Mayor Matt Driscoll continued his series of neighborhood picnics, featuring people asking questions and the mayor dodging them inartfully.

What he said to start the meeting: Sit back, grab a hot dog or a donut, relax. We'll get started shortly.

What I heard: All workers line up and get your soma tablets. Praise Ford.

It comes down to money: The city is $48 million in the hole. Read: Don't ask us for anything, there's nothing we can do.

This is why the mayor's been advocating what he called Destiny, but what even the developers are calling the mall expansion. But here's a major part of the problem: Only 50% of the city, says the mayor, is on the property tax roll. Anyone know of list of what's been exempted?

One resident asked if the city was courting major employers, but Driscoll came back with something that I feel (and I know I'm not alone in that) should have made everyone happy: The biggest growth in the city has been small businesses – and guess what? – mostly women and minority-owned. Wake up, folks, this is fantastic!

The mayor also touted an "urban renewal plan," with an aim to "instill bold change." This urban renewal plan comes with no details – at least not details he's willing to share with his constituency.

I'm willing to give the mayor an 'A' for effort, but I have to say, I was left wanting, and no number of questions I could have asked would have left me satisfied in the end..

Or, why I quit politics and became a washing machine salesman.

But seriously. Thanks go out to NYCO for digging up a transcript of the Democratic primary debate – which may likely be the only one before the September primary – between Eliot Spitzer and Tom Suozzi.

That certainly did make it easier for those of us who happened to be more interested in Jeopardy! Tuesday night.

What did we learn from the transcript?

• We will not be changing our affiliation from unaffiliated to Democrat for the sake of the primary.
• We can't vote for either the pro-death penalty Spitzer or the anti-gay marriage Suozzi.

And we definitely can't vote for that fascist the Republicans are putting up.

Howie Hawkins should drop his senatorial bid (though he'd be my man in that race, too) and run for governor. He'd do us more good in Albany than in Washington – and Hillary Clinton does us less harm in Washington than Spitzer, Suozzi or John Faso does us in Albany.

It pains me to say, but I may be leaving the governor line blank in November.

UPDATE: Ooh. The marketing machine is rolling. We got an e-mail from the campaign of actor and author Malachy McCourt (yes, that's Frank McCourt's brother), who is running as a Green Party candidate. He claims an endorsement from the New Paltz Times (you'll remember New Paltz as the progressive town that first started marrying gay folk in New York state), and has what I'm afraid is a really bad campaign slogan:

Don’t Waste Your Vote. Give It To Me.

UPDATE II: So that campaign slogan I don't like so much reminded me a bit of the film Brewster's Millions, with its "Vote for none of the above" campaign. Funny thing is, McCourt was in the film.

UPDATE III: I don't mean to ride McCourt so hard. He's got a good vision for the state, though it's a vision that would probably be better accomplished from the Senate. Maybe he and Howie could switch campaigns.

The authors of this blog are all city of Syracuse residents, and as such, there are definitely issues in our region we're a little out of touch with – mostly, obviously, issues that don't come into play in the city proper. One of those issues is the New York Regional Interconnect (NYRI), a proposed high-voltage power line that would run from Orange County to Oneida County. Of course, the purpose would be to benefit New York City.

There has been an amazing amount of organizing regionally against the project. NYCO has been blogging about NYRI since the proposal first was made public. Read NYCO's coverage here.

So, I haven't written (it seems) in a thousand years, but I have been designing like crazy. Tonight (Monday, August 17) at the Coffee Pavilion, I will be guest hosting Monday Night Poetry. We're doing a fundraiser to benefit the the Ithaca Slam Team that is headed to the National Slam Poetry competition in Austin, TX, in August, no less. What does this have to do with anything? Well, we will be conducting a Silent Auction for three 11x17 Broadsides--one poem for three of the four team members--all designed by me. We will also have some smaller copies available for sale. Also, the poets will have chapbooks for sale.
This is my first attempt at Broadside designing, so all you folks out there go easy on me. But, all of this is not about me. It is about the Ithaca Slam Team and making sure they eat as they are representing CNY to the rest of the country--travelling is expensive these days. Their first bout pits them against the team from Bar13 in NYC--how's that for representing?
So ALL of you come on out and show some love for these poets (including Monday Night Poetry's Jane Cassady).
(PS--Not to get ahead of anything, but there are rumors that Syracuse might find itself home to a Card-Carrying SlamMistress who is thinking about fielding a home-town team. These are only rumors, mind you, but if you want a local slam (to watch and/or perform in) be at the Coffee Pavilion TONIGHT (133 East Water St.)

