Copyright 2012 The New York Sun Wed, 23 May 2012 20:18:09 -0400 http://blogs.law.harvard.edu/tech/rss Andrew Wolf :: Stories from The New York Sun http://www.nysun.com/authors/Andrew+Wolf admin@nysun.net (Seth Lipsky) webmaster@nysun.com en-us ANDREW WOLF http://www.nysun.com/new-york/falling-traffic-congrestion-a-sympton-of-weak/87835/ Wed, 23 May 2012 15:26:25 EST Urban traffic congestion is on the way down in most cities, according to a study recently released by a Washington State firm, INRIX. The data is based on monitoring GPS devices, maybe even yours, and reveals one interesting trend. If the economy of an area is doing well, you are more likely to get stuck in traffic. A few years ago, this was the number one issue here in New York. Mayor Bloomberg, who has a home in London, became enamored of congestion pricing, which has raised billions for... ANDREW WOLF http://www.nysun.com/new-york/turnaround-now-possible-in-the-bronx-as-its/87659/ Thu, 19 Jan 2012 08:00:51 EST This his has been a good month for the president of the Bronx, Ruben Diaz, Jr. When Mayor Bloomberg’s proposal for a shopping mall in the Kingsbridge Armory was defeated two years ago, largely due to Mr. Diaz’s opposition, he was widely demonized as a “job killer” in a borough that desperately needs employment. One of the president’s initial failings on this issue was to allow the discussion of the so-called “living wage” bill to consume the real issue of unfair government-subsidized... ANDREW WOLF http://www.nysun.com/new-york/weak-results-on-national-tests-are-a-wake-up-call/87565/ Mon, 14 Nov 2011 05:11:15 EST New York State parents, teachers and students have gotten during the past few weeks a couple of wake-up calls about the quality of education here in the Empire State . Weak results on two nationally administered tests confirmed the worst fears of critics of the State Education Department and the City Department of Education. It has become clear that boasts of academic progress are hype at best, deception at worst. Despite the nearly a decade under the mayor’s direct and total control, the... ANDREW WOLF http://www.nysun.com/new-york/startling-study-in-belgium-suggests-rate-of-heart/87332/ Fri, 6 May 2011 08:18:20 EST Maybe Mayor Bloomberg should move to Belgium. A startling study was just published in the Journal of the American Medical Association. It disputes the conventional wisdom that too much salt in the diet leads to all sorts of negative health consequences. Doctors in Belgium studied 3,681 healthy Europeans and tracked their salt usage. They found that those with a heavy hand on the salt-shaker were no more likely to develop high blood pressure than those with a lighter touch. In fact the rate of... ANDREW WOLF http://www.nysun.com/new-york/formal-search-needed-for-new-york-schools/87297/ Sun, 10 Apr 2011 06:42:42 EST From all we’ve seen, Dennis Walcott, Mayor Bloomberg’s choice as the city’s new schools chancellor is a fine fellow, a loyal deputy to the mayor, and a knowledgeable public servant. Loyalty and knowledge are admirable qualities, but are they all that are needed to bring success to New York’s students? Recent events lead us to suspect not. Mr. Walcott will be the third person appointed by the mayor as Chancellor of the New York City schools and shares two attributes with his predecessors: he... ANDREW WOLF http://www.nysun.com/national/how-israel-can-have-a-big-impact-via/87485/ Wed, 14 Sep 2011 05:54:42 EST The victory of Robert “Bob” Turner in the race to replace Rep. Anthony Weiner in New York’s 9th Congressional District hands the Republicans a seat that the Democrats would, according to most polls, have held had Mr. Weiner stood for reelection. The 9th is a district with a three-to-one Democratic edge among registered voters and a heavy Jewish population that can be counted on to turn out in impressive numbers in most elections. Despite this, one Democrat, Mayor Koch, saw this as a unique... ANDREW WOLF http://www.nysun.com/new-york/bloomberg-skating-on-thin-ice-as-he-casts-aside/87231/ Fri, 11 Feb 2011 07:36:23 EST All over the city, local communities are rebelling over the government’s plans to place bicycle lanes in their streets. In a city where a diner owner can’t put a table in front of his or her establishment without a public hearing, it is amazing just how so much can be done by