Developers, Development and Conflict of Interest in Politics
"Developer" is an oft cited bogeyman in NYC politics. I cite it often myself. But recent discussions I have had make me realize that focusing on developers can miss some critical points as to why developer money is such a problem and why developers are often political donors not to be trusted.
Development per se is not bad. It can be bad or good depending on how it is done. I remember when I was living in San Diego there was a huge controversy over the revitalization of downtown. Ultimately what they did with the downtown seems excellent to me. Similarly, redevelopment of downtown Los Angeles seems ultimately to have been done well. There are always problems about gentrification, changing historic communities, balancing profit and community benefit. If done right, with a strong local government calling the shots, development can be good. But if developers call all the shots, as they do in NYC, the results are disastrous for the community.
The answer is not to attack all developers. And pledges of "no developer money" by politicians can be misleading. I have seen the term "developer" defined so narrowly, in such a pedantically precise manner as to make the "no developer money" pledge almost meaningless. And yet I have also seen perfectly good contributions made by good people who happen to be developers given back because if a "no developer money" pledge. I think such pledges do help to draw distinctions among those politicians who eagerly grab developer money and give favors back in return with no qualms (Marty Markowitz, Mike Bloomberg, Melinda Katz...) and those who at least recognize that the pay-to-play system that was so horrible nationally under Bush is no better under Bloomberg in NYC. But the "no developer money" pledge and the knee-jerk negative reaction to developers misses the underlying problems. Or, more precisely, oversimplifies the underlying problems to one word: Developer.
I see two basic issues that underlie this debate: the actual corruption that occurs in a city dominated by developers, and the more general issue of conflict of interest that may primarily involve developers and development in NYC, but goes beyond that.
The first problem is indeed the overwhelming influence developers and development (which includes not just developers but the contracting industry and even some unions) has on NYC politics. The history of Bruce Ratner's leverage of his personal friendship with Pataki into a series of backroom deals that nearly got him a free hand in a huge swath of Brooklyn (not just "Atlantic Yards"), with huge amounts of taxpayer money funding him, in exchange for vague and unenforceable promises of "affordable housing" and "jobs" will illustrate the problem. And Ratner's influence, though it may have initially depended on his law school friendship with Pataki, became a simple buying of politicians like commodities...often through non-developer channels. Here is one example where "no developer money" would break down. Brooklyn Party Boss Vito Lopez suddenly received some large donations from relatives of Bruce Ratner, none of whom were developers themselves. Immediately afterwards, Lopez proposed a bill in the State Assembly that was so blatantly favoring Ratner himself that even Bloomberg balked. Money in exchange for a favor in a fairly blatant way, and yet "no developer money" didn't apply because Ratner himself didn't front the money. Also, not all benevolent sounding organizations that advocate for nice things like affordable housing are so benevolent. Ratner himself set up some pro-affordable housing organizations whose sole purpose seemed to be to give his Atlantic Yards project cover and supposed "community support." Those organizations aren't "developers." Yet their efforts and their money has gone largely to provide political support to a specific developer's project. "No developer money" would miss this one because, in essence, the developer money is laundered through a front organization. Finally, even union support, and my family has been pro-union since the days my great-grandfather lost an eye and part of a hand in an industrial accident, can front for developers. One example of how this works is the pro-Ratner "rallies" put on to counter community rallies against Atlantic Yards. These "rallies" are made up of union workers being paid union wages to come out and "protest." In all these examples a particular developer is using his money to subvert the system and in none of those cases would the political activity be directly covered by a "no developer money" ban.
But it isn't just Ratner, of course. Backroom sweetheart deals orchestrated by politicians like Bloomberg and Marty Markowitz and other developer shills are common, including a deal given to developer Stephen Ross that gave him prime Manhattan real estate for a mere $100,000. This isn't capitalism! It is cronyism of a sort I usually associate with Republicans...yet Democrats participate in as well in NYC. I mentioned Vito Lopez's corruption vis a vis Ratner above. But favors for developers in exchange for favors for politicians dogged members of the previous Brooklyn machine as well. And our City Council speaker, Christine Quinn, always acts oh-so-shocked when the details come out of such backroom schemes, yet the truth is, there is no effective oversight of these backroom deals and the ultimate winners are developers at taxpayer expense, often with little or no actual affordable housing or lasting union jobs coming out of the whole thing.
