adopted little brother of the Council.

Many of the foster homes he ended up in were apparently less than shining examples of parenting: he told DNAinfo he was something denied food and locked out, forced to sleep in shelters.

But Quinn remarked that Polite has never let his experiences beat him down.

“Nothing has gone particularly well or easy in James’ life and he is the most grateful, positive young man I’ve ever met,” she told DNA. ”Not every foster family was perfect, not every school was perfect, but he just always seems to believe there’s something better around the corner and keeps working towards it.”

As their bond grew over the last six years, Quinn has occasionally paid Polite’s living expenses and even helped him get into Brandeis University, where he is now in his second year.

When he was accepted, her fierce devotion to him prompted her to call the school and demand he be looked out for.

“The school must have been like, ‘Who the hell is this pushy broad?’” Quinn recounted. “But I just didn’t want anything to go badly.”

You know, you just don’t want him to want for anything,” she added.

And thanks to Quinn, he hasn’t.

“I haven’t had the same life I had before I met her,” Polite told DNAinfo. “I’ve never had to worry about where I was going to get my next meal from, I haven’t had to worry about anything.”

Follow Danielle Tcholakian on Twitter @danielleiat

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Before she entered politics, City Council Speaker Christine Quinn struggled with bulimia and alcoholism. Quinn opened up about those experiences in an interview with the New York Times, and is expected to talk about them publicly at Barnard College on Tuesday.

Quinn’s mother was dying of breast cancer when she was 16 years old, the speaker told the Times. Quinn spent every morning waking her mother, bathing her, making her breakfast and giving her medication. Her mother’s condition wasn’t improving, and when it was all too overwhelming for the teen to handle, she would binge on ice cream and corn muffins — and then make herself throw up.

The habit continued for 10 years until she sought help at the age of 26.

“I just want people to know you can get through stuff,” she told the Times. “I hope people can see that in what my life has been and where it is going.”

The speaker reached out to the Times to share her experience. She will also touch upon the issues in a memoir that is scheduled to be published next month.

Quinn also talked about how although her mother was diagnosed with cancer when she was in the second grade, she didn’t know about it until the eighth grade when a nun at her school told one of her classmates to be nice to her because her mother had cancer.

At this time, Quinn felt that she needed to be perfect — and thinner — in order to save her mother, the Times reports. Secretly eating sweets and then purging brought a sense of relief, she said.

“For a brief moment, you’ve kind of expelled from your being the things that are making you feel bad,” she said. Quinn also began going out and drinking with friends around this time.

Quinn was in her junior year of high school when her mother died. She continued to struggle with her bulimia and drinking throughout college.

Years later, Quinn got a job working as a campaign manager for City Councilman Thomas Duane. When Quinn opened up to Duane about her problems, he urged her to go to rehabilitation, and she did.

Quinn said she is proud of what she has overcome and does not want to hide it anymore. She added that she does not believe her openness about this part of her life will have an effect on the mayoral race, saying it feels “nonpolitical.”

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You might soon need more than a $5 bill to buy an item from a city newsstand.

City Council Speaker Christine Quinn outlined legislation today that will bump the maximum price of newsstand products from $5 to $10.

The move will streamline selling more products for city small business owners, Quinn said.

“This legislation will allow New York City’s iconic newsstands to sell more products, thereby expanding consumers’ access to more of the products they want and need,” she said.

New items that might be added to the city’s 300 newsstands? Chargers, umbrellas and earphones, Quinn suggested.

The Council last increased the product price from $2 to $5 in 2001.

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Christine Quinn will stand with hate crime survivors, community members and other elected officials at Madison Square Garden today to call for witnesses to last week’s alleged hate crime to come forward.

Last week, a group of men in Midtown Manhattan attacked two men, shouting anti-gay slurs at them and physically assaulting them. The NYPD released video footage of eight men wanted for questioning and asked the public to come forward with any information on the incident.

The incident was the third reported hate crime in Manhattan last week.

Follow Danielle Tcholakian on Twitter @danielleiat

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Two men were arrested after an alleged bias crime this morning, the third hate crime reported this week.

A Port Authority spokesman confirmed that their police officers arrested two men in an alleged hate attack early this morning.

According to NBC, when two men were unable to get into a billiards club in Midtown, five men started to yell slurs at them.

