NYC Council Hands Out Nearly $50 Million In Pork

Times are tough, the Mayor and Council tell us we must skimp and save to weather the economic storm. They're doing that by increasing the sales tax, cutting city services and of course, pulling in almost a billion in fines. However, despite preaching to New Yorkers about fiscal responsibility, the Council is terrible practicing what they legislate for the rest of us. Thanks to Quinn's "reforms" concerning city spending after she was caught in a slush-fund scandal, we get a whole 24 hours to see what they are going to spend on member items. The possibility that this so-called transparency will do anything to combat their wasteful spending is slim to none.

From The NY Daily News:

The funds are disbursed by Council members to several thousand nonprofit and charitable groups that defenders say will help a wide variety of needy constituency groups.

But it also lets Council members - most of whom are running for third terms because they and Mayor Bloomberg lifted the prior two-term limit - boast they've brought home the bacon.

In a public disclosure on Thursday fraught with missteps, Council aides said the new pork pie is to be spent as follows:

$17.7 million dispensed by the individual 51 Council members, with some members getting to dole out bigger slices because they chair major committees or hold leadership posts;

$17.9 million dispensed through Speaker Christine Quinn (D-Manhattan);

$7.7 million equally divided among the 51 members to give to youth-service groups;

Another $5.5 million to be disbursed by the members to senior citizen groups.

Quinn of course gets the largest piece of the pie and from that, a tremendous amount of influence with specific groups that are essential for her to hold onto power. It is incredibly unethical, should be criminal, yet she continues to do so because that is the name of the game in New York City. Nearly two years after the scandal broke concerning the secret slush fund, there still has been no accountability for the Speaker's actions and she continues to (falsely) claim that everything has been addressed and resolved. Of course, it hasn't it because the political will to take out Quinn from within is simply not there, especially with that smile of hers.