editorial 30 THE QUEENS COURIER • FEBRUARY 4, 2016 FOR BREAKING NEWS VISIT www.qns.com SNAPS QUEENS OAKLAND LAKE / PHOTO BY MICHELLE LONG Send us your photos of Queens and you could see them online or in our paper! Submit them to us via our Instagram @queenscourier, Facebook page, tweeting @queenscourier or by emailing editorial@queenscourier.com (subject: Queens Snaps). Who do you think is going to win the Super Bowl? “Panthers. They have a strong pace to their game.” Mario Villamizar “Panthers. I don’t watch football, but I like the color blue. I don’t like orange.” Justin Lee “Same here.” Joel Park “Broncos. The Panthers are underestimating them.” Roger Pierro “Panthers. I love Peyton, but Cam’s a monster.” Matt Devore BY MIGUEL VASQUEZ “I’m hoping the Broncos, but the Panthers will win unfortunately.” John Halkiadakis “Cam’s gonna outscore them.” Michael Feliciano street talk “Panthers. They’ve been on a long streak and Cam has had a great season.” Jacques Sylvestre “I don’t watch football, but I like the way Denver Broncos sounds.” Chris Choe “Broncos. All my friends post stuff about them on social media.” Shanik Pimentel Carriage compromise stinks Something smells about this horse carriage “compromise” that Mayor Bill de Blasio announced last month and will be voted on by the entire City Council this Friday. The bill would reduce the number of horse carriages in use in Central Park, where they have been a popular fi xture for decades, and allow for the construction of a new, multi-million stable within the park. The carriage operators would be relocated from their existing stables, including one in the now valuable Hudson Yards area. It is no secret that since taking offi ce, de Blasio has worked to end the horse carriage industry. Though it has been described as an animal rights issue, in reality, it’s about real estate. Developers have long coveted these stable sites, but reportedly, there has been no offer made to the stable owners. So the city is intervening with this “compromise” to get them out and into a portion of the park. This is a real estate deal, plain and simple. This compromise fails to adequately address the futures of the men and women employed by this industry as it is downsized and relocated. And who says the powerful Central Park Conservancy will go along with it? In short, de Blasio is willing to sacrifi ce an entire industry at the altar of real estate developers. We also fi nd it hard to believe the city will ultimately give the green light to taking a piece of Central Park away for a $25 million stable when that money could (and should) be used for more meaningful purposes. The horses already have adequate stables; the stable owners should be allowed to stay or leave on their own terms-- they are a private industry that is a symbol of New York. What’s worse, the City Council will vote on this horse carriage plan the same day it has schedule a vote to give its members a 30 percent pay increase. Mayor de Blasio insists one has nothing to do with the other. Does anyone at City Hall realize how bad this looks? We support the City Council’s pay increase, but it should delay a vote on the horse carriage issue. A dangerous precedent We learned with dismay that Governor Andrew Cuomo’s Joint Commission on Public Integrity (JCOPE) has issued an advisory opinion requiring that public relations representatives register as lobbyists and disclose whatever contact they may have with newspapers’ editorial writers or editorial boards, as well as if they write an opinion piece that is published in a newspaper. If passed, this would be an extremely dangerous precedent, not just for the members of the press but for American citizens. The Freedom of Speech and the Freedom of the Press were included in the First Amendment to the Constitution for a reason — they are critical to the functioning of a democracy. Any attempt by government to infringe upon those rights, no matter how limited the exception might seem, opens the door to further erosions of key liberties upon which our nation was founded. Journalists, in the course of our job, need to speak with paid representatives of many organizations as well as the paid representatives of elected offi cials or candidates. We also often get off-the-record tips that can lead to important stories, and the publication of these stories is part of the press’s critical job as a government watchdog. Much of that information would likely dry up, leaving rank-and-fi le citizens the poorer, should JCOPE’s ill-advised recommendation be implemented. There’s a vast difference between lobbying government offi cials on behalf of a client in an attempt to infl uence public policy and providing information to editorial writers, who will evaluate all the data they compile before they take a position. Confl ating the two does a great disservice not only to the fourth estate and the PR people we deal with, but to this country’s citizens, and to the very notion and practice of democracy. THE QUEENS PUBLISHER & EDITOR CO-PUBLISHER ASSOCIATE PUBLISHER EDITOR-IN-CHIEF VP, EVENTS, WEB & SOCIAL MEDIA ART DIRECTOR ASSISTANT TO PUBLISHER ASSISTANT ART DIRECTOR ARTISTS STAFF REPORTERS WEB EDITOR CONTRIBUTING REPORTERS EVENTS MANAGER CLASSIFIED MANAGER CONTROLLER PRESIDENT & CEO VICE PRESIDENT VICTORIA SCHNEPS-YUNIS JOSHUA A. SCHNEPS BOB BRENNAN ROBERT POZARYCKI AMY AMATO-SANCHEZ NIRMAL SINGH ALAN SELTZER STEPHEN REINA RON TORINA, JENNIFER DECIO, CHERYL GALLAGHER KATRINA MEDOFF, ANTHONY GIUDICE, ANGELA MATUA, ALINA SURIEL KATARINA HYBENOVA CLIFF KASDEN, SAMANTHA SOHMER, ELIZABETH ALONI DEMETRA PLAGAKIS CELESTE ALAMIN MARIA VALENCIA VICTORIA SCHNEPS-YUNIS JOSHUA A. SCHNEPS Schneps Communications, 38-15 Bell Blvd., Bayside, NY 11361 718-224-5863 • Fax 718-224-5441 www.qns.com editorial e-mail: editorial@queenscourier.com for advertising e-mail: ads@queenscourier.com Entire Contents Copyright 2016 by The Queens Courier All letters sent to THE QUEENS COURIER should be brief and are subject to condensing. Writers should include a full address and home and offi ce telephone numbers, where available, as well as affi liation, indicating special interest. Anonymous letters are not printed. Name withheld on request. LETTERS TO THE EDITOR, AS WELL AS OP-ED PIECES IN NO WAY REFLECT THE PAPER’S POSITION. 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