The suspects then stomped on one of the men and dragged and beat the other, NBC reported.

Port Authority police intervened near the PATH station on 33rd Street and arrested two men.

The assault was blocks away from another  bias attack Metro reported. A group of men approached two men in front of a Midtown McDonald’s Sunday night near Madison Square Garden and yelled anti-gay slurs at them.

They then punched one of the victims in the face, cops said.

Council Speaker Christine Quinn said today that cops told her of three hate crimes against LGBT New Yorkers in her district during the past week.

In a third case, a man was physically and verbally assaulted while leaving a gay bar in the West Village, a source said.

“I am outraged by this string of assaults,” Quinn said. ”These vicious assaults are not reflective of the diversity that defines New York City. Our city prides itself on its inclusiveness, and hateful slurs and physical attacks against anyone, for any reason, go against the very fabric of what makes our city great.”

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As a national debate on immigration reform heats up, the New York City Council is proposing an amendment that would grant broader immigrant voting rights, and the Bloomberg administration told Talking Points Memo they will not support it.

The legislation, co-sponsored by Councilman Daniel Dromm and Councilwoman Gale Brewer, would give legal immigrants who are residents of the city for six months or longer the right to vote in municipal elections.

It had eight supporters in the council when it was first introduced in 2010. It currently has the support of 34 of the Council’s 51 members, which is exactly the number of votes needed to override a veto from the mayor, Dromm told Metro.

The mayor has long been a vocal proponent of immigration reform, but a spokeswoman for his administration, Evelyn Erskine, told TPM: “This bill violates the state constitution and the administration does not support it.”

“The mayor believes voting is the most important right we are granted as citizens, and you should have to go through the process of becoming a citizen and declaring allegiance to this country before being given that right,” Erskine said.

While the majority vote in the council could override a Bloomberg veto, the bill could still be stopped by Council Speaker Christine Quinn. Quinn decides when — if at all — bills come to the floor, so it’s up to her whether it comes up for a vote.

Robin Levine, a spokeswoman for Quinn, told Metro the speaker is “looking forward to reviewing testimony from today’s hearing.”

Dromm is adamant that legislation is vital for the adequate representation of the city’s immigrant communities, particularly ones like the one he represents, which he says “is 68 percent immigrant, many of whom would fall into this category.”

Giving them the right to vote would change the way politicians interact — or often neglect to interact — with them, Dromm said: “No longer could people running for city office ignore communities like mine; they’d have to come and address the issues.”

“The nation’s founders were right in saying that there should be no taxation without representation,” Dromm said. “In the early days of this country if you were a property owner, it didn’t matter what country you came from, you had the right to vote.”

He corrected himself, conceding that the law only applied to white male property owners, but noted that over the course of history, that law was expanded to include women and African-Americans. Including immigrants, he believes, is simply the next logical step.

Dromm also notes that the state constitution actually says that municipalities and localities are able to determine who can vote in their elections, and that from 1968 to 2001, anybody, even undocumented immigrants, could vote in school board elections — a rule which was approved by the state legislature in 1968. 

He dismissed concerns that giving immigrants voting rights will deter them from applying for full citizenship and taking on all the responsibilities that come with that status.

“These are people who desperately want to participate in the American system,” Dromm said. “Sometimes it takes 13 years, even when you have a good lawyer and you’re on the path to citizenship and even after you’ve received a green card.”

Councilman Jumaane Williams, another one of the bill’s supporters, agreed after Thursday’s hearing, and noted the potential this legislation has to affect the national conversation on immigration reform.

“These individuals are contributing and taxpaying members of our communities,” Williams said. “I am a proud child of immigrant parents and I represent a proud immigrant community.”

“We look forward to the restoration of immigrant voting rights and the positive effects this will have on the nationwide conversation,” he added.

Follow Danielle Tcholakian on Twitter @danielleiat

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Council Speaker Christine Quinn and other elected officials will meet with teaching assistants trying to unionize at New York University this afternoon.

UAW, the graduate student organizing committee, wants to form its own union.

Quinn, who supports the students’ unionizing efforts, will be delivering a letter alongside other officials to NYU President John Sexton, asking NYU to agree to a fair process for unionization. The politicians and students will meet at the university’s Elmer Holmes Bobst Library by Washington Square.

