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WPCNR TRAFFIC TATTLER. By John F. Bailey.
The Executive Director noted that increased salary costs, an expected increase in ticket collection fees by the outsource vendor which administers the ticket collection, dictated the ticket increase.
A CLOSER ANALYSIS: Moroni determined that judging by the basic Parking Violations (for overtime) Fines charged by nearby cities and towns, that White Plains at $10 currently is below market rates. Photo by WPCNR News.
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WPCNR ROVING PHOTOGRAPHER. January 21, 2004: The Photograph of the day, the Department of Public Safety on South Lexington Avenue.
“POLICE HEADQUARTERS” Photo by The White Plains Roving Photographer.
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WPCNR Police Gazette. By John F. Bailey. Getting the Call: Commissioner of Public Safety, Dr. Frank G. Straub administers the oath of office to the Police Department Recruits. Over 200 candidates applied for the openings. 80 persons were interviewed, and these 19 made the grade. (One new officer was not at the ceremony). Photo by WPCNR News.
Taking the Oath: The White Plains Police Department Class of 2004 take their oath of office. Commissioner Straub described them as representative of the city they will serve and where it’s going, noting that the 19 is the most diverse group of recruits the department has ever assembled. The new White Plains Finest are: Anthony Carelli, Jennifer Coggins, Gerard Cole, Sebastian DaCosta, Michael Dawson, John Emhardt, Morgan Finnie, James Ford, Hector Fuentes, Brian Johnson, Irene Logan, Andrew McNulty, Julio Orellana, Sheila Ortiz, Daniel Pagan, Michael Petrosino, Felix Rosado, Sean Suarez, and Jennifer Suggs. The force is now at full-strength at 210 men and women. Photo by WPCNR News.
“IN THE ARENA,” Commissioner Straub after administering oaths of office to four officers being promoted, paid tribute to the promotees and challenged the new recruits with his keynote address. Drawing on a quotation from President
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WPCNR ROVING REPORTER. January 18, 2004: Presenting the White Plains Photograph of the Day. Shot on a very cold morning.
WAKE-UP CUP . DOUBLE CAPPACHINO LATTE CITY LIMITS. Photograph by the White Plains Roving Photographer.
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WPCNR ROVING REPORTER. January 19, 2004: Six inches of fresh fallen snow blanketed White Plains Sunday afternoon as the best forecasts of weathercasters failed to define the snowline of a slow moving tropical low.
THE MORE IT SNOWS, TIDDLEY-POM. Photo by The White Plains Roving Reporter
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WPCNR Daily Mirror. By John F. Bailey.
George Washington stands for honesty.
Abraham Lincoln for freedom
Dr. King’s name stands for Opportunity.
When I think of Dr. King, I think of the Selma marches, I think of Birmingham, I think of Little Rock, Arkansas, where he lead the African-American community in demonstrations asking for the right of equal opportunity in America: a seat on a bus wherever they chose; a restaurant or hotel of their choice; the right to apply for a job without being turned down because you were black. Blatant in-your-face- discrimination was publicized by Dr. King and
Today, subtle discrimination denying equal opportunity, and guaranteeing less opportunity are the evils that Dr. King, had he lived would be attacking today.
When I write those sentences I just wrote, it seems incomprehensible to me that someone would deny another person that. When you think about it, it is an awful situation to think about. In the 36 years since Dr. King was murdered, the nation has come a long way in my opinion, in breaking down the visible barriers of racism based on creed and the color of one’s skin.
Today the barriers to Equal Opportunity are more subtle and just as effective.
Barriers still exist: in the classroom. There is reluctance to deliver quality education to the black and Hispanic populations in
There is the perception that because your name and skin color sound Spanish or Jamaican, or Dominican, or you look that way you automatically need help and are slow-tracked into remedial classes; the inclusion of the slower (read minority) children in one corner of a classroom so you can deal with the “problem children” all at once; the notion that it is all right to use millions of dollars meant for rebuilding poor performing schools with better buildings, better teachers, but is used to create educational bureaucracies for the politically connected instead.
