reif Archives - Brooklyn Downtown Star

Pandemic predators

glendaleregstg on December 8, 2021

Dear Editor,
I’m shocked by accusations that “nonprofit” hospitals sued patients and filed liens against their homes during the COVID crisis, despite receiving state emergency funds.
The Coalition for Affordable Hospitals, a group of labor unions, claims that 55 hospitals sued nearly 4,000 patients for medical debt while getting over $442 million from the state’s Indigent Care Pool.
These pandemic predators exploited taxpayers and patients out of sheer greed. Among the worst culprits, says the Coalition, is Northwell Health, New York’s largest hospital system a biggest private employer with 23 hospitals, 650 outpatient facilities and more than 70,000 staffers.
Its president & CEO, Michael Dowling, got a total compensation exceeding $4 million last year, ten times higher than President Joe Biden’s salary. Not bad for the head of an enterprise designated as a “nonprofit, tax exempt” organization by New York State and the federal government.
In television commercials, hospitals portray themselves as compassionate lifelines to their communities. But their bottom line takes top priority in real life.
They are nonprofit profiteers who violated a basic mandate of medicine: “First, do no harm.” State leaders and regulatory agencies must probe and penalize them for financial abuse.
Sincerely,
Richard Reif
Kew Gardens Hills

Cap SALT

glendaleregstg on November 24, 2021

Dear Editor,
Regarding Evan Triantafilidis’ article about restoring the state and local tax deduction, I disagree with efforts by congressmen Tom Suozzi and Gregory Meeks to
end the $10,000 cap the deductions on federal income tax returns that was set in 2017 as part of the tax code overhaul.
Congresswomen Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez says ending the cap is a “gift to billionaires” that will increase income inequality.
Many of those billionaires live in Silicon Valley and are represented in Congress by Speaker Nancy Pelosi, who wants to raise the cap because it will benefit them and her.
She has a personal net worth of $120 million. Don’t reward one-percenters while screwing average taxpayers.
Sincerely,
Richard Reif
Kew Gardens Hills

Illegal burden

glendaleregstg on November 17, 2021

Dear Editor,
The flood of illegal immigrants coming here from our southern border bring the risk of COVID and places an unfair burden on our schools.
Queens are Brooklyn are among 15 counties nationwide that each took in over 1,000 children who were rounded up illegally crossing the border and brought here on secret flights landing in darkness at WestChester Airport in a clandestine program run by the Department of Health & Human Services.
Many of them are unaccompanied teenagers who don’t speak English and have special needs, but are placed in the city’s burdened public schools that do not get federal funds to handle the challenge.
This creates a financial “classroom crisis” for New York City schools that already cost taxpayers over $28,000 a year per student.
Law enforcement authorities worry that unaccompanied minors are prime recruiting targets for MS-13 and other violent street gangs. Why don’t our elected officials protest this program and try to stop its harmful impact?
If they fail to stand up for their constituents now, we should not re-elect them.
Sincerely,
Richard Reif
Kew Gardens Hills

Crime pays

glendaleregstg on November 3, 2021

Dear Editor,
Who says that crime doesn’t pay? Families who illegally entered our nation may get up to $1 million each under a plan the White House is reportedly considering.
Biden’s administration is responding to a lawsuit filed by the American Civil Liberties Union on behalf of 5,500 children who were separated from their parents under the Trump administration’s zero-tolerance policy in 2018 for people illegally crossing the U.S. border from Mexico.
The ACLU calls this policy “a deep moral stain on our country.” What’s really immoral is parents forcing their kids on a perilous journey in the false hope of asylum.
The amount per immigrant family under consideration is more than twice what the U.S. pays to families of military troops killed in combat.
Taxpayers and voters must demand zero tolerance for this payout. If the Biden administration approves it, Democrats will likely lose the 2022 midterm and the 2024 presidential elections.
Sincerely,
Richard Reif
Kew Gardens Hills

