QUEENS CHRONICLE, Thursday, November 10, 2011 Page 8
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EDITORIAL
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Rein in the BSA to protect our neighborhoods he people of Queens are sick and tired of seeing the city’s unelected Board of Standards and Appeals reduce the quality of life in our neighborhoods and our property values by allowing developers to sidestep the building and zoning regulations enacted to protect our interests. The BSA continually violates the guidelines under which it is supposed to operate. Now some of our elected representatives have finally taken the first steps toward reining in the agency, and we wholeheartedly support their efforts. The BSA is tasked with granting variances and special permits to developers and regular old homeowners who want, for whatever reason, to exceed some limit in the city building code. It might be something innocuous, like a family that wants to build an extension stretching a foot or two closer to the property line than the law allows. Or it might be something that will seriously impact on a neighborhood, like a business wanting to expand into a residential zone, or a developer looking to exceed height limits to jam more units into a new apartment building and maximize his profits. The city zoning handbook says the BSA may grant variances only when it finds that a piece of property has some
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kind of peculiar, unusual or unique characteristics that would cause the owner difficulties or hardship without a waiver from the usual regulations. But to be blunt, those requirements are a joke. The BSA grants variances all the time without any of those conditions being met. It’s one of those things about this administration that drive civic activists crazy, rightly so. One case involves a lot in Bayside Hills that the owner, a real estate firm, had divided into two so a second house could be built. Problem is the second lot isn’t big enough for a house. But no problem: The firm just went and got a variance from the BSA — even though the neighbors opposed it; area Councilman Dan Halloran opposed it; Borough President Helen Marshall opposed it; and Community Board 11 opposed it, the latter in a unanimous vote. None of that mattered to the BSA any more than the city handbook did. What do the neighbors know? They only live there, on lots laid out in 1936. What do Halloran and Marshall know? They’re only the people’s duly elected representatives. What does CB 11 know? It’s only the governmental body closest to the people. No, it’s the mayorally appointed BSA in Manhattan that knows what’s best for Bayside Hills.
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Hire on merit Dear Editor: Knowledge is power, but having only a little knowledge can be dangerous. District Leader Elmer Blackburne’s Oct. 27 letter about the FDNY, “Unbiased stories about bias,” revealed that he possesses only a little knowledge and precious few facts about the issue of FDNY minority hiring and this leads him to hope for an outcome that will likely prove dangerous to both New York City residents ONLINE and firefighters. He characterMiss an editorial or letter cited by a writer? izes the efforts Want news from our to diversify the other editions covering FDNY as “meathe rest of Queens? Find ger”; over $20 past reports, news from million spent across the borough and since 1989 on minority recruitmore at qchron.com. ment efforts is meager? The numerous, expensive, extensive and varied initiatives instituted to entice both minorities and women to become firefighters are meager? NYC and the FDNY have bent over backwards to recruit underrepresented groups to consider firefighting as a career and have nothing to apologize for or be defensive about. As a 30-year elected off icial Mr. Blackburne should be aware of these efforts. Does Mr. Blackburne realize there was a quota for blacks to be hired as firefighters in the 1970s? This quota resulted in blacks filling almost 8 percent of the f iref ighting ranks, about twice what Mr. Blackburne declared in his letter. Does he realize that all the cities he cited as having higher percentages of minority firefighters than New York achieved those percentages due to quotas that have been challenged in the courts and thrown out? When he writes of Hispanics being discriminated against, does he realize that the FDNY Hispanic Society refused an invitation to join the lawsuit because they do not want standards lowered and believe everyone should have to pass the same test? His assertion that the Civil Service system in New York practices illegal discrimination bumps up against the fact that blacks are the most over-represented — that’s right, the
Halloran, Marshall, Councilman Mark Weprin and his brother, Assemblyman David Weprin, see it differently, however. Last week they announced a bill that would allow community boards and borough presidents to appeal BSA decisions. Those appeals would be heard by the City Council, which would then have the final say. No longer would “unelected bureaucrats” be able to “run roughshod” over residents, as Mark Weprin put it. This is a bill worth supporting. So is a companion measure that would allow the city to impose fines on companies that get variances with time limits but continue operating after they expire as if they had been granted in perpetuity. These measures constitute the kind of problem solving the Council should engage in more frequently. Too often members get wrapped up in matters that really aren’t their concern, such as, say, the healthcare policies of a company that doesn’t even operate within the City of New York (yes, we mean Walmart). Passage would also increase the strength of the legislative branch of government in a city where the executive branch has been wielding too much control, bringing the balance of power closer to where it should be. Ask your rep to vote yes.
EDITOR
most over-represented — group in city employment. At approximately 24 percent of the NYC population, blacks hold 36 percent of city jobs. If we adopt the argument that city agencies must mirror the city population we will have to either let a lot of black workers go or have a moratorium on hiring blacks until the numbers match up. Do you support this, Mr. Blackburne? I don’t. I, and my group, instead support treating everyone equally no matter their race or gender. To advocate for quota hiring means you want the decision to hire based on their race or gender instead of their preparation, motivation, intelligence and ability. This is illegal, Mr. Blackburne, and in no way guarantees the “fundamental fairness” you say you want. It is also dangerous as it leads to arguments being made that reading comprehension ability is not required (an argument your distinguished federal judge, Nicholas Garaufis, astonishingly accepted), and neither is physical strength, if you want to be a firefighter. Paul Mannix President, Merit Matters Staten Island The writer is a FDNY Deputy Chief but does not represent the department in this letter.
Save Queens trees Dear Editor: (An open letter to NYS DOT Senior Landscape Architect Jim Lau) I understand you are the state Department of Transportation landscape architect assigned to the Kew Gardens Interchange Project. Many of my colleagues and I have read in local papers such as the Queens Chronicle that 600 trees would be slated for the chopping block, as the roads undergo reconfiguration in Kew Gardens and Briarwood (“Highway plans will uproot 600 trees,” Sept. 29, multiple editions; and “Expect delays: Big road project will take years,” Aug. 18, multiple editions). I have some creative ideas, which I encourage you and the NYS Dept of Transportation to consider. We feel there is no replacement for our beautiful, mature trees. The September 2010 tornado and the August 2011 hurricanes were responsible for the loss of about 4,000 trees cumulatively in our borough. Natural disasters are beyond our control, but proactively preserving our trees is within our control. The DOT’s potential plans to cut down 600 trees goes against my morals as a citizen and human-