Teaching assistants have been trying to unionize at the university through UAW, their organization for teaching, research and graduate assistants.

“Graduate employees at NYU deserve a real say in the conditions of our work,” their website explains.

The students’ concerns include wages, benefits and safety conditions in university labs.

“We think we can do better,” the students say on the site.

More than 1,000 first asked New York University in 2010 to recognize them as a union, which the school did not do.

Follow Alison Bowen on Twitter @reporteralison

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The New York City Council passed legislation Wednesday that will require thousands of businesses to provide paid sick days to workers.

Companies with 20 or more employees will be required to offer five paid sick days beginning Apr. 1, 2014. On Oct. 1, 2015, it will expand to include companies with 15 or more workers.

An estimated one million workers will benefit from the legislation. Another 300,000 workers will receive unpaid sick leave under the new legislation.

“This vote marks a big step in the right direction toward providing paid sick time to workers in our city,” said Vincent Alvarez, president of the city AFL-CIO.

Stuart Appelbaum, president of the Retail, Wholesale and Department Store Union, said the vote means “working families do not have to choose between their jobs or their health.”

He added, “More than 1 million workers will no longer be afraid of being fired for taking a sick day.”

Supporters say the bill will allow workers to take time off when they are sick without fear of losing pay or their job. Critics of the measure say that many business owners cannot afford to offer paid sick days, and that businesses and employees should be left to work out sick-leave arrangements on their own.

“We have a good, strong and sensible piece of legislation that recognizes the needs of everyday New Yorkers and the realities that our struggling small businesses face,” City Council Speaker Christine Quinn said when she first outlined the bill on March 29.

Advocates have been pushing for a bill that would apply to businesses with five or more employees. Despite some of the limits of the bill, the legislation is viewed as a pivotal step in a national push for paid sick days.

Mayor Michael Bloomberg, who said earlier this year that the bill would “stifle job creation,” is expected to veto the measure, but the Council, which passed it 45-3, will likely have enough votes to override the veto.

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Local politicians are speaking out against anti-Muslim graffiti found spray-painted on a sidewalk in Sheepshead Bay, Brooklyn.

“This revolting act of prejudice was meant to intimidate New Yorkers on their streets and in their homes, but because of our unity and our strength, it’s not going to work,” Public Advocate Bill de Blasio said.

City Council Speaker Christine Quinn issued a joint statement with City Council Member Michael Nelson, who represents the area where the graffiti was found. “The vulgar anti-Muslim graffiti found in Sheepshead Bay does not represent the views of the residents of Brooklyn and our city. We join with millions of other New Yorkers in condemning such hateful acts.”

The graffiti reportedly read “dumb Muslims die” and was found outside a home on Avenue Z. Police are investigating the situation, according to NY1.

The Anti-Defamation League’s acting New York regional director Etzion Neuer also released a statement, saying, “We deplore this disturbing act of bigotry, which is an affront to the entire Muslim community and the community at large.”

He continued, “An act of hate like this sends shock waves through an entire community and makes residents feel unsafe, and it is critical that we reaffirm our commitment to remaining united in speaking out against hate.”

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City Council Speaker Christine Quinn and members of New York’s design community ushered in the city’s first-ever NYCxDesign event Monday at a Times Square ceremony.

NYCxDesign is a new cultural showcase, spanning all five boroughs for 12 days, with more than 200 events ranging from exhibitions to instructional craft seminars to open artists’ studios. The festivities officially begin Friday and run through May 21.

“Over 40,000 designers call the city home, and it’s time for us to tap into this sector, raise its profile, and turn it into an economic engine,” Quinn said at the event.

Although there are too many workshops, gallery shows, discussions, symposiums, and celebrations to list individually, a full schedule of goings-on can be found on the NYCxDesign website.

A boutique-design light-fixture display in Brooklyn? Check. A lecture on the role of architecture in community building? Yep. An entrepreneurial workshop for aspiring industrial designers? It’s happening.

Officials also revealed a multimedia campaign running the duration of the expo, a project they call “Multifesto.” Design fans can contribute to the project through NYCxDesign website, where they enter their own “design manifesto.” The volunteer-produced results will run on Taxi TVs and Times Square video screens, including the Nasdaq and Reuter’s video panels and will be updated throughout the week.

