Cuomo vows to sue Trump over hurricane response in Puerto Rico and trump sues for violation of rights secured by ny const art 1 sec 3
Claude Solnik
Long Island Business News
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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.
Modal Trigger
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Wandering Dago case to cost taxpayers $325K
Previous settlement cost $68K; additional litigation still underway
ALBANY — One half of the Wandering Dago’s five-year legal saga reached its conclusion, but there’s no end in sight for the other.
The controversially named food truck is back outside the state Capitol, selling lunch, but its owner is still fighting to get her state job back.
In 2013, state officials banned the truck from state property and programs because of its name. (“Dago” is widely considered an ethnic slur against Italian-Americans, but the truck’s owner has insisted it is actually a nod to Italians’ early history in America, when many were day laborers paid “as the day goes.”)
Truck owner Andrea Loguidice mounted a fight in federal court against the ban on freedom of speech grounds, lost an initial ruling, but won on appeal. Earlier this month, part of the cost to taxpayers was revealed, as attorneys for Loguidice and the state submitted paperwork in federal court stipulating the state would pay her attorney $325,000 for legal fees and court costs.
Because the state is represented by the Attorney General’s Office, whose staff would be drawing salary with or without the Dago case, that side of the pricetag is harder to quantify.
Saratoga Race Course faced a similar claim after ousting the Wandering Dago. NYRA later settled that suit for $68,500 without admitting liability.
Attorney George Carpinello of Boies Schiller Flexner said Loguidice wasn’t seeking reimbursement for revenue she lost when she was barred from state property and state programs, just an end of the ban. But he added that she did lose revenue. There are 10,000 potential customers within walking distance, and Wandering Dago missed out on every one of them during its exile, he said.
There’s more money still at stake for Loguidice and for state taxpayers as a result of state officials’ handling of the matter, Carpinello said Monday.
“This is only the end of the first chapter. We still have the second case to adjudicate,” he said, referring to Loguidice’s firing. “It’s really unfortunate that we’re five years into this.”
Loguidice was an attorney working for the state Department of Environmental Conservation when the Wandering Dago controversy boiled over. She was still on probationary status as a new hire, and officially was fired for conflict of interest: Bringing the food truck to a General Electric event while also being involved in legal matters involving General Electric’s dumping of PCBs in the Hudson River.
That’s unfounded for two reasons, Carpinello said. First, a GE property was the site of the event, not the organizer — a third party organized the event. Second, Loguidice was not involved in day-to-day operations of the food truck at that point, on instruction of her supervisors at DEC, though she retained ownership.
The purported conflict of interest is a pretext for punishing her for dubbing her truck Wandering Dago and then fighting back over it, Carpinello said.
“She was fired because of that controversy. Our claim is that she was terminated because she brought the lawsuit.”
In this part of the case, Loguidice is seeking more than legal costs: She also wants to be reinstated, with backpay.
“She would very much like to return to her job,” Carpinello said.
He said he hopes to go to trial soon, but pretrial processes are going slowly.
Loguidice has not practiced law since her firing.
Clarification: An earlier version of this article incorrectly reported that the state would reimburse its owner for $325,000 in legal fees and court costs after losing its attempt to block its operation near the state Capitol. In fact, the state will make that payment directly to her attorney.
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Andrew CuomoGetty Images
Gov. Cuomo stepped into a new electioneering snafu on Sunday when he stood at the pulpit of a Bronx church to make an official executive announcement — flanked by video screens showing his current campaign poster.
Cuomo made what his office said was an official government visit to the Heavenly Vision Christian Center to announce a planned lawsuit over President Trump’s response to hurricane-ravaged Puerto Rico.
But when Cuomo began speaking, two flat-screen TVs displayed a slideshow with images that included a poster saying “CUOMO FOR GOVERNOR.”
The ad features Cuomo’s smiling face and campaign logo, which has a red check mark superimposed on the “M” in his name. Video of the speech, including the screens showing the poster, was immediately posted on his official gubernatorial Web site and YouTube account.
During his speech, Cuomo accused Trump of violating the Constitution by giving Puerto Rico “a different level of care than Texas and Florida and other states” following Hurricane Maria last year.
“We’re going to hold ‘King’ Trump to the Constitution of the United States, and the Constitution said equal protection under the law. Puerto Rico did not receive equal protection under the law,” Cuomo said.
The video of Cuomo’s 16-minute speech showed the camera zoom in on him after about 90 seconds. Both TV screens are dark when the camera zooms back out around the 3-minute, 20-second mark.
A Cuomo spokeswoman blamed the church for the display of his campaign poster.
“This was a government event and while we appreciate that the church produced materials to welcome the Governor, as soon as staff realized they were campaign related, we asked them to be taken down and they were,” spokeswoman Dani Lever said in an e-mail.
The video was altered to eliminate all but a brief, partial glimpse of one sign. Lever thanked The Post “for bringing it to our attention.”
Heavenly Vision released a statement Sunday night claiming the image was selected by its media team — which was unaware that it contained the campaign logo.
Cuomo is running against former “Sex and the City” star Cynthia Nixon in the Sept. 13 Democratic primary. Nixon spokeswoman Lauren Hitt said Cuomo “has truly been shameless when it comes to using government resources to promote his campaign, but this is a new low.”
In June, The Post exposed how pro-Cuomo signs bought by his campaign were distributed from a Department of Transportation truck at the NYC Pride March. Last month, The Post also revealed that the Department of Motor Vehicles mailed out voter-registration flyers touting how Cuomo “is expanding access and opportunity to New Yorkers to register to vote.”
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