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Honor Andrew Haswell Green!


 

 
Andrew Haswell Green gets nothing more than a portrait in City Hall and a park bench.

Exactly one hundred years ago on November 13th, Cornelius Williams, a jealous and delusional furnace tender, set out to kill the elderly gentleman he claimed stole his girlfriend. Williams pumped five bullets into the greatest civic hero in New York City history, 83-year-old Andrew Haswell Green.

New Yorkers can be forgiven for not having heard the name, since his murder is not the only injustice committed against Andrew Green. Obscurity has done in a man whose contributions to the city were truly astonishing.

It was Green who was as much responsible for the creation of Central Park as its architects Frederick Olmsted and Calvert Vaux. In his position leading the state commission charged with building the park, he secured the adoption of their Greensward plan, defended it from meddlers, kept it on budget, expanded its acreage.

This would have been enough to make him deserving of recognition, but it is only one of his accomplishments. He was largely responsible for the Metropolitan Museum of Art and the American Museum of Natural History. He brokered the creation of the New York Public Library and co-founded the Bronx Zoo. He added Riverside, Morningside and Fort Washington Parks to the map, too, and threw up a bridge over the Harlem River.

Most importantly, Green masterminded the 1898 consolidation of Greater New York, a fiercely contentious measure that, in a stroke, lassoed the various municipalities of today's Brooklyn, Queens and Staten Island within the borders of New York City, enlarging the metropolis fivefold.

"It took Robert Moses, Fiorello LaGuardia and Franklin Roosevelt, drawing upon the combined resources of the federal, state and city governments, to exceed Green's accomplishment," urban historian Thomas Kessner has written. But while Moses has a state park, LaGuardia an airport and Roosevelt a drive named after them, among much other recognition, Andrew Haswell Green gets nothing more than a portrait in City Hall and a park bench. He deserves more.

GOTHAM'S FIRST COMPREHENSIVE CITY PLANNER

Born in

  New Yorkers can be forgiven for not having heard the name of the man responsible for the Washington Bridge (above) and the Bronx Zoo, since his murder is not the only injustice committed against Andrew Green.

Worcester, Massachusetts in 1820, Andrew Green moved to New York as a young man, became a lawyer and developed an interest in civic affairs. In 1857, after a stint as president of the Board of Education (where he railed against unfair state funding of upstate schools at the expense of those in the city!) he landed his position on the Central Park Commission. Honest, hardworking and tight with a buck, Green soon became the driving force behind that body

He convinced the legislature to adopt a series of escalating measures that gave the commission authority beyond just Central Park itself, and allowed it to oversee the development of all of northern Manhattan, the Harlem River and the suburban hinterland we now call The Bronx. In essence Green leveraged the Central Park Commission into the first comprehensive urban planning body in New York City history.

Mindful of growth and economy, two principles that would always guide his proposals, Green insisted on the coordinated planning of all the public improvements under his authority -- roadways, parks, bridges, water supplies, transportation lines and even cultural institutions.

By gaining the trust of public officials and the city's powerful business elite with well-formed arguments and a track record to back it up, Green was able to influence the metropolitan region's physical development to the end of the nineteenth century, long after the park commission was officially dissolved in 1870.

COMPTROLLER AND PRESERVATIONIST

In 1871 Green was enlisted to serve as New York City Comptroller after the Tweed Ring bankrupted the municipal treasury. He immediately put a stranglehold on the city's chaotic spending habits. By trimming unneeded workers, denying fraudulent claims, curtailing public works and sometimes even using his own personal credit to secure funds to meet the government payroll, he restored the city's fiscal health.

Green was a lifelong historic preservationist and champion of urban green space. He chose the location of the Bronx Zoo where it would fell the fewest trees, and even objected to the placement of Grant's Tomb and the New York Public Library - an institution he fought hard to create - on park grounds.

Soon after helping to quash a proposal to demolish City Hall and move the seat of government uptown, Green gathered New York's preservationists into the American Scenic and Historic Preservation Society, an organization he founded in 1895. In his lifetime and beyond the society created numerous state parks, lobbied to save endangered sites like Hamilton Grange, erected countless historic markers and proposed the name for the Williamsburg Bridge.

