Yesterday, Mayor Bloomberg announced a project to commemorate abolitionist activity that occurred in Brooklyn in the 1800s. He named a panel made up of community leaders, academics, and historians to aid the city and Downtown Brooklyn Partnership in asking for and reviewing commemoration proposals. more ›

For better or worse, thanks to Mayor Bloomberg's assertion of political independence, we'll be hearing about an all-New Yorker presidential race for months to come. Last week, a Quinnipiac poll found that New York State would go to Democratic front runner Senator Hillary Clinton, over former Mayor Rudy Giuliani and Bloomberg. Clinton would get 43% of state votes, Giuliani would get 29% and Bloomberg would get 16%. If Bloomberg's not in the picture, Clinton still wins NY State, 52% to Giuliani's 37%. more ›

Last week, the virtues of organ donation were extolled with news that actor Jerry Orbach had made sure to donate his eyes to two New Yorkers. But making sure that people know you would be a willing organ donor is not so easy. The Daily News points out the license format is not very donation-permission friendly. The surface quality of the licenses which is meant to prevent counterfeiting does a good job of not registering pen ink. (And it also turns out that simply signing the back of your license "doesn't constitute full legal permission to harvest organs, but it may at least indicate a desire to do so.") more ›

As news of what could be the biggest real estate deal in history spread, residents of Stuyvesant Town and Peter Cooper Village - and the rest of New York City - wondered what this could mean for the real estate market. Though selling the 110 building complex and changing over ownership of all the units would probably take years, questions about what Mayor Bloomberg will do about the city's housing policy arose, as well as what this will mean for the middle class residents who live there as a large swath of housing is taken away. The Tenants Political Action Committee tells the NY Sun, "This sale is the perfect illustration of the hole in the bottom of the bucket of the Bloomberg housing plan. The plan deals only with production. They will never build as much as we're losing." more ›

- That he smokes a lot of pot - "I smoke weed morning till night, like everyone in the ghetto. I'm Jamaican. We don't use those other fancy drugs."Reverend Al Sharpton went to pay his respects to officer Stewart at Brooklyn's 70th Precinct, the very station where Abner Louima was abused. Police say that Cameron went to his girlfriend's apartment after the shooting and took a nap. The NYPD posthumously made Stewart a detective, which means a "$21,200 bump in the late officer's salary and ensures that his widow...will receive an estimated $80,000 annual pension." And NY and Philadelphia authorities are continuing to look at why Cameron was even free.
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Could there be anything more stomach turning than reading that in order for a family of four in New York to "live well," they'd need about $500,000 a year (after taxes) to do so? Forbes.com figured out that a family of four would need a tony address in the 10021 Upper East Side, private schools, cars, a Hamptons home, fancy vacations... The real nail in the coffin for Gothamist is that "living well" in other Northeast cities is much less pricey - which we knew, but hate having confirmed. Gothamist will have to crank the numbers on living well in a non-Upper East Side area (think the outer boroughs!), praying that the kids get into magnet schools, and summering in the Rockaways, not to mention look into pyramid schemes to start. Sigh, The Jeffersons never had these worries. more ›

Peter Hayden, the Chief of the FDNY, will testify in front of the City Council today to make the case for why any emergency response protocol should be led by a joint NYPD-FDNY team, instead of the Bloomberg administration's current NYPD-led effort. Two weeks ago, Chief Hayden openly criticized the plan, calling it a "recipe for disaster," and it seemed that the Mayor's team sought to quiet Hayden by having only Office of Emergency Management head Joseph Bruno testify about emergency operations. This stirred up the City Council which then subpoenaed Hayden to testify, painting the Mayor as narrow-minded; the Mayor's team responded by saying the City Council never asked for any other officials to testify. Now Bruno, as well as Hayden and Police Commissioner Raymond Kelly, will testify, setting the stage for the battle for emergency command control. Hayden, a 36-year FDNY veteran with two sons and a son-in-law in the department, is the only one of the officials who actually responded on September 11. more ›

And then there's the governorship of NY at stake: Some say that with Senator Charles Schumer's resounding win makes a run for Governor inevitable. But Attorney General Eliot Spitzer, whose profile has been raised by taking on Wall Street, 9/11 silver dollars, and most recently Marsh & Mclennan, is also eyeing the seat. Which then makes us think that we'll be seeing a new wave of NY Republicans appearing in the woodwork, most likely from upstate, in the next few years. more ›

- NY magazine had a funny and over-the-top piece about NYC seceding from the United States that starts off with a great Woody Allen/Alvy Singer line from Annie Hall ( which reminds Gothamist we need to see Annie Hall again) as well as an interview with Norman Mailer by his son. And NY magazine officially announced the not-so-secret plans for a daily during the Convention.
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