In the last ten years the products of this subtle unequal educational opportunity have been well documented and given a name: The Achievement Gap. The educational establishment invests millions in studies to fine solutions to it and they have learned a lot about it. It takes more
The lagging behind of the African-American youth is blamed on the home and family breakdown. Well then you have to bring more attention to the family unit and those youngsters’ home environment, putting the education in there. It’s expensive but if you want to solve the Achievement Gap you have to do that.
The argument that you have to speak English in the schools and learn it is obvious racial superiority. Of course you have to learn to speak English, but really, Bilingual education is how we English-speakers learn another language….why not have teachers educate Hispanic background children in their own language with English simultaneously? It is proven to work. It is time to stop the subtle prejudice that we do not want Hispanic children in our towns and schools because they are too hard to educate and will cost us money to do that. They are children, you simply cannot throw them away because they are Hispanic.
That’s discrimination I think Dr. Martin Luther King would find hard to take. He would also bristle at lowering standards for minorities, because he would see right through that argument, saying well when are you going to raise the standards for my people because you don’t have to work any harder at educating them if you do not raise your expectations for them.
I think Dr. King would look around today and appreciate how Blacks and Whites, Hispanics and Jews, Catholics and Protestants, Muslims and other races mingle together in today’s
I think he would observe we are all becoming more appreciative and respectful of each other. But, I do not think he would like today’s buzz word :”diversity” and priding ourselves on diversity. He would say that’s nice, but let’s keep our eye on the prize, to borrow the wonderful motto of the White Plains Department of Public Safety, let us treat all with integrity, professionalism, respect, and to that add opportunity.
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WPCNR PRESS BOX. “VIEW FROM THE UPPER DECK,” By John Baseball Bailey.
VIEW FROM THE UPPER DECK.
Pete Rose batting in Wrigley Field, 1975.
Photo by WPCNR Sports
On ABC Television last week he admitted he bet on baseball four or five times a week. This raises the very legitimate question of how much Rose bet on baseball when he was a player. Obviously, Mr. Rose had a big-time gambling problem. The sportswriters and fans who believed Mr. Rose, and I myself was one, have been betrayed by a cheap hustler whose admission in cavalier fashion raises more questions than it answers.
Far from now making him eligible for the Hall of Fame, it is good reason for baseball to keep him out of it.
How many times as a player did Rose know things about the opposition and placed bets on games based on this insider knowledge, or perhaps threw meaningless, or maybe not-so-meaningless-games by his performance on the field at certain times? He will of course, deny this, but the box scores do not lie.
His admission on television casts a black cloud on the less-than-steller performances of the Cincinnati Reds in the 1970 and 1972 postseasons when Rose was a key member of that club.
The Reds allowed themselves to be closed out in 1972 against the
Moreover the Reds were a powerful team in 1969, 1971, 1973 and 1974, losing the pennant in 1969 by 4 games in 1969; 11 games in 1972, and 4 games in 1974. A game here and there made a huge difference in whether
Now we know he did bet on baseball a lot.
The question is did he bet a lot when he was a player? Rose was no rookie in the early 1970s when the Reds were a strong contending team. This reporter finds it hard to believe that Rose did not gamble on baseball in his playing days, as he steadfastly maintains.
As baseball found out in 1919, it is very easy to throw a baseball game, by not hitting, by making a crucial error. Mr. Rose played the outfield in those games against
The Chicago and Cincinnati papers in 1919, even wrote columns saying “I’m forever blowing ball games, pretty balls games in the air…”
The video tapes of the 1972 World Series should be looked at very carefully to watch Rose’s efforts in the field and at the plate. Did he have good at-bats? Did he swing at bad pitches?
Rose was not the only Red who did not hit in those series. But, that’s the problem with a gambler in baseball, you never know. Does anyone really believe Rose when he says he just started gambling on baseball when he quit playing?
Are you kidding us, Pete?
The Reds lost the 1973 National League Championship Series to the Mets by primarily by being unable to get the Mets out due to lousy pitching. That was also the series where Rose got into a fight with Bud Harrelson the Mets Shortstop at second base, and was not suspended at all, or kicked out of the game. Did Pete have something riding on the Series? Was he trying to take himself out of the Series? How were his finances during the time he played?
