Oddo: Replacing Buildings Commissioner Isn't Enough
City Councilman Jimmy Oddo, who has been critical of the city's Department of Buildings for years, said that getting rid of the commissioner, as Michael Bloomberg just did, should just be the beginning.
“You can replace [Commissioner] Patricia Lancaster with the most talented person in the world, and if you don’t provide this department with resources to put boots on the ground, you’ll have the same results for the last couple of years,” Oddo said.
“Just changing commissioners without giving it additional resources is not enough. And that’s coming from me. I’m not a guy who believes in throwing money at a problem."
Oddo acknowledged the agency has had a slight increase in funding and manpower, but said, “Now, juxtapose that with the level of growth we’ve had over the last six years, and I say it’s not enough.”
- Poll
- Obama (D)
- McCain(R)
- Spread
- RCP Average
- 47.7
- 43.8
- Obama +3.9
- Candidate
- Favorable
- Unfavorable
- Spread
- Obama
- 54.3
- 34.4
- +19.9
- McCain
- 51.7
- 36.3
- +15.4
As a Democrat I am wary of some Republicans but Jimmy Oddo makes sense when he speaks. It is beyond belief that the Bloomberg Administration has not proportionately increased the Buildings Department to address the real development going on in the City. And the lengthy process to approve projects gives the city all the warning time it needs.
So far this year, one construction worker a week has died on the job. One a week. Oddo is on the right track, and I'm glad he's pushing for a department of buildings that has the staff to match the frenzy of building going on.
Early on, Bloomberg proudly proclaimed that his administration would see more building in the city than any in the last 100 years. Given his ambition to literally change the face of every neighborhood in the city, one would have thought a cautious mayor elected in the shadow of 911 would have put in place the mechanism to oversee this unprecedented building boom.
He didn't. And maybe because he's insensitive to the death of construction workers, many of whom are foreign born and not voters. It took a tragedy like the crane demolishing an eastside building to get his attention.
That'll teach the Commissioner to play solitaire on government time!
maybe if Bloomberg concentrated on being the mayor of new york city and not imitating London trying to tax the middle class with congestion pricing or worrying about winning the olypics that was never gonna happen, maybe he would be, as bubba says, increasing and decreasing the size of the buildings dept. based on the amount of building permits get approved in line with the city's land use process.