City Limits articles from May 2004

City Limits archives from May 2004

Central power.(Editorial)(Editorial)
May 1, 2004... Three lessons in the dysfunction of power: 1. The Bloomberg administration rams through its controversial plan to hold back third-graders who fail a proficiency test. In itself, the proposal might not be so bad. Holding back young kids...

Foster (mis)treatment.(Letters)(Letter to the Editor)
May 1, 2004... "Kicking the Habit" [March, 2004] spoke to the double challenge faced by mothers with substance abuse problems--namely, how to beat addiction while keeping a family together or, in some cases, reuniting after a period of separation. The...

Obscene punishments.(Letters)(Letter to the Editor)
May 1, 2004... There is one absolutely ingenious solution to the problem of prisoner reentry ["Prison Break" February 2004]. We the people of the United States incarcerate our citizens at a rate that is seven times the rate of any other Western country,...

Hip hop foray.(Frontlines)
May 1, 2004... CHECK OUT NYCVISIT.COM--the city's official tourism site--and you'll find textured profiles of Manhattan neighborhoods, encouraging you to explore "experimental music clubs" in the East Village and artists' lofts in SoHo. The Bronx, however, is...

After the editorials: the ground campaign to raise the minimum wage.(Frontlines)
May 1, 2004... THE FIRST DOOR is the worst door for volunteer canvasser David Schwartz. "If you want to get somewhere in life," opines the gruff man who answered the door, after pulling up to his attractive Yonkers house moments earlier in a Jaguar, "you work...

Breathing ground zero.(Firsthand)
May 1, 2004... There is a guy I know, Dave. He was down there two months longer than I was. He was working in the same area I was. He was only 33. Three years later, he needs a lung transplant. Me? I had post-traumatic stress, but didn't know it. My cough was...

Child welfare: wise demise.(Frontlines)
May 1, 2004... LOUISE WISE SERVICES, a highly rated foster care agency based in Harlem, is caught in the most contentious family separation in the group's 90-year history: its own. Since the agency announced last October that it would shut down due to city...

Housing: behind the Section 8 ball.(Frontlines)
May 1, 2004... TENS OF THOUSANDS of New York City families could lose their rental assistance under President Bush's plan to slash the budget of the nation's largest housing program, a fiscal think tank said in March. The city stands to lose $104 million...

Welfare: parks program withering.(Frontlines)
May 1, 2004... AS CONGRESS DEBATES the future of welfare, New York's municipal workers union and the welfare recipients it once represented are trying to keep a valued work program from becoming a thing of the past. [ILLUSTRATION OMITTED] Once...

Abstaining from abstinence-only: Bronx fifth-graders are getting home schooling--in no-holds-barred sex ed.(InsideTrack)
May 1, 2004... TEN FIFTH-GRADE BOYS sit by their mothers and other kin in a South Bronx school auditorium, listening to a man explain why it's vital to talk with kids about sex. The discomfort in the room is palpable. A grandfather shoos his grandson to the...

The art of the flip: how one man bought Bushwick with no money down.
May 1, 2004... The promise of the deal was easy money. It would not take any hard labor or peddling of illicit goods, only a drive to a shallow basement office at 1821 Mahan Street in the Bronx for a real estate closing. All Milton Mendez had to do was follow...

Race wars: since 9/11, New York has been shocked by hate crimes against immigrants. But what happens when the perps are people of color too?
May 1, 2004... MIDWOOD -- The truth is locked in the offender's heart It was billed as a chance for South Asian immigrants to learn from a cop and prosecutor what hate crimes are and how to report them. But by the end of the meeting in Brooklyn's heavily...

The diagnosis mo' money, mo' money.(The Medicaid Showsown: A User's Guide)
May 1, 2004... If there's one thing everyone agrees on about Medicaid, it's this: The government health program for poor people is in critical condition. [ILLUSTRATION OMITTED] It is New York's second-largest budget item, topped only by public...

The treatment: four agendas claim to cure Medicaid's ills.(The Medicaid Showdown: A User's Guide)
May 1, 2004... There's an easy fix to Medicaid's budget troubles, and it's one of the few proposals all four of the major players in this year's showdown rally around: Make Washington pay a greater share of the bill. Unfortunately, the feds have their...

The state Senate.(The Medicaid Showdown: A User's Guide)(Brief Article)
May 1, 2004... Control the cost of Family Health Plus. The program grew sixfold between 2002 and 2003. In response, the Senate plan would require copayments for services and start counting assets, rather than just income, to determine who qualifies. Any state...

