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Victor J. Blue for The New York Time |
NY TIMES
Historians have been hard-pressed to find a mayor who, along with his administration and inner circle, was ever the subject of as many simultaneous investigations — conducted by as many different agencies — as Mayor Bill de Blasio now faces.
In recent weeks, no fewer than five separate inquiries — involving at least six different federal, state and local law enforcement and regulatory agencies — have come to light. Four of these investigations are focused on possible violations of criminal law.
What is Mr. de Blasio’s connection to the investigations?
At the heart of each of the five inquiries is money — in most cases, fund-raising linked to the mayor, his election campaign or a nonprofit group connected with him.
Mr. de Blasio, a Democrat elected in 2013, has made no secret of his attempts to raise significant sums to bolster his agenda through a group, the Campaign for One New York, and through an effort in 2014 to wrest control of the State Senate from the Republicans by supporting several Democratic candidates. Donors to the mayor’s political endeavors include major unions and real estate developers, and many of them have business before the city.
It is not clear how direct a role, if any, the mayor played in some of these matters. The inquiries that seem closest to him focus on two issues: the effort to help Senate Democrats, and the relationship he had with Nyclass, an animal-rights group that spent heavily in the 2013 mayoral race against Mr. de Blasio’s chief rival, Christine C. Quinn.
Two of the main backers of that effort, Steven Nislick and Wendy Neu, have contributed to Mr. de Blasio’s nonprofit. Ms. Neu has given at least $75,000 and Mr. Nislick $50,000. |
Bryan R. Smith for The New York Times |
Nyclass has been the main backer of a proposal to remove horses from city streets, an idea that Mr. de Blasio has so far failed to achieve despite promises that he would tackle the issue on the first day of his administration.
In March, the mayor announced that the Campaign for One New York had stopped raising and spending money and would be shutting down. He said that the action was not connected to any inquiry, and that the group’s “work is done.”
Mr. de Blasio’s efforts to get Democrats elected to the State Senate also backfired. Republicans resented his effort to oust them, and it hurt his ability to promote his programs in the Legislature — notably last summer when he was given only a one-year extension to mayoral control of city schools.
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| Mr. de Blasio announcing his One New York plan in 2015. Sam Hodgson for The New York Times |
What inquiries seem
the most serious?
Cyrus R. Vance Jr., the Manhattan district attorney, in conjunction with federal authorities, is investigating whether Mr. de Blasio, or those acting with him, violated state election law in an effort to raise money to buttress three Democrats running for the State Senate in 2014.
In that case, investigators are examining whether donations to the candidates were funneled through county party committees to evade contribution limits, a violation of state law and a possible felony.
But the biggest scandal thus far has centered on gifts and trips that senior police officials may have received from two men who raised money for the mayor: Jona S. Rechnitz, a real estate developer, and Jeremiah Reichberg, a businessman and police enthusiast in Borough Park, Brooklyn, who hosted a fund-raiser at his home for Mr. de Blasio in 2014.
The possible crime that is being investigated by Preet Bharara, the United States attorney for the Southern District of New York, is whether political contributions by those two men were given in exchange for some unknown municipal benefit. So far, the authorities have not signaled what favorable city action, if any, was secured by the donations.
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| Investigations looking into fund-raising get particularly close to Mr. de Blasio, focusing on one of his top aides, Emma Wolfe, left. Fred R. Conrad for The New York Times |
What about the other investigations?
With Nyclass, investigators are looking for any favorable municipal treatment granted in exchange for the spending. The principals of Nyclass, beyond being animal-rights activists, also have ties to real estate: Ms. Neu is the chairwoman and chief executive of a real estate and electronics recycling company, Hugo Neu; Mr. Nislick, a parking-garage magnate, became the chief financial officer of Ms. Neu’s company in 2014.
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Steve Nislick Photo by Julia Xanthos
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Steve Nislick, is the low-profile former real estate executive whose wealth and skillful manipulation of the political process helped get Bill de Blasio elected mayor....What Nislick has done, really—is take an issue affecting some 300 drivers, 200 horses and four horse stables on prime Manhattan real estate, and make it inescapable.
