May 29, 2005
Duck season! Rabbit season!
The New York Jets stadium vote is back on again ... or maybe not. Mayor Michael Bloomberg said Friday that Gov. George Pataki will call a meeting for this Friday of the Public Authorities Control Board that controls the stadium's fate, though Pataki himself has been silent on the matter. While state assembly speaker Sheldon Silver and state senate leader Joe Bruno have each used up their get-out-of-vote-free cards already, Silver told WCBS-TV yesterday that he could just not show up (PACB votes must be unanimous among all three voting members) or refuse to second the governor's motion to put the stadium on the agenda. (Presumably the latter would require Bruno's cooperation as well.) What Silver does could be determined by the result of this Thursday's court ruling on three lawsuits against the sale of state land for the proposed stadium - though the speaker has recently stressed that his problems with the stadium plan go beyond the unsettled legal situation.
Meanwhile, pro-stadium forces are turning up the heat on anti-stadium politicians, with the New York Building & Construction Trades Council, a construction union group, threatening to withhold its $1 million in annual campaign contributions from legislators who vote against the Jets project. (You'll note, by the way, that the union group currently gives its money to "Assembly Democrats and Senate Republicans," the parties in power in each house - do you still wonder why incumbents are almost always re-elected?)
Finally, Cablevision, owners of Madison Square Garden, have launched a new series of TV ads against the stadium, including one that declares, "it's a football stadium, not an Olympic stadium" - something that the Daily News (in an "exclusive" - what, other newspapers don't get cable?) described as "stadium mind Games." Except, of course, that it's true: Converting the current stadium plans to an Olympic-sized facility would require a major expansion and additional state and federal approvals to build over the West Side Highway.
Hyperbole is never in short supply in stadium debates. From the NYDN article cited above, this comment from Jets VP Matt Higgins: "As the entire country rallies around our Olympic bid..."
The entire country? Is there anyone outside of New York City who even cares? I don't think most people can name the city that hosted last year's Summer Olympics.
Posted by George Ebertin on May 30, 2005 09:48 PM
It is interesting to note how little journalists are expected to do these days. Nowhere in the NYDN article does the writer make an effort to evaluate the truth of the Cablevision ads, or the Jets reply. Is it a football stadium? Is it an Olympic stadium? No wonder the average person is left so in the dark on what is going on here.
Posted by Joel on May 31, 2005 12:57 PM