Comments On: Let's Make a Deal by Dan Savage http://slog.thestranger.com/slog/archives/2012/11/27/lets-make-a-deal Comments On: Let's Make a Deal by Dan Savage en-us Copyright 2013 The Stranger. All rights reserved. This RSS file is offered to individuals, The Stranger readers, and non-commercial organizations only. Any commercial websites wishing to use this RSS file, please contact The Stranger. webmaster@thestranger.com (The Stranger Webmaster) Sat, 25 May 2013 00:00:01 -0700 Sat, 25 May 2013 07:30:00 -0700 Foundation http://blogs.law.harvard.edu/tech/rss <![CDATA[Re: Let's Make a Deal]]>
1-Sea Gate residents pay Federal, New York State and New York City taxes like every non-Sea Gate residents. That means that Sea Gate residents are entitled to public funds.
2-for the gate and private police and more, Sea Gate owners pay $2500 /year Sea Gate taxes; you morons dont pay that, but if you want, nobody stops you to rent or buy property in Sea-Gate, so you will benefit of everything, taxes and gated community.

Oh my God, where this country is going...when I see cretins everywhere.


Posted by Fedup33]]> Sun, 02 Dec 2012 19:21:00 -0800 The Stranger <![CDATA[Re: Let's Make a Deal]]> Posted by Learned Hand]]> Tue, 27 Nov 2012 22:35:47 -0800 The Stranger <![CDATA[Re: Let's Make a Deal]]>
If you read the comments to the article from residents from sea gate or the other place, they sound embarrasingly entitled and coded racist.

Posted by Alanmt]]> Tue, 27 Nov 2012 16:27:00 -0800 The Stranger <![CDATA[Re: Let's Make a Deal]]> Posted by seeker6079]]> Tue, 27 Nov 2012 15:46:57 -0800 The Stranger <![CDATA[Re: Let's Make a Deal]]>
So no, they're not receiving less in city services. They're receiving the same in city services, and paying a little extra to receive a little extra (gates, security, private streets) themselves. This on its own would be fine, except now they want some of this "little extra" to be subsidized by the city at the expense of people who have no access to the streets they'd be helping pay to repair.

Other New Yorkers can't wall off their neighborhood and ban everyone else from entering. If they did, they'd no longer have the right to demand that these same outsiders fund their little chunk of walled off land. It’s one or the other. If you want to deny people access to your streets, then you can't use their money to repair those streets.

If these people don't like that, then they're free to go fuck themselves as they walk around NYC on publicly funded sidewalks in other neighborhoods.


Posted by Bonefish]]> Tue, 27 Nov 2012 15:15:27 -0800 The Stranger <![CDATA[Re: Let's Make a Deal]]>
My take on this is that the State/City of New York should be held to its promises. That is the part of this that has implications for people who do not live in Sea Gate.

If the deal was, "We'll pay for all our own infrastructure and services and we'll keep paying full-price taxes and in return we want permission to put up guards and a fence," then that's what all parties should be held to.

If the response was "Okay, we're classifying your town as private property, so you will never get disaster funds," and everyone knew this in advance, then they should not get any Sandy funds. If it was "Your streets are still legally public property, this exchange applies only to ordinary upkeep, and you're eligible for the same emergency measures as everyone else" was part of the deal, then they should get their share. If this is a bad deal, then New York should not enter into any new such deals but should indeed honor existing agreements.

This question would best be answered in those "political efforts to open the streets to the public." If Sea Gate residents argued that they could close their gates because they were private property, then that's that. But if there were some other grounds, then maybe not.
Posted by DRF]]> Tue, 27 Nov 2012 15:10:47 -0800 The Stranger <![CDATA[Re: Let's Make a Deal]]> Posted by Dougsf]]> Tue, 27 Nov 2012 14:46:22 -0800 The Stranger <![CDATA[Re: Let's Make a Deal]]> Posted by Fortunate]]> Tue, 27 Nov 2012 14:36:41 -0800 The Stranger <![CDATA[Re: Let's Make a Deal]]> http://maps.google.ca/maps?q=sea+gate,+b…
Posted by seeker6079]]> Tue, 27 Nov 2012 14:25:06 -0800 The Stranger <![CDATA[Re: Let's Make a Deal]]> Posted by DRF]]> Tue, 27 Nov 2012 14:13:28 -0800 The Stranger <![CDATA[Re: Let's Make a Deal]]> Posted by California Kid]]> Tue, 27 Nov 2012 14:11:54 -0800 The Stranger <![CDATA[Re: Let's Make a Deal]]>
If the pipes from the street to my house, that run through my private property, break I don't call the town to fix them. I call a plumber and pay through the nose to get them fixed. If the pipes running up to my property break THEN I call the town.