IT'S THE PART ABOUT THAT LAND, ON THE FAR WEST SIDE, that looks the funniest to people. It's long been the source of innuendo—and more recently an explicit call-out by the editorial board of the New York Times—about what Nislick's real motives are in trying to put the carriages out of business.
[Here's an excerpt from that NY Times editorial: Details are lacking, but questions are many....What will happen to the stables, on coveted property on the West Side of Manhattan? And does this have anything to do with the $1 million ad campaign financed in part by NYClass to eliminate Mr. de Blasio’s main rival in the primary, then-Council Speaker (and carriage defender) Christine Quinn? Why are no advocates talking about getting rid of Police Department horses, which have tougher jobs than carriage horses?A selective animal-rights pose is an odd position for Mr. de Blasio, who calls himself a defender of unions and small businesses, and whose job it is to promote the city as a place for tourists. Why wipe out a well-loved, well-regulated, law-abiding part of the tourist economy?]
Nislick contends such innuendo is unfair, and says the whole thing really is just about getting horses off the streets.
“It’s maybe low-down,” said Nislick, but animal rights is “part of a social justice agenda. So whether it’s living wage, affordable housing, or the proper treatment of animals, this country and this city in particular can afford to treat its animals fairly. And it hasn’t. It’s been probably the worst city in the United States for animal welfare.”
Nislick sat for the interview with Wendy Neu, his comrade in the fight against horse carriages, and his employer: Since September, Nislick has worked as chief financial officer for Hugo Neu Corporation, the recycling and industrial real estate company run by Wendy.
They also run New Yorkers for Clean, Livable and Safe Streets, the organization battling to ban horse-drawn carriages—the one that helped fund the ads against Quinn. Nislick is the president. Neu is on the board.
“[Animals] experience much the same feelings that we have, whether it’s depression, sadness, fear, anxiety, all those things,” said Neu. “I don’t care whether it’s a dog or cat or a rabbit or a horse or a gorilla. ... It is our responsibility to ensure that they don’t suffer. That’s my biggest goal in life, is I can’t tolerate suffering.”
Nislick owns four horses, and recently broke his arm riding one.
Together, Nislick and Neu have made their personal belief in the sanctity of animal life an unlikely, and also inescapable, part of New York City politics in the era of de Blasio.
No one but the mayor can say for sure why he's so enthusiastic the issue, but certainly, the anti-carriage group supported his mayoral ambitions at a pivotal time, and he offered backing—in a big way—for their cause.
Early this month, a year after de Blasio promised action, council members who themselves have received donations from Nislick introduced a City Hall-backed bill that aims to do away with the horse carriages.
But the bill, facing a groundswell of opposition from the horse carriage drivers, their allies in organized labor, and organized labor's political allies, was sent back to committee.
STEVE NISLICK was born in Newark, raised in South Orange, and educated at University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. He trained as a certified public accountant and, after working in that field, joined his first cousin Jerry Gottesman’s parking lot empire.
When he started at Edison Properties in 1973, the family owned 30 parking lots. He helped build the business to more than 200 lots and garages nationwide before retiring as C.E.O. in 2012 (he’s still a consultant to the company).
During his tenure there, Edison Properties also developed Manhattan Mini Storage into the locally ubiquitous concern known for its liberal-sounding subway ads. (“If you store your stuff outside the city, it may come back Republican.”)
He and his second wife Linda Marcus have two daughters and three grandchildren
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| Wendy Kelman Neu is the CEO of Hugo Neu, an electronics recycling firm with almost 100 employees and facilities in Westchester and Connecticut; Jacqueline Kelman Bisbee, her sister, operates Park Pictures, a Manhattan-based film and television production company that she founded 15 years ago. |
Wendy Neu worked six years as a social worker at maximum security prisons before joining Hugo Neu and marrying the boss, who died last year.
She has no children, but her interest in animals knows few bounds. She has a 48-feral feline cattery, runs a trap, neuter and release program at a Hugo Neu facility in New Jersey, and a nonprofit that helps senior citizens keep pets. She has four rescue dogs, two of whom accompany her to the office. She has never ridden a horse.
“I have no connection to horses other than the fact that they’re sentient creatures and I care about animals, whether domestic or wildlife or species that are becoming extinct,” she said.
