Joel Rivera

Unofficially, the bill to change the city’s term-limits law will pass the City Council with about 35 votes in favor, according to Majority Leader Joel Rivera, who spoke to me on the City Hall steps after the Council's Democratic caucus meeting.

As far as what divides the two camps, Rivera said there isn’t much of a split between members who will be term-limited out of office if the law doesn't change, and those that could run for re-election this year. The split, he said, fell along ideological lines: those who are willing to change the law legislatively through a Council vote, and those who think it needs to go before the voters.  read more »

This could be another tough day for Christine Quinn.

She's going to meet with the 47 other members of the Democratic conference in the City Council today at 4 p.m., which will be the first time she speaks officially with many of her colleagues about the accounting-practices scandal that she’s now spent the good part of two weeks trying to quell.  read more »

Congestion pricing just passed the City Council Committee on State and Federal Legislation, 6-4. Members who voted in favor included Maria Baez, Melissa Viverito, Larry Seabrook, Joel Rivera, Mike McMahon and Hiram Monserrate. Those opposed included Lew Fidler, Joe Addabbo and Erik Dilan.

It goes to the full council tonight.

On March 8, The New York Times published a survey of where some of the City Council's 51 members stood on congestion pricing. At the time, 20 were against, 12 were for, and 19 were either undecided or did not respond to the survey.  read more »

It's barely 2008 and likely Bronx Borough President candidate and City Councilman Joel Rivera has already spent $144,852 of the $201,996 he raised.

According to the city Campaign Finance Board's rules, Rivera has exceeded his out-year spending limit for a borough president candidate, which is $129,000. Any money spent beyond that limit will be counted towards the $1,386,000 spending limit for the 2009 primary.

More after the jump.   read more »

A Democratic source called last night with a few names being circulated by the Queens organization to be Hillary Clinton delegates.

This group is from the 7th congressional district, which covers parts of Queens and the Bronx, and it includes: Queens Borough President Helen Marshall, City Councilman Joel Rivera, his sister, Assemblywoman Naomi Rivera, East Elmhurst district leader Vita Brome and City Councilman Hiram Monserrate.

The inclusion of Monserrate is noteworthy for several reasons. These are petitions the Queens County Democratic Organization are circulating with approval from the Clinton campaign, and Monserrate has traditionally run outside (read: against) the local establishment.

But despite the fact that he attended a Barack Obama fund-raiser, and that he previously told the Daily News that Clinton’s Iraq vote was troubling, he appears to be resisting the urge to go against his party colleagues by actually endorsing Obama.

Anyone have any other names? Or any other observations about this bunch?

Citizens Union has posted online its study on how City Council members spend taxpayer dollars to raise their profiles.

I’m not sure what benefit top spenders like Michael Nelson and Helen Sears got for their expenditures, but others at the top of the list are widely known to be eyeing races for other offices: Domenic Recchia is running for congress. James Gennaro is likely taking a shot at state Senator Frank Padavan’s seat. Joel Rivera may run for Bronx Borough President, and James Oddo may run for Borough President on Staten Island.

There are some changes happenings in Christine Quinn’s press office.

Angel Audiffred, who handled Hispanic media and the Health Committee for Quinn, went back to his old boss, City Councilman Joel Rivera, as director of communications. Rivera is majority leader in the City Council, chairman of the Health Committee, and is eyeing a race for Bronx Borough President.

“We want him back,” said Rivera adviser Mike Nieves, “And he’s going to play a big role in not only ‘09, but we’re going to crank up the councilman’s views on health and he’ll play a big role on that.”

Nieves went on to say, “Don’t believe the rumors. Nobody canned him. He worked for us before but we wanted him to get more press experience, so we sent him over there.”

The departure of Audiffred comes about a week after the start of Quinn’s new director of communications, Jamie McShane.

Sometime around last week, at the New York Women of Excellence Awards, Councilman Joel Rivera received the group’s Gentleman of Quality, or “GQ” Award. This site, I must say, was on Rivera's tip years ago--we featured him in our famous list of the “Top Ten Most Beautiful People in City Politics.”

 

Which brings me to a question. Who's the most distinguished gentleman in the New York press corps? Maybe I'm feeling sentimental since he just retired, but I really have to go with Marc Humbert, long the AP's man in Albany. Liz Benjamin has video from his going-away party.

In his sophomore year at the New York Military Academy near West Point, Joel Rivera and his friends  read more »

OK, if you care, here's the official list of new City Council assignments. (Everything not mentioned stays the same.)

