"You are out of order, sir!" Gordon Crovitz, former publisher of the Wall Street Journal, had just interrupted Community Board 1's Executive Committee discussion with shouts of "Take responsibility!" and had to be silenced by board's chair Julie Menin. Crovitz was one of the six public speakers who spoke out against Occupy Wall Street at last night's meeting, as opposed to the 21 others who praised the movement. A resolution that limits loud noise to two hours a day, arranges access to off-site bathrooms for the protesters and "opposes the use of excessive and unnecessary force by the City of New York and/or Brookfield properties to address this situation" was enthusiastically passed. more ›

Some pessimistic news out of the Sienna College Research Institute: according to a new poll (below) 41% of New Yorkers say quality of life in the state has gotten worse over the past ten years, and 39% say it's stayed the same. Just 19% said it got better, and 35% say life will get worse in the next ten years. So what are their biggest gripes? more ›

The cacophony of New York City will no longer include the noise of tour guides on open-air tour buses, if city officials have their way. The City Council has proposed that open-air tour buses should outfit their tourists with individual headsets instead of blaring tidbits like "This is where John Lennon was shot!" via a public address speakers. According to the Post, yesterday's hearing was "heated," pitting "New Yorkers living in the city's toniest neighborhoods" versus the tour operators. more ›

The annoying, constant whirring of tour helicopters has been driving Brooklyn residents crazy, and today, lawmakers gathered to ask the city to enact measures to better "protect the safety of helicopter users and the quality of life of neighborhood residents" with these three steps: "Implement a 311 protocol for receiving, responding to and addressing helicopter complaints; Increase oversight and planning of the helicopter industry, with a focus on reducing, if not eliminating, tourist helicopter traffic; and Conduct an assessment of security risks involved in storing fuel at the downtown heliport." more ›

Last year, small business Susan Hager was fined after taping an envelope filled with 15 of her business cards to a lamppost on Court Street. Them's the breaks... but the problem here is that she was charged a fine for each card; so instead of facing a $75 fine for the envelope and its contents, she faced closer to a $3,000 fine. The Brooklyn Paper now reports that after her hearing, her fine was knocked down to just $75. This could be seen as a small coup for small business owners facing Bloomberg's quality of life ticketing spree. A pet-groomer, also in Brooklyn, is currently fighting over $8,000 in fines for posters he put up to advertise his shop... which he may now have to close. more ›

After a 7.1% decrease in summonses for petty crime last year, the number of "quality of life" summonses is on the rise, according to an article in the NY Post that neatly credits the Post for the change. The NYPD issued about 297,000 criminal summonses for minor offenses during the first half of 2009; that's almost a 5 percent jump over the 283,000 summonses from the same period last year. And the Post claims credit for shaming the NYPD into action with an article last year calling attention to the drop in summonses—an unidentified "well-placed official" says, "It is fair to say there was a push... and [The Post's] articles did it." So next time you're busted drinking a beer on your stoop, it's only proper to send Rupert Murdoch a thank-you note. Of course the NYPD can't officially lionize the Post, and spokesman Paul Browne says the stat just seems dramatic in light of the previous decline. The biggest "quality of life" increase so far is in Chinatown's Fifth Precinct, where police have not been doing as little as possible; summonses have doubled from 2,344 to 4,708 as of last Sunday. more ›

The NYPD recently released its summons counts for the seven most common "quality-of-life" violations, and for the past two years, the overall totals have been the highest on record, surpassing 500,000 "quality-of-life crimes" in '07 and '08. The Post reports that last year the number of summonses for drinking in public increased by more than 4,000 (from 66,885 cases to 70,948) from July 1st through December 31st, compared with the same period in 2007. And it doesn't take a conspiracy theorist to get why more people were also busted for public urination during the same time period, up from 3,888 to 4,161. More stats: disorderly conduct arrests during that time dropped from 47,730 to 43,018, marijuana possession busts declined from 4,775 to 4,107, and littering violations were down from 3,216 to 2,901. And the Post says you've got the Post to thank for a recent NYPD crackdown on "quality-of-life" crimes; the tabloid says cops turned up the heat on misdemeanors after the Post reported fewer summonses for minor offenses in 2008 than in 2007. more ›

NYPD's Chief of Department Joseph Esposito brought in the heads of station-houses from throughout Manhattan and the Bronx into One Police Plaza to re-up the Department's effort in making sure that officers are going after the smallest of crimes. With summons numbers down in each of the last two years, the Post says that police are trying to refocus their attack against quality-of-life crimes with a source coming out of the meeting telling them, "If you have a homeless person on your street, that's a threat." The station heads were shown photographs taken by an NYPD scout of problem areas in their neighborhoods: the "aggressive beggars, squeegee men, hookers and illegal peddlers." A source came out of the meeting telling the paper, "They want to get a hold of these quality-of-life problems. They really want to go back to basics." NYPD spokesman Paul Browne says that the effort was nothing but routine and one official told the Post the lessons were rudimentary saying, "If you know your squeegee men by first name, you're on top of this." more ›

Board up your windshields and lock yourself in the trunk: The squeegee men—those Giuliani-era poster boys for quality-of-life crime—are making a comeback according to the Post, which has an alarming article about the "pests." Of which there are four. But be afraid! They're congregating near the entrance to the Lincoln Tunnel, and a Hells Kitchen elevator manager tells the tabloid, "They get very aggressive. I was like, 'Dude, don't even think about it!'" The Post finds business booming, even though police have arrested several squeegee men at the location. But at least one of them is still haunted by Giuliani's crackdown (which actually began under NYPD commissioner Ray Kelly during the Dinkins administration); he implored the reporter not to publish the article because "Giuliani will lock my ass up. There will be 30 cops up and down this street." more ›

According to a recently released international survey, quality of life in New York City has been slipping compared to other cities around the world. New York ranked 46th in 2006, 48th in 2007 and now 49th. That’s twelve places behind Boston! Washington, D.C., Chicago and Portland are also ranked higher for “quality” living in the survey, which was conducted by a global consulting and investment firm, Mercer. At least we solidly defeated Baghdad, which came in last at in 215th place. more ›

We noticed two YouTube videos, taken from an apartment with a view of Dean Street, documenting some late night construction activity at the Atlantic Yards site in downtown Brooklyn. How late? Well, one video takes place at 11:42PM (video) while the other is in the 4AM hour (above!). For reference, according to 311, construction hours are generally 7AM to 6PM on weekdays (there may be emergency work in the middle of the night, but only on occasion; we also know some contractors get variances and conduct work late at night). more ›