Most of the time she’s vegetarian. Nislick eats meat.
Nislick dates his interest in horses to the ‘80s, when he first started keeping some of his own. He has occasionally taken part in eventing, which the United States Eventing Association describes as an “equestrian triathlon” involving show-jumping, dressage and endurance riding. A 2012 Time article described eventing as a “sport enjoyed frequently by the wealthy and sometimes even by royalty” and “perhaps the most dangerous sport in the Summer Olympics—to both horse and rider.”
Ask him when, precisely, he set out to rescue New York City’s carriage horses, and Nislick will say there was no Rosebud moment: He and his wife just really hated having to walk by those sad-looking horses every day.
Though neither he nor Neu has visited the stables where the horses are kept, they've seen video and they consider the horses’ lives an ongoing act of animal abuse.
Their notion of what makes an acceptable horse life is fundamentally and philosophically irreconcilable with that of the horse carriage drivers. They disagree on basically all of the subsidiary facts, from whether horses have adequate stall space to the amount of monthly horse turnover, to where the horses end up when they leave the city.
“The NYC carriage horses are probably the most regulated horses in the country, if not the world,” said the New York State Horse Council — backed by the American Horse Council — in a letter of support for the 156-year-old industry. The State Horse Council decided to ride into the fray more than two months ago, after its city chapter conducted a thorough investigation of the stables used to house carriage horses.
“I have visited all four stables. We’ve been going for quite some time,” said Alison Clarke, the city chapter head.
“The stables could set a good example for some of the stables in the country. They’re very modern,” said Clarke.
Nislick and NYCLASS have promised that every one of the carriage horses will go to a sanctuary if the ban is enacted....But Diane Jones, president emerita of the council, doesn’t believe it will be that easy to find the horses good homes.
“Show me the names of these sanctuaries — I’d like to know exactly where they are,” she said. “There are hundreds if not thousands of unwanted horses in America. It’s a very sad situation."
"Personally, I think Nislick and Neu are elitist rich people who have no idea about the real lives of working horses or of working people," said Christina Hansen, a carriage driver and a spokeswoman for the New York City carriage industry. "They have shown absolutely no regard for the carriage drivers in this business. If anything they have been full of contempt for us. We're treated like objects who can just be told what to do, and we won't care because we're not ‘real people’ to them."
"When I met [Nislick], he wasn't really political," said John Phillips, the executive director of the League of Humane Voters."He just understood, as a horse lover, that having horses pull carriages in traffic was cruel."
Nislick helped fund de Blasio's public advocate campaign. And at some point, amid what the Daily News referred to as the "stream of campaign checks from the anti-carriage crowd," de Blasio came around.
“It was funny, we would have these rallies at City Hall,” said Nislick. “Twenty-five people would show up and Bill de Blasio. He has a very strong moral compass.”
“I agree,” said Neu.
Along with Nislick’s and Neu’s direct contributions to de Blasio’s campaign, both they and NYCLASS funded a PAC called New York City is Not for Sale, which, in turn, underwrote ads attacking Christine Quinn, who defends the carriage drivers, and who was at the time considered to be the Democratic front-runner.
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Separately, several city and state agencies are examining a deal by the city to lift protections on a nursing home in Manhattan that paved the way for its sale to luxury condominium developers. The city sold its protection — a restrictive covenant — for $16 million to a company that then resold the property, for a profit of roughly $72 million.
Investigators are looking at whether the for-profit nursing home company may have misled city and state agencies; they are also examining the role of the city’s top lobbyist, James F. Capalino, in advocating the deed removal in 2014 on behalf of the original nonprofit owner. He later represented the ultimate purchaser of the property, on other matters.
What has the mayor
said in response?
Mr. de Blasio has vigorously defended himself, his administration and his fund-raising apparatus, saying “unequivocally” that he had not violated any campaign finance laws during the 2014 Senate races. He has also denied any criminal conduct related to Mr. Rechnitz and Mr. Reichberg or to fund-raising more broadly.
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| A nursing home on Manhattan’s Lower East Side was sold to a condominium developer after the city lifted a deed restriction. Dave Sanders for The New York Times |
He has denied any involvement, or even prior knowledge, of the lifting of deed restrictions of the former nursing home; indeed, the mayor has not been tied to that deal.