NYCxDesign (NYC by Design) celebrates all aspects of the field including architecture, graphic design, fashion, manufacturing, industrial, landscape and urban design, in the hope of spurring more growth in the city’s design community.

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City Council Speaker Christine Quinn said Wednesday that she will move forward with the bill to create an inspector general for police.

Despite Mayor Michael Bloomberg’s speech on Tuesday defending stop-and-frisk and slamming the proposal for an inspector general, Quinn said she stands firm on the bill, the New York Post reports.

The mayoral candidate said she will also allow a vote on a second bill to ban racial profiling even though she does not agree with that legislation.

Bloomberg criticized the way some of the mayoral candidates have attacked the Police Department, saying he believes it is politically driven. He noted that crime in the city is significantly lower than other major cities in the country. The mayor believes eliminating stop-and-frisks and creating an inspector general to oversee police would have deadly consequences.

Quinn also said Wednesday that if she is elected mayor, stop-and-frisks would happen in a “constitutionally sound way.” She also noted that the number of stops in the city has declined as a result of her intervention.

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Proposed legislation would help drivers save money at muni meters, Speaker Christine Quinn and other council members announced Wednesday.

Under the proposed bill, muni meters would turn off when drivers do not need to pay for parking, give drivers a five-minute grace period and not accept payments when there is no paper for printing receipts.

Quinn, Council Member David G. Greenfield and Committee on Transportation Chair James Vacca will present the bill at the city council’s next meeting May 8.

“Whether you’re doing your laundry or parking your car, you should always get what you pay for,” Quinn said. “This legislation ensures drivers will no longer pay for parking at a meter, only to find out that this requirement ended 20 minutes earlier.”

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Immigrants in New York City are carefully watching to see whether Congress will reform the immigration system.

Starting next month, the city will help them sort through whatever changes the federal government makes.

Hoping to dispel misinformation and protect immigrants from scammers, Council Speaker Christine Quinn announced today a series of events.

The events will include many different services for immigrants in one spot, like help getting taxpayer identification numbers or passports. They will also include information on Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals, a recent law that allows some immigrants over 15 to apply to live legally here.

“We’re very excited about the changes happening at the national level on immigration reform, and we want to make sure we as a city are prepared and that our immigrants know their rights and know where to go to for help,” Quinn said.

Consulates from varied countries will also be available to help provide passports and identification help.

These events will be offered in all five boroughs, with the first happening May 10 to 12 at Renaissance Charter School in Jackson Heights, where representatives from the Mexican Consulate will attend.

The New York Immigration Coalition will post future events on their website.

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City Council Speaker Christine Quinn praised basketball star Jason Collins for opening up about his sexuality. Collins is the first major male athlete to come out as gay.

In his coming-out statement in an upcoming issue of Sports Illustrated, Collins says, “I’m a 34-year-old NBA center. I’m black. And I’m gay.”

Quinn, an openly gay public figure herself, said Collins’ decision will “literally… save lives.”

“It takes a great deal of courage to be who you are, and it is not easy to come out of the closet on any day, in any profession,” Quinn noted. “And we know that professional sports have never been a particularly welcoming place to the LGBT community.”

The first female professional athlete came out 32 years ago.

Tennis players Martina Navratilova and Billie Jean King both came out in 1981. Navratilova was a seven-time Women’s Tennis Association player of the year, and King won 12 Grand Slam titles.

Most recently, basketball player Brittney Griner, the number one WNBA draft pick this year, came out a few weeks ago. She has also signed an endorsement deal with Nike.

In an interview about two weeks ago, Griner recounted how she was bullied as a child.

“It was hard, just being picked on for being different, just being bigger, my sexuality, everything. I overcame it and got over it,” she said, noting that it’s “definitely something [she is] very passionate about.”

“I want to work with kids and bring recognition to the problem, especially with the LGBT community,” she added.

Quinn anticipates that Collins’ coming out will help LGBT youth as well.

“There will be a day soon when a young boy or young girl is sitting watching the NBA finals or the Super Bowl or the World Series,” Quinn said. “ANd there on the screen will be an openly gay athlete. And that little boy, maybe he thinks he’s gay or maybe he knows he’s fay, and maybe he sat all alone in his room with that.”

