New York Desk

This article is from the archive of The New York Sun before the launch of its new website in 2022. The Sun has neither altered nor updated such articles but will seek to correct any errors, mis-categorizations or other problems introduced during transfer.

The New York Sun
NY Sun
NEW YORK SUN CONTRIBUTOR

MANHATTAN


9/11 FAMILIES APPEAL FOR POLICE, FIREFIGHTER PAY RAISE Family members and widows of those who died in the World Trade Center attacks lent their voice to police and firefighters yesterday in the fight with Mayor Bloomberg for salary increases.


“I think that Bloomberg is an administrator and I understand where he is coming from, but he has no heart as far as we’re concerned,” said Ann Marie McAleese, whose firefighter son, Brian, was killed on September 11, 2001. “These guys shouldn’t have to work three jobs just to make ends meet.”


The Patrolmen’s Benevolent Association is expected to file a lawsuit in Manhattan Federal Court today charging that the city has violated members’ constitutional rights by videotaping them and penning in protesters during rallies.


Mr. Bloomberg has repeatedly said the city does not have the money to increase salaries. The PBA and the city have already moved to binding arbitration. Neither union has ruled out the possibility of an illegal strike.


– Staff Reporter of the Sun


MUSEUM BUYS TWO COLUMBUS CIRCLE The Manhattan Borough Board approved yesterday the sale of Two Columbus Circle to the Museum of Arts & Design, paving the way for a new 54,000-square-foot museum on the site.


The museum in 2002 beat out such competition as Donald Trump and the Dahesh Museum to develop the building, and yesterday’s decision was the last in a series of public hearings on the deal. The board, chaired by the Manhattan borough president, C. Virginia Fields, voted 9-1 in favor of the plan.


Construction on the museum, which will hold a collection of contemporary art in varied media, including clay, glass, and wood, will begin next year. The museum is scheduled to open in 2007.


“For the first time in the history of this institution, we will have the variety of quality spaces that we need to display our unique permanent collection,” the museum’s director, Holly Hotchner said in a statement. In addition to the collection, the museum will have artist studios and offer educational programs.


– Staff Reporter of the Sun


BUDGET OFFICE SAYS FEWER THAN EXPECTED ON WELFARE The Independent Budget Office reported yesterday that the recent recession had not led to as large an increase in welfare cases in New York City as anticipated. The city agency said that the numbers were lower than the recession of the 1990s because this time around large numbers of low-skilled workers suffered fewer job losses than they did in the recession a decade ago. What is more, there is now a large share of women in the labor force who weren’t there a decade ago, further driving down the anticipated numbers on the welfare rolls, the IBO said. The budget office also credited city, state, and federal welfare-reform programs with reducing the number of people on public assistance.


– Staff Reporter of the Sun


PROSECUTORS PRESENT VIDEO IN TERROR-LAW YER TRIAL Prosecutors presented the centerpiece of their terrorism case against a civil rights lawyer yesterday: grainy videos of her meetings with an imprisoned Egyptian sheik she is accused of illegally helping to communicate with followers.


A hidden camera from above a round white table at a federal prison in Rochester, Minn., snared the conversations of lawyer Lynne Stewart, Arabic interpreter Mohamed Yousry, and Sheik Omar Abdel-Rahman, who is serving a life sentence. Prosecutors contend the videotapes prove a conspiracy to aid terrorists existed among the three conversation participants and a U.S. postal worker, Ahmed Abdel Sattar, who had served the sheik as a paralegal and interpreter.


They have said Ms. Stewart and Mr. Yousry enabled the sheik to pass dangerous messages to the outside world despite prison rules severely limiting his visitors, mail, telephone calls, and consultations with lawyers. In the videotapes, played on a large screen in U.S. District Court in Manhattan, the three can be heard talking about their hopes that keeping Abdel-Rahman’s name on the world stage might someday get him freed from prison. Ms. Stewart represented the sheik at a 1995 trial in which he was convicted of conspiring to assassinate Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak and to bomb five New York landmarks.


– Associated Press


PROPOSAL TO EXTEND SEPTEMBER 11 VICTIMS FUND The compensation fund for September 11 victims should be extended and some of its regulations relaxed, so that recovery workers diagnosed with health problems from work at ground zero can be helped, Rep. Carolyn Maloney said yesterday.


The congresswoman, joined by Rep. Jose Serrano, firefighters, and other recovery workers at the World Trade Center site, unveiled legislation that would extend the September 11 Victim Compensation Fund for another three years, as well as amend some of the guidelines. The deadline for applying for the fund expired on December 22, 2003.


The fund’s guidelines describes eligible workers as those who arrived at the site within 96 hours of the attacks and sought medical attention for problems within three days, although the fund overseer had some discretion. But Ms. Maloney pointed out that some kinds of illnesses, particularly respiratory ones, may not have shown up until months, if not years, after September 11, 2001.


– Associated Press


BRONX


MAYOR JOINS CARRION TO OPEN SHOPPING CENTER Mayor Bloomberg and the Bronx borough president, Adolfo Carrion, yesterday officially cut the ribbon on the largest retail development to open in the Bronx in more than a decade. Developed on the former site of a vacant warehouse and other abandoned industrial buildings, River Plaza is a 235,000-square-foot retail center that Mr. Bloomberg said will create more than 1,000 jobs. The $90 million development is privately financed, and is expected to generate $12 million in annual tax revenue for the city.


– Staff Reporter of the Sun


ALBANY


JUDGE SETS BAIL FOR TWO ACCUSED IN TERROR CASE A federal judge set bail yesterday for two mosque leaders accused of supporting terrorism, reversing an earlier decision after concluding the men were not as dangerous as he believed.


Magistrate David Homer had denied bail for Yassin Muhiddin Aref and Mohammed Mosharref Hossain two weeks ago, but cited a translation error in a key piece of evidence and an apparently weaker case in setting a $250,000 bond for each man. Judge Homer said prosecutors have not presented evidence that the men were in contact with terrorists. He said it appears less likely now that the two men were threats to the community or substantial flight risks.


“Evidence in this case appears less strong than it did,” Judge Homer said.


Mr. Aref, 34, and Mr. Hossain, 49, were caught in an FBI sting operation built around a fictitious assassination plot against a Pakistani diplomat. An FBI informant told the suspects he was an arms dealer and asked Mr. Hossain to launder money from the sale of a shoulder-fired missile that would be used to kill the diplomat in New York City, according to the federal complaint.


The men face charges of conspiring to launder money and promoting terrorism.


Mr. Aref and Mr. Hossain were denied bail August 10.


– Associated Press

NY Sun
NEW YORK SUN CONTRIBUTOR

This article is from the archive of The New York Sun before the launch of its new website in 2022. The Sun has neither altered nor updated such articles but will seek to correct any errors, mis-categorizations or other problems introduced during transfer.


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