Identity. Ditto for Palm Sunday. What do you expect from lawyers?
N.Y. / Region
Assembly Speaker Finds Fall Guy: Another Sheldon Silver
To Sheldon Silver, the powerful speaker of the New York State Assembly, it was nothing but a simple case of mistaken identity.
In
the 1970s, Mr. Silver, a Democrat, worked with a new nonprofit group,
the United Jewish Council of the East Side, to block low-income housing
on a large, barren site in his district on the Lower East Side of
Manhattan, the beginning of a decades-long effort that was described in a recent article in The New York Times.
Those
actions, Mr. Silver insisted after the article was published, were
actually taken by another man: Sheldon E. Silver, a Minneapolis-born
lawyer who moved to Brooklyn in the early 1970s and died in 2001.
“I
was forever confused with this guy,” Mr. Silver said at a breakfast he
hosted on Thursday at the state Democratic Party convention. “Even after
he left there, I got phone calls from people who I knew.”
Mr.
Silver’s spokesman, Michael Whyland, said in an email that the other
Mr. Silver “was a counsel to U.J.C. in the ‘70s and early ‘80s.”
“You can understand why he would be upset,” Mr. Whyland said in a subsequent telephone call.
But
the documents cited in the article make clear that Speaker Silver — a
master at distancing himself from controversies and scandals in his
chamber — was in fact the person who pressed New York City officials to
allow an international mall to be built on the site, instead of
low-income housing. The letter
quoted was written on his official stationery from the Assembly. And
minutes of the meetings with city officials clearly identify Mr. Silver
as the lawmaker, not the similarly named lawyer from Brooklyn.
After
Mr. Silver’s office saw those documents, it dropped its request for a
correction on which Mr. Silver pressed for the mall in the 1970s.
But
the office held on to one claim of mistaken identity: The “Sheldon
Silver Esq.” identified as counsel to United Jewish Council on the group’s letterhead from all those years was not the assemblyman, but the other Mr. Silver. As evidence, the office produced two one-sentence letters from 1973 to the Internal Revenue Service from the council signed by Mr. Sheldon E. Silver.
Enter Shoshana Silver, the widow of the deceased lawyer.
Ms.
Silver, now 66, said her husband did briefly hold a job with the newly
formed United Jewish Council right about the time he was admitted to
practice law in New York, in June 1973. He was let go by the group by
early 1974.
If
anything written on behalf of the council had Mr. Silver’s name on it
after 1974, it had nothing to do with her husband, she said.
“It
was only six or nine months, a very short period of time,” Ms. Silver
said. “They needed him because they were just starting up, but once they
got up and going, I guess they didn’t need him anymore.”
She
recalls it clearly, she said, because they had been recently married
when he lost the job, and the United Jewish Council gave him a set of
Mishnah Berurah, or Jewish law books, as a parting gift.
“Once he left, he had no ties with them whatsoever,” she said.
Speaker
Silver said Mr. Silver’s widow was mistaken. “He didn’t work there for a
few months; he worked there, for, you know, several years,” the speaker
said, adding for emphasis that he did not serve as the group’s counsel.
The
council’s comptroller, Norma Klein, confirmed that the speaker’s office
asked if there were any records that would show that Sheldon E. Silver
had worked there. She said she found nothing other than the two letters
from 1973.
A Documented History
Mayoral archives, court files and business records document
Assemblyman Silver’s long involvement with the United Jewish Council.
Though many show the name “Sheldon Silver Esq.,” the assemblyman says
they actually refer to Sheldon E. Silver, a Brooklyn lawyer who died in
2001.
Throughout
the late 1970s, United Jewish Council’s stationery lists the counsel as
Sheldon Silver, Esq. — exactly how Speaker Silver, who has no middle name, listed his name in his official registration with the state court. The other Mr. Silver is registered as “Sheldon E. Silver.”
Had
the lawyer from Minneapolis been the group’s counsel through the early
1980s, he would have made acquaintances with some of Speaker Silver’s
closest and longest allies. The board members listed on United Jewish
Council’s stationery during those years included Speaker Silver’s rabbi,
Yitzchok Singer of Bialystoker Synagogue; the board president was
Harold Jacob, one of the speaker’s closest associates (his wife, Esther,
has been an employee of Mr. Silver’s Assembly office since 1978).
Together, Mr. Silver, Mr. Jacob and Rabbi Singer were the co-founders of a nonprofit housing partnership between United Jewish Council and Bialystoker to build apartments for seniors.
