While the Bloomberg administration remains supportive of the U.N. expansion plans, the mayor met with obstacles yesterday at the city and state level as several lawmakers said they felt the United Nations has no place in New York.

City Council Member Simcha Felder told The New York Sun yesterday that he will introduce legislation December 15 “asking that the city not do anything to help the U.N. expand, since it’s really been the core of hate against democracy, hate against America, and against anyone who stands for freedom.”

Mr. Felder, a Democrat of Brooklyn, said that, because he is chairman of the council’s subcommittee on landmarks and public siting, and because he also sits on the land-use committee, he expects to exert some control over the U.N. plans to expand and refurbish the Secretariat, which involve a small city park in Turtle Bay. “When the city buys property or leases property, it has to go through my committee,” Mr. Felder said.

The council member approved of the state Senate’s refusal Thursday to consider the world body’s expansion plans. “The state is doing its share, and the city will have to do its piece,” the council member said. “We don’t want the U.N. here, and if they are here, we’re not going to do anything to make them more comfortable. We want them to feel as comfortable as they want democracy around the world to feel – in other words, not very comfortable.”

Mr. Felder said he would like to see the United Nations remove itself from New York altogether, saying, “I’m in favor of Kofi Annan’s resigning, and I’m in favor of closing the shop down.”

“I have not come across many people in this city who are big fans of the U.N.,” he said, “and we’re in political season, and anyone who is going to support the expansion will have to face tremendous political ramifications.”

“This is a body that does not stand for freedom,” he said of the United Nations, “and anyone who wants to help them will be viewed by the voters and by constituents as someone supporting a body that’s in favor of torture, supporting countries … that have a record of destroying freedom, that hate America and all things American.”

Mr. Felder’s political warning came as the Bloomberg administration expressed its continued support for the U.N. expansion plans.

In an interview Friday with the Sun, Andrew Alper – a member of the board of the United Nations Development Corporation and president of the city’s Economic Development Corporation – said, regarding the state Senate’s decision: “My job is to make sure the Legislature understands the economic importance of the United Nations. I don’t want to get involved with the geopolitics of it, but I just want to make sure they understand the economic impact.”

Mr. Alper also said he is “optimistic that this impasse will get broken.”

“I can’t talk about the whole administration,” the Bloomberg appointee said, “but I can tell you from the Economic Development standpoint we’re talking, at the staff level, to the legislators to make sure they understand the economic impact of the U.N. presence in New York City.”

Another figure citing the United Nations’s economic importance as reason to approve the organization’s expansion plans is Rep. Eliot Engel, a Democrat of the Bronx whose district includes parts of Westchester and Rockland counties.

Although Mr. Engel said he has “been as critical of the U.N. as anybody,” especially over its Middle East policy, he wants the United Nations “to remain in New York, and to thrive here, and expand.” He cited the “several thousand construction jobs for the New York economy” that would be generated by the expansion as a reason “not to cut off our nose to spite our face.”

Mr. Engel said that while he does not “second-guess the New York State Senate,” he believes there are “other ways to send a message,” especially by having Congress demand greater accountability from the United Nations in exchange for continued American financial support.

Mr. Engel would not, however, state whether he supports H.R. 4284, introduced by Arizona’s Rep. Jeff Flake, which calls for America to withhold funds from the United Nations until it cooperates with House and Senate investigations into the oil-for-food scandal.

Despite the prospect of potential job growth, some state legislators oppose the U.N. presence in New York. One such legislator is Assemblyman Dov Hikind, Mr. Felder’s predecessor as the City Council member from Boro Park. Mr. Hikind said he, too, is wary of pressure from the mayor and other “biggies” who have supported the U.N. expansion.

“I’m thrilled with what has happened so far, but it ain’t over till it’s over,” Mr. Hikind said. “Even though, for now, things are on hold, I guarantee you this is going to come back to life, so we want to continue to educate people in the meantime about what the U.N. represents.”