And even if I had a car, all I could do is drive out to some stupid mall, if I'm lucky, play some fucking video games, smoke a joint and get stupid.

- Christian Slater as Hard Harry in Pump up the Volume

I bumped into R— on Saturday morning, and we had our usual conversation. It goes something like this:

R—: How's your week been?
Josh: [Prattles on for five minutes, summarizing the socially active week that covered a wide scope of activities with at least half a dozen different people.]
R—: Why are your experiences always so much more positive than mine or anyone else's I know?

Maybe I just look harder, but I know I'm not alone. Angela and I were out on Saturday with RBR and the Geech (now that sounds like a sitcom), and the topic came up. I think Angela's words were something like this: "I'm so sick of people saying there's nothing to do here!"

This was said after we met at the Coffee Pavilion, wandered over to Pastabilities for dinner, stopped in at Sound Garden, and then plopped ourselves on chairs in Armory Square to listen to live jazz – after they had blocked off all the streets so restaurants could put tables on them and serve people dinner while they listened to music.

And then we went over to Ohm. And I bumped into G&K at Bull and Bear on the way back to the car, so I spent a little longer downtown, this time getting to hear some live music in Hanover Square.

Yeah, I really do wonder why my experiences are so different from R—'s, but I just can't imagine not having anything to do in this town.

This is a repeat from CNY in the Pros, but it's relevant. There are a lot of players from Central New York playing for the Iroquois Nationals (that's right – the Iroquois have their own team to play in international competition!) in the World Lacrosse Championships. I'll be mostly following the tournament – which starts tomorrow – over on the CNY in the Pros blog (and Donna Ditota will probably follow it here and here). Here's a round-up of the tournament, with some history and such.

If you picked up a copy of the Post-Standard this morning, you probably noticed the spread on the front of the sports section on the World Lacrosse Championships, which kick off tomorrow in London, Ontario.

The stories are about the Iroquois Nationals, the only Native American team playing in the tournament, which features 21 national teams (including Latvia, Hong Kong and Bermuda).

The Iroquois team has been ranked in the top five internationally three times, and this year they've got a slew of players – 18 – with college lax experience. Plus, the roster's full of people who played locally.

In May, the team hooked up with Nike for new uniforms, which feature the nation's flag.

The Championship happens every four years, with this year's being the 10th. The U.S. team has won eight of the previous nine – in 1978, they came in second to Canada, which won the championship game 17-16 in overtime. Australia and Canada have split the runner-up position in the other tournaments.

The tournament schedule (PDF) is on the brutal side. While college teams and the pros tend to play one game a week, the World Lax Championships start tomorrow, and most teams will play nine straight days (losers may get a day off toward the end of the tournament).

Notes: Canadian star Gary Gait, who recently retired from the National Lacrosse Leage, is suiting up again at the age of 39. Canada issued a postage stamp for the Championship.

We've got a bunch of places we'll be following the Championship, so feel free to play along at home. Here they are:

• U.S. goalie Trevor Tierney is blogging his experience on Major League Lacrosse's web site.
• Lax Power isn't the easiest site to get around, but it's got a bunch of good info.
• ESPN has coverage at Inside Lacrosse and in a special section of its main site.
• U.S. Lacrosse has some extensive info (though, obviously, it's U.S.-centric).
• You can also search Google News or blogs at Technorati for more coverage.

One of the points of contention with the new tax agreement is the amount of money the city would see through a PILOT program. People were holding signs at the June 20 public info session that said $60 million or nothing. Well, that's not exactly true – the $60 million promised with the current tax agreement means that the mall will stay off the tax rolls, and the developer will pay the city and county $60 million (actually, it's more like $54 million) a year, as a guarantee for sales tax. It doesn't replace property taxes.

In Councilor Stephanie Miner's letter to the mayor regarding the 2002 tax agreement, it becomes clear that the city and county get the actual sales tax amount they're entitled to and the mall has to get only private financing. That private financing, assuming it's done the traditional way (and any bank putting up $300 million-plus is going to do it their way), would require that the mall gets built and it has tenants in it. The new tax agreement requires no such guarantee.