Developers are one of the dominant financial influences in NYC politics. Take the NYC Comptroller's race. Before John Liu entered the race, there were three mediocre candidates. Melinda Katz is well known for being one of the largest recipients of developer money in the city and openly shills for them. David Yassky and David Weprin take less blatant approaches and actually have taken stands that would be unpopular among developers (most recently this by Yassky). And yet Yassky, at least, has shown an amazing willingness to appease developers in order to beg for crumbs from them. This is a defeatist approach that my wife felt repelled by before I caught on to it. And for each of the three candidates, Katz, Yassky and Weprin, the two largest sources of donations were developers and lawyers. Many developers donated to more than one of them, clearly not favoring a particular candidate on merit so much as trying to establish a blanket obligation by the next comptroller to that developer's interests. It is in such cases that "no developer money" can best serve to distinguish developer friendly politicians from community friendly politicians. But even here, many of the developers didn't list themselves as developers. And there can be funneling of money from developers through relatives and front organizations, like Ratner does. Only with the entry of John Liu into the Comptroller's race did NYC get a more community-friendly option for the person who will keep an eye on our city's money. But will Liu also become a target for developer money?
But it isn't just developers. It is the development industry. Contractors, unions, etc. also try to influence politicians in favor of developers (as the Ratner example shows) because they see their livelihood influenced. I don't know why subway upgrades, building new school buildings and upgrading our sewers isn't seen by people as also creating jobs completely separate from developers. But somehow ONLY developers are seen by some as providing new jobs to working class New Yorkers. I think that is a mistake and our city suffers. And it drives a wedge between unions and progressives which benefits no one but developers.
These examples show how developers and the whole development industry per se are a big corrupting influence on our city. But beyond this is the fact that political donations often create conflicts of interest and it is those conflicts of interest, not just developers, that are a corrupting influence. And in many cases the "no developer money" pledge in no way removes such potential conflicts of interest. "No corporate donations" pledges go further in avoiding these conflicts of interest, though not always completely.
Is it a conflict of interest for a person fishing for a judgeship to make political donations to the very people who can offer him an appointed judgeship? Of course it is and it actually is illegal to buy a judgeship. This kind of conflict of interest has dogged Brooklyn judges, landing some in jail and damaging the chances of others when they later (after failing to buy a judgeship) ran for a judgeship.
And is it a conflict of interest when a company whose stated purpose is to buy undervalued companies and use negotiations with government to secure a better financial situation for those companies to donate to political candidates who may very well be part of the government making decisions that will turn that company a profit? Of course it is a conflict of interest. But this conflict would be ignored under the knee jerk "no developer money."
And it is a conflict of interest for Bill de Blasio (running, rather cynically perhaps, for NYC Public Advocate) to take gobs of money from the billboard industry right before advicating that NYC should: "Leave billboards ALONE!" It is amazing how $8000 from the industry got de Blasio's advocacy skills so active advocating for that self same industry.
To see who a politician is beholden to, look to where their donations come from, keeping in mind that a name on a donor list may not reveal their industry without a search. Linking a name to a company is generally required to know. But it is worth noting that developers donate to Melinda Katz so much yet still hedge their bets by donating to Weprin and Yassky as well. It is worth noting that Weprin also gets donations from the garage and horse carriage industries and this seems in line with his legislative stands. It is worth noting that Vito Lopez is showered with money from developers and chiropractors. Of course the people least beholden are the ones who bring in money mainly from average folks with little to spare, so they bring in the least money and so have the toughest time winning. Norman Siegel, running for Public Advocate, is so scrupulous about donors and so scrupulous about not being influenced by big money that it is hard for him to raise money. The people whose best interests are to elect Norm Siegel don't have as much money to donate as those whose best interests are in electing a far less scrupulous candidate.
Money from companies who want politicians to advocate for their industry is common practice. And yet it is also, in a very real sense and even when not illegal, corruption. Well accepted and legalized corruption is still corruption. It means money buys influence in a pretty blatant way. And although developers are the biggest donors and expect the biggest returns on their donations, it is a problem throughout the system.
These are the underlying problems that too often get ignored when people, in a knee-jerk way, attack developers and when politicians declare a "no developer money" policy. Look carefully at ANY politician's donors and ask just what those donors are expecting from that politician. Don't take a "no developer money" pledge to mean "no conflict of interest." Pay to play is an integral part of the American political system. Nationally Republicans took it to extremes during the Bush years. But under Pataki in NY State and Bloomberg in NYC, and with the complete connivance of way too many NYC Democrats, pay to play is taken to extremes in NYC, particularly in favor of wealthy developers. Finding the candidates who take money with the least strings, or at least take money with strings you are most comfortable with is the trick.
