Cornegy Steps To Plate For Small Businesses
Bedford-Stuyvesant City Councilman Robert Cornegy, Jr., who chairs the council’s committee on small business, yesterday called for more legislative measures to protect small businesses facing landlord harassment.
One measure he’s looking at is for a review of any government subsidies or tax abatements being received by any commercial landlords who are harassing their tenants. Another is for the state to create a property tax credit to landlords that voluntarily limit rent increases to small business owners upon lease renewal.
“Small business tenants believe that some landlords are actually creating condition problems to pressure them to give up the spaces they’ve invested in even when they still have a lease. If this is true, it’s a shame and we have to do something about it,” said Cornegy.
Cornegy encouraged small business owners experiencing instances of harassment to reach out to his office through email at cornegysmallbiz@gmail.com or call his office 718.919.0740.
Squadron Asks City Schools What About Chinese New Year
Brooklyn Heights State Sen. Daniel Squadron yesterday complimented Mayor de Blasio for giving public schools the day off for the Muslim holidays of Eid al-Fitr and Eid al-Adha, but said he should do the same for the Lunar New Year, which many Asian-American students are absent from school.
“Adding Eid al-Fitr and Eid al-Adha to the school calendar is an important recognition of the diversity of our city. It’s great that the Mayor kept his pledge to designate them as school holidays. It’s critical that the Mayor also keep his pledge to designate Lunar New Year as a school holiday,” said Squadron.
“At schools in my district and across the city, absentee rates are as high as 80% on Lunar New Year. Approximately one in six New York City public school students is Asian American, which is why acting on the mayor’s pledge is so important, so that students no longer have to choose between their most important cultural holiday and missing class.” the lawmaker added.
Published reports estimate that 10 percent of the city’s public school students are Muslim. At post time, KCP did not have the percentage Asian American students.
Lander, Menchaca Arrested for Civil Disobedience
City Council members Brad Lander and Carlos Menchaca yesterday were arrested for blocking traffic while protesting with striking workers outside the Vegas Auto Spa at 19th Street and 7th Avenue in Windsor Terrace.
The predominately immigrant car wash workers have been trying to unionize and say they are being denied fair wages in an unregulated industry. Lander and Menchaca, along with Council Speaker Melissa Mark-Viverito, are floating legislation requiring more regulation of car washes including putting up a surety bond to ensure cash is available to pay out substantiated wage theft claims.
But Vegas Auto Spa owner Marat Leshehinsky, told reporters the workers have always been properly paid by law and they are in the midst of negotiating a fair contract in which the two sides are not that far apart. This is politically motivated, he said.