When Sandy caused a tree to fall in my yard in NY I didn't call the town to come get it. They came and got the trees out of the PUBLIC street in front of my house, but the tree that fell on my PRIVATE property was my problem.

A gated community is ALL private property. It gets treated as if it were one big private plot of land, and the city is no more reprehensible to come on to that plot of land and fix problems on it than they are responsible to come onto my little plot of private land and fix problems there as well.

If a private, gated community is entitled to have public funds spent to fix it then I am entitled to have public funds fix problems on my land, and my neighbors are as well, and my relatives who don't live in gated communities are, and pretty much everyone is.

Just because their plot of PRIVATE land is huge and has streets running through it doesn't entitle it to be treated differently than my small plot of land that only has a driveway running through it.
Posted by Fortunate]]> Tue, 27 Nov 2012 13:53:06 -0800 The Stranger <![CDATA[Re: Let's Make a Deal]]>
If they don't, may I suggest schadenverschieben? Instead of "joy in the damage or harm" it means (if google translate isn't lying to me) "shifting the damage or harm". Or perhaps schadenumgehung, meanigg evasion of the harm.

Of course, the underlying message from these people is essentially "fick dich", and "fuck you" is easier to spell, in either language.
Posted by seeker6079]]> Tue, 27 Nov 2012 13:27:40 -0800 The Stranger <![CDATA[Re: Let's Make a Deal]]>
The question is this: What was the exact deal that Sea Gate residents made for their privacy? Did they purchase the land outright and convert it to legally private property? I'm feeling a "no" on that. Was the deal that they would take no public funds for their own water, police and upkeep while still paying full-price taxes as if they were? That doesn't seem to be the full story either.

Did the Sea Gate residents uphold their end of the deal and does repairing Sandy-induced damage to their infrastructure go above and beyond anything that they agreed to? If yes, then yes they should have access to some of the funds designated for Sandy repair. However, they should not get more than other neighborhoods. If most neighborhoods have streets but no fancy sea wall, then Sea Gate should get enough to repair streets but not their sea wall, etc. Sea Gate should get enough to repair standard beach jetties, not whatever name-brand supermegaultra jetties they have holding the sand in place.
Posted by DRF]]> Tue, 27 Nov 2012 13:27:37 -0800 The Stranger <![CDATA[Re: Let's Make a Deal]]> They chose that. And they received what they perceive to be fantastic benefits: private beaches, streets with only their neighours instead of drunken locals, a private police force in NYPD uniform to harass the riff-raff ...

They were happy with the deal until it came to something they couldn't handle. Now they want people who weren't allowed to walk on their streets to pay for repairing those streets. It's private property, so it's their problem. I'm not allowed to use the pool and gym of the condo down the street, but I'm not obliged to pay for their repair if a storm floods 'em, either. This is, essentially, a huge condo that just looks like a city neighbourhood.
Posted by seeker6079]]> Tue, 27 Nov 2012 13:18:43 -0800 The Stranger <![CDATA[Re: Let's Make a Deal]]>
When idiots like this guy (and Bailo) stupidly demand that the government give rich people handouts for their private property, and then complain about poor people receiving handouts and accuse liberals of having the entitlement complex, it simultaneously amuses and infuriates me.

I bet the Germans have a word for that.
Posted by Bonefish]]> Tue, 27 Nov 2012 13:13:55 -0800 The Stranger <![CDATA[Re: Let's Make a Deal]]>
Sea Gate residents pay the same taxes as other New Yorkers, and in normal years (that is, non-Sandy years), they are receiving far less in city services as other New Yorkers (since Sea Gaters also pay a separate tax which pays for Sea Gate's roads, police, razor wire, etc.).