Development per se is not bad. It can be bad or good depending on how it is done. I remember when I was living in San Diego there was a huge controversy over the revitalization of downtown. Ultimately what they did with the downtown seems excellent to me. Similarly, redevelopment of downtown Los Angeles seems ultimately to have been done well. There are always problems about gentrification, changing historic communities, balancing profit and community benefit. If done right, with a strong local government calling the shots, development can be good. But if developers call all the shots, as they do in NYC, the results are disastrous for the community.
The answer is not to attack all developers. And pledges of "no developer money" by politicians can be misleading. I have seen the term "developer" defined so narrowly, in such a pedantically precise manner as to make the "no developer money" pledge almost meaningless. And yet I have also seen perfectly good contributions made by good people who happen to be developers given back because if a "no developer money" pledge. I think such pledges do help to draw distinctions among those politicians who eagerly grab developer money and give favors back in return with no qualms (Marty Markowitz, Mike Bloomberg, Melinda Katz...) and those who at least recognize that the pay-to-play system that was so horrible nationally under Bush is no better under Bloomberg in NYC. But the "no developer money" pledge and the knee-jerk negative reaction to developers misses the underlying problems. Or, more precisely, oversimplifies the underlying problems to one word: Developer.
I see two basic issues that underlie this debate: the actual corruption that occurs in a city dominated by developers, and the more general issue of conflict of interest that may primarily involve developers and development in NYC, but goes beyond that.
The first problem is indeed the overwhelming influence developers and development (which includes not just developers but the contracting industry and even some unions) has on NYC politics. The history of Bruce Ratner's leverage of his personal friendship with Pataki into a series of backroom deals that nearly got him a free hand in a huge swath of Brooklyn (not just "Atlantic Yards"), with huge amounts of taxpayer money funding him, in exchange for vague and unenforceable promises of "affordable housing" and "jobs" will illustrate the problem. And Ratner's influence, though it may have initially depended on his law school friendship with Pataki, became a simple buying of politicians like commodities...often through non-developer channels. Here is one example where "no developer money" would break down. Brooklyn Party Boss Vito Lopez suddenly received some large donations from relatives of Bruce Ratner, none of whom were developers themselves. Immediately afterwards, Lopez proposed a bill in the State Assembly that was so blatantly favoring Ratner himself that even Bloomberg balked. Money in exchange for a favor in a fairly blatant way, and yet "no developer money" didn't apply because Ratner himself didn't front the money. Also, not all benevolent sounding organizations that advocate for nice things like affordable housing are so benevolent. Ratner himself set up some pro-affordable housing organizations whose sole purpose seemed to be to give his Atlantic Yards project cover and supposed "community support." Those organizations aren't "developers." Yet their efforts and their money has gone largely to provide political support to a specific developer's project. "No developer money" would miss this one because, in essence, the developer money is laundered through a front organization. Finally, even union support, and my family has been pro-union since the days my great-grandfather lost an eye and part of a hand in an industrial accident, can front for developers. One example of how this works is the pro-Ratner "rallies" put on to counter community rallies against Atlantic Yards. These "rallies" are made up of union workers being paid union wages to come out and "protest." In all these examples a particular developer is using his money to subvert the system and in none of those cases would the political activity be directly covered by a "no developer money" ban.
But it isn't just Ratner, of course. Backroom sweetheart deals orchestrated by politicians like Bloomberg and Marty Markowitz and other developer shills are common, including a deal given to developer Stephen Ross that gave him prime Manhattan real estate for a mere $100,000. This isn't capitalism! It is cronyism of a sort I usually associate with Republicans...yet Democrats participate in as well in NYC. I mentioned Vito Lopez's corruption vis a vis Ratner above. But favors for developers in exchange for favors for politicians dogged members of the previous Brooklyn machine as well. And our City Council speaker, Christine Quinn, always acts oh-so-shocked when the details come out of such backroom schemes, yet the truth is, there is no effective oversight of these backroom deals and the ultimate winners are developers at taxpayer expense, often with little or no actual affordable housing or lasting union jobs coming out of the whole thing.
