Frank Padavan Scores Independence Line For State Senate Race In Queens, But Anthony Como Is Blocked By Chris Bragg - City Hall News

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In his attempt to hold off former New York City Council Member Tony Avella this year, State Sen. Frank Padavan will have the crucial Independence Party line.

But fellow Queens Republican Anthony Como, who is running against State Sen. Joe Addabbo, will not.

The party’s executive committee officially submitted its endorsements on Monday.

Both riled members of the State Independence Party by using members of the party’s rival New York City faction to gatherer their petition signatures. Padavan was pulled from the precipice thanks to his longstanding ties with party chair Frank MacKay and his close relationship with Mayor Michael Bloomberg, an Independence ally and benefactor.

But in Como’s race, the line went to Addabbo.

“I was able to keep one of them off,” said Michael Zumbluskus, a downstate executive committee member who was upset with the campaigns’ use of rival signature gatherers, and claimed victory from keeping Como off the line.

Zumbluskus said that the decision was also helped by Addabbo’s campaign carrying petitions for Independence Party state committee members, while Como’s had not.

Como campaign spokesman James McClelland sought to downplay the development, which could make it difficult for Como to win in a Queens district with a heavy Democratic enrollment advantage. McClelland said that Como’s campaign met Sunday night after learning of the news and decided they still would be viable going forward.

“It’s not a blow to the campaign, because this year the anti-incumbent sentiment is so strong,” he said. “In the past, the Independence Party was more of an asset.”

Though Padavan is seen as having a close relationship with Bloomberg, Como does not. After losing a Council election in 2008, Como voted against the term-limits extension. He says he was later offered a job by the Bloomberg administration as a commissioner at the New York City Housing Authority, which prompted him to skip a planned reelection bid for his old Council seat. But the job never materialized.

To those watching the situation, Bloomberg’s fingerprints are on some other party endorsements as well. According to Zumbluskus, Mark Pollard—a pro-charter school candidate running a Democratic primary gainst State Sen. Velmanette Montgomery in Brooklyn—also got the Independence nod.

State. Sen Toby Ann Stavisky, meanwhile, got the Independence nod despite the support of Queens County executive committee member Michael Niebauer for Democratic challenger Isaac Sasson.

Niebauer is one of a number of executive committee members around the state disheartened that local candidate picks got trumped by state party leadership.

“They never make us look good here in Queens,” Niebauer said. “We’ll see what happens. I don’t know what we’re going to do.”

Broad Channel Journal - Broad Channel Loses Free Trips on Cross Bay Bridge by Fernanda Sanchez - NYTimes.com

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Ending free trips on the Cross Bay Bridge for Broad Channel residents will have an impact. Chester Higgins Jr./The New York Times

ZIP code 11693 in southeastern Queens spans two communities divided by water and a half-mile-long toll bridge. One of them is Broad Channel, a narrow island in Jamaica Bay with cottages on stilts and a quaint business district that has a nail salon, a bar, a pizzeria, a deli and little else.

Dan Mundy Jr., the president of the Broad Channel Civic Association, says that “around here, people live on a budget, so every dollar counts.” Chester Higgins Jr./The New York Times

If a car is vandalized in Broad Channel, the owner must cross the toll bridge linking the island to the Rockaway peninsula in order to file a police report. The closest pharmacy, hospital, gas station, grocery store and bank are also on the other side of the bridge, and so is the rectory for the local parish, which was merged in 2008 with a parish in the Rockaways.

Broad Channel’s only Roman Catholic church has no resident priest and a limited Mass schedule. Broad Channel has a post office, located inside a variety store, but it does not offer post office boxes or sell money orders. It had a laundromat, but it burned down on Wednesday.

For its roughly 3,000 residents, daily trips to the peninsula over the Cross Bay Veterans Memorial Bridge are something of a necessity. The toll is $2.75 for drivers without an E-ZPass. But for the past 12 years, residents of Broad Channel and the Rockaways have been allowed to cross it without charge.

But their free ride is about to end.

