Pedi Politics

On Monday, April 23, the day after Earth Day and the Mayor’s Long-Term Sustainability speech, City Council Speaker Christine Quinn plans to hold a decisive vote on Intro. 331-A, a law limiting and restricting pedicabs. Mayor Bloomberg vetoed the bill but rather than going back and trying to improve the legislation by, say, simply increasing the cap on the number of pedicab licenses, Quinn has been twisting Council members arms to override the Mayor’s veto.

It looks like she has the votes. The Speaker has managed to convince some of City Council’s most progressive and pro-environment members to go along with her. On NY Turf’s PediCouncil map shows David Yassky, Bill de Blasio, Daniel Garodnick and Diana Reyna all on-board with Quinn’s veto override.

What is Quinn’s leverage?

"May is budget month," says pedicab industry representative Chad Marlow of the Public Advocacy Group. "Going along with the Speaker’s program ensures that ‘member items’ will be approved" —  the funding requests that Council members submit for special projects in their districts.

And why has Quinn decided to pick this fight with New York City’s small but growing pedicab industry? "The interests of the
taxi, hotel and theater industries have been given more weight than the
interests of the pedicabs, environmental and transportation groups," says Marlow.

More info: 

  • Zef

    Something tells me it didn’t take too much twisting to get Yassky and DiBlasio on board.

  • Quinn was on Brian Lehrer this monrning:
    http://www.wnyc.org/shows/bl/episodes/2007/04/17#segment77336

    She mainly discussed a tax rebate for renters, but also defended the parade rules and the pedicab bill. Its worth a listen if you want to get really pissed off.

    I contacted Yassky over this earlier today and tried to shame him on the Earth Day angle…I think if the heat is turned up enough, we could win this one. The timing is right for us.

  • Quinn must be a real piece of work! 11,000 smog-spewing taxicabs must be protected from competing with 500 zero-emission pedicabs (which also must be prevented from using zero-emission electric assistance.) The fix is in!

    I own and operate a pedalcab in Orlando, Florida; our City Commission is holding off on a pedicab ordinance until NYC passes one.

    And I thought 1960s Chicago machine politics was bad! Can’t y’all impeach this tailpipe-sucker?

    Please!

  • Why not email Yassky and let him know what you think?
    http://www.davidyassky.com/contact.php

  • ddartley
  • human

    You can also send a fax to key City Council members here:

    http://www.transalt.org/streetbeat/2007/Apr/0417_efax.html

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