OUR INDIFFERENT CITY

 

In 1898 a small island was named for Andrew Green at Niagara Falls in recognition of the preservation work he did there. But incredibly, here in the five boroughs, no park, bridge, building, school or even street bears his name! All he has here is a forlorn and obscure bench in Central Park that was evicted from its original prominent hilltop years ago to make room for a compost heap.

"It is preposterous that the only memory marker recalling Green's contributions to New York is a park bench," wrote Mike Wallace, the Pulitzer Prize-winning co-author of Gotham, a History of New York City to 1898.

I agree. And I'd like to propose two significant structures, both in need of a name change, as candidates for a Green monument.

The first is the little-known Washington Bridge, a handsome Harlem River span that Green conceived. Ever since the Port Authority built the giant George Washington Bridge, the name of this other, lesser-known bridge has only confounded drivers.

The other is the Tweed Courthouse, the newly refurbished home of the Department of Education. (Tweed's designation is not "official," some say, but it is literally engraved in stone on the building.) Tweed was perhaps our city's greatest villain and Green our greatest champion; Tweed has a big shiny courthouse, and Green has a sad little bench. Isn't something wrong with this picture?

Michael Miscione discovered Andrew Haswell Green when producing a TV documentary in 1998 about the consolidation of all five boroughs into the City of Greater New York. He has launched a campaign to get a substantial monument named for Green.

Bank Robberies On the Rise


After notorious bank robber Willie Sutton was released from prison, he filmed a commercial in 1970 for a Connecticut bank, touting the bank's new photo credit card, a security measure. Now three decades later, at a time when everybody else -- from airports to government agencies to office buildings - are emphasizing their metal detectors and scanners and beefed-up security personnel, banks seem to be taking the opposite tack: They apparently prefer to be seen as friendly rather than secure.

Is it a coincidence that, almost as soon as Commerce Bank opened 17 branches in New York City, 16 of them were robbed?

Commerce Bank has the distinction of being the most targeted bank for robberies in New York this year. But it is probably unfair to single it out for criticism. It is certainly not alone. Bank robberies have more than doubled in the city this year so far, compared to 1999. By the beginning of September, there were 312; in all of 1999 there were just 141.

Police Commissioner Raymond Kelly has blamed the surge of robberies in New York banks on their lax security, and security experts agree. Tom Reppetto, president of the Citizens Crime Commission of New York City, says that many banks have cut down on the number of armed guards and do not have such standard security equipment as bullet-resistant barriers, closed circuit television, and "dye packs" - stacks of cash that explode with an ineradicable dye minutes after the robber leaves. Diana L. Taylor, the New York State Banking superintendent, has complained that many banks tell their employees to acquiesce to the robber's request. "This posture sends a clear message to the criminal that the institution is an easy and convenient mark for robbery," she wrote. And Robert McCrie, professor of security management at the John Jay College of Criminal Justice, after analyzing the police department's latest bank robbery statistics, concluded: "Senior management in banking firms is blocking the imposition of needed controls They are resisting approving security measures that could make a difference."

Why Would New York Banks Be So Casual?

First, it is important to point out that few bank robberies in New York bear any resemblance to "Dog Day Afternoon" or "Bonnie and Clyde." The majority are committed without an actual weapon, just a note, and result in payoffs under $2,000. Most bank robbers nationwide, according to security consultant John Kennish, "do not case the bank prior to the attack, wear any kind of disguise to hide their identity, or have a post-attack plan in place prior to the attack." Violence is rare, though it does occur: In the course of 7,127 bank robberies committed nationwide in 2000-2001, according to the Federal Bureau of Investigation, eight people were killed.

This may help explain why, in an interview with Crain's New York Business, Vernon Hill, the chief executive officer of Commerce Bank, which is based in Cherry Hill, New Jersey, could apply a cost-benefit analysis to such security measures as bullet-resistant partitions: "If we get 11 million customer visits and if we get robbed five to six times during the same period," he said, "am I going to design branches for the 11 million, or for the five to six robberies?"