The governor.(The Medicaid Showdown: A User's Guide)
May 1, 2004... Rein in Family Health Plus. Governor Pataki echoes the Senate's focus on this program as a budgetary boogeyman. In addition to the added copays and asset test that the Senate proposes, the governor's plan would disqualify anyone in a government...

The industry.(The Medicaid Showdown: A User's Guide)(Brief Article)
May 1, 2004... Represented by the Healthcare Education Project, a partnership of healthcare workers union SEIU 1199 and the hospital and nursing-home industry group Greater New York Hospital Association [ILLUSTRATION OMITTED] Make managed care work...

The consumer.(The Medicaid Showdown: A User's Guide)
May 1, 2004... Represented by the coalition Medicaid Matters New York [ILLUSTRATION OMITTED] Protect Family Health Plus. Advocates remind everyone that this program was largely conceived as a way to help ease the transition from welfare to work. Its...

The Medicaid challenge: getting signed up.(The Medicaid Showdown: A User's Guide)
May 1, 2004... So you say you can't afford health insurance? You can just wait until your ailments become acute and go to the emergency room--a pricey choice made by most of New York City's 1.8 million uninsured. But the state also has four public health...

What's at stake? Medicaid by the numbers.
May 1, 2004... 1. Number of uninsured people in New York City: 1.8 million 2. Percentage of the city's uninsured who have full-time jobs: 60 3. Cost of an average prescription for Lipitor, the leading brand-name cholesterol drug: $275 4. Cost of...

Factory town: as high-priced housing squeezes out jobs, businesses push a plan to stake out their own space.(How to Keep New York Working)
May 1, 2004... "IT'S A REAL New York success story," begins Eric Greenberg. In 1969, his father, Morris, after years as a commercial painter, decided to go into business for himself. He set up one engraving machine in a tiny shop on the Lower East Side and...

It has already been proven that communities of color suffer from higher levels of pollution in their air, water and soil than do white ones--but a new report gives statistical details.(New Reports)
May 1, 2004... It has already been proven that communities of color suffer from higher levels of pollution in their air, water and soil than do white ones--but a new report gives statistical details. Based on data from state and federal agencies, researchers...

As the feds struggle with a mounting deficit and the states try to limit spending, more working families are being left to raise their children without any help from the government.(New Reports)(Brief Article)
May 1, 2004... As the feds struggle with a mounting deficit and the states try to limit spending, more working families are being left to raise their children without any help from the government. This study shows that child care subsidies for poor families...

Feel inundated by news, yet uninformed?(New Reports)(Brief Article)
May 1, 2004... Feel inundated by news, yet uninformed? Do you see fewer people actually reading the newspaper? According to this recent study of trends in journalism, your perceptions are on target. Studying the content, audience and economics of major media,...

Spreading infection: a correspondent documents the mythmaking behind a monster.(Citylit)(Notorious HIV: The Media Spectacle of Nushawn Williams)(Book Review)
May 1, 2004... Notorious HIV: The Media Spectacle of Nushawn Williams By Thomas Shevory University of Minnesota Press, 280 pages, $18.95 NUSHAWN WILLIAMS apparently thinks of himself as a small-town version of the hip hop martyr Tupac Shakur,...

No Fire Next Time: Black-Korean Conflicts and the Future of America's Cities.(Now Read This)(Brief Article)(Book Review)
May 1, 2004... No Fire Next Time: Black-Korean Conflicts and the Future of America's Cities By Patrick Joyce Cornell University Press, $19.95 During the 1992 LA riots, Korean-owned stores were singled out for torching. NYC blacks were also angry...

Witchcraft and Welfare: Spiritual Capital and the Business of Magic in Modern Puerto Rico.(Now Read This)(Brief Article)(Book Review)
May 1, 2004... Witchcraft and Welfare: Spiritual Capital and the Business of Magic in Modern Puerto Rico Raquel Romberg University of Texas Press, $24.95 Haydee is a professional witch--a bruja--but you wouldn't know that at a glance. This...

Local Actions: Cultural Activism, Power, and Public Life in America.(Now Read This)(Brief Article)(Book Review)
May 1, 2004... Local Actions: Cultural Activism, Power, and Public Life in America Ed. by Melissa Checker and Maggie Fishman, Columbia University Press, $24.50 If a transgender prostitute drives through the Meat Packing District and howls out the...