“But there will be that athlete on TV, proving to the world that stereotypes don’t matter, but showing others who you are and being true to yourself does.”

While many expressed appreciation and support for Collins after his coming-out, Miami Dolphins receiver Mike Wallace reportedly tweeted: “All these beautiful women in the world and guys wanna mess with other guys SMH…”

He followed up that tweet with: “I’m not bashing anybody don’t have anything against anyone I just don’t understand it.”

He later deleted those tweets and apologized: “Never said anything was right or wrong I just said I don’t understand!! Deeply sorry for anyone that I offended.”

Follow Danielle Tcholakian on Twitter @danielleiat

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Thousands of New York City middle school students will have more than two hours added to their school days come this fall.

City Council Speaker Christine Quinn and Schools Chancellor Dennis Walcott announced a pilot program that will extend the school day for high-needs students at 20 middle schools.

“Improving our city’s middle schools is vital to helping close the achievement gap and putting kids on a better track toward educational success,” Quinn said.

The program is a part of the expansion of the Middle School Quality Initiative. Selected schools will be able to offer students an additional 12 hours per week and offer literacy-focused training during the extra hours, according to the city’s Department of Education. An estimated 2,000 students each year over the next three years will participate.

Schools will be randomly selected for the program from a pool of applicants. The $6.2 million effort is being funded by the Robin Hood Foundation, the New York City Council and the DOE.

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Supermarket mogul and mayoral hopeful John Catsimatidis lost his temper at a Brooklyn Young Republicans event on Sunday, the Daily News reported.

A questioner reportedly criticized Catsimatidis’ plan for “public-private partnerships” to increase vocational training in schools, asserting that it amounted to stealing money from voters.

Catsimatidis reportedly yelled, “No! No! No!” at the seated questioner, stepping closer to him with every word.

Tea Party President Frank Russo asked Catsimatidis to explain the plan, to which Catsimatidis responded, “Bullsh–!”

“Go bullsh– yourself, if you want!” he reportedly said. “The program is to teach these people the ability to earn a living. OK?”

Russo later said he was disappointed in Catsimatidis’ “grasp of the issues” and noted that running the city is “not an easy job.”

“You’ve got to be cool, calm and collected,” Russo advised.

Echoing another mayoral candidate’s response to being accused of excessive aggression, Catsimatidis dismissed the encounter, saying, “These people are used to deal with people who don’t have courage. I used to confrontation. I don’t blink.”

Democratic candidate Christine Quinn, recently portrayed in a New York Times profile as threatening to staff and colleagues, also said she doesn’t “think being pushy or bitchy or tough, or however you want to characterize it, is a bad thing. New Yorkers want somebody who’s going to get things done.”

A campaign spokeswoman for Republican competitor Joe Lhota, who has been known to use expletives with the press in the past, said, “Anyone running for mayor should be able to offer substantive ideas and solutions to our city’s problems without engaging in irrational and antagonistic exchanges with voters.”

Catsimatidis also released a terrorism-themed radio ad today, exactly two weeks after the Boston Marathon bombings.

“Terrorism: it maims and kills innocent people,” a narrator says in the ad, over the sound of sirens.

The ad goes on to praise stop-and-frisk and surveillance by the NYPD.

“Since 9/11, the NYPD has kept us safe with pro-active police work. Now, career politicians want to end stop and frisk and cut the NYPD’s powers of surveillance,” the narrator continues. “That’s why we need John Catsimatidis for mayor.”

This is Catsimatidis’ second radio ad of the election cycle. The first focused largely on his complicated-sounding last name.

Follow Danielle Tcholakian on Twitter @danielleiat

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A man is stopped and frisked by NYPD in Brooklyn. (Credit: Jeremy Sparig.)

According to one NYPD sergeant, an NYPD inspector general is simply unnecessary. 

Ed Mullins, a sergeant with the 67th precinct in Brooklyn, accused politicians who are pushing for an Inspector General of “political pandering.”

“The NYPD is overloaded with people watching what we do,” he said. “The standards that we’re held to are already in place.”

The argument echoes Christine Quinn’s recent explanation of her choice not to institute an official ban on racial profiling: we already expect law enforcement, and public officials generally, not to engage in racial profiling.