hizzoner, King Mike, without so much as a murmur of public participation. Bicycle lanes? Has anyone bothered to ask the public whether they really want them? I know there is a small cadre of cyclists who yearn for New York... ANDREW WOLF http://www.nysun.com/new-york/a-chimera-emerges-at-the-helm-of-new-york-schools/87156/ Sun, 28 Nov 2010 20:55:09 EST Whatever one can say about the state education commissioner, David M. Steiner, Solomon he’s not. He split the baby in half, and he has satisfied no one. But skip that analogy. One would have to go to Greek mythology to look for what he has produced — a two-headed monster, part lioness, part goat, which is known as a chimera and has come to connote an unrealistic dream. Which is apt enough, as the gains are going to prove chimerical. Cathleen Black may have the waiver needed to get the title of... ANDREW WOLF http://www.nysun.com/new-york/fix-appears-to-be-in-at-secret-hearing-on-next/87145/ Mon, 22 Nov 2010 08:40:39 EST The growing movement to deny Cathie Black, Mayor Bloomberg’s friend and choice to become New York schools chancellor has, I suspect, ground to a halt. The New York State Education Commissioner, David Steiner, has appointed an advisory committee so heavily stacked with former employees of the Bloomberg administration’s education department and recipients of Bloomberg’s charitable largesse that it is hard not to draw the conclusion that the “fix is in.” One can only conclude that Mr. Steiner: ·... ANDREW WOLF http://www.nysun.com/new-york/public-deserves-full-hearing-on-bloombergs/87139/ Sun, 14 Nov 2010 13:18:56 EST Before Cathie Black gets a waiver to come in as Mayor Bloomberg’s schools chancellor, there should be a proper hearing in Albany. It would provide a moment not only to explore whether Ms. Black is the right person for the job but to assess how far the city has actually come under mayoral control of the schools. The mayor, who fashions himself as a great educational reformer, wants New Yorkers to believe that he has found the magic formula that can be executed by any fine manager, even one who... ANDREW WOLF http://www.nysun.com/new-york/tale-of-the-bronx-fires-perfect-for-mayor/87057/ Thu, 26 Aug 2010 08:05:04 EST How did we get to a point where the academic performance of our children hasn’t improved despite the fact that expenditures for our schools have soared to $21 billion a year from $13 billion? The answer can be found in a new book, written by Joe Flood, "The Fires," recently published by Riverhead Books. This is not a book about education, but rather a study of how the top-down management techniques favored by the administration of Mayor Lindsay was responsible for the devastating damage by the... ANDREW WOLF http://www.nysun.com/national/new-york-emerges-as-cautionary-tale-on-charter/86934/ Mon, 3 May 2010 16:29:24 EST Charter schools were first touted in the Empire State as a way of improving all schools by introducing competition and choice to the system – and saving the taxpayers money. By creating competition for the conventional public schools, all schools, we were told, would end up doing better. This is idea has been subverted in a dangerous way, and there is no better example than in New York, where civil discourse seems no longer possible when discussing charters. During the 1990s when charters were... ANDREW WOLF http://www.nysun.com/opinion/what-is-cooking-in-albany/86908/ Sun, 14 Mar 2010 01:20:46 EST Albany has now become the latest front in the war to drag us all, kicking and screaming, into state-mandated good health. Assemblyman Felix Ortiz of Brooklyn has decided it’s not enough that the government is banning trans fats and possibly taxing into oblivion the sugar that, Ira Stoll has pointed out, the government subsidizes to start with. Mr. Ortiz has now introduced a bill that would establish, as a matter of law, that “No owner or operator of a restaurant in this state shall use salt in... ANDREW WOLF http://www.nysun.com/opinion/ravitch-offers-passionate-defense-of-americas/86906/ Tue, 2 Mar 2010 07:07:57 EST No silver bullets. This is the simple premise of Diane Ravitch’s new book, “The Death and Life of the Great American School System,” which is being brought out this week by Basic Books. Written by one of our nation’s most respected scholars, it has been eagerly awaited. But it has also been, at least