What concerns you about a player with a gambling problem and Pete Rose has admitted that now, is whether or not Rose might have compromised his team on the field in those close pennant races in the years I mentioned. In the years the Reds lost pennants they were heavily favored to win them.
Think about this: The Reds lost the pennant in 1969 by 4 games; They lost it by 11 games in 1971, and 4 games in 1974. A game here and there made a huge difference in whether
Ironically, Ty Cobb, the player Rose passed by setting baseball’s all-time hit record, also performed terribly in the World Series he played in in three consecutive years. And Cobb was a known gambler.
It is an obvious, nasty question, which Rose will deny. But there is no way he can prove he did not. Hopefully, the ABC interviewer asked him that question, if they did not, shame on them.
Now that Bud Selig, the Baseball Commissioner, and his investigators have been vindicated, it is clear that Rose should not be in the Hall of Fame ever. Their decision was correct.
More pressing is whether Rose should be allowed to manage again. Clearly that answer has to be “No.”
“Say it Ain’t so, Ro?”
I cannot believe you. Baseball should never again trust you.
If Baseball puts Rose in the Hall of Fame, he should be given a Black Plaque that notes his gambling ban.
Ironically, Pete Rose idol of millions of fans for years for his abilities has delivered a valuable lesson to fans, youngsters and idealistic fans that once your integrity is compromised, you can never regain it.
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WPNCR WHITE PLAINS ROVING REPORTER. January 19, 2004: Here is a postcard from the new White Plains, created over the weekend. One hundred years from now perhaps the controversy will be saving the City Center from demolition.
DOWNTOWN WHITE PLAINS, 2004
Photo by The White Plains Roving Reporter.
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WPCNR ROVING REPORTER. January 18, 2004: Presenting the White Plains Photograph of the Day captured at White Plains High School, former J. C. Penny Estate.
5 Degrees, 7:15 A.M. Photo by The White Plains Roving Reporter
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WPCNR’S ADAM IN ALBANY. By District 89 Assemblyman Adam T. Bradley. January 17, 2004: The Assembly recently passed legislation to help New York level the playing field for women and minorities in the workplace. I supported this legislation which was designed to end wage discrimination, and help businesses owned by women and minorities succeed.
The difference in annual salaries between the average man and woman working in similar positions is more than substantial – women are making $13,087 less, according to the National Committee on Pay Equity. Not only does that mean reduced Social Security benefits and less money for bills, mortgages and savings, it also means a lack of independence, security, equality and opportunities for women.
To remedy discriminatory salary practices, the legislation (A.6252) seeks to amend the state Labor Law to provide pay equity for all people who perform work of comparable skill, effort and responsibility.
To help achieve pay equity for all New Yorkers, I also sponsored legislation:
· Implementing a state policy of equal compensation for work of comparable worth for state and public employees (A.737);
· Making discriminatory salary practices unlawful — especially in traditionally female-dominated occupations (A.3998);
· Allowing groups of workers with similar complaints to file them together — helping individuals fighting discrimination to defray the costs associated with filing a complaint alone (A.148);
· Enacting the New York State Fair Pay Act — ensuring pay differentiation is not based on a person’s sex, race, or national origin (A.6701); and
· Making it a discriminatory practice for public employers to compensate employees of opposite sexes differently for work that is of comparable worth (A.6237).
I urge the Senate and the governor to join the Assembly by passing these initiatives to help end wage discrimination for all New Yorkers.
We also need to encourage the growth of businesses that provide economic opportunities for women and minorities. A measure I supported that attempts to achieve that goal was signed into law. The law extends for another 15 years a program to ensure a fair portion of state contracts are allotted to businesses owned by minorities and women. The law was also expanded to include contracts put out to bid by the Empire State Development Corporation (A.7233-A/Ch.628 of 2003). Another law is designed to help promote women- and minority-owned business participation in state contracts for construction and services (A.9057/Ch.636 of 2003).
These innovative measures will help make