Sometime in July — the exact date has not yet been set — the Metropolitan Transportation Authority will end a program that instantly credits their E-ZPass accounts with the toll imposed every time they cross the bridge. It is part of an effort to close the transit agency’s $800 million budget gap, which also includes eliminating subway lines, reducing subway service and scrapping some bus routes.

Under the new rules, residents of Broad Channel and the Rockaways who have an E-ZPass will no longer be credited the $1.13 toll they pay each time they cross the Cross Bay Bridge, although they will not be charged if they make more than two crossings a day. The transit agency estimates that ending the program will bring in an additional $3.5 million a year. It is part of a package of cuts and other money-saving measures totaling about $93 million.

To many people in Broad Channel, a largely working-class enclave, it means paying to get to the doctor’s office, go to work, pick up a child at school or attend a meeting of the local community board. It is not uncommon for families to have lived there for generations; many of the residents are civil servants.

“It makes no sense to have to take out-of-pocket money to do a job I’m not paid for,” said Dan Mundy, 72, who volunteers on five committees at Community Board 14, which meets in Far Rockaway. “Am I upset? Yes, I’m upset. I’m also angry.”

He is not the only one. An online petition against eliminating the toll refund gathered 1,000 signatures in four days and drew some nasty comments, including one comparing the transportation authority’s board members to terrorists. At a public hearing in Queens last month, protesters chanted “no more tolls” as the board’s chairman, Jay H. Walder, who grew up in the Rockaways, took his seat.

Phone calls have been pouring into the office of Assemblywoman Audrey I. Pheffer in Rockaway Beach. And among business owners in Broad Channel, there is a palpable sense of dread.

People who live in the Rockaways are “not going to want to pay a toll to buy a dozen bagels,” said Al Pisani, one of the owners of a bagel shop that is about to open just off the toll plaza on Cross Bay Boulevard, Broad Channel’s main roadway.

The Cross Bay bridge opened in 1939, and drivers have paid to traverse it ever since. (To this day, old-timers reminisce about how it cost just 10 cents into the 1970s.)

A spokeswoman for the transportation agency, Joyce Mulvaney, said the agency was obligated by the state to charge tolls at the bridges and tunnels it operates and then to use the money to maintain the crossings and subsidize mass transit services.

Only the Legislature can abolish the toll for everyone, and Ms. Pheffer, a Democrat whose district includes Broad Channel and the Rockaways, has introduced many bills hoping to do just that over the years, with no success.

Broad Channel has a wildlife refuge and 20-some residential blocks of mostly single-family home. It is so narrow that the water is visible on both sides from Cross Bay Boulevard. The A train stops there, but the ride to the financial district often takes 90 minutes. Someone who uses the bridge to get to work will now have to pay nearly $600 a year.

“A hundred bucks may not seem like much for some people, but around here, people live on a budget, so every dollar counts,” said Mr. Mundy’s son, Dan Mundy Jr., 46, a firefighter who lives in the house that belonged to his grandfather and is the president of the Broad Channel Civic Association.

Anthony Causi, 28, who moved to Broad Channel four years ago and owns an insurance agency there, put it this way: “We’re already paying more for everything, so I think of this as nothing but an unfair tax.”

There is another crossing on the northern end of Broad Channel, the Joseph P. Addabbo Memorial Bridge, which connects the island to the Howard Beach section of Queens. It is operated by the city’s Department of Transportation, is at least a mile longer than the Cross Bay bridge and is free.

Residents Want to Keep Free Pass for Cross Bay Bridge by Brendan Brosh - NY Daily News

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The Cross Bay Bridge rebate program, which saves Rockaway and Broad Channel residents millions of dollars every year, is in jeopardy of being axed as the MTA tries to fill a nearly $400 million hole in its budget.

The program allows E-ZPass holders in those communities to essentially cross the bridge for free.

"We'll block the bridge and get arrested again," vowed Democratic District Leader Lew Simon, who has been active in the fight to remove the toll for more than two decades. "We plan on busing people to the hearings."

