Republican mayoral candidate, Joe Lhota, and Bertha Lewis, a black woman and founding member of the Working Families Party, came to the same spot in Yorkville this last Saturday to protest a Bloomberg garbage site that is being built right next to public housing and an athletic field used by 31,000 kids.
Joe Lhota, ex-MTA boss, opposes it for more or less exactly the same reasons as Bertha Lewis, who is a staunch supporter of de Blasio, though probably to the left of him. De Blasio is currently in favor of the garbage site for reasons that are not entirely clear. Yet.
When two powerful city figures with such different political views as Lhota and Lewis agree so completely and so vehemently on an issue, something is obviously wrong and it should get coverage. But, although the groups who oppose the garbage site employ well-known PR companies, there was no press at all.
I'm going to be writing a lot more about this because it's not just about a garbage site, nor about Yorkville, nor even just about New York, it's about policies of overdevelopment the public does not understand. Rezoning by Bloomberg will change New York in many ways and few will benefit the less fortunate.
Why Bloomberg, who needs no one's money, has been so adamant about overdevelopment is anyone's guess; but if the lavish pre-election anointment oil being poured over de Blasio by the real estate industry is any guide to the future, sadly nothing much is likely to change under him.