in some quarters, anticipated with a certain foreboding, because it was likely to debunk much of the conventional — and some not so conventional — wisdom surrounding education reform. Much of the... ANDREW WOLF http://www.nysun.com/opinion/flat-earth-society/86890/ Sat, 24 Oct 2009 22:39:03 EST No sooner did the Daily News lambast critics of Mayor Bloomberg’s educational program as “flat earth” adherents than the federal NAEP math test released its results, which undermine the mayor’s claims for academic improvements on his watch. It seems that New York’s NAEP scores have been stagnating, despite the fact that scores on the state tests, on which the mayor bases his claims, have been soaring. It’s surprising to see the editors of the New York’s Picture Newspaper miss this frame of... ANDREW WOLF http://www.nysun.com/opinion/bloombergs-diversion-strategy/86887/ Sun, 18 Oct 2009 07:26:31 EST The negative tone of Mayor Bloomberg’s reelection effort must signify that there is concern in the Bloomberg camp over Comptroller Thompson’s surprising strength with just over two weeks to go in the campaign. It could be that the Bloomberg camp is really worried that, despite the advantage it has in money and institutional support, Mr. Thompson is gaining and could pull off a surprise upset. Alternatively, the campaign may be a reflection of the nasty side of Michael Bloomberg. Either way, I... ANDREW WOLF http://www.nysun.com/opinion/the-dreaded-cupcake/86883/ Sat, 10 Oct 2009 21:51:30 EST News is in from the front lines of the epidemic afflicting our nation. No, I’m not talking about Swine Flu, which seems to be well under control, but the raging “Childhood Obesity Epidemic,” against which Mayor Bloomberg has just banned the common practice of selling at school fund-raisers the dreaded cupcake. Apple pie, no matter how American, will, I predict, be next. I don’t know about you, but I sleep better knowing that our children are so much safer, protected from the evils of cupcakes... ANDREW WOLF http://www.nysun.com/opinion/new-yorks-education-challenge/86879/ Fri, 2 Oct 2009 07:42:55 EST David Steiner was sworn in as the new State Commissioner of Education Thursday, and was immediately greeted with a familiar song: Send More Money. These are the education “advocates” who have become the perpetual remains of the “Campaign for Fiscal Equity,” undeterred even in the face of evidence that huge increases in expenditures in New York City schools during the Bloomberg years — some 79% in just six years — has barely moved student performance. And the song has barely changed, despite the... ANDREW WOLF http://www.nysun.com/opinion/school-change-we-can-believe/86764/ Mon, 29 Sep 2008 00:00:00 EST For the past six-and-a-half years I have frequently occupied space on these pages sounding off on everything from nepotism in Bronx politics to politically induced fear of eating French fries or Frosted Flakes. Most often I have written about our schools. I came to this task with a point of view, influenced by the events of 1968 and 1969, turbulent years for society, but particularly for New York's schools. The city's power elite, centered around well-meaning philanthropists and non-profit... ANDREW WOLF http://www.nysun.com/opinion/for-love-of-a-ballpark/86310/ Mon, 22 Sep 2008 00:00:00 EST The last game of Major League baseball has been played at Yankee Stadium, following an incredible outpouring of nostalgia and reminiscences. Now the vultures are swooping down to sell off the great coliseum, piece by piece. Seats will fetch about a $1,000 each, someone is ready to package the dirt from the field, holy ground to millions of baseball fans throughout the world, and even the urinals will be sold for their "historic" value. It wasn't supposed to be this way. When the announcement... ANDREW WOLF http://www.nysun.com/opinion/pass-the-frosted-flakes/85806/ Mon, 15 Sep 2008 00:00:00 EST Michael Phelps, the Olympic champion, is understandably trying to capitalize on his remarkable athletic achievements. In reality, there is little money to be made from swimming. There are no pro swim teams, or other professional competition for which he could be compensated. So in time-honored tradition, Mr. Phelps is seeking his fortune through endorsements. Last month he delivered endorsements for Kellogg's Frosted Flakes and McDonalds Restaurants. He might