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    • VIDEO: Councilman Greenfield Likes Kosher Pork


    by on Aug 3rd, 2011

    The Brooklyn Politics has put up the above video, originally posted on Youtube by gifterphotos, in which Councilman David Greenfield responds to criticism about the amount of city money going to Jewish religious and charitable organizations.

    According to an article in the New York Post, Jewish groups “secured $4.26 Million from city council members in the 2012 budget, far more than Catholic groups, which will take home $517,250 and Islamic/Muslim groups, which secured $19,000.”

    City Councilman David G. Greenfield represents the 44th Council District, which includes Borough Park as well as parts of Midwood and Bensonhurst.

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    • Brian H.

      This was his stated aim as far back as the debate for the election that put him in City Hall in the first place. When his two main rivals were making a big show of pouring over the budget to trim the fat, Greenfield said (and I quote): “The role of the Councilman is not the role of the Mayor. We don’t manage the budget, we don’t write the budget, we don’t root out waste and fraud. There is one job that I have, and that is to demand more for this community, to bring the resources back and deliver to you.”

      http://www.bksouthie.com/2010/03/city-council-special-election-debate-highlights-with-video/

      • http://www.nedberke.com Ned Berke

        Councilman Lew Fidler is also a big proponent of this kind of “pork” – or discretionary funding, or whatever you want to call it. There is certainly a valid argument for it, and one that needs critical exploration, as there are benefits and drawbacks. Fidler has argued for it, using the logic that a councilmember knows the needs of his/her community better than a faceless bureaucrat and should be the one to decide where the money for his community goes. A councilmember is also more accountable – money not going where you think it should? Vote the rep out.

        On the other side, critics say that it creates a patronage system, where community leaders and organizations are afraid to criticize or vote against their representative because of the damage it may do to their budgets. I can tell you that several community leaders in Sheepshead Bites’s coverage area had a personal and political dislike of Carl Kruger, for example. However, they repeatedly stated that no matter how dirty they felt he was, they could not afford to stand apart from him, and feared voting in a person less effective at funneling money to the community.

        At the end of the day, the only way this is going to end is if you have a cadre of politicians very skilled at bringing home the bacon to continue to do so (in order to stay in power), while simultaneously pushing to rewrite the rules against it.

        I’m pretty sure if that ever happens, we all ought to become more religious, because the end is most certainly nigh.

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