Needle panic

glendaleregstg on October 26, 2021

Dear Editor,
I’m glad that 23 City Council members sent a letter to Governor Kathy Hochul and state legislative leaders urging revision of bail reform and giving judges discretion to consider a defendant’s criminal history.
But I have little hope for a positive response. Rather than strengthen law
enforcement, Governor Hochul seems to favor lawbreakers.
The latest example is a bill she signed that decriminalizes open drug use and
allows addicts to shoot up in public places without interference by cops.
It bolsters far left lunatics’ goal of “harm reduction,” but will actually heighten drug addiction. It will create a real-life version of the 1971 film “Panic
in Needle Park,” which depicts an upper Manhattan area that was a mecca for junkies.
We will have panic in all city parks that will no longer be safe for law-abiding residents, including families and children.
Hochul panders to “progressives” in order to win the 2022 Democratic primary election. She recently appointed two people to top-level posts in her administration who support bail reform and defunding the police.
She also approved a measure, opposed by the state’s Democratic Party chairman, that provides financial aid to illegal immigrants.
Far-left Democrats who call themselves “progressive” are really regressive. They want to return our city to the bad old days of the 1970s. Don’t let New York City become a paradise for junkies and a living hell for the rest of us.
Sincerely,
Richard Reif
Kew Gardens Hills

Racist initiative

glendaleregstg on October 20, 2021

Dear Editor,
Mayor Bill de Blasio is ending the Gifted & Talented programs in public schools because a large number of Asian and white students are enrolled compared to a smaller Black and Hispanic enrollment.
That is blatantly racist and unfair.
He condemns the kids and parents of two ethnic groups who succeed by following the rules. He wants to replace G&T with something called “Brilliant,” which is anything but.
It puts students of different academic levels in the same classroom. This underscores the difference between equality and his goal of “equity.”
Equality means equal opportunity for all, everyone is the same at the starting line. Equity demands equal results, everyone must cross the finish line at the same time.
That defies reality unless it’s achieved by replacing merit with manipulation.
This the Department Of Education’s latest step to dumb down education, which prompted many parents to pull their kids out of public schools and put them in charter, religious and private schools.
Enrollment declined in all 32 elementary and middle school districts. Parents realize that “equity” results in failure for all public school students.
Our likely next mayor, Eric Adams, wants to extend, not end, Gifted & Talented programs. He displays a gift that de Blasio clearly lacks: common sense.
Sincerely,
Richard Reif
Kew Gardens Hills

The new NYPD?

glendaleregstg on October 6, 2021

Dear Editor,
If you think that fighting crime is the NYPD’s top job, guess again.
While shootings and homicides in New York City are nearly double their pre-pandemic levels, Mayor Bill de Blasio said “Customer service has to be what the NYPD is about.”
To achieve that goal, the NYPD will hire “community guides” at all 77 police precincts to greet visitors at the door. This new program will cost taxpayers $5.7 million a year.
Our mayor is doing this because he’s upset by the “gruff & dismissive” attitude toward the public. Even though New Yorkers fear for their safety, de Blasio wants cops to act like Walmart.
Instead of hiring greeters, why not hire more cops to reduce crime? New York’s Finest serve their “customers” – law-abiding residents and taxpayers – by risking their lives daily to protect us.
If they are sometimes “gruff & dismissive,” perhaps it’s because de Blasio and other “progressive” political leaders don’t respect them. Getting pelted and spat at by “peaceful” protesters may impact attitudes.
I urge our elected representatives to halt this insanity. But if they don’t, I’m sure our likely next mayor, Eric Adams, a former cop, will pull the plug. He values public safety above “customer service.”
Sincerely,
Richard Reif
Kew Gardens Hills