as well have endorsed firearms for... ANDREW WOLF http://www.nysun.com/new-york/bronx-democrats-in-post-primary-disarray/85646/ Thu, 11 Sep 2008 00:00:00 EST The defeat suffered by the Bronx County Democratic organization, which lost every race in which it supported a candidate in Tuesday's primary, may mean new leadership for the county party. The organization was opposed by a so-called rainbow coalition of legislators, which includes prominent black, white, and Hispanic lawmakers from throughout the borough. That coalition is expected by political observers and activists to move quickly to depose the current Democratic leader, Assemblyman Jose... ANDREW WOLF http://www.nysun.com/opinion/finding-a-flawed-structure/85235/ Fri, 5 Sep 2008 00:00:00 EST A commission, appointed by Public Advocate Betsy Gotbaum, has recommended a revision in the State Education law, putting restrictions on the power of the mayor to run the city's public schools. Lurking in the background is the 800-pound gorilla in the room, the issue of term limits. The two issues are intertwined, and indeed the mayor's inflexibility, rejecting any proposal for change in school governance, suggests that he will indeed move to end or modify term limits, to allow him to run for a... ANDREW WOLF http://www.nysun.com/opinion/panning-for-fools-gold/84885/ Fri, 29 Aug 2008 00:00:00 EST It is now just 10 months before the expensive experiment that is mayoral control of Gotham's public schools is set to expire. And as parents ready their children for the start of classes Tuesday, the news has been released that the average S.A.T. scores have declined here once again. There was no press extravaganza. No Power Point presentations, no top officials, union leaders at their side, beaming as the results were outlined. No, troubling test results turn out to be an orphan. One could ask... ANDREW WOLF http://www.nysun.com/opinion/save-yankee-stadium-babes-granddaughter-says-yes/84425/ Fri, 22 Aug 2008 00:00:00 EST Last month, I said that the "old" Yankee Stadium, slated to be demolished after the current baseball season, should be preserved. I suggested that there are ways that we can not only protect this unique piece of our American heritage, but make it profitable for the city and its residents as well. That column generated quite a bit of interest, with readers weighing in on both sides of the issue, but mostly in favor of halting the wrecking ball. I was flattered and excited by the support I... ANDREW WOLF http://www.nysun.com/opinion/hobsons-choice/83937/ Fri, 15 Aug 2008 00:00:00 EST If you are dissatisfied with the political leadership in your community, I have a cure for you: come to the Bronx. Maybe your elected officials are skimming from the town treasury, or perhaps they are cheating on their spouses. Perhaps they have sold their vote so that the DigWeMust Development Company can do their digging on your block. Or maybe they can be found driving through the streets on any given night with a blood alcohol content well above the legal limit. In the Bronx we have a term... ANDREW WOLF http://www.nysun.com/opinion/how-much-mayoral-control/83592/ Mon, 11 Aug 2008 00:00:00 EST A third group has begun public hearings on the future of mayoral control of the public schools, due to sunset in less than a year, on July 1, 2009. This panel, the "New York City School Governance Task Force," is sponsored by the New York State Senate Democratic minority. It may well be the Democratic majority come January, which would greatly diminish the mayor's clout in Albany. Although Mr. Bloomberg abandoned his membership in the Republican Party to become an independent, he left his... ANDREW WOLF http://www.nysun.com/opinion/waiting-for-the-regents/83115/ Mon, 4 Aug 2008 00:00:00 EST Could it be that just a few short years ago, at the top of the list of news stories in our city and state were the machinations surrounding the lawsuit filed by the Campaign for Fiscal Equity to "adequately" fund New York's schools? I have written on this topic in this space perhaps a dozen times during the past six years, each time cautioning that the idea that merely spending more money will result in better outcomes. But for all our spending --and education expenditures have increased in the... ANDREW WOLF http://www.nysun.com/opinion/fasten-your-seatbelts/82614/ Fri, 25 Jul 2008 