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Scoopy’s Notebook, April 21, 2016

SCOOPY
District Leader Arthur Schwartz taking Ruth Berk to vote at P.S. 3 on Hudson St. on Tuesday. Photo by Jacob Schwartz
District Leader Arthur Schwartz taking Ruth Berk to vote at P.S. 3 on Hudson St. on Tuesday. Photo by Jacob Schwartz

Poll info card chaos: Sparking accusations of “voter suppression,” the Board of Elections didn’t mail out any informational cards to voters this time around to notify people where their polls were for the April 19 presidential primary election. A miffed Doris Diether, the doyenne of Community Board 2, said she called the B.O.E. last week to ask where her card was, so that she would know where to vote. “They told me they were ‘working on it’ — but it was already Thursday!” she told us. Diether had to make further calls to the board to find out her correct poll site. It often switches back and forth between two different locations, so she wanted to know for sure. District Leader Arthur Schwartz, who is Bernie Sanders’s New York campaign counsel, told us he was, in fact, ready to sue the state B.O.E. over the fact that the cards were never mailed out, but had to hold off. “The campaign told me not to sue about it,” he said. “I’m not sure why — but that’s my client.” He may still sue later on. As it was, only 40,000 newly registered voters got the cards. Apparently, under state law, there is a requirement to mail out the cards for state elections — but not for federal ones. At any rate, nowadays, thanks to the Internet, it’s much easier to find one’s polling place, Schwartz noted. “I don’t think it’s voter suppression,” he added. “I tend to think that it’s laziness and incompetence.” But the Sanders campaign, for one, was leaving nothing to chance. Bernie supporters got text messages to tell them where their poll site was and phone calls and door knocks to remind them to vote. “I’ve had people knock on my door twice,” Schwartz said. “It’s so great to get canvassed. I don’t think I’ve ever had people knock on my door for an election.” Getting back to Diether, she is actually a Republican, so we were curious who she voted for. “I voted for ‘Kulan’? It starts with a ‘K…’” she told us. John Kasich? “Yes, that’s the one.” What if Donald Trump is the nominee, would she vote for him? we asked her. “No way! No way!” she immediately blurted out. “He’s a liar — he built ‘Trump Tower’ down here and it was illegal. It was supposed to be a hotel.” She did get five robocalls from Team Trump, though. She only listened to the first one, which was actually The Donald himself, since she was curious what he had to say. But he’s still a liar to Diether — Lyin’ Donald!

 

Assembly foes…spy cams: As Assemblymember Deborah Glick was doing electioneering for Hillary Clinton outside P.S. 41 on W. 11th St. — though while keeping the legally required distance from the poll site — on Tuesday, her September Democratic primary election opponent and Bernie backer, Arthur Schwartz, was taking Ruth Berk to vote at P.S. 3 on Hudson St. Berk voted for Bernie, he said. Schwartz was arrested last year for removing a nest of the landlord’s mini-spy cameras that were hidden outside the senior chanteuse’s Christopher St. apartment to keep an eye on her and her daughter, Jessica Berk. “They have reinstalled the cameras,” Schwartz reported. “I am about to file suit about it.” As for his case on removing the previous spy cams, he said he will hear on May 19 when his next trial date is.

 

Foxy — not proxy: Hudson River Park activist Tom Fox tells us that City Club members will be meeting with their attorneys later this week to consider whether to appeal a judge’s decision to throw out their lawsuit challenging Barry Diller’s new Pier55 “art island” project at W. 13th St. “Chances are 70-30 that we will,” he said of filing an appeal, adding they have to have a careful discussion first. “There’s democracy on this side of the table,” he said cuttingly, in a dig at the Hudson River Park Trust, the state-city agency that is building and operating the 4.5-mile-long West Side waterfront park. They also are considering whether to file an Article 78 lawsuit over the state Department of Environmental Conservation permit for the plan, he noted. To those who blast Fox as a mere “proxy” for Douglas Durst, the former chairperson of Friends of Hudson River Park, who has been a top critic of the Trust since bailing from Friends in 2012, Fox said that’s balderdash. “There’s no proxy — just Foxy,” he said. “That was my nickname as a kid. I was involved in this long before Douglas was. I was involved in the park since 1984. Fortunately or unfortunately, they’re going to have me looking over their shoulder until I can no longer utter a breath or write a word.” Yes, Fox said, he was Durst’s partner in New York Water Taxi, but he sold his share five years ago.