WWW.QNS.COM RIDGEWOOD TIMES FEBRUARY 7, 2019 13
LET TEACHERS
FINALLY TEACH
Teachers are breathing a sigh of
relief because the mandatory link
between their performance ratings
and their students’ standardized test
scores has been abolished by the Democrat
controlled state Legislature and
Governor Cuomo.
These educators aren’t rejoicing
because they had something to hide
and now they will no longer be held accountable.
Teachers never, as a whole,
felt threatened by accountability. They
feel that a big weight has been lift ed
from their shoulders, because they
have now been freed from the tyranny
of arbitrary and scientifi cally unsound
tests that were used punitively
with no redeeming value to improved
instruction and learning.
Because they can now concentrate
once again on teaching, learning
will soar.
Despite some bumps in the road in
recent years, state government has
now listened to the teachers union
and the coinciding pleas of a preponderance
of experts and accepted that
standardized tests must be conceived
and administered only for right reasons
which do not allow for abusive
practices. They have struck a blow
for the re-professionaliaztion of
education.
Albany has fi nally, for the present,
cast off the yoke of the union-busters
and private school acolytes and
inquisitors of the Grand Obsolescent
Party.
Ron Isaac, Fresh Meadows
WAITING FOR THE
SECOND HALF
Whatever happened to Phase 2 of
Woodhaven Boulevard Select Bus
Service? Today’s estimated cost of $231
million could increase based upon the
outcome of fi nal design and engineering
on the project scope of work.
Several years ago, city Transportation
Commissioner Polly Trottenberg
testifi ed before a City Council
Committee meeting that completion
of the project could cost up to $400
million. Why would the Federal
Transit Administration enter into
a Full Funding Grant Agreement to
guarantee the proposed $97 million
federal share request toward a total
project cost of $231 million until this
task is completed?
According to the February 2018
FTA New Starts Report for Fiscal
Year 2019, the project is still in the
development stage. It will still need
several more years before reaching
a serious discussion about approval
of a FFGA. This would represent
a legal commitment by the federal
government to commit $97 million
toward the project. This also requires
congressional and presidential authorization
and approval of funding in
future FTA budgets.
The previous construction start
date of 2019 for Phase Two is impossible
if design and engineering will not
be completed until the end of 2019. You
need six months from start to fi nish
for the procurement process to award
contracts for construction, which
would have to take place in 2020.
Taxpayers, commuters, transit advocates,
elected officials and media have to ask
if potentially waiting seven more years until
2026 before boarding the full Woodhaven
Boulevard SBS is worth the fare.
Larry Penner, Great Neck
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The local impact on Amazon HQ2
BY MAUREEN TANT
Long Island City loves Amazon’s HQ2
plan! Or so Amazon PR and NYS politicians
in support of the deal say — $3
billion tax incentive giveaway, lack of public
review, hardline anti-unionism and all.
Amazon has embarked on a frenzied
campaign to tell everyone the great opportunity
we would be missing without
HQ2. You have surely gotten their mailers
letting you know.
In reality, Amazon’s gentrifying
presence and abuses of power aff ect a
much broader population and here in
Ridgewood, we are directly implicated
in this scam of a deal.
For one, Assemblywoman Catherine
Nolan represents Queens’ 37th District,
which spans northern Ridgewood to
the proposed HQ2 site. Nolan was fi rst
elected in 1984. She’s an avid supporter
of the plan to build HQ2 in LIC, home of
Queensbridge Houses, the largest public
housing development in the U.S.
In 2017, Nolan wrote a letter to the
mayor in which she said of a 17-story luxury
tower set to be built in Ridgewood:
“this development will have a profound
eff ect on infrastructure, schools, price
of rental units and has the ability to
negatively aff ect the quality of life.” We
wonder, what’s with the turnaround?
The notion that LIC is “too far gone” to
luxury condos, breweries and corporate
offi ces shouldn’t stop us from fi ghting
this deal. Gentrifi cation doesn’t happen
naturally — it’s a phenomenon that in this
case is being facilitated by the promised
capital investments Amazon’s Jeff Bezos
hopes to make in LIC and enabled by politicians
such as Assemblywoman Nolan,
Governor Cuomo and Mayor de Blasio.
As LIC begins to see even greater real
estate speculation due to this deal, the
gentrifi cation eff ect will only spread
further as Amazon recruits a new population
of tech workers — none of whom
need be Queens or even NYS residents
under this deal. We’ve lost enough local
character to gentrifi cation — fi ghting
Amazon is a critical step in protecting
what we love about living here.
Ridgewood is about 49 percent Hispanic
or Latinx, according to the 2010
U.S. Census. With business and luxury
development comes an infl ux of wealthy
transplants and an increased police presence.
The NYPD has a shameful history
of racial profi ling, and the proliferation
of Amazon’s surveillance tech could compound
this problem. Amazon’s patent for
a “smart doorbell” became public last year.
These devices would enable homeowners
to add photos of “suspicious” people
and off er an option to automatically alert
police if they’re spotted on the device’s
camera. In theory, the doorbell would
protect deliveries; in practice, it seems
more likely to enforce racial biases.
From Ridgewood to LIC, it’s time to stand
up for Queens and protect it from this hostile
takeover because nothing is ever “too
far gone” that we cannot organize against it.
Maureen Tant is a member of the
Ridgewood Tenants Union, an independent
tenant-led housing group building
power among community members to fi ght
displacement.
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