00:00:00 EST If we were somehow travel ahead in time, say a decade from now, and land in New York City, one thing is for certain: we will be still be talking of the crisis in education, complaining about graduation rates, wringing our hands over the loss of our competitive position in the world marketplace. The Bloomberg reforms? They will fade away as surely as the morning dew. How do I know this? Because in a way we can already make that journey through time, and evaluate the results of a reform effort... ANDREW WOLF http://www.nysun.com/opinion/save-yankee-stadium/82184/ Fri, 18 Jul 2008 00:00:00 EST It came as an relief to me that our Landmarks Preservation Commission has designated 30 mostly forgettable buildings along the west side of Manhattan as the "West Chelsea Historic District." I can now sleep soundly secure in the knowledge that the R.C. Williams and Co. building, the Berlin and Jones Envelope Co. building, the Wolff Building and the Wolff Building Annex, and 26 others will be protected from the wrecking ball. Meanwhile, several miles to the north, wrecking crews are anticipating... ANDREW WOLF http://www.nysun.com/opinion/school-lessons-from-china/81699/ Fri, 11 Jul 2008 00:00:00 EST Next week, some 30 educators from Shenzhen, China are attending seminars sponsored by the College of Mount St. Vincent "to study the concepts, practices, institutions, policies, and learning strategies embedded ... specifically within New York City where test scores are ever improving, and put those concepts into practice back in China," according to the announcement of the program released by the college. I would suggest that perhaps we turn things around and have the Chinese educators teach... ANDREW WOLF http://www.nysun.com/opinion/three-american-originals/81196/ Thu, 3 Jul 2008 00:00:00 EST The Fourth of July marks the anniversary of the independence of America, a time to reflect on the greatness of our nation and all sorts of high-minded civic concerns. For me, however, it's an opportunity to reflect on another aspect of America's greatness and ingenuity, the great jazz music pioneered by Louis Armstrong. Armstrong's birthday traditionally is celebrated on the Fourth of July. It is said that Satchmo thought that he was born on the Fourth of July of 1900. But research since he... ANDREW WOLF http://www.nysun.com/opinion/middle-management/80815/ Fri, 27 Jun 2008 00:00:00 EST When one digs into the testing data released by the State Education Department earlier this week, one comes up with some surprises. The huge across the board gains in the statewide math and English language arts tests would suggest that all children should be doing better. But one group seems to be adrift when it comes to the English test. Curiously, it is not the low performers, special education students, minorities, English language learners, or other "at risk" groups that is lagging behind... ANDREW WOLF http://www.nysun.com/opinion/civil-rights-or-good-instruction/80392/ Fri, 20 Jun 2008 00:00:00 EST Unmarked vans from a private courier service were sent out last week by the Department of Education to deliver the news to lucky families whose children were admitted to the gifted programs around the city. Now comes news that the results undermine the whole rationale of the Bloomberg administration for restructuring the popular programs. A front-page story in yesterday's Times told the tale. After a second round of restructuring last year failed to increase the numbers of minority children, a... ANDREW WOLF http://www.nysun.com/opinion/the-ikea-that-never-was/79878/ Thu, 12 Jun 2008 00:00:00 EST On a visit to Washington, D.C. many years ago, a slick advertising supplement fell out of my morning newspaper. It was for a store I had never heard of, but immediately wished there was a branch in the New York area. The booklet was filled with the kind of furniture that would appeal to people who appreciated modern design and incredibly low prices, in other words many New Yorkers like me. So I celebrate the opening of the city's first Ikea branch in Red Hook, Brooklyn. I had hoped that the... ANDREW WOLF http://www.nysun.com/opinion/for-whom-beller-tolls/79427/ Fri, 6 Jun 2008 00:00:00 EST The issue of mayoral control of the schools is due to end at midnight on June 30, 2009. If the state legislature and governor fail to act, the current