2/17/98

Letter to the Editor - B.I.D. Police Facilities

by Robert Lederman, President of A.R.T.I.S.T. (Artists' Response To Illegal State Tactics).


provided through OPENAIR-MARKET NET


Dear Editor,

"Wall St. Plans to Pay for a New Police Substation There" N.Y. Times 2/16/98 and "Precinct to House Private, City Cops" Daily News 2/16/98 describe the alarming acceleration towards a corporate police state that New York City has been moving under Mayor Giuliani. When corporations pay the bill for police facilities as described in this article, mixing City Police and private security guards in the same facility and build and finance their own local criminal courts, as the times Sq. B.I.D. (Business Improvement District) and Fifth Ave. B.I.D. have done on 54th St. can anyone doubt that they have undue influence on the police? That the operations managers of all the city's major B.I.D.s just happen to be ex high-ranking police officials further illustrates the problematic relationship these so-called "Business Improvement Districts" have with City government. New York City's street artists have experienced first hand how the B.I.D.s set the N.Y.P.D.'s agenda and decide government policies affecting everything from pedestrian movement to free speech. It's time for the City Council to put its collective foot down and stop these unelected non-representational B.I.D.s before they completely take over our city.

Robert Lederman, President

A.R.T.I.S.T.

(Artists' Response To Illegal State Tactics)

255 13th Street

Brooklyn, N.Y. 11215


For more info, contact: A.R.T.I.S.T. Ph: (718) 369-2111 or (212) 561-0877; Email <ARTISTpres@aol.com>; Web site http://www.openair.org/alerts/artist/nyc.html


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