How Did The Blizzard Go Wrong? Let Bloomberg Count The Ways

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The City Council is continuing to grill city officials about just what happened during the Blizzageddon catastrophe, and they're actually getting a few apologies! Emergency Management Commissioner Joseph Bruno said, "I should have moved more quickly," and Deputy Mayor Stephen Goldsmith admitted, "We owe you and all New Yorkers for that lack of performance our administration's apology and my personal promise not to let it happen again." Now, Mayor Bloomberg has released a full report on just what happened, and his action plan for the future.

In the review [pdf], Bloomberg cites the decision not to declare a snow emergency and insufficient accountability tools as problems with the city's response. He writes, "plowing progress is tracked based on routes, so it is difficult to know the status of a particular City street at any given time." However, the city is not completely to blame. People should be angry at meteorologists, who "predicted low accumulations up until 18 hours prior to the storm." That gave them just 17 scant hours to get motivated enough to call an emergency meeting one hour before the storm.

Bloomberg's 15-point action plan calls for the city to first "establish a more formal process for considering emergency declarations" and "provide a broader range of options that could be part of an emergency declaration and make them clear and understandable to New Yorkers." Because according to Goldsmith, the protocol to declare an emergency "never arrived at my doorstep, or the mayor's doorstep." Bloomberg also lists off arming Sanitation trucks with better communication devices, improving tow truck deployment and making it easier to hire additional laborers, but let's face it, none of this is going to get done by the time tomorrow's snow starts falling. So everybody just make sure your Chinese delivery place can still make it to your house and position your video cameras at your windows—we wouldn't want to miss another YouTube sensation.

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By Jaya Saxena in News on January 10, 2011 2:49 PM

Comments [rss]

Just Me

Even if you're not a fan of Charles Barron, you have to admit, he gave it to Bloomberg's cronies during the hearings.

just saying

"In 2007, before a seminar for new mayors at the JFK School of Government at Harvard, Mr. Goldsmith [said]...'If you pick up the snow well, you build up political capital. It’s a way to establish your credentials so that when you have a tough issue, you can deploy your capital there.' ”

Dumb@ss Stephen Goldsmith, Bloomberg's handpicked Deputy Mayor for Operations, doesn't even follow his own advice.

But this wasn't the first time Goldsmith as a city administrator screwed up snow removal in a big way. There was a similar situation when he was the mayor of Indianapolis. In 1994, then Mayor Goldsmith didn't declare a snow emergency (and guess what--he was away in NYC that time!) and as a result many roads went unplowed. Although his administration tried hard to downplay the situation (sound familiar?), many of the major thoroughfares in Indianapolis were coated with layers of ice which made any travel treacherous and difficult.

Rod

exactly. goldsmith wasn't chosen for his brains.

he was chosen because team bloomtard were trying to spread out their support across the nation for obvious reasons.

just saying

Actually Bloomberg probably did choose Goldsmith for his supposed "brains." You may be surprised to learn that Stephen Goldsmith is viewed as something of an authority on urban governance. He has written books on the subject in addition to being a member of the Harvard faculty.

Stephen Goldsmith is the Daniel Paul Professor of Government and the Director of the Innovations in American Government Program at Harvard's Kennedy School.

whitecastlerock

He writes, "plowing progress is tracked based on routes, so it is difficult to know the status of a particular City street at any given time. So send out some of the traffic agents who couldn't write parking tickets and have them relay what the streets were like....

Stevennnn

Don't worry this will happen again. Probably not this year or the next or the next, but it will happen again.

Rod

what do you mean? it happens hundreds of times a day in every other agency in every other situation.

from the mayor's too-late bedbug panel to the most poorly-run school system on earth to the mayor building parks with metal rides that burn the flesh off kids who use 'em.

you didn't notice that bloomtard failed at everything he does? why do you think he breaks the bank to "win" elections?

GalBklyn

Because according to Goldsmith, the protocol to declare an emergency "never arrived at my doorstep, or the mayor's doorstep."

I'm listening in on the hearings. Goldsmith admitted that he never asked about declaring an emergency.

He is responsible for all city operations? He doesn't have a clue and so long as he is in charge, we are in danger should another terrorist attack or another emergency occur. Time for him to go before more lives are lost.

Rod

what do you expect? he was a total failure in Indianapolis but the press covered that all up to protect midget mike, as usual.

like, did you see how many media outlets examined Cathie Black's totally-failed tenure at Hearst? they refused to even discuss it and all went with the bloomtard talking point that "yes she's a genius CEO..."