May 23, 2005
Jets to circle endlessly?
Scratch another New York Jets stadium vote from the calendar: State assembly speaker Sheldon Silver has called for the postponement of this Wednesday's scheduled Public Authorities Control Board meeting. This, you'll recall, is the meeting already rescheduled from last week after Silver's state senate counterpart, Joe Bruno, postponed that one.
The Associated Press reports that Gov. George Pataki's representative on the board, budget director John Cape, plans to re-reschedule the meeting "at the earliest possible date" - but also notes that "further delays are possible under the rules if a voting member is absent." This raises the specter of Silver and Bruno delaying a decision indefinitely by refusing to show up, perhaps by hiding out at a Holiday Inn in Oklahoma until after the Olympic committee vote in July.
In related news, the ninety economists are back, only this time there's 106 of them, and they're denouncing the Jets deal for $1.3 billion in "unnecessary" subsidies that "will not generate significant net economic or fiscal benefits."
LATE NOTE: This morning's New York Times adds: "State and city officials acknowledged at the time that they wanted to force Mr. Silver into using his postponement option, fully expecting him to ask for a second delay. That would set the stage for a showdown at the next meeting, where Mr. Silver and Mr. Bruno could be painted as potential villains for jeopardizing the city's Olympic bid." Like I was saying...