To read the letter, go here and click the link at the bottom of the page.

Today, the Syracuse Common Council made it official: They've hired their own lawyer to "pursue mall expansion matters" (P-S - WSYR).

What does this mean? Well, no one really knows. See, the state court of appeals today accepted the mayor's withdrawal of the appeal of the lawsuit that Pyramid won March 9. The Common Council – which hasn't hired its own lawyer since 1984 (when I was eight, and had never heard of Syracuse, so I couldn't tell you what for) – could appeal the lawsuit on its own. But it's not clear they'll get anywhere, what with the city having technically already dropped the appeal.

The council could conceivably sue Pyramid for something, the mayor for shutting out a branch of government, the county legislature for breach of trust (the legislature had said it would follow the Common Council's lead), SIDA for pretty much anything, since it's an appointed board and really just does what the mayor tells it to do.

What I can say for sure: The next three and a half years are going to be hell at the city level in Syracuse. When the mayor decided to exclude the Common Council on the biggest issue facing the city, he screwed up royally – he'll either have to figure out how to avoid the council on every other decision he makes for the rest of his term, or he'll have to at some point come groveling back and convince the council to work together with him. And in fact, the settlement deal probably would have been approved if the mayor had taken the time to include a couple of members of the council in the negotiations and addressed their concerns.

Instead, he just decided he didn't need to be accountable to anyone but himself.

I posted earlier in the week about the Syracuse Industrial Development Agency's (SIDA) vote to approve a new mall expansion settlement deal, and added some details a little later.

It's erupted since then, and it really does read like a movie script.

To recap: On Wednesday, with no public notice, SIDA – an appointed board – met and voted 3-0 to approve a settlement deal that would exclude the Common Council – a group of elected representatives – in any dealings on the expansion. Not present at the SIDA meeting was the city's corporation council, Terri Bright, who was against the settlement.

Bright was entertaining the mayor at her home, because for whatever reason, he wanted to meet there, instead of her office. He asked her to withdraw an appeal of a court decision reached March 9 in favor of the mall's developer, Robert Congel and his Pyramid Management Group, which she did. Then she asked her to sign off on a statement that said she believed the vote SIDA was taking was legal, as was the settlement they were approving. That, she would not do.

So, Driscoll brought in another lawyer to sign those documents.

Later in the day, the six common councilors who had voted against the settlement deal asked Bright to continue with the appeal, and as she felt she represented the council as well as the mayor, she faxed a letter to the courthouse asking the court to ignore the previous document withdrawing the appeal.

The mayor was asked about the move at a press conference, and had not heard anything about it. Later that evening, Bright was fired.

You can read about the oh-so-dramatic deception here.

But, wait! There's more! On Thursday, now without a lawyer to continue the appeal, The Common Council hired its own lawyer to help the city.

Friday, it came out that a grand jury is investigating whether the six common councilors who voted against the settlement agreement might have met illegally before the meeting at which the vote was taken, though it's not clear that even if they did, any effect would be seen on the settlement agreement, since that was a separate meeting and held legally.

The council may also challenge the legality of Wednesday's SIDA meeting, at which they took the vote on the new agreement; if they did meet illegally, the vote will be nullified – and the later vote of approval by the Onondaga County Legislature will also be nullified, because they technically will have no document on which to have held that vote.

This is that life imitating art thing again, isn't it?

By now, most of you are aware that New York's top court today said that only heterosexual couples can get married. I won't go into the absolute ridiculousness of this decision, but I want to applaud Empire State Pride for getting their rally on.

I headed down to Hanover Square tonight to meet up with Kim and 250 other people in a rally for equal marriage rights. That's right. The decision was handed down this morning, and by 7 p.m. there were 250 people rallying in downtown Syracuse.

I just don't see the apathy and withering here that other people seem to see – except among our elected representatives: none of the locals came out tonight. Not one.

My favorite sign tonight, and I'm paraphrasing, as the memory is now five hours old:

Dear Pataki,

Thanks for supporting the court's homophobic ruling. My partner and I are proud second-class citizens of N.Y.!

Here's a not-so-novel-anymore idea: No more state-sponsored marriage. Civil unions for everybody – straight or gay. You want to get married? Have it witnessed before your own god in your own house of worship.

Update: Here's a story on the rally.

