4 ms·

Sure DeBlasio and Cuomo 100% bungled the response in March especially, but you have a lot wrong here. The city has been massively transformed to allow outdoor

Sure DeBlasio and Cuomo 100% bungled the response in March especially, but you have a lot wrong here. The city has been massively transformed to allow outdoor dining. Easily 1000's of restaurants and bars now have outdoor dining in what would usually be street parking spaces. Manhattan and Brooklyn especially. I've seen less of this in the Bronx, but most restaurants stayed open doing takeout anyway. NYC gave direct cash grants to businesses with <10 employees. I know business owners got the money. Those grants were approved and funded before Care Act / PPP was passed. Once PPP opened there was no point in NYC trying to compete, the city can't print money. Other states were able to give more direct financial assistance to businesses because they didn't have to spend so much on actual COVID response. Remember NY received a tiny amount of federal funding relative to population and actual pandemic impact, because of who was in control of the funding formula.

whatok 6y ago
Outdoor dining is a bandaid fix that does not work for all restaurants. Several of the restaurants in my neighborhood that actually have decent sidewalk space are probably serving 50% of what indoor dining would have been. Even with saving money by not employing as many people for solely dining, you have increased costs through constructing bespoke outdoor dining spaces and additional cleaning.
chimeracoder 6y ago
> Sure DeBlasio and Cuomo 100% bungled the response in March especially Okay, so we agree on that. > The city has been massively transformed to allow outdoor dining. Easily 1000's of restaurants and bars now have outdoor dining in what would usually be street parking spaces. As journalists have documented extensively, New York's expansion of street space is incredibly paltry compared to what other cities in the US have done. No, it's not zero, but it's clearly not enough (per the article), and it's not even keeping pace with what other cities are doing. > NYC gave direct cash grants to businesses with <10 employees. I know business owners got the money. Those grants were approved and funded before Care Act / PPP was passed. Once PPP opened there was no point in NYC trying to compete, the city can't print money. Yes, there is a a point to the city (and the state) providing direct aid to local businesses on top of the federal assistance. And there absolutely is a point to the city and state targeting funds to essential industries that are hit particularly hard - which is what plenty of other jurisdictions have already done. > Other states were able to give more direct financial assistance to businesses because they didn't have to spend so much on actual COVID response. Remember NY received a tiny amount of federal funding relative to population and actual pandemic impact, because of who was in control of the funding formula. First of all, New York wouldn't have needed to spend as much on COVID response if Cuomo and DeBlasio had actually done their jobs in January or February. But more importantly: the limiting factor here isn't money. As I outlined in my post, the state is actually spending money in ways which are directly harmful to small businesses, with no justifiable public health gain. DeBlasio and Cuomo could literally just base their policies on what other cities and countries have done with success, and that would already be miles ahead of what they've decided to do instead. The problem isn't that they can't. The problem is that they've genuinely expressed zero desire to.
bogomipz 6y ago
>"The city has been massively transformed to allow outdoor dining." Massively? The city has simply allowed restaurants to put tables out in the street and share the street with passing cars. You have people eating out in the road while surrounded by gridlock traffic, exhaust fumes and all the accompanying horn honking. It's a total shit show. Additionally the Open Streets initiative been implemented in such a haphazard patchwork manner it could hardly be viewed as anything remotely transformative. This is a pretty spot on overview: https://nyc.streetsblog.org/2020/07/07/op-ed-open-streets-isnt-working-for-all-of-the-people/ https://nyc.streetsblog.org/2020/07/07/op-ed-open-streets-is...

whatok 6y ago

Outdoor dining is a bandaid fix that does not work for all restaurants. Several of the restaurants in my neighborhood that actually have decent sidewalk space are probably serving 50% of what indoor dining would have been. Even with saving money by not employing as many people for solely dining, you have increased costs through constructing bespoke outdoor dining spaces and additional cleaning.

chimeracoder 6y ago

> Sure DeBlasio and Cuomo 100% bungled the response in March especially Okay, so we agree on that. > The city has been massively transformed to allow outdoor dining. Easily 1000's of restaurants and bars now have outdoor dining in what would usually be street parking spaces. As journalists have documented extensively, New York's expansion of street space is incredibly paltry compared to what other cities in the US have done. No, it's not zero, but it's clearly not enough (per the article), and it's not even keeping pace with what other cities are doing. > NYC gave direct cash grants to businesses with <10 employees. I know business owners got the money. Those grants were approved and funded before Care Act / PPP was passed. Once PPP opened there was no point in NYC trying to compete, the city can't print money. Yes, there is a a point to the city (and the state) providing direct aid to local businesses on top of the federal assistance. And there absolutely is a point to the city and state targeting funds to essential industries that are hit particularly hard - which is what plenty of other jurisdictions have already done. > Other states were able to give more direct financial assistance to businesses because they didn't have to spend so much on actual COVID response. Remember NY received a tiny amount of federal funding relative to population and actual pandemic impact, because of who was in control of the funding formula. First of all, New York wouldn't have needed to spend as much on COVID response if Cuomo and DeBlasio had actually done their jobs in January or February. But more importantly: the limiting factor here isn't money. As I outlined in my post, the state is actually spending money in ways which are directly harmful to small businesses, with no justifiable public health gain. DeBlasio and Cuomo could literally just base their policies on what other cities and countries have done with success, and that would already be miles ahead of what they've decided to do instead. The problem isn't that they can't. The problem is that they've genuinely expressed zero desire to.

bogomipz 6y ago

>"The city has been massively transformed to allow outdoor dining." Massively? The city has simply allowed restaurants to put tables out in the street and share the street with passing cars. You have people eating out in the road while surrounded by gridlock traffic, exhaust fumes and all the accompanying horn honking. It's a total shit show. Additionally the Open Streets initiative been implemented in such a haphazard patchwork manner it could hardly be viewed as anything remotely transformative. This is a pretty spot on overview: https://nyc.streetsblog.org/2020/07/07/op-ed-open-streets-isnt-working-for-all-of-the-people/ https://nyc.streetsblog.org/2020/07/07/op-ed-open-streets-is...