Last week, the New York City Council Parks Committee held a public hearing to discuss the Parks Department budget. The Parks Department is woefully underfunded and has been for at least twenty years, if not more. It has gotten worse under the Bloomberg Administration — the lack of funds is used as an incentive to encourage privatization of our public parks.
On Thursday, March 22nd, at the public hearing – note: the “public” hearings are always minimally publicized (which is basically, not at all) – NYC Council Member James Oddo had a heated exchange with Parks Commissioner Adrian Benepe. This was covered over at A Walk in the Park Blog which reports that Council Member Oddo (whose district encompasses parts of Brooklyn and Staten Island) at one point called Commissioner Adrian Benepe “arrogant, cavalier and disgraceful.” Benepe told Oddo to “have a nice day.”
An excerpt from A Walk in the Park Blog:
Staten Island City Council member James Oddo and Parks Commissioner Adrain Benepe provided some fireworks during a Council Parks and Recreation budget hearing this afternoon.
Oddo said it was no ‘Act of God’ that lead to flooding dozens of people’s homes six months ago when Hurricane Irene hit – it was a lack of maintenance from the Parks Department.
The pond in Willowbrook Park overflowed, flooding nearby streets, cars and dozens of homes.
The cause, according to the angry council member, was a culvert that was blocked by plastic bottles and errand softballs from nearby fields that had not been properly maintained by the Parks Department.
Adrian Benepe did not agree. He repeatedly said the flooding was caused by Hurricane Irene, not an “Act of God” and refused to acknowledge or take any role or responsibility for the damage.
Many people in the Willow Brook/Bulls Head section of Staten Island suffered huge loses in property damage and personal belongings due to the damage. The four streets that were flooded are adjacent to Willowbrook Park.
Oddo said some residents had eight feet of water in their basements.
If Rudy Giuliani were mayor, Benepe “would have been canned a long time ago, ” the councilmember said.
Oddo said he couldn’t wait until the remaining days of this administration were over and Benepe was gone.
“I’ll tell ya, I can’t wait for the 650 days to be up,” he said. “I can’t wait till we get someone in there who treats all five boroughs equally.”
“I appreciate your passion,” Benepe said condescendingly to the visibly upset Oddo.
(I was wondering how many days were left in Mayor Bloomberg’s term. Really? That many?)
In August, Washington Square had its own flooding and Parks Department maintenance problem:
Previously at WSP Blog:
Privatization, Concessions and New York City Parks October 8, 2010
NYC Parks Dept.-2/3 cuts in workers and endless privatization schemes April 25, 2008
After attending the forum on public parks last year and listening to Adrian Benepe talk about the “heroism” of city park volunteers, I came to understand the strategy. Replace necessary social contract services such as managing and maintaining our public parks a “volunteer” effort, it excuses the city from spending tax dollars. Maintaining the parks should not be relegated to volunteers. We need full time professionals, from clean up crews to landscapers to wildlife educators to wildlife safety enforcers — we need our parks staffed with professional crews, not High School kids with good intentions.
http://parkslope.patch.com/blog_posts/nature-brooklyn-parks-geese-and-occupy
@johannaclear
Thanks, Johanna, for your comment. Excellent point (and blog post)!
Cathryn.