Cost-consciousness is part of the equation. So is an apparent fatalism. The New York State Bankers Association says it encourages its members to implement what are called Best Practices strategies including dye packs and bullet-resistant barriers to reduce crime, but the association's general counsel Roberta Kotkin sounds less than confident about the efficacy of such a measure: "A study showed that 89 percent of banks that have bullet-resistant barriers were robbed," she says. Then why is it considered a best practice? "It's a deterrent," she replies, but no fail-safe antidote to robbery. "We have the best interests of our customer in mind. We do what we can. Bank robberies can't be eradicated."

This does not mean banks are completely indifferent. Some banks have strengthened individual branches where robberies have taken place, though, in order to keep costs down, have opted not to make wholesale improvements in their branch network. North Fork, which had 27 robberies in its 78 branches, upgraded its security by installing digital cameras that display the customer's photo on a flat screen as a deterrent. Still, Edward Hausdorf, the director of security at North Force Bank, said, "If someone is intent on robbing a bank, they're going to rob the bank."

But Commissioner Kelly and the others say there is plenty more that the banks could be doing. Kelly recently railed at a Chase Manhattan Bank manager who took 15 minutes to dial 911 after a robbery took place. "They don't get it," Kelly told the press. "They have a security guard, and he said he didn't see anything." Kelly wondered why Emigrant Savings Bank, which was robbed by the same perpetrator several times, did nothing to alter its security practices.

In Europe, banks have been installing "people traps" in which customers must enter the bank through an enclosure that includes a metal detector and takes considerably more time to exit. A security guard can press a button and trap the robber before he can escape.

In the absence of such obvious preventive measures by banks here, the police themselves are employing such strategies as stakeouts and special surveillance at branches that have been struck numerous times, according to Reppetto of the Citizens Crime Commission.

Meanwhile, Taylor, the New York State Banking superintendent, is trying to apply pressure on banks by informing them that bank examiners will be focusing on "safety and soundness" during their examinations. They will be looking to see that corrective action is taking place.

"If banks don't make the move toward better safety practices, they may find themselves on the road to a legislated solution," Taylor says, "whereby compliance with a set of standards is legally mandated by the New York City Council and/or the state legislature."

Gary M. Stern has written articles for the Daily News, NY Post, and NY Observer, and newsletters for JPMorgan Chase.

 

The Racial Profiling Settlement


More than four years after Amadou Diallo was gunned down by police, a wrongful death lawsuit filed by Diallo's parents seeking millions in damages nears trial, sure to re-ignite some public opinion against the department if it goes before a jury.

In contrast, few headlines were made last month when city officials settled a federal class-action suit accusing the police department of illegal racial profiling when stopping suspects. But the settlement, while downplayed by the department as merely formalizing changes that have already been made, requires department records to be turned over for outside review through 2007. This ensures that racial profiling - which is what police critics say killed Diallo -- will remain the subject of intense legal and judicial scrutiny for years to come. And, with data on race often subject to more than one interpretation, the settlement could wind up sparking future debates.

The Settlement

The police department will not admit any wrongdoing as part of the settlement with the Center for Constitutional Rights, the non-profit group that filed the federal lawsuit one month after the Diallo shooting, naming as plaintiffs 10 black men who said they had unfairly been stopped by police because of their race. As part of the settlement, these men will receive a total payout of $167,500 from the city.

The settlement also includes a court order prohibiting the department from racial profiling (it is already against department policy). Once the agreement becomes final (which will likely happen during a November 25 “fairness hearing,” a standard practice in class-action suits that gives plaintiffs a chance to object to the settlement), police will also be obliged to begin conducting racial-bias "audits." The results of these "audits" must be turned over quarterly to the Center for review.

Along with these internal audits, the department must turn over every so-called "stop-and-frisk" report. Each time a New York police officer stops a potential suspect and pats them down, the officer must fill out a form, essentially answering why they stopped the person in the first place. To try and ensure fairness, another outside law firm will also review the reports. U. S. District Judge Shira Scheindlein would review anything found by the center to be questionable.