AGING - Maria del Carmen Arroyo CONSUMER AFFAIRS - Leroy Comrie CONTRACTS - Yvette Clarke ECONOMIC DEVELOPMENT - Tom White EDUCATION - Robert Jackson FIRE AND CRIMINAL JUSTICE - Miguel Martinez GOVERNMENTAL OPERATIONS - Simcha Felder HEALTH - Joel Rivera HOUSING AND BUILDINGS - Erik Martin-Dilan MENTAL HEALTH - Oliver Koppell RULES, PRIVILEGES, ELECTIONS - Diana Reyna SMALL BUSINESS - David Yassky STANDARDS AND ETHICS - Inez Dickens STATE AND FEDERAL LEGISLATION - Maria Baez WATERFRONTS - Michael Nelson WOMEN'S ISSUES - Helen Sears

Subcommittees: PLANNING, DISPOSITION, CONCESSIONS - Dan Garodnick LANDMARKS - Jessica Lappin

New Standing Committees (formerly subcommittees): CIVIL RIGHTS - Larry Seabrook JUVENILE JUSTICE - Sara Gonzalez LOWER MANHATTAN REDEVELOPMENT - Alan Gerson(continued)  read more »

MAJORITY LEADER - Joel Rivera DEPUTY MAJORITY LEADER - Leroy Comrie ASSISTANT MAJORITY LEADER - Lew Fidler ASSISTANT MAJORITY LEADER - Bill de Blasio MAJORITY WHIP - Inez Dickens

Something for (almost) everyone!

An extraordinary thing about the race for Speaker is how it's not being driven by two traditional factors in city politics: political machines and race. Sure, machine politics will play big a role, but neither of the two leading candidates, Bill de Blasio and Chris Quinn, is closely tied to a county organization. And race is part of the politics, as always, but only part.

This is all the more striking because there has been for years a strong feeling that the next Speaker should be black or Latino. One of the loudest voices in support of that notion was East New York's Charles Barron, the body's leading race politician. But now even Barron has, reluctantly, given up and allied himself with de Blasio.  read more »

"I think it should be a person of color, but it doesn't look like it's going to be," he told The Politicker. "The two persons who were running out there weren't serious," he said of Leroy Comrie and Joel Rivera.

Barron deplored the weakness of the Council's Black, Latino, and Asian Caucus. "Before we can get together and make a decision of what we can do as 25 strong, we are all in different camps," he said. "We have a tendency to be picked off by county leaders, by the mayor, by unions and other groups."

Joel Rivera and Valerie Vazquez

Met: April 21, 2001  read more »

Engaged: Jan. 30, 2003

It's a pretty sleepy Tuesday out there, so I've taken it on myself to stroll the blogosphere in search of sparks for The Politicker's second-ever Blog Stroll. As always, please email me if I seem to have any hotttt blogs in my blind spot. Here we go.... GOP and the City gleefully derides Freddy's suspicious attitude toward Mike's charitable giving, which totalled $139 million last year. Freddy recently referred to the gifts as "strategic charitable contributions" during an interview on Air America...a forum which, the blog notes, may have been an ironic choice to for airing that kind of criticism, considering the radio station's own charity-money scandal.

At the DMI Blog, Andrew Friedman lambasts Madeline Pronvezano for dragging her feet on scheduling a hearing for the Healthy Homes Act. The act would authorize the city's Department of Housing Preservation and Development to fix "immediately hazardous" outstanding housing code violations, bypassing negligent landlords and billing them three times the value of the repairs as a penalty. The blog suggests that addressing complex issues like lead paint (is it good? it it evil? is it tasty? such nuance...) is too much of a political hot button to hit before the election.

The Neighborhood Retail Alliance follows the ongoing food fight over Intro 699, a bill to tighten regulation of city fruit stands that makes vendors want to thow rotten tomatoes at City Hall. They also take a look at the mayor's track record on solid waste management, and suggest that it shows how "being 'above politics'...doesn't automatically translate into astute policy making."

Over at Daily Gotham, Liza high-fives Chuck for tangling with Roche over its Tamiflu patent.  read more »

Joel Rivera wants you to take him seriously as a candidate for Speaker, notes Power Plays. Apparently, last week's display of door-measuring prowess didn't do the trick. Soon, I hope, we'll get reports of the council member sawing down his desk to fit through that hallowed door (saws are louder than tape measures, and therefore more likely to get attention, right?).

And who knew that there was a BlogOn social media summit in New York yesterday? Not us! But Dominic Basulto at Corante's New York blog did. And apparently the McDonald's corporation did, too; nothing says "social media" quite like a Big Mac and fries nestled up against your keyboard.