“We do an enormous job on our own as far as discipline goes,” Mullins said. “The penalties in the police department are harsh, people get terminated.”

Mullins thinks the Inspector General proposal is simply a pivot off of the stop and frisk controversy, and he “sympathizes with people on the issue.”

But he insists an Inspector General isn’t the answer—and that the issue of stop and frisk is “not really a racial issue.”

“I don’t believe the police department is targeting male blacks [because of race],” Mullins asserted. “We don’t determine who the perps are, they’re described by the victims of crimes, then we go into specific neighborhoods where the crimes are committed.”

The pressures of CompStat

CompStat was originally a managerial tool brought in by Deputy Commissioner Paul Browne, Mullins explain, meant to create accountability for the precinct commanders to do something about the crimes in their commands.

And it has enabled the police to do their jobs with maximum efficiency, Mullins said. By pinpointing specific areas where crimes are taking place, CompStat can help make the city safer block-by-block.

He gave the example of 42nd Street between 7th and 8th avenues where, in the early 1990s, there would be about 100 robberies a month on that one street alone.

“I’m in favor of CompStat, I don’t think it’s a bad thing,” Mullins said.

But, he added,  ”what it wasn’t designed for was to keep creating demands for more and more and more.”

Mullins explained it’s especially difficult for a brand new commander in a precinct. If crime plummeted the year before, there’s pressure felt to prove oneself with an even greater decrease.

But Mullins pointed out there’s always going to be crime: “The question is, how much crime? Can we try to keep it to where it is?”

Mullins said that while he doesn’t believe there is a quota specifically for stop-and-frisks, “there’s no doubt there’s a quota” system generally.

NYPD Deputy Commissioner Paul Browne rejected Mullins’ take on the situation, noting that there has been a 25 percent decrease in the number of stops citywide.

A call for more community engagement

Mullins also suggested that the NYPD may not be doing the most effective job of communicating with the communities they’re operating within.

Mullins suggested that police engagement with the community should start “at the grammar school level.”

“We need to educate children and families so that in the future… they don’t see police as the bad guys,” Mullins said.

“At the end of the day, we all want to go home safe,” Mullins said. “So shouldn’t we be on the same team?”

Browne also dismissed Mullins’ allegation that more community engagement is needed.

The NYPD has an “extensive and mandatory community immersion program that has been part of police training since Commissioner Kelly instituted it after the [Sean] Bell shooting,” Browne said.

Police reportedly participate is the very kind of activities Mullins suggested.

Browne said they also engage in role-playing, including role reversal exercises, with teens and young adults in a separate police-community program, and yet another program engages teens and young adults in actual police training themselves.

Follow Danielle Tcholakian on Twitter @danielleiat

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Council Speaker Christine Quinn said she would not support legislation to ban cops from racial profiling, worrying that it could lead to overwhelming lawsuits.

Quinn’s remarks were part of a speech this afternoon outlining public-safety proposals at Hunter College.

During the speech, she said she still supports the controversial idea of an inspector general for the NYPD, someone to independently evaluate the department’s actions.

But she said she would not support another proposal, which would create an enforceable ban on racial profiling. She said legal remedies already exist to combat the practice.

Other Council members were quick to criticize Quinn, arguing that data from police actions like stop-and-frisk show cops overwhelmingly stop minorities.

“There is strong reason to be concerned that the NYPD is engaging in bias-based policing,” Councilmen Jumaane Williams and Brad Landers said in a joint statement.

The NAACP also released a series of criticisms.

“No other city in the United States has implemented racial profiling policies on as wide a scale, or taken it to such destructive levels as Commissioner Kelly’s NYPD,” NAACP president Benjamin Todd Jealous said.

Among Quinn’s other proposals were hiring 1,600 more cops and bumping up the next police class’s graduation to July, from January 2014.

Sanitation workers and transit workers should be trained in counterterrorism, she said. Together, 40,000 in these positions work underground and on city streets daily.

She also wants to fund 1,000 new security cameras, bringing the total to 7,000 in the five boroughs.

A proposed ‘panic app’

Quinn, who is running for mayor, suggested a panic-button app that New Yorkers could use to summon cops with the touch of a finger.

