This week’s biggest Winners & Losers

With New York City pools and beaches looking more and more appealing every hot summer day, the lifeguards watching over these precious city oases aren’t the only ones doing the saving. Henry Garrido, head of the public employee union that represents that vital role, just struck a deal with the city to bump lifeguards’ starting pay 22% to over $19 an hour in hopes of combating the dire shortage. 

Who cares that Hochul’s taking her Garden State counterpart to the Supreme Court over Murphy defunding the Waterfront Commission? It’s all peace and love when it comes to the Gateway Tunnel. The two govs shook hands to go 50-50 on funding the long, long, long delayed rail tunnel under the Hudson. Getting deja vu? This already happened a political lifetime ago, with Andrew Cuomo and Chris Christie in 2015. Maybe this time it’ll stick. 

While New York drivers may lament once again having to move their parked cars twice a week because of full alternate-side parking’s return, Jessica Tisch has more than one reason to celebrate. Not only will the sanitation commissioner oversee cleaner streets thanks to twice-a-week cleanings, she also starred in a highly-dramatic TikTok from the department’s account where she implores New Yorkers to move their cars because the streets are “crying out to be cleaned up.”

Former New York City mayor, current congressional candidate and infamous glutton for punishment Bill de Blasio is back in watchdogs’ crosshairs. The City reported last week that the NY-10 candidate ignored a warning from the Conflicts of Interest Board to pay taxpayers back for using his NYPD detail during his ill-fated presidential bid. De Blasio’s expensive obsession with waterway transit also came under fire this week as the city comptroller released an audit finding $224 million in undisclosed expenditures for the NYC Ferry. 

Not only was the New York City Police Department outed by Gothamist for blocking off parts of the waterfront for cop families to watch the July 4th fireworks, but the department’s troubled Special Victims Division also came under fire in a new probe. The Department of Justice announced it would investigate allegations that have persisted for more than a decade of SVD officers “shaming and abusing survivors.” News of the exclusive access given to officers  for the Independence Day festivities came less than a week later and was labeled “an abuse of power.”

Mayor Eric Adams wants New York to be a “city of yes” but New Yorker’s eligible for a monkeypox vaccine got a big fat “no” when trying to schedule vaccine appointments on the department of health website. The city recently received 6,000 doses of the vaccine from the federal government but a malfunctioning website prevented residents from getting them. Health department officials attributed Wednesday’s cyber snafu to “technical difficulties.”  The episode is eerily reminiscent to the early days of the COVID-19 vaccine rollout, when New Yorker’s spent hours scouring for appointments. Fool me once…