Larry Silverstein's accusation that Mayor Bloomberg 's plan for ground zero amounts to "Soviet-style confiscation" is a signal from the 74-year-old developer that he will fiercely defend his contractual rights to rebuild on the World Trade Center site.Silverstein has been paying $10 million in rent each month ever since the WTC was destroyed and has already rebuilt his own portion of the WTC site, 7WTC, out of his own pocket and proceeds from insurance. And as the New York Sun editorial page notes:
The comment, part of a four-page statement issued yesterday by Silverstein Properties, escalates the fight over the future of Lower Manhattan. Mr. Bloomberg has claimed that Mr. Silverstein doesn't have the money to complete the construction envisioned under the site's master plan. The mayor has sought to reallocate to a developer other than Mr. Silverstein the Liberty Bonds created by Congress to fund rebuilding, and Mr. Bloomberg is pressing for apartments instead of some of the office space slated for ground zero.
Mr. Silverstein insists, however, that he'll have the financing if the city honors the intent of Congress in respect of the Liberty Bonds. He holds the proceeds from an insurance settlement worth more than $4.5 billion. He holds the state's half of the remaining Liberty Bonds. Mr. Silverstein also, incidentally, notes that the city's analysis disregards the state's half of the remaining Liberty Bonds, which Governor Pataki has already committed to Mr. Silverstein. It seems disingenuous for the city to pillory Mr. Silverstein for not having money the city itself is trying to avoid giving to him.The problem comes with the incessant delays over construction at the site. The longer it takes to rebuild, the less value the Liberty Bonds hold - construction costs continue to rise, which makes rebuilding more difficult.
Meanwhile, the New York Daily News has a truly bizarre story of how a moviemaker managed to get money to do a documentary on 9/11, and instead used the money to make a movie featuring topless women.
A budding filmmaker that FEMA found in the yellow pages used his taxpayer-funded video of the smoldering World Trade Center ruins in a documentary featuring topless women chatting about their breasts, a Daily News investigation has found.He continued to have access to the police helicopters into May 2002 and proceeded to copyright his work May 30, 2002. These photos were apparently commissioned and should belong to the City, and indeed the entire nation. Instead, Brown is profiting from them personally. Brown declined to be interviewed for the story through his attorney, claiming that he saw no upside to being interviewed. No kidding. But this whole mess stinks from the get-go and the DDC can't find all the paperwork, let alone the videos that were commissioned although it has copies of the photos (but not the original negatives).
Provided with unique access in an NYPD helicopter, Gregg Brown was flown by cops over the restricted air space of Ground Zero daily for eight months beginning on Sept. 15, 2001, capturing countless hours of grim video while snapping 30,000 photographs.
Red-faced officials at the city Department of Design & Construction, which oversaw the cleanup of Ground Zero, concede that the stunning, gut-wrenching material was supposed to belong to the people who paid for it — the citizens of New York and the nation. But Brown, who was ultimately paid up to $302,000 in federal 9/11 disaster recovery funds, refused to sign a prepared agreement ceding "title and ownership" to the city.
With the legal paperwork unsigned in late 2001, Brown was inexplicably allowed to keep shooting — and keep collecting big paychecks.
UPDATE 2/13/2006:
Michelle Malkin picked up the story, calls the mess with Brown and the DDC an obscene ripoff, and thinks that the people involved at DDC should be fired.
Technorati: World Trade Center, WTC, Pataki, LMDC, urban policy, Freedom Tower, IFC, International Freedom Center.
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