Keys To The City (And A Reprieve For The Renters)
"Not everyone’s going to agree with this," Bill de Blasio said Tuesday.
It was an understatement. He was referring to a new initiative called "Key to NYC Pass," which mandates proof of vaccination for patrons and employees across a variety of businesses and attractions. Both customers and workers will be required to prove they're vaccinated in order to dine indoors, visit gyms and enter entertainment venues in the city, including Broadway and movie theaters.
Thankfully for the vaccine skepti
Snark level at hundo p. Love it.
As Dean Wormer might say: Fat, drunk, and unvaccinated is no way to go through life.
WHEN will it be a good time for the eviction moratorium to expire? Perhaps during the school semester? Or during the winter? Or really anytime there’s anecdotal evidence of some poor soul just suffering out there? This sort of short-sighted helicopter governing is the exact thing that gets republicans elected.
Speaking of anecdotal evidence, at work yesterday, whoever used the computer before me was googling renters assistance numbers. Lucky for whoever that was, we’re short staffed and begging people to pick up extra shifts.
And yes, your conservative news host will visit you in the hospital. Many of the covid patients rooms have Fox News holding vigil above their bed
I don’t think the Biden admin or the cdc is under any delusions about the moratorium extension surviving court challenges. As H said, it’s basically just a delay tactic to allow the rental assistance programs more time to distribute funds and hopefully help those most in need.
Also a political gesture.
“WHEN will it be a good time for the eviction moratorium to expire? Perhaps during the school semester? Or during the winter? Or really anytime there’s anecdotal evidence of some poor soul just suffering out there?”
Housing, like healthcare, and a decent job, should be a right, not a privilege, in the nation that prints the world’s reserve currency.
It’s clear from one of your previous comments (“…it had to expire,” “rent can’t be cancelled forever”) that you were going to be irritated by another extension. Well, here you go. And here you’re irritated (using all caps on “when,” for example). You said “I feel for those caught up in financial trouble.” Well, I’m sure they “feel for those” like yourself who were irritable to learn of the extension. But you’ll get over it.
You’re correct, I am irritated. I’ve been a small-time landlord for 20 years. My tenents have been great people, and I remain friends with most of them. I had to evict one of my tenants a few years ago. She started using heroin, stopped paying rent. I tried to work with her for 6 months but to no avail. She also lost her job (RN btw). The whole episode was a sad slow motion meltdown. She had access to a good paying job, to healthcare, and housing-things you consider rights, but her addictions/choices ran counter.
IMO ‘Rights’ is where the progressive wing loses the political middle. I want to see better jobs, better safety nets, more affordable healthcare etc too. But for me these things are ‘rights’ only to a point.
What point is that?
Well, Eddie, I don’t think anyone in their right mind would argue with you when it comes to the first paragraph. I mean, clearly, you can’t have a heroin-addicted renter who quits their job and never pays you when the economy is functioning fine and there’s no public health crisis. I don’t think AOC would suggest you should keep a renter like that, either.
Congratulations Eddie, you pulled off a classic Ronnie Reagan move. You controlled the narrative with a tale that makes you a long suffering hero at the expense of your dead beat drug addict renter. You know, it’s not easy to become an RN. It takes intelligence, commitment and drive to get that title and a job that requires long stressful hours in less than ideal circumstances. So before we give you a medal, I’d like to hear the RN’s side of the story.
What’s Ronnie Raygun got to do with it? Well, he told similar stories about a “welfare queen driving her Cadillac” and “the strapping young buck using food stamps to buy T-bone steaks” as a way to convince the public that the welfare state had to be dismantled. And here we are after four decades of Reaganomics; with homelessness, recessions, endless wars, income inequality, coast to coast demonstrations and riots in the capital. To paraphrase the great purveyor of voodoo economics: Are we better off than we were four decade ago?
Great, so now I’m RR. I’m familiar with the man, and not a fan of Reaganomics. For the record, this renter was my real renter, not a hypothetical composite made up for convenience sake.
Eviction in my state is a many month long process. It’s hard work legally speaking. Renters have extensive rights here (as they should), and being mildly behind on rent isn’t going to result in eviction if the tenent is showing a good faith effort to get caught up.
Again, renters have extensive rights here (as they should). My complaint is that for political reasons, the government has/is trampling landlord rights. Meanwhile the far left is driving around with “Cancel Rent” stickers.
Now for another RR anecdote, except also true. Every landlord I know has a disaster renter story or two. I have an inexperienced landlord friend whose renter stopped paying at the start of covid. Last I heard he’s still there.
He’s been working full time throughout the pandemic. She’s still paying the mortgage and trying to get a judgement.
And since I’m RR, one more (also true) I went 3 months without a rent check this last winter because my tenent died of covid. I’m not going after his estate, so that cost me 4K
I’m inclined to believe Eddie Z about the RN — cancer is the most likely culprit behind this tragic story. Various types of cancer diagnoses are more survivable now than even 5, sometimes just 2 years ago. But proper pain management has not improved as rapidly as the medical advancements concerning cancer treatment.
Even if the cancer guess is wrong, don’t doubt the genuine need for relief from chronic pain as a motivator for getting on the path to addiction.
Ps. I’m a reader here to learn. Sorry I vented on social media. Lesson learned
For what it’s worth, you’re mostly right Eddie, because we’ve structured society the way we have.
If we incentivize property investment and rent collecting of various sorts, we can hardly blame the rent collectors for expecting to be paid.
My only point is that we may need to start rethinking things, because what COVID showed is how vulnerable the setup is to total collapse.
As a smarter man than me put it last year:
“In the absence of a major disruption, the system is capable of moving along by collecting small installments of rent (‘clipping the coupons’) from a large segment of the population. However, if an exogenous shock disrupts the fragile order of these cashflows, there is a chain reaction of collective insolvency ready to sink the entire system”.
Agree. Thanks H