Judy
Rapfogel, the assemblyman’s chief of staff and an employee of his
office since 1977, also served on the group’s board. Her husband,
William E. Rapfogel, who was a longtime associate of Mr. Silver’s and
worked with him to fight housing plans for the empty swath of land,
pleaded guilty in April to stealing over $1 million from the Metropolitan Council on Jewish Poverty.
Among other examples of the assemblyman’s ties to the United Jewish Council, one lawsuit stands out.
In
1979, the council and about a dozen families sued a local synagogue to
block its planned sale to a Buddhist temple; Mr. Silver was their
lawyer. He filed an affidavit arguing that United Jewish Council should
have standing to sue in the case because it represented “the entire
organized Jewish community of the Lower East Side of Manhattan.” A judge
did not agree.
As
the case reached its conclusion seven years later, Mr. Silver wrote to
the court that he had met with the aggrieved worshipers at United Jewish
Council headquarters to discuss their wishes. And he left little doubt
which Mr. Silver he was.
“I
am also the assemblyman for the district in which the synagogue is
located and have a keen interest in having the plaintiff congregants
continue to use their synagogue in the future,” he wrote.
Mr. Silver’s office continues to say he was never counsel or lawyer to United Jewish Council.
“It
is not surprising that he worked with this major community group in his
district many times over 40 years in office,” Mr. Whyland said. “In
fact, it would be more surprising if they had never worked together.”
Sheldon
E. Silver’s family finds it a little humorous that his three decades as
a work-a-day lawyer in Brooklyn somehow muddled the résumé of the
powerful Assembly leader.
That
other Mr. Silver was the son of nonobservant Jews. In 1961, he was
admitted to practice law in Minnesota. He moved to Crown Heights,
Brooklyn, to pursue a life with the Chabad-Lubavitch Hasidic movement.
He
built a small law practice, as a public defender and in smaller-scale
commercial litigation, and rarely, if ever, worked outside Brooklyn,
said his son Moshe K. Silver, now a lawyer himself.
Shoshana
Silver, who works as a special-education teacher, chuckled when told
the politician insisted her husband had met with officials and a
prominent developer in the mid-1970s to push for the construction of a
large mall. “I guess he doesn’t want to take responsibility for those
things,” she said.
Sheldon Silver does not care to know that Easter Sunday and Palm Sunday are not observed by all on the same Sunday in all years. See NY Const. Art. 1, Sec. 3
Andrew Cuomo tells the Pope that Nassau OTB will only close on Roman Catholic Palm Sunday and Roman Catholic Easter Sunday. Bettors that don't like it can simply go to hell.
Andrew Cuomo tells the Pope that Nassau OTB will only close on Roman Catholic Palm Sunday and Roman Catholic Easter Sunday. Bettors that don't like it can simply go to hell.
HI-
Thanks for
the help. The item’s below. I’d be happy to mail you a copy,
if you give me a mailing address.
Claude
Solnik
(631)
913-4244
Long
Island
Business News
2150
Smithtown Ave.
Ronkonkoma, NY 11779-7348
Home > LI
Confidential > Stop
scratching on holidays
Stop scratching on holidays
Published: June 1, 2012
Off Track Betting in New York State has been racing into a crisis called shrinking revenue. Some people have spitballed a solution: Don’t close on holidays.
New York State Racing Law bars racing on Christmas, Easter and Palm Sunday, and the state has ruled OTBs can’t handle action on those days, even though they could easily broadcast races from out of state.
“You should be able to bet whenever you want,” said Jackson Leeds, a Nassau OTB employee who makes an occasional bet. He added some irrefutable logic: “How is the business going to make money if you’re not open to take people’s bets?”
Elias Tsekerides, president of the Federation of Hellenic Societies of Greater New York, said OTB is open on Greek Orthodox Easter and Palm Sunday.
“I don’t want discrimination,” Tsekerides said. “They close for the Catholics, but open for the Greek Orthodox? It’s either open for all or not open.”
OTB officials have said they lose millions by closing on Palm Sunday alone, with tracks such as Gulfstream, Santa Anita, Turf Paradise and Hawthorne running.
One option: OTBs could just stay open and face the consequences. New York City OTB did just that back in 2003. The handle was about $1.5 million – and OTB was fined $5,000.
Easy money.
Pope Calls for End to 'Unacceptable' Israeli-Palestinian Conflict
By Deborah BallBETHLEHEM, West Bank-- Pope Francis threw his weight behind a two-state solution to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict during a visit Sunday, calling the situation there "increasingly unacceptable" and inviting leaders to the Vatican for prayer.
On the second day of his three-day visit to the region, the pope used his meeting with Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas to strongly affirm the Vatican's support for an independent Palestine living in peace with Israel.