The Metropolitan Transportation Authority board approved a 2010 budget yesterday that would also reduce train and bus services and potentially eliminate free student MetroCards. Before the cuts can be implemented public hearings must be held and another vote taken.

The bridge produced $12.2 million in toll revenues, MTA spokeswoman Judie Glave told the Daily News earlier this year. The MTA spent $3.6 million on the program in 2008, she added.

Locals with E-ZPass are charged a $1.13 toll every time they cross the bridge. That money is then remitted to them in the form of a rebate.

The community fought against the toll until the rebate program was introduced in 1998, when Deputy Mayor Rudy Washington helped negotiate a deal , Simon said.

Broad Channel residents, who live in zip code 11693, have to take the bridge to pick up a package at the local post office.

Members of Community Board 14 must also cross the bridge to attend local meetings.

"This is the only place in the country where you have to pay to see your neighbor," said Broad Channel activist Eddie O'Hare.

Locals are hoping to get new MTA Chairman Jay Walder - a Rockaway native who attended Beach Channel High School - to save the rebates.

"The battle should be to eliminate the toll altogether," said Community Board 14 District Manager Jonathan Gaska. "This won't help businesses and it'll increase the traffic problems."

The rebate program was on the chopping block earlier this year, but was saved during last-minute negotiations between the MTA and state officials.

The normally subdued Assemblywoman Audrey Pheffer even strong-armed Assembly Speaker Sheldon Silver and then-Senate Majority Leader Malcolm Smith to procure the money and save the program.

"I thought I was going to fall off my chair when I heard about this again," Pheffer said yesterday.

North Channel Lot: Who's Responsible? by Lisa Fogarty - Queens Chronicle

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Though it isn’t illegal to fish off the coast of the North Channel parking lot, inexperienced fishermen are warned to avoid wading into the waters, which are known to produce strong currents. (photo by Lisa Fogarty)

The changing weather may mean more time spent by the pool or frequent trips to Rockaway Beach, but for many Howard Beach residents bordering the Addabbo Bridge, it also unearths a host of familiar issues.

Each year, it’s the same old story: parking problems along 164th and 165th avenues, illegal garbage dumping both inside and along the perimeters of the community and safety concerns resulting from a lack of park security on the large patch of beach and concrete across the bridge known as the North Channel parking lot, residents said.

“People park across the street from us to go walk through the trails because it shortens their walk to the water,” said Pat Toscano, who lives along 164th Avenue. “They have picnics and leave their garbage all over the place and their vans and cars are sometimes still there at 9 or 10 p.m. We never know who is parked outside our house.”

Though recent accounts have focused on animal sacrifices that had reportedly taken place on the shore, many residents have temporarily looked past the religious practice to search for answers to an even more pressing question: exactly who is going to take responsibility for the area’s problems?

Eight years ago, Toscano and his neighbor asked Gateway National Park Service, which owns the lot, to take measures to curb the number of people loitering in front of their homes after hours. Parks Service responded by erecting gates and “No Entry” signs in front of the Jamaica Bay wildlife refuge, an effort Toscano said helped to an extent, but was in no way an antidote to the problem.

“It’s federal property, but it’s not being patrolled properly,” he said. “I try to look out for it as much as I can, but at this point I’m a little peeved that the federal government has done very little to patrol it.”

Dorothy McCloskey, president of Friends of Charles Park Committee, said Gateway needs to designate a park ranger to the area.

“There are no garbage cans down there and people barbecue and fish all night and day,” she said. “Why is it you can’t step onto Fort Tilden or Breezy Point without a permit, but it’s okay to run rampant in Howard Beach?”

Democratic District Leader Frank Gulluscio, who is running for City Council next fall, said trash build-up and loitering is only part of the problem. Recreational fishing, though not illegal, is unsupervised, he said. Some fishermen wade out into the bay unaware of its reputation for having perilous underwater currents.

“Forget about the legality of fishing for a moment,” he said. “It’s dangerous to go out in the water. Gateway doesn’t have a patrol in the area.”