She envisions a smartphone app that would allow people to request assistance from a nearby cop in situations where it would be impossible to call 911.

Cops could locate the crime victim using GPS, she said, and this could save live.

And cops themselves should have smartphones, she said, to immediately pull up previous arrest info or outstanding warrants.

The post Quinn says she will not support new legislation on police racial profiling appeared first on Metro.us.

The city is cracking down on smoking again, this time by proposing to raise the minimum age to purchase tobacco from 18 to 21.

The City Council is taking up legislation that would make New York City the first major city in the nation to have a minimum smoking age above 19 years.

Several towns in the country have raised the tobacco purchase age to 21, including Needham, Massachusetts in 2005, and Canton, Massachusetts earlier this month.

According to Council Speaker Christine Quinn, one of the bill’s greatest proponents, many smokers in New York City start smoking before the age of 21. Her hope is that this legislation could minimize that number.

“By delaying our city’s children and young adults access to lethal tobacco products, we’re decreasing the likelihood they ever start smoking,” Quinn said.

The legislation’s sponsor, Councilman James Gennaro, was emphatic about the benefits this legislation posed.

“When it comes to smoking, the science is clear,” Gennaro said. “The earlier you start, the harder it is for you to quit.”

Gennaro likened the proposal to the legislation in the 1980s that increased the minimum drinking age to 21 for the purpose of reducing drunk driving deaths. He noted that smoking not only claims American lives, but costs the country billions of dollars in health care needs.

Health Commissioner Thomas Farley noted that one-third of all smokers die from the habit.

“By raising the legal purchase age to 21, we will prevent a generation of New Yorkers from becoming addicted to smoking and ultimately save thousands of lives,” Farley declared.

The bill’s advocates estimated that raising the smoking age to 21 has the potential to reduced the smoking rate about 18-20 year olds by 55 percent, and among 14-17 year olds by two-thirds.

These figures come in part, they said, because 90 percent of the people who were asked by minors to purchase cigarettes for them were between the ages of 18 and 21.

Mayor Michael Bloomberg proposed a law last month that would require stores to keep cigarettes in concealed locations.

Follow Danielle Tcholakian on Twitter @danielleiat

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City Council Speaker Christine Quinn and state Sen. Simcha Felder announced this weekend proposed legislation that would expand the child care tax credit to middle-class families earning up to $170,000.

The Middle Class Child Care Tax Credit would expand the credit that is currently only offered to families who make $25,000 or less.

“We must rein in the skyrocketing cost of child care and make it affordable for all New Yorkers,” Quinn said.

The average cost of daycare in the city was $14,000 in 2012, according to a statement from Quinn’s office.

Parents with children under the age of 4 will be eligible for the credit. If the legislation is implemented, middle-class families would receive up to $1,000 for one child in tax credits and $2,000 for two or more children.

Expanding the tax credit bracket would cost an estimated $32 million in public money, the New York Post reports.

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Brooklyn Borough President Marty Markowitz has endorsed City Council Speaker Christine Quinn in the mayoral race, The Daily News reports.

Markowitz will not support either of his fellow Brooklynites in the race, Public Advocate Bill de Blasio and former Comptroller Bill Thompson.

“I think the goal is to elect to most qualified person to be mayor, regardless of where they live,” the borough president told The News.

“And I think it is time for a woman to be mayor of New York City,” he said.

Markowitz said he was impressed with the way Quinn handled the aftermath of Hurricane Sandy as well as her commitment to revive the Brooklyn Navy Yard.

The post Marty Markowitz endorses Christine Quinn for mayor appeared first on Metro.us.

Former Congressman Anthony Weiner has not yet declared that he is running for mayor, but a new poll showed him in second place among the Democratic candidates, trailing only City Council Speaker Christine Quinn in a hypothetical primary race.

According to an NBC New York/Marist poll released Tuesday, Quinn led the race with support from 26 percent of voters, and Weiner came in second with 15 percent. City Comptroller John Liu followed with 12 percent, and former City Comptroller Bill Thompson and Public Advocate Bill de Blasio both received 11 percent.

“Right now, a Weiner candidacy attracts double-digit support in the Democratic primary,” said Dr. Lee M. Miringoff, director of the Marist College Institute for Public Opinion.  “He makes it even more difficult for any of the Democratic contenders to reach the needed 40 percent to avoid a runoff.”

