MANHATTAN

MAYOR’S CAMPAIGN KICK OFFS FEBRUARY 15

Mayor Bloomberg has decided to kick off his 2005 mayoral campaign unofficially on February 15 at B.B. King’s Blues club, his campaign manager said. Hundreds of volunteers from the 2001 campaign and new recruits for the 2005 race will gather for beer, pigs-in-blankets, and other Southern fare at the barbeque fete, the mayor’s campaign manager, Kevin Sheekey, said, declining to say how much the party will cost. When asked if the room will be packed with Democrats even though Mr. Bloomberg is running as a Republican candidate, Mr. Sheekey demurred. “The guest list will mirror the mayor’s campaign – we’ll have a cross section of New Yorkers,” he said. Mr. Bloomberg’s formal re-election announcement will be in June, Mr. Sheekey said.

– Staff Reporter of the Sun

COUNCIL TAKES UP QUESTION OF GARBAGE TRANSFER STATIONS

The battle over Mayor Bloomberg’s proposal for changing the way the city deals with its trash continued in the City Council yesterday, focusing on a plan to reopen three garbage transfer stations, including one on the Upper East Side at 91st Street, in Council Speaker Gifford Miller’s district. The Upper East Side transfer station was closed along with the others several years ago when the Fresh Kills Landfill on Staten Island was closed. In the meantime, the city’s garbage is taken to out-of-state landfills by truck. Mr. Bloomberg envisions a plan in which the garbage is floated out of the city on barges instead.

– Staff Reporter of the Sun

CITYWIDE

TWO CASES FOUND OF RARE SEXUALLY TRANSMITTED DISEASE

A rare sexually transmitted disease that can scar the genitals has been found in two patients in New York, and the strain is the same as that recently detected in Europe, the city’s health commissioner said yesterday. Lymphogranuloma venereum, or LGV, is a form of chlamydia that can damage the bowels and scar the anus. Among the few patients that have been identified in America, most also had the AIDS virus, the health department commissioner, Thomas Frieden, said at a news conference.

– Associated Press

COUNCIL MEMBER SAYS STATIONS SHOULD HAVE FIVE FIREFIGHTERS

Staten Island Council Member Michael McMahon introduced legislation yesterday that would require five firefighters be assigned to every engine and ladder truck in the city, a move that flies in the face of the mayor’s budget proposal, which envisioned saving some $17 million by implementing four firefighter trucks throughout the Fire Department. Mr. McMahon called on the mayor to look past the bottom line and “do the right thing. This is a public safety issue, not a fiscal one,” Mr. McMahon said.

– Staff Reporter of the Sun

RADIO HOST WHO PLAYED TSUNAMI SONG IS FIRED

The co-host of a morning radio show and his producer were fired 12 days after their New York-based program aired an offensive song that used racial slurs while mocking the orphaned children of the tsunami in south Asia. In making the announcement, Emmis Broadcasting said it would also make a lump-sum donation of $1 million to Give2Asia as a gesture of goodwill following the “parody” that aired January 21 on WQHT-FM. Three other members of the morning crew remain in the middle of a two-week suspension that ends February 9.

– Associated Press

MOTHER OF DIALLO ESTABLISHES SCHOLARSHIP

The mother of Amadou Diallo, whose killing by police in 1999 prompted massive demonstrations against police brutality, established a scholarship yesterday for Bronx Community College and Borough of Manhattan Community College students of African descent.

The $30,000 scholarship will be equally divided between BCC and BMCC. In the first year, $1,000 scholarships will be awarded to five students of African, African-American, and Afro-Caribbean descent.

– Special to the Sun

BRONX

BLOOD DRIVE HONORS THREE FIREFIGHTERS WHO DIED

The Fire Commissioner, Nicholas Scoppetta, and the Bronx borough president, Adolfo Carrion, kicked off a blood drive yesterday morning in honor of three firefighters who died last month. Rookies and veteran firefighters alike donated hundreds of pints of blood in the Bronx Supreme Court building yesterday in honor of their fallen comrades, Lieutenants Curtis Meyran and John Bellew, and Firefighter Richard Sclafani.

– Special to the Sun

ALBANY

LOBBYING WATCHDOG GROUP WON’T BAN GIFTS

The state’s watchdog on lobbying this week chose not to recommend a ban on gifts from lobbyists to lawmakers – a proposal that’s gained strong backing in the Legislature and one Albany reformers argue is common sense. “Let’s make this a simple rule that if you are in government, you don’t take gifts,” said Commissioner Andrew Celli, a New York City lawyer and former top aide to Democratic Attorney General Eliot Spitzer. The lack of action by the politically appointed board is a blow to the proposal and could give lawmakers political cover to avoid the issue that was first supported five years ago by the Senate. Republican Governor Pataki and Democratic Attorney General Eliot Spitzer recently called for a gift ban.

– Associated Press

UPSTATE

CHARGES REINSTATED AGAINST MAYOR WHO MARRIED GAYS

A judge reinstated criminal charges yesterday against a small-town mayor who got in trouble for marrying a series of gay couples last year. The resurrection of the case came on the same day that lawmakers in at least three states took up constitutional bans on gay marriage. Kansas lawmakers placed a ban on the April 5 ballot, while similar constitutional changes failed in Idaho and passed a House committee in South Dakota. The rush to write gay-marriage bans into state constitutions is part of a heated debate that New Paltz Village Mayor Jason West helped ignite last February when he married about two dozen same-sex couples.

– Associated Press

POLICE BLOTTER

TWO IMPERSONATE OFFICERS, CONDUCT FAKE SEARCHES

Two men posing as police officers were arrested less than 20 minutes after robbing patrons at a Brooklyn diner early yesterday morning, the police said. Vladislav Rabinovich, 33, and Eric Vinogradov, 21, allegedly stopped three men as they were leaving the El Greco diner in the Sheepshead Bay section at about 12:25 a.m., claiming they were police officers and frisking them for guns. During the fake searches, police said the men stole an unspecified sum of money. But the victims called 911, and a patrolling anti-crime unit stopped the robbers about half a mile away.

– Special to the Sun

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