Pete McCarthy, acting superintendent of Jamaica Bay, said the organization is ramping up its efforts to maintain the North Channel parking lot. A few weeks ago, staff members and a park ranger began patrolling the area on Fridays, Saturdays and Sundays, picking up garbage and ensuring visitors clean up after themselves, he said. When asked about the fact that, just this past Saturday, the lot’s beach was ridden with litter, McCarthy said he would address the issue.

Parks Service also plans to start closing the lot between the hours of 11 p.m. and 5 a.m., an experiment McCarthy said improved the conditions at Brooklyn’s Canarsie Pier by 75 percent. On the issue of fishing, although Gateway is ultimately responsible for any injuries incurred while wading out into the water to surf fish, McCarthy said in his 11 years at the department, he has never confronted this problem.

“Most people who wade know what they’re doing and are prepared,” he said. “It’s part of the recreational experience.”

Statement from Council Candidate Frank Gulluscio on the Proposed Fare Hike by the MTA

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE

January 21, 2009

Contact: Y. Phillip Goldfeder

718-825-2566

Statement from Council Candidate Frank Gulluscio on the Proposed Fare Hike by the MTA

"I was proud last night to join over three hundred of my friends and neighbors at the MTA public hearing in Flushing to tell the MTA that we are not going to take their fare hike proposals lightly."

"Once again, the Metropolitan Transportation Authority is expecting hard working commuters to bail them out of their financial disrepair. I am deeply troubled at the prospect of a fare hike and even more so at the proposed elimination of the resident rebate for the Cross Bay Bridge. The MTA continues to be a prime example of mismanagement and mis-allocation of public funds and their historical and only response to budgetary crises is to further tax local families."

"The Cross Bay Bridge is unique in that it is the only tolled bridge in the city that connects two communities within the same zip code. Just over ten years ago, we joined together as a concerned community to fight for our rights and we were successful. It is time once again to let our voices be heard and remind those leaders of the MTA that they are not going to balance their budget on the backs of Queens residents. Local families rely heavily on the bridge to commute to work, transport their children to and from school, shop for groceries, attend religious services, utilize their police precinct and visit their doctor."

Residents, Pols Protest ;Unfair and Unjust; Cross Bay Bridge Toll by Lee Landor - Queens Chronicle

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Queens Borough President Helen Marshall, a handful of politicians and hundreds of Broad Channel and Rockaway residents are demanding the removal of the only intra-borough toll in the city.

Photo caption: Assemblywoman Audrey Pheffer, City Councilman Joseph Addabbo Jr., C.B. 14 Chairwoman Dolores Orr and District Leader Frank Gulluscio. Photo: Lee Landor

The toll plaza that sits at the northern end of the Cross Bay Bridge has been the cause of much contention between the two communities and the city for decades.

Residents began protesting the toll in 1974 and finally won in 1998 when the Metropolitan Transportation Authority, which operates the city-owned bridge, agreed to implement a rebate program.

With the program, Broad Channel and Rockaway drivers with E-ZPasses are charged $1.03 (discounted from $2.50 for non-residents) each time they cross the bridge, and the money is returned to them in a rebate.

Now that the MTA is facing a serious fiscal crisis in its 2009 budget, it is contemplating abrogating the rebate program, which would save the agency $3.6 million a year.

Just the utterance of the MTA’s proposal sent Broad Channel and Rockaway drivers scrambling to the offices of their elected officials and local leaders, who organized a protest on Tuesday.

Joining Marshall in her call to remove the toll were Assemblywoman Audrey Pheffer, City Councilman Joseph Addabbo Jr., several district leaders and a number of community board members.

According to Marshall, the toll will “hamper the ongoing economic development of the entire Rockaway Peninsula. It will make the current housing boom less attractive to prospective buyers.”

The toll will also discourage Rockaway residents from driving into the rest of the borough to shop, according to Pheffer. Why would they pay a toll to get to Queens Center Mall, for example, when they could drive into Five Towns in Nassau County for free?