State Senator Martin Golden, another Brooklyn Democrat, who was one of the first representatives to ask that the Senate not consider the U.N. expansion plans, said it was unlikely proponents of the project would have much luck in pushing it through, under current circumstances.

“I believe the New York State Senate will not bring this to the floor,” he said. The only way that could happen, he said, was if the oil-for-food and other U.N. scandals “are addressed.” Citing the 55 internal audits the United Nations has refused to hand over to congressional investigators, Mr. Golden said: “The U.S. Senate has to review those audits, and only at that time should the mayor and governor sit down and reconsider.”

Now that the state Senate has blocked the expansion legislation, he said,the only way around it would be “a voter referendum,” which he said he didn’t expect. Mr. Golden also said he knew of no senator who favored the expansion.

Two members of New York’s delegation to the House joined the Albany lawmakers yesterday in praising the state Senate’s decision.

Rep. Vito Fossella, a Republican who represents Staten Island and parts of Brooklyn, said that while “the economic considerations are important,” the state Senate was right to rebuff the expansion plans. He cited the need for the United Nations to “restore its moral foundations.”

“When they created the U.N. 50 years ago,” Mr. Fossella said, “it wasn’t for economic benefit to New York City. Its purpose was to be a beacon of peace and freedom to many who were oppressed around the world.”

“I don’t think the economic argument trumped anything else then, and it shouldn’t trump anything else now,” he said, adding that denying material benefit to the world body was the best way to inspire reform.

“It seems the only language the U.N. understands is money,” Mr. Fossella said, “and if that’s the language they understand, then that’s the language we need to speak.”

Rep. Anthony Weiner, a Democrat who represents Brooklyn and who has criticized the United Nations over the oil-for-food scandal, said: “I agree with the state senators’ apprehension about extending any benefits at all to the U.N. Its members run up parking tickets, fritter away oil-for-food money, and pass resolutions that are virulently anti-Israel.”

“The U.N. thumbs its nose at U.S. policy-makers and New York taxpayers … the U.N. barely goes a week without doing something that infuriates me,” Mr. Weiner added.

In response to the state Senate’s decision, U.N. spokesman Fred Eckhard said the action “could kill the [expansion] plan.”

When asked whether the decision de rived from the oil-for-food scandal, Mr. Eckhard told the Sun: “It’s a perceived scandal. Nothing has been proved.”

He went on to say leaders of the Secretariat see the Senate’s refusal to consider the expansion plan as “a missed opportunity to have a win-win situation both for us and for New York City.”

A press release from Senate Majority Leader Joseph Bruno announcing the state Senate’s decision specifically cited the oil-for-food scandal, and the U.N. refusal “to cooperate with a congressional investigation regarding allegations of bribery and fraud” related to the scandal, as reason for blocking the U.N.’s plans.

The condemnations of the United Nations issued by elected representatives in New York City, New York State, and Washington came as the national list of politicians calling for Mr. Annan’s resignation – and for action against the United Nations – grew longer.

On Thursday, Senator Ensign, a Republican of Nevada, said he supported the push by a Minnesota colleague, Senator Coleman, for Mr. Annan’s resignation. Fellow Nevadans at the Las Vegas Review-Journal editorialized in support of Mr. Ensign’s decision and of Mr. Annan’s departure.

Also joining the list was a New Jersey Republican, Rep. Scott Garrett, who scheduled a press conference for today with Mr. Flake in support of H.R. 4284, of which Mr. Garrett is a cosponsor.

Yesterday, Mr. Garrett told the Sun: “On the question of whether Kofi Annan should stay in power, I think the real question is whether he should be in jail.”

He also dismissed defenses of Mr. Annan from key European U.N. member states, saying, “It should not come as any surprise that those European nations are standing on the side of him – because these allegations lead right back to them.”

Mr. Garrett expressed support for New York lawmakers’ decision to halt consideration of U.N. expansion. “I absolutely salute what they’re trying to do over there,” he said. “Some of us were trying to withhold all funding for the U.N. earlier this year, because of the overall ineptitude of that body, so anything that the New York State legislators can do to put pressure on the U.N. is a positive thing.”