I’ve written about the scene at the Project FAIR help desk for welfare recipients before; today I tell the stories of two women I met last week that exemplify how trying to jump through welfare’s nonsensical hoops can be a … Continue reading
This Thursday is September 11, and Major League Baseball is marking the day by dressing up its players in “patriotic” uniforms: This Thursday, all Major League Baseball teams will take the field wearing specially designed “Stars and Stripes” caps, part … Continue reading
I revisit some of the small business operators who were threatened by downtown Brooklyn redevelopment last year, and find that many have now been forced out entirely: Jeff Gargiulo’s e-mail address still says “BagelGuys,” but he’s no longer a bagel … Continue reading
A look at the burning issue of the day, if you’re a Yankee fan without a taste for ballpark prices: Will the team try to level a ban on bringing in outside food when they move to their new city-financed … Continue reading
What do ocean trawling and mass transit have in common? unintended consequences. There’s a word for it in the fishing world: “bycatch.” That’s the unfortunate tendency, when you’re trying to net one type of seafood — say, shrimp — to … Continue reading
More on the great Brooklyn supermarket showdown, this time with more thoughts on what the conflict means for hopes of a livable city: The scene on Fort Greene’s Myrtle Avenue on Thursday was certainly bursting with cheap irony: John Catsimatidis, … Continue reading
In part two of my debunking of overinflated economic impact studies, I examine the claims that New York City will see an influx of tourist spending as a result of the “Waterfalls” public art exhibit: I was riding the B … Continue reading
The rebuilding of the World Trade Center site is hideously behind schedule, but the bigger problem is what the city will end up with when it’s finally done: Last week’s Port Authority report on progress (or lack thereof) at ground … Continue reading
New York City is facing the prospect of bus and subway fare hikes again, but could there be another way to do this? As if New Yorkers hadn’t been beset by enough bad news of late — foreclosures going through … Continue reading
More on the New York Yankees’ latest demands for city-backed bonds… When the rich want to get richer off the public till, one trick is to make the theft so boring that only a trained accountant could understand it without … Continue reading