In this week's Chief-Leader, the civil service newspaper, Jim Callaghan ties together the Bloomberg administration's casting blame on rank-and-file workers in the fatal 2003 Staten Island Ferry crash and in the recent fatal fire at the former Deutsche Bank in lower Manhattan. (Subscription).
For excerpt of the printed copy, click "continue" bar below:
"The larger issue with the fire was this: six years after 9/11, four years after the summer blackout of 2003 and after a similar rainstorm several years ago disrupted the subways, it is now clear to all New Yorkers that the Mayor has no plan - none - for any emergency - terrorism included - that might befall the city.
"The fire deaths might have been prevented if Bloomberg implemented a suggestion made two years ago by a lowly reporter: namely that his technology experts figure out how to get Buildings Department violations - all of which are on line - to the firehouses across the city. If each firehouse had nothing more than a BlackBerry, the brave men who responded would have at least known of some of the perils that awaited them.
The fire came on the heels of another man-made disaster (not an act of God, as one of the Mayor's water-soaked Commissioners would have us believe).
Earlier in August, flooding in the subway system essentially closed down the metropolis (never mind that longtime subway riders can't even remember such occurrences except in the past few years).
As news spread, it seemed that everyone who had a car jumped in it. Bus trips in Queens that are scheduled for 20 minutes took two hours - just to get to the subway. Traffic was bumper to bumper, people were walking in the streets, there was little police presence at major intersections, and lanes for fire trucks or ambulances were impassable. A half-hour rainstorm had knocked out the city's entire subway system, leaving nearly every single commuter stranded, unable to get to work on time or unable to get to work at all. "