Filed under: News, Politics, Race and Civil Rights
As the blizzard of 2010 dumped 20 inches on New York City, paralyzing public transportation, flooding the subways, and leaving EMT workers stranded in the snow, those first responded to were the wealthiest. No surprise here.
On Facebook, posters have posted pictures of areas in Bed-Stuy, Bushwick, and other neighborhoods in Brooklyn and Queens, all untouched by snow plows. As of today, four days after the blizzard first hit, cars remain buried under drifts, the streets are empty of footprints, and trash trucks, ambulances, or any city services have apparently blown away in the wind.
The upper East Side is clean as a whistle as snow plows and crews ready 42nd St for New Year's festivities. It brings to mind people in the Ninth Ward waving white flags as their families drowned in attics as rescue and city workers rushed towards the French Quarter -- mostly to save the structures.
A newborn baby died in Crown Heights, Brooklyn, after it took emergency responders 10 hours to respond to the mother's 911 call on Monday. A Queens woman was forced to wait for three hours for first responders after calling 911 on behalf of her mother who was having trouble breathing on Monday morning, according to the Daily News. Her mother, Yvonne Freeman, 75, was dead by the time emergency workers were able to reach her home. A stroke victim had to be carried by emergency personnel and police officers because they could not drive through the streets. By the time they reached the hospital she was brain dead.
But Mayor Michael Bloomberg's block on E. 79th Street between Fifth and Madison Ave. was clear by Monday.
Why New Yorkers continue to think Mayor Bloomberg serves any other interests other than business and the wealthy perplexes me. Bloomberg's response to the criticism: "We did not do as good a job as we wanted to do or as the city has a right to expect," he said during a press conference in the South Bronx yesterday.
New York has seen bigger snowstorms that have not left the city crippled. The largest snowstorm New York City ever experienced was in 2006, 26.9 inches, and it did not stop public transportation systems.
City workers say Bloomberg's recent budget cuts have decreased manpower and allowed for this dysfunction.
In contrast, in equally cash-strapped Newark, New Jersey, Mayor Cory Booker has been responding via Twitter to residents who have not been plowed. Pictures show him running out of his own house with a shovel -- at least giving Newark residents the idea that they have his ear. Check the video below of him shoveling snow during the snow storms earlier this year.
Meanwhile in New York, as people die, and remain stranded, including my own mother who is stuck at my sister's house in Bed-Stuy, Brooklyn, without her heart medication, Bloomberg offers excuses at various press conferences and goes home to a cleanly plowed street.
Permalink | Email this | Linking Blogs | Comments
Kasey Chambers Megan Ewing Kristanna Loken Aubrey ODay Drew Barrymore
No comments:
Post a Comment