John Quaglione & Real Estate Board SuperPac
Kings County Politics wrote: PAC Money Aids Qugalione (see here) reported about John Quaglione being backed by the Progress Now New York Inc. That’s REBNY, the Real Estate Board of New York PAC. Fantastic reporting by Kadia Gobia as our local papers like to glorify candidates, rather than tell us the truth.
I didn’t think Quaglione would go this low.
REBNY backed Mark Treyger in Coney Island and we can see what has happened to Coney Island – it’s owned by developers. Like Treyger, Quaglione is denied that he is associated with the group. The flyer they created has a picture of John and his family. If you live in Bay Ridge, you know that Quaglione would have been crying all over social media about then taking a picture of his family without his permission. Yet, Quaglione has been SILENT about it. Quaglione told Kings County Politics: “I have no idea and no knowledge of any groups doing any such activities.” Since Quaglione is aware of the situation, he should have addressed it and denounced REBNY, but John Quaglione is silent.
John Quaglione is aware that Senator Golden wrote a bill with distinct wording to give certain developers in Manhattan huge take breaks. No one in our area of Bay Ridge or Brooklyn benefited from that deal. John Quaglione continued to work for Senator Golden even after he saw how corrupt this was. Quaglione’s job involves writing press releases and telling the public about what the Senator is doing. John Quaglione was silent because he would rather work for a corrupt politician, than find a new job working for an honest one. We understand it’s hard to leave someone you have been working for 400 years, but when the level of corruption has been exposed, it’s time to move.
My family owned a business property in Downtown Brooklyn for many years. In 2003, developers came into the area, the City tried to illegally use eminent domain to seize my family’s property. The developers wanted the property at an extremely discounted price. The property owners in Downtown Brooklyn were not told about the plans to use eminent domain through a letter or any type of mailing, a flyer was placed in their mailbox about a public meeting at a hotel. When my family and two other property owners showed up at the morning meeting, the politicians and developers were toasting each other over a model of Downtown Brooklyn with huge skyscrapers placed over my family’s property. The suits didn’t appreciate the business owners’ candor and desire to keep their property. They fought eminent domain for years. My family won in court without an attorney because they were able to present that eminent domain was being misused, others were not so lucky and lost their property for less than half the value.
In 2015, after Mark Treyger was elected (supported by REBNY), eminent domain was threatened on property owners in Coney Island. The city used the term “blighted” on a property with a beautiful and fully functional amusement park. The owner, Carol Murray was a senior citizen whose family had owned the property for 100+ years. Carol Murray stood alone at a meeting where the city threatened to use eminent domain by having representatives of different NYC departments speak in favor of eminent domain. That week, Murray quickly sold her property.
In 2015, NYC did away with 421-a, yet Bay Ridge’s Senator Golden and Senator Simcha (from Borough Park/Midwood) keeps proposing 421-a bills (December 2016). These bills give huge tax breaks to developers in exchange for a few low income apartments to be included in the development. Thankfully, Senator Golden’s bill on this has not passed. Senator Golden also attends REBNY’s banquets.
From Kings County Politics. “It is not clear how much the PAC contributed to the mailer for John Quaglione because there is no record of the listing on the city’s Campaign Finance Board yet. The New York State’s Board of Elections has listed the funding on their site, but doesn’t give a dollar figure on how much was spent on the mailing.”
Special interests don’t pour thousands of dollars into a politician’s campaign without expecting something in return. John Quaglione has not admonished REBNY – that shows our neighborhood is up for grabs, just as Downtown Brooklyn and Coney Island have been.
Hugs,
marlene
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