End overcrowding

glendaleregstg on September 28, 2021

Dear Editor,
As a graduate of Forest Hills High School (Class of 1957), I was shocked to learn that 4,000 students now attend my alma mater. That’s nearly four times the number when I went there, and many of them live far from Forest Hills.
Parents complain that students don’t have enough room for the social distancing required by COVID-19 protocols.
The reason for overcrowding at FHHS and other high schools is a change in admission policy that occurred under former mayor Mike Bloomberg. Students were enrolled in the high school closest to their home for more than a century.
That changed in 2004, when the Department of Education introduced a school choice program requiring all 8th graders to submit a list of 12 high schools they
wish to attend, no matter where they lived.
The DOE would match student preferences with each school’s attendance capacity. The intent was noble, but the results are a nightmare.
Schools with a high rate of college admissions, like FHHS, are flooded with students, while under-performing schools lose students and funding, which is based on enrollment. Thus they have fewer resources to improve.
The DOE must restore the zone-based system of high school enrollment except for the eight specialized high schools that require a rigorous admissions test.
This will create a fairer balance of enrollment at all high schools and a better education for all of our city’s students.
Sincerely,
Richard Reif
Kew Gardens Hills

Do the math!

glendaleregstg on September 21, 2021

Dear Editor,
New York City’s public schools began the fall semester with sharp declines in enrollment and education standards. Enrollment in grades K-12 fell to 890,000, the first time in 20 years that it fell below the one million mark.
Many parents pulled their kids out of public schools offering only remote learning over the past 18 months and put them in private schools with in-person learning. New guidance from the Department of Education (DOE) may trigger another exodus of students.
DOE wants to scrap grades, honor rolls and student rankings that are “detrimental to learners” and “negatively influence future student performance.” This is part of Mayor Bill de Blasio’s racial equity program to replace merit with mediocrity.
He wants to level the playing field for minority students, but it is really the soft bigotry of low expectations that sets kids up for failure when they graduate high school unprepared for college or the workplace.
DOE’s guidance is the latest step in an effort to dumb down education that ended academic screening for middle schools and reduced Gifted & Talented programs. These measures cheat students and taxpayers.
New York City spends $28,808 a year for every public school student, more than any other U.S. public school system.
We get a poor return on our investment, based on the results of the state’s English Language Arts & Math tests for students in grades 3-8 in 2019, the last pre-pandemic year in which those tests were given: 45.4 percent of all test takers were proficient in English and 46.7 percent in math.
That means the majority of the city’s elementary and middle school students can’t satisfactorily read, write or perform basic math functions.
A voucher system giving parents funds to send their kids to private schools makes more sense than the mess we now have. I hope that Eric Adams, our likely new mayor, replaces DOE’s woke warriors with responsible educators who value academic merit over corrupt manipulation.
Sincerely,
Richard Reif
Kew Gardens Hills

Fire Banks

glendaleregstg on September 16, 2021

Dear Editor,
Regarding Jessica Meditz’s article on September 1 (“Sliwa on homeless crisis”), in his interview with this paper’s editorial board, GOP mayoral candidate Curtis Sliwa vowed to close 26 shelters filled with mentally ill and drug-addicted homeless people.
He blamed Human Resources Administration (HRA) Commissioner Steven Banks for forcing homeless shelters “down people’s throats with no transparency or discussion.” Sliwa promised to fire banks if he becomes mayor.
But his opponent Eric Adams has a different view. He told news media that Banks “is
doing amazing things” and hinted that he might retain Banks if he wins. That’s like putting an arsonist in charge of the FDNY.
Before joining the de Blasio administration, Banks spent 33 years with the Legal Aid Society advocating for the homeless. He filed a lawsuit resulting in a milestone 2008 settlement creating a permanent right-to-shelter law for the homeless in New York City.
New York is the only U.S. city that has such a law. During his tenure as mayor, Mike Bloomberg blamed the law for attracting people from all over the country to the city for a free roof over their heads.
He urged its elimination. Our next mayor must do the same and gain support from City Hall and Albany to make it happen. Readers should urge their representatives in the City Council and state legislature to revoke this wasteful law.
Sincerely,
Richard Reif
Kew Gardens Hills

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