The call from the popular pope marks his clearest enunciation of his stance on the Israeli-Palestinian conflict of his young papacy, raising the pressure on both sides to resume talks that broke down recently. The pope's comments went beyond his general call for a "just solution" during his visit Saturday in Jordan.
"The time has come for everyone to find the courage...to forge a peace that rests on the acknowledgment by all of the right of two states to exist and to live in peace and security within internationally recognized borders," the 77-year-old pontiff said during his meeting with Palestinian authorities soon after his arrival in Bethlehem.
He called for an "end to this situation that has becoming increasingly unacceptable."
The pope offered an invitation to Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas and Israeli President Shimon Peres to the Vatican for a peace initiative. "I offer my home in the Vatican as a place for this encounter of prayer," said the pope. A Vatican spokesman later said that the invitation isn't a political one.
In an extraordinary gesture, the pope stopped his open-topped popemobile at the Israeli separation wall that divides Jerusalem from Bethlehem on his way to Manger Square, the site believed to be the birthplace of Jesus, where he celebrated Mass. Security forces scrambled to hold back the small crowd that followed him to the wall.
The pope flew from Amman in Jordan directly to Bethlehem, making him the first pope to arrive in the West Bank directly, rather than passing through Israel--a symbolic boost to Palestinian leaders. The Vatican praised a U.N. resolution that granted the Palestinian Authority observer state status in 2012, a development opposed by the U.S. and Israel.
On Sunday afternoon, Pope Francis will travel to Tel Aviv, where he will meet with Peres and Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, and is expected to press further his call for a two-state solution. The Pope will meet again with the Israeli leaders in Jerusalem on Monday, the last day of his visit.
Before his departure, the pope described his trip-- the fourth papal visit to the Middle East--as "purely religious," but leaders on both sides of the Arab-Israeli conflict have jockeyed for his support. Every detail of the pope's travel plans and schedule of meetings has been scrutinized for political significance.
Pope Francis will also meet children from two Palestinian refugee camps, gratifying Palestinian officials looking to highlight their issues with Israel to a pontiff who has expressed great concern for migrants and displaced peoples.
The Bethlehem visit highlights the plight of Christians in the Middle East and sets the stage for the pontiff's call for ecumenical unity. The city was festooned with yellow-and-white Vatican flags to mark the visit, while an enthusiastic crowd gathered in the square for the pope's Mass.
Bethlehem once boasted a large Christian community, but is now two-thirds Muslim, making it a case study of the difficulties Christians are facing in the Middle East. The pope's trip to the region is aimed in part at encouraging Christian communities, which are under pressure to flee in many Middle Eastern countries. Hundreds of thousands of Christians have fled after their churches were targeted, and a number of priests have been abducted or killed.
In comments at the meeting with Mr. Abbas, the pope called for respect for religious freedom, saying that "Christians desire to continue (their) role as full citizens" in the region.
Fouad Twal, the Latin Patriarch of Jerusalem, has expressed fears that the Holy Land could become a "spiritual Disneyland" if it loses a permanent Christian presence and becomes purely a destination for religious tourism.
The pope will finish his visit Sunday with a meeting with Orthodox Christian leaders in an effort to unify and strengthen Christian communities in the region. In Jerusalem later, he will hold a prayer service together with Patriarch Bartholomew in the Basilica of the Holy Sepulcher, the site believed to be Jesus' burial site.
The patriarch, who sits in Istanbul, is considered the first among equals in the various Orthodox churches and acts as the spokesman in dialogue with other Christian faiths and other religions. The pair will meet to commemorate the 50th anniversary of the meeting between Pope Paul VI and Bartholomew's predecessor, Patriarch Athenagoras, that marked a new rapprochement between the Orthodox and Catholic churches.
The ceremony will include leaders from the five Christian communities that have a historic presence at the major Christian sites in Jerusalem. The choice of the Holy Sepulcher is a deliberate one. While the church itself is under joint control of Greek Orthodox, Armenian and Catholic officials, their relations are notoriously fraught.
The pontiff's Middle East trip is his second abroad since his election last year. On Monday, he will visit the Western Wall, meet with Israeli leaders, and go to Holocaust memorial Yad Vashem in Jerusalem. He will finish the tour with a mass at the Cenacle, the room believed to be the site of Jesus' Last Supper with his disciples.
Write to Deborah Ball at deborah.ball@wsj.com
By Deborah Ball and Nicholas CaseyBETHLEHEM, West Bank--In the wake of stalled negotiations between the Israelis and Palestinians, Pope Francis announced a peace initiative of his own on Sunday, asking the presidents of the two governments to come to Rome to speak together and pray with him.
