Queens Crap: Chipping away at self-cert

Saturday, February 3, 2007

Chipping away at self-cert

With all that was going on yesterday, QC forgot to mention this gem:

Council Moves Against Scofflaw Builders

Yes, the city council is patting themselves on the back for passing legislation that basically says, "If you get caught, you're gonna get grounded." This doesn't help much because they rarely get caught. Therefore, self-certification needs to be eliminated completely. Of course, Ms. Quinn disagrees:

"What we don't want to do is ever put such a level of regulation that we unfairly or unnecessarily slow down the building process in the city of New York," the speaker said.

6 comments:

Anonymous said...: CM David Weprin has legislation that was offered to the council this past week that would eliminate self-certification for all one and two family homes. This doesn't have that loophole that allows three strikes and a slap on the wrist for architects that the council-favored legislation has.

Mayor Bloomberg has been quoted in the papers as not liking Weprin's legislation. Sounds to me like that may be a good reason to look even closer at this.; Saturday, February 03, 2007
Anonymous said...: Crafty Christine Quinn is obviously on the developers' payroll if she (along with His Royal Highness Bloomberg) thinks that nothing should get in the way of slowing down building in NYC. We're over-choked with development with an antique infrastructure that has already proven to be unable to support the city as it is! A complete end to self-certification without any compromises must be signed into law immediately! We citizens pay the taxes that run this city and you've heard our demands. Anyone who is for modifying them is a pure and scurrilous traitor! It's time our elected officials learn to represent us not the developers they been taking money from!; Saturday, February 03, 2007
Anonymous said...: Taxpayers get screwed with a law full of loopholes once again! "Parkside" (Stavisky) must have been working overtime lobbying for this compromise. Instead of an iron clad law we get Swisscheese! Next time I'll go to the corner deli when it's time to cast my ballot.; Saturday, February 03, 2007
Unknown said...: Although I disagree with a lot of your positions, I've always been skeptical of this whole self-certification thing, ever since I first heard about it (as a proposal?) in the late 1980s. Since I haven't been keeping up to date with this issue, however, I hope that somewhere along the line you'll clarify how it actually works:

If someone incorrectly self-certifies something are they ever eventually required to correct their mistake? From reading these articles, one gets the impression that they don't. If so, this would really be outrageous and unbelievable.

-- Benjamin; Saturday, February 03, 2007
Anonymous said...: Benjamin, you're not going to get a full course in self-cert and its shortcomings from me. You've got to do some homework. I suggest that you look up an architect named "Scarano", who voluntarily gave up his self-cert privilages in the wake of an investigation regarding his many unsafe building sites. He's still working as an architect, I believe, despite numerous fatalities connected to his projects. Scarano is the poster boy for what's wrong with the system!; Saturday, February 03, 2007
Anonymous said...: Wow. Someone owes their appointment to the democratic machine of Queens.

Coupled with her position of ignoring the public's wishes on overturning term limits, I think the folks of Manhattan should get a chance to review and comment about her.

Perhaps the Village Voice can do something useful (besides providing a nice thick mat of free paper for wet boots at this time of year) and examine this issue.; Sunday, February 04, 2007