Dipping into New York City funds for disaster assistance isn't really so crazy and unfair, so long as this isn't the sort of thing they're doing frequently.
Posted by Functional Atheist]]> Tue, 27 Nov 2012 12:53:37 -0800 The Stranger <![CDATA[Re: Let's Make a Deal]]> Snow Crash. If we're already on the way to fulfilling that prophecy, I guess that makes Papa John's the most likely to take up the mantle of the pizza mafia, then.
Posted by Knat]]> Tue, 27 Nov 2012 12:48:24 -0800 The Stranger <![CDATA[Re: Let's Make a Deal]]> William Korn, 52, the owner of a bakery who says his house in Sea Gate sustained over $300,000 in damage, said the city should pay for rebuilding the community even if it is gated because residents pay city taxes. “I don’t pay for water?” he said rhetorically, as if the question were absurd. “I don’t pay for real estate taxes — $6,000 a year? I don’t pay for services? I pay all those. Just because we have a private community? I pay for that private community.”Actually, Mr. Korn, you pay taxes for one of two types of public goods and services: ones that everybody can use, such as roads and fire departments; ones that everybody is excluded from, such as secured areas of publicly owned buildings, such as the Mayor's study or the ops centre of the local precinct. Yes, Mr. Korn, you are entitled to have the city fix the water pipes ... right up to the point at which your private property begins and the public is excluded.
Posted by seeker6079]]> Tue, 27 Nov 2012 12:10:56 -0800 The Stranger <![CDATA[Re: Let's Make a Deal]]>
No, @1 is right: they are trying to socialize their losses, and should be told no. Regrettably, NYC already seems to be, de facto, saying yes:
Already city officials have dispatched private contractors with bulldozers to cart away the sand and concrete slabs from Sea Gate’s streets and trucks to vacuum the sand out of its sewers.
It would be amusing as all hell if the "public" locals set up armed guards at the entrances to Sea Gate, politely and helpfully telling any City services that they are making a wrong turn onto private property and respectfully showing them the way to public property.

Also, I'd be betting that the Sea Gate folks would be engaged in the mongo-iest of freakouts if NYC staff started to fix the internal pipes in some Harlem high-rise or Park Avenue condo.

Posted by seeker6079]]> Tue, 27 Nov 2012 12:01:00 -0800 The Stranger <![CDATA[Re: Let's Make a Deal]]>
They pay for upkeep of roads and public things that they have the right to, and do use. Unless they don't ever leave their own compound, do not have mail, packages or food delivered over public roads, don't have access to fire, ambulance and police assistance, run their own radio, cable, power and sewage stations and plants, etc. etc. etc. Perhaps this is why people are so adverse to paying taxes - they don't understand how screwed they would be had they not access to all of these things.

Those ivory towers are not actually self-sufficient. That would entail generating *everything* they use or need on site. Including the manpower to protect what they have - which they currently only rent.
Posted by secretagent]]> Tue, 27 Nov 2012 11:54:52 -0800 The Stranger <![CDATA[Re: Let's Make a Deal]]>
Makes it seem like there should be a governing body devoted to public works and public good, even if there is no profit to be made.
Posted by Theodore Gorath]]> Tue, 27 Nov 2012 11:46:53 -0800 The Stranger <![CDATA[Re: Let's Make a Deal]]> Posted by Mattini]]> Tue, 27 Nov 2012 11:40:47 -0800 The Stranger <![CDATA[Re: Let's Make a Deal]]> caddy day at the Bushwood pool if they let the rabble in: someone's going to leave a doodie in their private pool.
Posted by Banna]]> Tue, 27 Nov 2012 11:35:17 -0800 The Stranger <![CDATA[Re: Let's Make a Deal]]>
@7, 9: Nope - their taxes go to pay for upkeep on public property to which they have access, just like everyone else. What they're asking for is public money to help with repairs to their private property (which they keep people out of with a private army). It's the equivalent of me demanding tax money to have my yard re-landscaped if a flood washes it out, especially if I surround my yard in razor wire fencing and shoot anyone who trespasses. (I recognize that disaster relief funds exist and are distributed; I'm ambivalent about that, mainly because I don't think there is a particularly good way to address the issue in any system that has private property.) They have every right to keep people out of their private property, and we have every right to tell them to go fuck themselves when they come crying for (even more of) our money to go to maintenance of their private property.
Posted by John Horstman]]> Tue, 27 Nov 2012 11:15:30 -0800 The Stranger