FOR BREAKING NEWS VISIT www.qns.com DECEMBER 1, 2016 • THE QUEENS COURIER 29 We have 5 MILLION reasons to thank our loyal QNS visitors! By Robert Pozarycki [email protected] @robbpoz Queens’ fastest-growing, ground-breaking news website, QNS.com, reached a historic milestone on Tuesday, when it received its 5 millionth page view in 2016. More than that, stories posted on the QNS Facebook page also reached more than 10 million accounts on the social media network. Launched last October, QNS.com replaced The Queens Courier’s website as the primary source for upto the-minute news from around the “World’s Borough.” News content for QNS.com is powered by The Courier and its sister publications including The Courier Sun, the Ridgewood Times, the Times Newsweekly and BORO Magazine. As of midnight on Nov. 29, QNS.com had a total of 5,007,901 page views dating back to Jan. 1. Page views are instances in which a visitor clicked onto QNS.com or a particular page on the website. As for Facebook, QNS posts reached approximately 10,088,471 accounts in 2016. “QNS has enabled us to reach a very large and growing audience of readers living in and interested in Queens,” said QNS co-publisher Joshua Schneps. “We’re focused on continuing that growth and elevating our dominant reach in the borough.” “Our media company is growing with the times, providing multiple platforms for our audience,” added QNS co-publisher Victoria Schneps. On behalf of the entire QNS.com team, we thank all of you for your support and look forward to hitting even greater heights with you in the years to come! Another lawsuit is latest chapter in Maspeth shelter war BY ROBERT POZARYCKI [email protected]/@robbpoz This landlord-tenant dispute could nix a proposed homeless shelter in Maspeth for good. The holding company that owns the land occupied by the Holiday Inn Express located at 59-40 55th Rd. has sued the hotel’s operator, Harshad Patel, and his company, New Ram Realty, for allegedly violating the terms of its lease, Crain’s New York reported on Nov. 29. Patel and New Ram Realty constructed the hotel in 2009 on land owned by the Brooklyn-based Kimcomatt Realty Corporation. Kimcomatt alleges in the lawsuit it filed in New York State Supreme Court that Patel and New Ram violated the terms of the lease — which allowed for the hotel’s use strictly for paid guests — when they allowed the city in October to rent hotel rooms in order to house 30 homeless men. Kimcomatt is seeking to terminate its lease with Patel and New Ram, and if they are successful, the future of both the hotel and any plans to convert it into a homeless shelter — first proposed by the Department of Social Services in August — would be in doubt. According to the lawsuit, the lease mandates that the property only be used as a hotel or for retail purposes. As early as Aug. 25, Kimcomatt informed Patel and New Ram Realty that using all or part of the hotel as a homeless shelter violated the terms of the agreement. Soon after the shelter proposal was announced, the city received tremendous opposition to it from Maspeth residents and lawmakers including Councilwoman Elizabeth Crowley and state Senator Joseph Addabbo. The elected officials sued the city over the proposal, claiming that the hotel lacks the required amenities for a homeless shelter. De Blasio playing with presidential fire By Michael Frichione Mayor de Blasio has a new strategy for winning re-election next year and it includes running against the one man he has a shot of beating: Donald J. Trump. That’s probably because Trump is the one New Yorker whom de Blasio is still more popular than. It’s politically smart. Hell, if I was advising his re-election, I probably would tell him to do the exact same thing. Especially since it distracts from the parade of scandals that our mayor is the band leader of every week. But smart politics and smart policy don’t always agree. It nice when they do, but disastrous when they don’t. Let me explain. City Comptroller Scott Stringer last week unleashed his doomsday scenario budget if Trump decided to cut federal funding to the city of New York, and it doesn’t look good. As it turns out, the city receives about $7 billion (with a “B”) from Uncle Sam. Furthermore, the programs that would be most adversely affected would be the ones pertaining to affordable housing in the city, as federal dollars account for almost half of the city’s entire budget in that department. That’s right, affordable housing programs, the very thing that de Blasio campaigned most strongly on and touts as his vision, is the very thing that Trump has the greatest authority over! That means programs like Section 8, Mitchell- Lama and NYCHA, which try to provide lowincome families the ability to rent decent, safe and affordable homes is decimated. I could understand playing some political games with the Republican president if at least one house in Congress was Democratic. But Donald Trump’s party now controls every branch of the Federal government. Why would New York City want to cross a president who has that much power!? If anything, Trump should be made New York’s closest ally in the Republican Party, especially since the rest of the Washington Republicans with power are regionally more interested outside of major cities and in the South and Midwest. Trump is the last of the Mohicans when it comes to New York Republicans with power. He could be a bridge to the other side, not a boogie man. But the problem with bridge building nowadays is that it’s boring. De Blasio wouldn’t make headlines for getting along with Trump, he would just quietly help our city get the resources it so desperately needs to survive. Unfortunately, there are no gold medals or front page stories for doing your job. Sadly, I don’t think de Blasio is ignorant of these facts. I think he’s smart, and I think he’s cunning. Call me cynical, call me a misanthrope, but nothing would energize de Blasio’s campaign, and likewise his chances for re-election, more than if the big bad Republican boogie man cut spending in our city. His supporters would decry the federal government and rally around their leader with gusto. Every supposed hero needs a villain. De Blasio found his. And while his campaign strategy is Photo: Anthony Giudice/Queens Coourier brilliant, it’s also just heartless. This lawsuit could shut down the proposed Maspeth homeless shelter. Queens Politics & More BY MIKE FRICCHIONE
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