Department of Education will disappear and revert into the old Board of Education at 12:01 a.m. the following day. This is unlikely to happen, but what is likely is that there will be changes in the law that will rein in some of the mayor's powers over the schools. In getting to an improved governing structure for the schools, there is likely to... ANDREW WOLF http://www.nysun.com/opinion/the-phoney-war/78937/ Fri, 30 May 2008 00:00:00 EST The specific issue in New York City's public schools that has caused the most recent brouhaha is how much we spend on teaching our students. In this dust-up, all parties manage to come out on the wrong side. Expenditures for education already have risen to more than $20 billion a year from $12.5 billion six years ago, without any objective indicator that would suggest that we are on the path to success. There was a time when the mayor himself would criticize the $12.5 billion figure, asking not... ANDREW WOLF http://www.nysun.com/opinion/the-education-of-ms-quinn/77403/ Fri, 23 May 2008 00:00:00 EST Correction Appended "We're lawmakers, not education experts," City Council Speaker Quinn declared in a breakfast speech Tuesday. She proceeded to wring her hands over cuts of $191 million to the schools. If she really wants to be mayor, better she should be asking how the administration squandered the $8 billion added to the budget these past six years, even as the system serves 60,000 fewer students, and why the results are so lackluster. When the Board of Estimate was struck down by the... ANDREW WOLF http://www.nysun.com/opinion/commissioner-on-the-hot-seat/76567/ Fri, 16 May 2008 00:00:00 EST The National Assessment Governing Board is in town, here for their quarterly meeting, the site of which rotates around the country. It is New York City's turn to host the board, which represent a glimmer of hope in a largely bleak educational landscape. NAGB is a federal agency that is truly non-partisan in the political sense. Think of it as a sort of bureau of weights and measures, providing a common measuring stick to measure the academic performance of our children. It is NAGB that puts... ANDREW WOLF http://www.nysun.com/opinion/herman-badillos-vision/75717/ Fri, 2 May 2008 00:00:00 EST Herman Badillo is too much of a gentleman to use his speech accepting the Manhattan Institute's Alexander Hamilton Award last week to attack the Department of Education over the half-hearted implementation of Mr. Badillo's pet program to end "social promotion" in our public schools. But the elder statesman still made his point clear, reminding all present that this pernicious practice still lives. During the years bridging the administrations of Mayors Wagner and Bloomberg, Mr. Badillo's... ANDREW WOLF http://www.nysun.com/opinion/new-yorks-academic-race-learning-from-siena/75335/ Fri, 25 Apr 2008 00:00:00 EST Students celebrated their spring vacation last week in the medieval town of Siena, Italy. And within the town walls are lessons for those who run schools in America's cities, particularly here in Gotham. Among these Siennese students were a number graduating from the University of Siena, just now completing their degrees. Gathering with friends and family in the vicinity of the Piazza del Campo, the graduates could easily be identified — they were the ones wearing laurels on their heads — from... ANDREW WOLF http://www.nysun.com/opinion/mccann-school-of-education/74928/ Fri, 18 Apr 2008 00:00:00 EST Mayor La Guardia was famous for his insistence on high levels of integrity on the part of the police. In those days, long before computers and CompStat were even dreamed of, lore has it that precinct commanders made themselves look good by "assigning" complaints to "Detective McCann." Detective McCann was slang for the precinct's garbage can. With the departure of LaGuardia from City Hall in 1946, official tolerance of crime grew, along with the political power of organized crime figures such... ANDREW WOLF http://www.nysun.com/opinion/making-do-with-fewer-dollars/74557/ Fri, 11 Apr 2008 00:00:00 EST In the midst of the state financial crisis, the governor and legislature still found funds in the budget to increase education spending across the state by a record $1.75 billion dollars. School spending has long been at the center of a key public policy debate, one that was "resolved" by a settlement