Winners and Losers 04/24/15

Mayor Bill de Blasio’s ambitious new sustainability plan for the city has plenty of commendable goals—who’s going to argue against ending infant mortality and eradicating poverty? But to call these aims “lofty” would be putting it mildly, and until we see a strategy as impressive as de Blasio’s dream, we’ll hold our judgment. But read on… there’s judgment aplenty in our weekly Winners & Losers.

WINNERS

Gary Barnett:Well, looks like the joke’s on everybody else. After a residential development on the Upper West Side sparked outrage over its separate entrance for low-income tenants, more than 88,000 people signed up to get their foot in the (poor) door. Since there are only 55 affordable units available, the tower’s developer, Gary Barnett, can make another 1,600 towers without running out of back-door applicants. “I guess people like it,” the tower’s developer, Gary Barnett smugly told the Times. See? He’s doing it for the people. You know, as long as he doesn’t have to look at them.

Andrew Cuomo – The governor took an excursion to sunny Cuba this week, beating every other state (but Missouri) since the thaw in relations, meeting with high-ranking officials (but not Raul Castro) and securing trade deals (but both are tentative). But voters will remember that Cuomo is a friend of Cuba, an advantageous position given the broad support for lifting the embargo (even if it angers some hardline expats and Republicans). Plus, he just happened to run into one of those classic 1950s American cars that still cruise around Havana. Que fantástico!

Loretta Lynch – It took five months and a whole lot of political wrangling, but Lynch has been confirmed as the next U.S. Attorney General, becoming the first African-American woman in history to hold the nation’s top law post. Now that that’s over, all she has to do is oversee the entire prosecutorial arm of the United States government.

Francisco Moya – The Queens assemblyman is an ardent defender of the Scaffold Law, which he says protects construction workers, many of them immigrants. But his stance has also endeared him to the state’s powerful trial lawyer lobby, which is looking for a new champion with Sheldon Silver sidelined by scandal. So the recent news that trial lawyers are spending more and more money in Albany could give Moya quite a boost.

Christopher Swain – Some people will do the craziest things for publicity. One notable example of that is Swain, an environmentalist who decided to take a dirty Earth Day dip in Brooklyn’s Gowanus Canal, a federal Superfund site so clogged with industrial sludge and human poo that it has become a poster child for pollution in North America. But while Swain’s tactics might seem foolish—even dangerous—no one can deny that he succeeded in grabbing the spotlight on a day when every tree hugger in New York is clamoring to be heard.   

LOSERS

John Ciampoli – It looks like the Skeloses aren’t the only ones in hot water. The former Nassau County official is reportedly knee-deep in the federal investigation into state Senate Majority Leader Dean Skelos and his son, Adam. Ciampoli apparently played a role in procuring the storm-cleanup contract for AbTech, a company that employed Skelos’ son as a consultant. It’s good to have friends in high places … but not when subpoenas are flying around.

Fred Dicker – The Post columnist is no stranger to erring on the side of the sensational, but it seems he went a little overboard this week, even by his own standards, when he published a story claiming that Mayor Bill de Blasio was positioning himself to run for president in 2016. Dicker has been sustaining criticism all week as a result—although it’s doubtful that he cares.

Carl Heastie – The Assembly speaker can’t seem to shake his Bronx roots. The Times detailed how Heastie managed to hold onto and eventually profit from a house his mother purchased using money she embezzled, despite a justice ordering its sale. The story highlighted how Bronx Democratic loyalists happened to give him a free pass.  The paper rounded out its coverage with an editorial urging the former Bronx Democratic boss to repay the stolen money.

Jason Helgerson – An audit released this week by state Comptroller Tom DiNapoli found $513 million Medicaid payments deemed improper over a four-year period. When the Cuomo administration pushed back against the audit, it only succeeded in raising more awareness of it. Setting aside which side is right, it’s a headache for the state’s Medicaid director.

Anthony Planakis – Too much buzz around the NYPD’s longtime unofficial beekeeper led to a coup at the honey hives, retired beekeeper Detective Anthony Planakis contends. Planakis said lieutenants were jealous of the attention former NYPD Commissioner Raymond Kelly gave him and accused him of stealing bees and making a profit off of their honey. He stepped down, only to learn the NYPD is now looking for someone to officially assume his prior role.