The offer was part of a flurry of activity marking the pope's three-day visit to the region, where he used a meeting with Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas to strongly affirm the Vatican's support for an independent Palestine and raise the pressure on both sides to resume talks that collapsed in acrimony following nine months of U.S. mediation.
The offer could signal at least a small opening for dialogue. Israeli President Shimon Peres accepted the invitation and Palestinian government officials also said that the offer to meet was welcome. Hanna Amira, a member of the Palestine Liberation Organization's executive committee, said the meeting would take place on June 6.
"I offer my home in the Vatican as a place for this encounter of prayer, " the 77-year-old pontiff said in his invitation.
Vatican Spokesman Federico Lombardi described the offer as an attempt to "build peace within the perspective of prayer," saying that Pope Francis had the "moral authority" to push the issue.
It wasn't clear just how far such an initiative could go. While Mr. Peres has a long history in past peace initiatives and supports two states, his post as president is mainly symbolic and ends next month. Already, other leaders are jockeying to take his position.
"Honestly I'm not sure what happens from here," said Mustafa Barghouti, a prominent Palestinian lawmaker in the West Bank.
In his clearest enunciation of his stance on the Israeli-Palestinian conflict of his young papacy, the pope threw his weight behind a two-state solution, calling the situation there "increasingly unacceptable." The comments went beyond his general call for a "just solution" during his visit Saturday in Jordan.
"The time has come for everyone to find the courage...to forge a peace that rests on the acknowledgment by all of the right of two states to exist and to live in peace and security within internationally recognized borders," the pontiff said during his meeting with Palestinian authorities soon after his arrival in Bethlehem.
He called for an "end to this situation that has becoming increasingly unacceptable."
In another extraordinary gesture, the pope stopped his open-topped popemobile at the Israeli separation wall that divides Jerusalem from Bethlehem on his way to Manger Square, the site believed to be the birthplace of Jesus, where he celebrated Mass.
Security forces scrambled to hold back the small crowd that followed him to the wall, where he stopped to pray in silence for several moments. Palestinians saw the move as a strong signal.
"I think it was courageous of him to stop there," said Ghassan Khatib, a former Palestinian peace negotiator.
Dimitri Diliani, a Christian Palestinian lawmaker, said the gesture indicated that Pope Francis has more willingness to "express his opinions and to speak his mind." He said Pope Francis could differ from John Paul II and Benedict XVI, who he said were "too diplomatic" in addressing the conflict.
A spokesman for Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu wouldn't comment.
The pope flew from Amman in Jordan directly to Bethlehem, making him the first pope to arrive in the West Bank directly, rather than passing through Israel--a symbolic boost to Palestinian leaders.
The Vatican has long supported two states in the region. However the Catholic Church has little clout among Israelis and Palestinians and faces many challenges in bringing the sides to the table.
Peace talks collapsed last April after months of mediation by U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry. Israel has withdrawn from negotiations and issued economic sanctions against the Palestinian government.
The Palestine Liberation Organization announced last month it would form a unity government with Hamas, which both Israel and the U.S. consider to be a terrorist organization. While the P.L.O. says the new government will only include technocrats, Israel has said it will not negotiate with any government that includes Hamas, which doesn't recognize Israel.
On Sunday afternoon, Pope Francis will travel to Tel Aviv, where he will meet with Mr. Peres and Mr. Netanyahu, and is expected to press further his call for a two-state solution. The Pope will meet again with the Israeli leaders in Jerusalem on Monday, the last day of his visit.
Before his departure to the Middle East, the pope described his trip-- the fourth papal visit to the region--as "purely religious," but leaders on both sides of the Arab-Israeli conflict have jockeyed for his support. Every detail of the pope's travel plans and schedule of meetings has been scrutinized for political significance.
Pope Francis will also meet children from two Palestinian refugee camps, gratifying Palestinian officials looking to highlight their issues with Israel to a pontiff who has expressed great concern for migrants and displaced peoples.
The Bethlehem visit also highlights the plight of Christians in the Middle East and sets the stage for the pontiff's call for ecumenical unity. The city was festooned with yellow-and-white Vatican flags to mark the visit, while an enthusiastic crowd gathered in the square for the pope's Mass.
Bethlehem once boasted a large Christian community, but is now two-thirds Muslim, making it a case study of the difficulties Christians are facing in the Middle East. The pope's trip to the region is aimed in part at encouraging Christian communities, which are under pressure to flee in many Middle Eastern countries.
Joshua Mitnick contributed to this article.
Write to Deborah Ball at deborah.ball@wsj.com and Nicholas Casey at nicholas.casey@wsj.com
No comments:
Post a Comment