of the long standing Campaign for Fiscal Equity lawsuit. That lawsuit began as an effort to create a uniform funding formula that would insure that New York City schoolchildren would get a "fair"... ANDREW WOLF http://www.nysun.com/opinion/history-for-the-speaker/74191/ Fri, 4 Apr 2008 00:00:00 EST In the late 1750s, fed up with steep tolls on the King's Bridge, then the only link between New York and the American mainland, the business community of the day underwrote the construction of the Farmers Free Bridge between Manhattan and what we now call the Bronx. The opening was celebrated at the time by a great barbecue on New Years Day, 1759. In short order, the toll revenue dried up on the King's Bridge, and the levies were abandoned. The lure of free travel to the mainland turned out to... ANDREW WOLF http://www.nysun.com/opinion/patersons-pocketbook/73823/ Fri, 28 Mar 2008 00:00:00 EST Good government types are quick to limit and monitor contributions to political campaigns. After all, we don't want Assemblyman Jones to be unduly influenced by the $250 contribution sent by Citizen Smith who works for a bank that just happens to have legislation pending before some committee on which the good Assemblyman serves. The problem is that the real corruption occurs not when the money comes in, but rather when it goes out. Scrutiny of this may be the sea change that will come out of... ANDREW WOLF http://www.nysun.com/opinion/why-i-drive/73472/ Mon, 24 Mar 2008 00:00:00 EST Last week, I spent a half hour debating with Transportation Commissioner Jannette Sadik-Khan over the issue of congestion pricing. Ms. Sadik-Khan came to my Bronx office to pitch her case to the editorial board of the Bronx Press and Riverdale Review newspapers, which I publish. I have come to the conclusion that congestion pricing is bad public policy for the city. For the vast majority of New Yorkers, those of us in the outer boroughs and upper Manhattan, having an automobile is a defining... ANDREW WOLF http://www.nysun.com/opinion/future-of-commuting/72489/ Fri, 7 Mar 2008 00:00:00 EST We're coming into the home stretch on Mayor Bloomberg's "Congestion Pricing" tax plan. The City Council and the state Legislature need to pass or reject this proposal by the end of March, the deadline for coming up with a plan that will enable the city to obtain several hundred millions of federal dollars to help get the scheme underway. This is money on which we would be well advised to pass, funds that will move us in the wrong direction as we plan for our city's future. I have previously... ANDREW WOLF http://www.nysun.com/opinion/whizzing-by/72195/ Mon, 3 Mar 2008 00:00:00 EST Immigrant children outperform some native-born children in New York schools, my colleague Sarah Garland reported the other day. Indeed, it seems the longer newly-arrived children attend our schools, the worse they do. These conclusions come from a new study, "Do Immigrants Differ From Migrants?" "The foreign born are whizzing by the native born at every level," one of the researchers, Amy Ellen Schwartz, said. Ms. Schwartz, together with Leanna Stiefel, both of the Institute for Education and... ANDREW WOLF http://www.nysun.com/opinion/lesson-of-the-bagel-man/71015/ Fri, 8 Feb 2008 00:00:00 EST Mayor Bloomberg, with the connivance of Council Speaker Quinn, has proposed permitting the addition of 1,500 vendors to city streets. These vendors have long been a source of contention. In some cases they so crowd certain streets that they become a public nuisance, which is the rationale for having government regulate them. Those who sell the same wares in conventional stores hate the street vendors with particular passion. After all, who wants a competitor opening up right in front of his... ANDREW WOLF http://www.nysun.com/opinion/reverse-commuter-tax/70578/ Fri, 1 Feb 2008 00:00:00 EST The commission appointed to "study" the mayor's congestion pricing initiative has come up with a proposal that hardly changes the original plan. This commission was front-loaded with committed proponents of the idea, a kangaroo court if ever there was one — if kangaroos acquit. There now seems to be a shift in emphasis away from claims by proponents that congestion pricing reduces traffic (only a 6% reduction is projected) or will clear pollution from the air and cure children of asthma. There...