The police department and the plaintiffs have also agreed to conduct outreach programs in schools and elsewhere to inform citizens why the police make stops, how to respond when stopped, and the rights people have if they believe they have been unfairly stopped . Between 40 and 50 such programs will be held at various city high schools each year..

Path to Compromise

Much has changed since the lawsuit was filed. Lawyers targeted the police department's Street Crime Unit, citing a 1999 report (in pdf format) by the New York State Attorney General's Office that reviewed 175,000 stop-and-frisk forms and found that the unit stopped about 16 black potential suspects for every stop that resulted in an arrest. Diallo was shot by four officers from the unit who were patrolling for a suspected serial rapist. The Attorney General's report and a report by the U.S. Commission for Civil Rights in 2000 both found that the police department stopped a disproportionately large number of blacks and Hispanics.

But police brass disbanded the unit in April (it had already been de-emphasized much earlier), citing decreased numbers on the police force and a need to deploy officers elsewhere. And a month before that, Commissioner Ray Kelly issued an order against racial profiling, putting in writing that the department prohibited "the use of race, color, ethnicity or national origin as the determinative factor for initiating police action" Of course, Kelly was sure to emphasize that this had been policy all along, just unwritten.

The true reasons behind these changes may be more closely tied to the lawsuit than city officials will ever admit, but it was certainly logical for the police to downplay the settlement, especially considering the avalanche of civil claims that inundate the city every year. Many of these claims involve allegations of improper behavior by the police department. There were 1,796 new police action claims filed in fiscal year 2002, while $21.9 million was paid out by the city for such claims in the same year, according to the New York City Comptroller's Office.

Yet in fiscal year 2003, there were only 41 police action verdicts, according to the New York City Law Department (12 of which were for the plaintiffs). The Diallo lawsuit seeks $81 million in damages and pain and suffering (although numbers named in pending civil lawsuits can be substantially inflated; Abner Louima sued the city for $155 million after he was tortured by police at a stationhouse, and he wound up settling for $8.75 million in 2001).

Reactions and Repercussions

It certainly wasn't the money, then, that led the New York Post to label the settlement as an "obscene sellout" in a September 20th editorial. Rather, the paper was dubious of how the settlement will play out. Bill Goodman, lead counsel for the plaintiffs, said that the Center for Constitutional Rights will be on alert for patterns of racial bias, rather than scrutinizing individual incidents.

But Goodman hesitated when asked whether data gathered from the police department will be released to the public. "We haven't decided that," Goodman finally said; as far as he knows, he added, nothing in the settlement would prohibit the center from doing so. While the Post is concerned that the center will somehow "come up with wholly different stats," data released by the New York City Council this summer already demonstrate how easily statistics can make the department look bad.

"Blacks Are Searched by Police At a Higher Rate, Data Show," read The New York Times headline from the summer. The data showed that 50.9 percent of. persons stopped and searched by police in the first six months of 2002 were black, about double the percentage of the black population of the city (24.5 percent, according to the 2000 Census). Police quickly defended the numbers, pointing out that 59 percent of suspects in violent crimes were black, as identified by victims.

One wonders if the stop-and-frisk forms will point to a true cause-and-effect relationship between those two numbers for the average cop out on the beat when scrutinized. In any case, the numbers, unless they change dramatically, will do little to calm those who already feel that something is systematically not right with the police department.

Regardless of how the settlement plays out, it seems unlikely to be the last word on race and the Diallo shooting. The New York Daily News, citing a law enforcement source, reported that Manhattan U.S. Attorney Jim Comey was continuing to investigate police stop-and-frisks for signs of racial bias.

Then, of course, there remains the wrongful death lawsuit filed by Diallo's parents. The four plainclothes police officers who shot their unarmed son outside of his Bronx apartment building were cleared of all criminal charges. The civil suit would appear to be their last legal recourse. Anthony Gair, lawyer for the Diallo family, offered no hints of an imminent settlement, saying he thinks the case will make it to trial in January or February. And while Gair said he plans to attack the police department for failing to adequately train the men who shot Diallo, he also said, "It's my position…that the only reason Amadou Diallo was confronted at all was because he was black."

Jaime Adame has written for Newsday, the San Jose Mercury News, and the Austin American-Statesman.

 



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