The mayor has also rejected suggestions that his unwavering pledge to remove carriage horses from city streets was being driven by Nyclass.
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| Mayor Bill de Blasio’s ability and style as a manager have come under scrutiny in recent weeks. Yana Paskova for The New York Times |
Will this hurt the mayor?
Time will tell. Before the investigations came to light, Mr. de Blasio enjoyed rising popularity in polls, with no prominent Democrat emerging as a serious rival to his 2017 re-election effort. But the inquiries have cast a shadow on his administration, and he has to repeatedly address questions about political favors and subpoenas.
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PHILIP KAMRASS/ALBANY TIMES UNIONChief Enforcement Counsel Risa Sugarman |
JIM DWYER, NY TIMES
Bewilderingly, Mayor Bill de Blasio and his crew are said to be in an exotic pile of legal trouble faced by virtually no other politicians who have done just about the same thing.
In 2014, the mayor and allies raised millions of dollars in hopes of giving control of the State Senate to the Democrats. By law, there was a limit of $10,300 that an individual could give that year to a campaign. But the same person could give about $100,000 to larger political organizations, like state and county party committees.
Those committees can spend away on behalf of the candidates, but everyone has to pretend not to coordinate efforts to get around the limits.
A scorching report by Risa S. Sugarman, chief enforcement officer for the State Board of Elections, said the de Blasio team had committed “willful and flagrant” violations of the laws by using those committees. She sent it on to the Manhattan district attorney.
Her document is remarkably assiduous in places, and filled with flagrant, or at least gaping, holes in others.
For instance, Ms. Sugarman managed not to notice that the State Democratic Committee received $766,000 in 12 days in October 2014, much of it from organizations and people linked to Mr. de Blasio, and promptly spent it on a number of the same vendors and on behalf of the same candidates, according to reports filed with the elections board. Not a word appears in her report about the money that passed through that committee. As it happens, that committee is effectively controlled by the governor, Andrew M. Cuomo, who nominated her for her job.
Why was the state committee left out of such a meticulous report?
“I don’t comment on confidential memos,” Ms. Sugarman said.
The de Blasio group solicited money for Democratic candidates they thought had a chance of winning election to the State Senate in 2014. The candidates could accept donations of as much as $10,300, but party committees in their counties, and at the state level, could receive about 10 times that.
“This is a widespread practice that Republicans and Democrats, county and state committees, take advantage of,” said Susan Lerner, the executive director of Common Cause New York.
The committee pipeline has become even more important as the Republican majority in the State Senate has dwindled.
Others might see this as tactical spending and fund-raising; to Ms. Sugarman, it amounts to an evasion forbidden by law.
In 2008, when Michael R. Bloomberg was mayor, he gave $1.2 million to the tiny Independence Party, which used the money to help the campaigns of two Republican senators in Queens, Frank Padavan and Serphin R. Maltese. “In many ways, we are the party of Bloomberg,” Frank MacKay, the leader of the Independence Party, told Tom Robbins of The Village Voice. He said he had coordinated his efforts for the two senators with a Bloomberg aide.
In the same 2014 election that drew the scrutiny of Ms. Sugarman, a Republican senator running in Erie County, Mark Grisanti, was in a tight race. At the direction of the Republican Party’s leader, Dean G. Skelos, the real estate company Glenwood sent $100,000 to the Erie County Republican Committee, which transferred $78,000 a few days later to Mr. Grisanti’s campaign.
In Ms. Sugarman’s report, she pointed to large contributions organized by the de Blasio group to county committees that everyone involved — donors, county committee and candidates — knew were going to support the Democratic candidates.
Her memo does not make clear why such coordination violates the law. Rather than being a matter of “everyone does it,” there appears to be nothing in the state election law that says it cannot be done.
The political parties have “housekeeping accounts” that the law explicitly states are not subject to regulation. Those accounts can take any amount of money from anyone, which can then be used for anything. Contributions to those accounts have increased by 50 percent since 1999, according to research by Prudence Katze and Kyle Gorman of Common Cause.