Developers are one of the dominant financial influences in NYC politics. Take the NYC Comptroller's race. Before John Liu entered the race, there were three mediocre candidates. Melinda Katz is well known for being one of the largest recipients of developer money in the city and openly shills for them. David Yassky and David Weprin take less blatant approaches and actually have taken stands that would be unpopular among developers (most recently this by Yassky). And yet Yassky, at least, has shown an amazing willingness to appease developers in order to beg for crumbs from them. This is a defeatist approach that my wife felt repelled by before I caught on to it. And for each of the three candidates, Katz, Yassky and Weprin, the two largest sources of donations were developers and lawyers. Many developers donated to more than one of them, clearly not favoring a particular candidate on merit so much as trying to establish a blanket obligation by the next comptroller to that developer's interests. It is in such cases that "no developer money" can best serve to distinguish developer friendly politicians from community friendly politicians. But even here, many of the developers didn't list themselves as developers. And there can be funneling of money from developers through relatives and front organizations, like Ratner does. Only with the entry of John Liu into the Comptroller's race did NYC get a more community-friendly option for the person who will keep an eye on our city's money. But will Liu also become a target for developer money?
But it isn't just developers. It is the development industry. Contractors, unions, etc. also try to influence politicians in favor of developers (as the Ratner example shows) because they see their livelihood influenced. I don't know why subway upgrades, building new school buildings and upgrading our sewers isn't seen by people as also creating jobs completely separate from developers. But somehow ONLY developers are seen by some as providing new jobs to working class New Yorkers. I think that is a mistake and our city suffers. And it drives a wedge between unions and progressives which benefits no one but developers.
These examples show how developers and the whole development industry per se are a big corrupting influence on our city. But beyond this is the fact that political donations often create conflicts of interest and it is those conflicts of interest, not just developers, that are a corrupting influence. And in many cases the "no developer money" pledge in no way removes such potential conflicts of interest. "No corporate donations" pledges go further in avoiding these conflicts of interest, though not always completely.
Is it a conflict of interest for a person fishing for a judgeship to make political donations to the very people who can offer him an appointed judgeship? Of course it is and it actually is illegal to buy a judgeship. This kind of conflict of interest has dogged Brooklyn judges, landing some in jail and damaging the chances of others when they later (after failing to buy a judgeship) ran for a judgeship.
And is it a conflict of interest when a company whose stated purpose is to buy undervalued companies and use negotiations with government to secure a better financial situation for those companies to donate to political candidates who may very well be part of the government making decisions that will turn that company a profit? Of course it is a conflict of interest. But this conflict would be ignored under the knee jerk "no developer money."
And it is a conflict of interest for Bill de Blasio (running, rather cynically perhaps, for NYC Public Advocate) to take gobs of money from the billboard industry right before advicating that NYC should: "Leave billboards ALONE!" It is amazing how $8000 from the industry got de Blasio's advocacy skills so active advocating for that self same industry.
To see who a politician is beholden to, look to where their donations come from, keeping in mind that a name on a donor list may not reveal their industry without a search. Linking a name to a company is generally required to know. But it is worth noting that developers donate to Melinda Katz so much yet still hedge their bets by donating to Weprin and Yassky as well. It is worth noting that Weprin also gets donations from the garage and horse carriage industries and this seems in line with his legislative stands. It is worth noting that Vito Lopez is showered with money from developers and chiropractors. Of course the people least beholden are the ones who bring in money mainly from average folks with little to spare, so they bring in the least money and so have the toughest time winning. Norman Siegel, running for Public Advocate, is so scrupulous about donors and so scrupulous about not being influenced by big money that it is hard for him to raise money. The people whose best interests are to elect Norm Siegel don't have as much money to donate as those whose best interests are in electing a far less scrupulous candidate.
Money from companies who want politicians to advocate for their industry is common practice. And yet it is also, in a very real sense and even when not illegal, corruption. Well accepted and legalized corruption is still corruption. It means money buys influence in a pretty blatant way. And although developers are the biggest donors and expect the biggest returns on their donations, it is a problem throughout the system.
These are the underlying problems that too often get ignored when people, in a knee-jerk way, attack developers and when politicians declare a "no developer money" policy. Look carefully at ANY politician's donors and ask just what those donors are expecting from that politician. Don't take a "no developer money" pledge to mean "no conflict of interest." Pay to play is an integral part of the American political system. Nationally Republicans took it to extremes during the Bush years. But under Pataki in NY State and Bloomberg in NYC, and with the complete connivance of way too many NYC Democrats, pay to play is taken to extremes in NYC, particularly in favor of wealthy developers. Finding the candidates who take money with the least strings, or at least take money with strings you are most comfortable with is the trick.
posted by mole333 | 10:44 PM
|
0 comments
0 Comments:
Post a Comment
<< Home