Pheffer called on the MTA to “eliminate the toll. It’s wrong. It’s unfair and unjust.”

Addabbo expressed concern about what the MTA would do with the $3.6 million it would save by ending the rebate program. “How many of us are really certain that the MTA can handle money?” he asked.

It’s time the agency learned that it cannot fix its financial problems on the backs of its customers, Addabbo added. He suggested that before it does anything, the MTA should look in the mirror, recognize the place from which its fiscal troubles stem and revamp its entire financial department.

Community Board 14 District Manager Jonathan Gaska said there is no question that the Cross Bay Bridge toll should not even exist. But since it does, the least the MTA can do is continue the rebate program.

Broad Channel residents send their children to school in the Rockaways, Gaska noted. It’s where they go for grocery and other shopping, to eat out, to see movies, to visit the post office and even to get gas.

Should they need to visit their local precinct, which is located on the peninsula, or pick up their kids from school or send certified mail, Broad Channel residents, who share a ZIP code with a Rockaway neighborhood, would have to pay a toll. Likewise, Rockaway residents who want to get to any other part of the borough have to pay a toll.

“It’s just ridiculous,” Marshall said. “Does the MTA charge Manhattan residents a toll to travel into Midtown or SoHo?”

Lifelong Rockaway resident Glenn DiResto, a candidate in the 32nd Council District special election, summed up the problem with the toll: it’s divisive. “The toll isolates the whole community,” he said.

Rockaway resident Dan Tubridy echoed the sentiment, saying, “This toll is a wall. It’s a wall that ... separates the city of New York.” It is time, he said, to “tear that wall down.”

In addition to the protest, the community held a demonstration Wednesday, sending six busloads of residents to speak out at an MTA meeting in Manhattan.

Beach in Jamaica Bay Littered with Debris, Slain Animals by Brendan Brosh - NY Daily News

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An isolated beach on Jamaica Bay has become an eyesore, littered with religious icons and the gruesome remnants of animal sacrifices, area residents complain.

And last week, Queens News found a decapitated goat and evidence of an apparent chicken sacrifice on the beach, at the foot of the Joseph P. Addabbo Memorial Bridge that connects Broad Channel and Howard Beach.

Fishermen said they have seen headless cats on the shore there.

Locals complain that the National Park Service, which has jurisdiction over the site, does little to patrol or clean the area.

"We're trying to clean up Jamaica Bay here, and we're finding all these religious objects that are detrimental to the marshes," said Dan Mundy Sr., a Broad Channel resident and head of the Jamaica Bay Eco Watchers. "We have been receiving numerous complaints about debris and litter."

Religious groups, sometimes more than 100 strong, congregate at the beach on weekends, according to locals.

They said the area is left littered with coconuts, flags, broken glass, flower wreaths, religious statues, plastic items and bottles - a mix of what appear to be Hindu and Santeria religious items.

The Park Service said it is trying to balance the competing needs of the religious communities and keeping the park clean.

"We've been working with the communities, trying to have them better understand and educate them about the impact of leaving articles from their religious ceremonies," said Patti Reilly, acting superintendent for the Jamaica Bay unit of the Gateway National Recreation Area.

Reilly said maintenance crews clean the site, but trash sometimes accumulates - including dead animals.

"From time to time, we have seen animal carcasses and have removed them quickly," she said. "None of that is permitted."

Local fisherman said the garbage is just one of many problems upsetting the fragile ecosystem of Jamaica Bay.

"There are all sorts of religious byproducts floating around the bay," said Mike McGovern, 70, a retired construction worker who has lived in Broad Channel for most of his life.

"I've seen Styrofoam plates with illuminated candles, dozens of them, floating on the water," he said. "People just can't leave garbage there."

Rep. Anthony Weiner (D-Queens, Brooklyn), who led a cleanup of the site Friday, said regular maintenance is the key.

"I don't think Gateway has done enough to clean up the foot of the bridge," said Weiner.

"We want all New Yorkers to enjoy our beaches, but we cannot have circumstances where there is animal cruelty," he said.