This is nonsense:

> “The woman yelled, ‘Knife, knife’ and the court officers were on the Trump-supporter like Voltron,” the bystander said.

I simply refuse to believe that 5 court officers merged together to form a larger court officer

Yeah, could very well be. I imagine there are a number of procedural delays, especially in a case such as that which involved eyewitness testimony. Covid may have also played a role after 2020.

> To me this has little to do with bail.

I didn't say anything about bail. Even with a bail system, an adult (he was likely around 26 at the time) who was accused of trying to sexually assault a minor shouldn't have been let out on ROR.

FWIW, the Post adds:

> Online records show that he was ordered held on $250,000 bail during his initial court appearance in the case.

> It is not clear whether he ever made bail, but at trial in March 2020, he was ordered held without bail – only to be released on his own recognizance weeks later with an order of protection issued, online records show.

I do not know the details of this case beyond what news reports note, but I agree: this has taken too long. It may be appeals, Covid or whatever, but 4 years is unacceptable.

> McIver already has an attempted rape case pending from 2019, when he broke into a sleeping 16-year-old girl's Bronx bedroom. He was caught in that case following a tip from neighbors and is due back in court March 29.

According to Pix11, he was out on ROR:

> McIver was already facing an ongoing Bronx case dating to April 2019 and was free on his own recognizance, police sources said. Public online court records indicate that McIver had pleaded guilty to burglary in that case, and that other charges included sex abuse.

> It is not incompetence to have to hire consultants to manage consultants when there is no one left. It's making the best of what you have when given an otherwise impossible task.

I think this is the crux of our disagreement. To me, if I was given no ability to manage my consultants, but forced to use them, that would be an inability to do something successfully. If I didn't kick it up and say it would be unsuccessful, that would be a failure of action too. If I was still forced to do so, the incompetence doesn't go away; it just includes those above me.

I do not malign those workers as being malicious, stupid or bad people. Simply, to me, they are incompetent in the literal sense of the term, especially if they were put in that situation (which necessarily means that those above them are also incompetent). Moreover, per the report, they used consultancies to fight the bureaucracy in the system. So they were willing participants in this quagmire.

For what it's worth, I just want efficient and effective government. It may mean that government(s) have in-house staff or they hire consultants. I think what this article elides, but the report emphasizes, is that our government is inefficient and ineffective (for a variety of reasons). We, as voters, should force government to be prudent with our money. I have no control over the various consultancies, but I do have some say in my government.

You should read the entire report. For example, they state that the NYCT could have done the initial designs since they had the standards and an in-house team:

> A review of detailed work modifications shared with us show that managing these interfaces between NYCT and Phase 1 designers meant that MTA CC had to instruct and pay its designers millions of additional dollars to redesign turnstiles after specifications changed, lay out new floor-tiling plans because NYCT objected to the proposed tiles’ dimensions, add internal partitions to public toilets, relocate CCTV locations, and revise the fire alarm system. Since NYCT had exacting standards, perhaps with new, experienced leadership who had a track record of planning, designing, and managing a megaproject, it could have designed the extension it wanted while also maintaining the project’s scope, schedule, and budget.

It's incompetence to hire consultants and then tell them to figure out what you want. That's what the report says.

You're also quoting me as saying "incompetent bureaucrats" when I said no such thing. That was some other guy.

My main point is that the MTC CC hired consultants, gave them free reign and relied on them for everything and then costs ballooned. That's incompetence. That's the wrong way to use consultants.

It's in the report:

> On this last point, a number of people told us that MTA CC had a difficult time wrangling NYCT even with its consultants, but without the consultants it would have been impossible.
> ...
> Second, several consultants who worked on Phase 1 told us that the lack of internal capacity and a clear sense of what the agency wanted meant that consultants wasted time solving basic problems that should have been determined prior to hiring a consultant ... Specifically, we were told that instead of being handed design guidelines at the start of the project, it was the consultants who developed those guidelines first, sometimes in conflict with NYCT standards

They're pro-CCP/pro-HK government. Those of us who are more pro-democracy dislike their bias.

They were also made to register as foreign agents in the US in 2021: https://twitter.com/axios/status/1430527894535688195

As a Hong Konger (who lives in NYC), fuck Sing Tao.

Also "fuck you" and "fuck your mother" (DLLM) are pretty pedestrian. You hear it all the time in Cantonese to denote frustration or disappointment.

It's unacceptable here, especially from an official, but I thought I'd add the cultural context.

> New Yorkers witnessed more homelessness

First line:

> New Yorkers filed a record number of 311 requests related to unsheltered homelessness ... during Mayor Eric Adams' first year in office, which was marked with high-profile policies aimed at reducing homelessness.

Those are not the same and probably explains why more New Yorkers felt a reason to call.

If George Santos ever blocks a bike lane with his ghost car, we're going to have a bad time

> It would eliminate the lowest-level drug charge in New York: drug possession in the seventh degree, a Class A misdemeanor. The charge currently applies to under a half ounce of heroin or opioids, or under 50 milligrams of PCP, 500 milligrams of cocaine, 1 gram of ketamine or 28 grams of GHB. It’s punishable by up to one year in prison. > Removing arrests, jail or prison as potential penalties, the bill would instead make low-level possession a civil violation, subject to a $50 fine.

As I understand it, it would remove this misdemeanor for all of these amounts. And then, they would set up a task force ... to figure out what amounts count as civil violations and what doesn't (which presumably would then be treated as a crime). What happens if they come up with the exact same amounts? Or lower?

Unless they (a) know the 21 members of this future task force and (b) know their expert opinion on all of these quantities, I'm not sure how this makes sense.

You've mistaken my stance on this. I'm of the opinion all soft drugs should be decriminalized. I just don't understand why they'd remove this first and then decide the quantities later, even if those quantities may end up being the same as now.

> The bill would also create a task force to meet and study the best ways to “[treat] substance use disorder as a disease, rather than a criminal behavior.”
> ...
> The task force would help determine the personal-use possession thresholds for each kind of drug that would be reduced to a civil violation under the law.

Shouldn't the task force study this before the decriminalization happens?

What a coincidence. I just changed my name to 142,000 People

In the name of equity, we should have the pols who slow-rolled the legalization smoke all the moldy stuff first.

> In truth, I am dissatisfied with all of these conditions, but not because they impact my safety on board trains; I’m appalled by our city’s failure to help the individuals

Except that has literally nothing to do with the survey. The heading of the question is something like, "How satisfied are you with the A train?". If you are dissatisfied with the city's inability to deal with the situation, then you can say you're satisfied with the train itself, since it's outside of the MTA's control.

> Please keep discussions civil.

I hope they aren't fucking up on purpose, because it's costing this woman more anguish, us taxpayers more money and is wasting everyone's time.

The judge did though and I quoted it. There was no evidence or documentation, which the prosecutors had, for what the prosecution said.

> Earlier this week, a judge declined Bragg's request to downgrade the charges from murder to manslaughter—because prosecutors once again did not bother to furnish evidence of her domestic abuse. That evidence includes a 2009 police report detailing Murray's arrests, written correspondence from 2018 in which Murray admits to physical abuse, and a 2019 video of a naked, intoxicated Murray attacking McCarter.

> "They affirm, without reference to exhibit or documentation, that she is a survivor of domestic violence," wrote Acting New York State Supreme Court Justice Diane Kiesel. Again, that's not because those exhibits don't exist.

The prosecutors really need to explain themselves