Weiner recently returned to the public eye when he announced in an interview with The New York Times Magazine that he is considering running for mayor. The former congressman resigned in 2011 amid a sexting scandal.

When voters were asked if Weiner should enter the mayoral race, 40 percent of registered Democrats said he should run, while 46 percent said he shouldn’t run. Fourteen percent said they are not sure.

The poll also showed what the race would look like without Weiner: Quinn led the race with 30 percent of support, de Blasio came in second with 15 percent, Thompson followed with 14 percent and Liu received 11 percent of support.

The results indicated a slight drop in support for Quinn, even though she still led by a large margin. A similar poll conducted in February showed 37 percent of voters supported Quinn.

The survey was conducted between April 11 and 15, with 1,127 adults interviewed over the phone.

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The potential candidacy for disgraced former Rep. Anthony Weiner has an unlikely supporter: a mayoral candidate who may be a future rival.

Former MTA chair Joseph Lhota told reporters outside City Hall that he would love to debate Weiner in the race.

“Anthony’s been a friend for a long time,” Lhota said. “I think he raises the level of the debate.”

Lhota also says he believes in forgiveness, indicating that voters should forgive Weiner for his 2011 sexting scandal.

Weiner said in a New York Times interview published last week that he was mulling a mayoral run.

Lhota is among an increasingly busy field of candidates, from City Council Speaker Christine Quinn to Public Advocate Bill de Blasio.

The post Joe Lhota supports an Anthony Weiner run for mayor appeared first on Metro.us.

City Council Speaker and mayoral hopeful Christine Quinn announced a plan on Thursday for a massive overhaul of the transit system.

The plan largely calls for a greater leadership role by the city, as well as expanded ferry, Metro-North, and bus service—but not subway expansion.

“We would love to be able to expand subway service, but that’s complicated, expensive, and time-consuming,” Quinn told Metro, emphasizing the importance of concrete, realistic steps “if we are going to meet the goal that I’ve articulated of making sure that no New Yorker has a commute time of over an hour.”

Quinn aims to cut commute times to an hour or less within the next decade.

In justifying the call for city control of the MTA, Quinn pointed out that city residents and workers contribute the vast majority of MTA funding.

“We know that 90 percent of the funding that ends up going to the MTA comes from the tolls, fare, and taxes of folks that are using, one way or another, the subways and the buses in the five boroughs,” she explained. “That makes us the economic engine of the MTA.”

But, she said, the board of the MTA doesn’t reflect that.

“We’re the engine, but we’ve got the voice of a piston,” she declared.

The answer, Quinn said, is for the mayor to have the authority to appoint not only the head of the MTA, but the majority of the board as well. Equally important, she added, is giving riders a voting member on the board, not just a ceremonial member.

The other major problem she called out is the way the lives of New Yorkers have outgrown the century-old system: it is no longer the case that the majority of jobs are in the central business district, for example.

“When this system was built, the majority of New Yorkers lived in Manhattan,” she said. “Its main function was to get people to jobs in Manhattan. That’s not the reality anymore.”

Though subway expansion is too ambitious an undertaking to see progress in the next decade, Quinn proposed several ways to extend transit in the five boroughs, from expanding ferry service to creating more Metro-North stops in the Bronx and Manhattan.

Follow Danielle Tcholakian on Twitter @danielleiat

The post Quinn pitches massive overhaul of MTA appeared first on Metro.us.

City Council Speaker Christine Quinn has reportedly threatened to sue local news station NY1 for including a negative ad against her in its coverage.

Lawyers for her campaign wrote to NY1 to warn them to stop running the ad, according to the station.

The 30-second advertisement, which opens with smoke surrounding an empty table, warns that Quinn, a mayoral candidate, makes decisions “with her friends in the 1 percent.”

“On the issues New Yorkers care most about, she is always on the wrong side,” it ominously continues.

The ad was created by NYC Is Not For Sale.

According to NY1, her lawyer wrote to NY1 executives that if they continue to air the ad, “Your station bears responsibility for its content.”

Her campaign has accused rival and Public Advocate Bill de Blasio of being behind the ad, an accusation he said today in a letter “falsely and baselessly” attributed the ad to him.

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