Update II: Discussion has begun at Feministing, including a report on the Greenwich Village rally last night. Keep checking that post. The comment threads get really good over there.

More on this tonight, but since there are details out on yesterday's Carousel Center shenanigans, I thought I should pass some along. You can read stories here and here.

• Open meeting laws were not broken. The mayor intentionally did not gather a quorum of SIDA so that the meeting would not need to be posted.
• The city's appeal was withdrawn by counselor Terri Bright at 8 a.m. at the mayor's request. Later in the day, the Common Council asked Bright to reinstate the appeal (since they also represent the city and were named in the lawsuit). She did so; the mayor found out through the press that it had happened, and he fired her.
• Even a councilor who supported the settlement deal was upset with the mayor for circumventing the council.
• Much of the council found out about the deal from the press, who called seeking comment.
• The Onondaga County Legislature's meeting was interrupted by the mayor in an effort to file a vote with the courts by a 4 p.m. deadline.
• The County Legislature decided not to honor a previous decision to follow the Common Council's lead on the settlement agreement, and approved 12-5 the items before it.

It's cliché to say one does not trust politicians these days. They turn back on campaign promises. They betray the public trust. Mayor Driscoll was applauded in November for successfully turning his campaign against Republican challenger Joanie Mahoney and Green Party candidate Howie Hawkins into a campaign against the developers of the Destiny USA project. And one has to admire his cunning throughout the day yesterday. Of course, cunning is not something you want in a politician, nor is backpedalling on the single campaign issue that got him elected.

I'll be expanding on this stuff a little bit later – and I'm sure there will be more comment throughout the day from the Common Council and others. Keep an eye out.

The Syracuse Industrial Development Agency (SIDA) today voted to enact a tax deal for an expanded Carousel Center, taking the mall off the tax rolls for 30 years.

In doing so, SIDA went around the Syracuse Common Council, which rejected a settlement offer two weeks ago. The agency may also have broken open meeting laws, as it's not clear the meeting was posted in time.

The problem with SIDA as an agency in general, is that its members serve entirely at the whim of the mayor. They do not serve at the will the people, and the people they are supposed to serve have no way to ensure that SIDA members have any expertise in their field. If they do something the mayor doesn't like, it's bu-bye.

The thing to do now is write to the Common Council, asking members to follow through with an appeal of Judge John Centra's March 9 ruling. For more info and sample letters, click here.

I was in my native Springfield, Mass., and nearby Northampton, for a couple of days (Saturday through Monday), and walking and riding around, it became clear that Syracuse could learn a lot from the Pioneer Valley.

Northampton is undergoing a lot of changes right now, but I'll share a short bit of history of downtown to give it context.

In the mid-1980s, downtown Northampton was dead. There were a few shops open on Main Street, but nothing special. With nothing there, rents were cheap, but people had to travel to obtain items they needed. And then the artists moved in, as often happens when you get a place with very cheap rents. They built a community, they made art (and music). And where there's art, rich people frequently follow. Main Street filled up in a hurry, and by about 1995, there wasn't a vacant store front in sight. If one place went out, it was snatched up in hours.

In the past few years, rents – especially business rents – have skyrocketed, and it's bringing more chains to Northampton. But still, there are very few vacancies, and there's lots to do.

Northampton's downtown consists of about a quarter-mile of Main Street, and then shops and restaurants that extend a few blocks in each direction. There are half a dozen places to buy coffee within three-minute walks of each other; four places to get sushi; at least a dozen and a half independent, creative restaurants; four bookstores (new and used, all independent); and plenty of other stuff.

This success comes from two things: Artists and musicians being encouraged to live there and make a living at their work without having to travel; and the city's welcoming of the Smith College community into the commercial aspect of the city, even though most students live on campus.

Minus a lot of artists living and plying their trades downtown, Syracuse certainly has an active, walkable downtown, from Hanover Square stretching to Armory – especially in the summer, when Clinton square is full of festivals. And while we don't think of Salina Street as a place to hang out (short of the Landmark), there are definitely places to shop and eat.

One of the major obstacles to pushing the envelope a little on downtown is Interstate 81, which cuts off the university from downtown. If the elevated part of the highway were removed, there would be a flood of people from campus walking down the hill and patronizing downtown business – and more businesses would likely spring up along the walking route.

But we really should talk about Springfield, because it has so much in common as a city with Syracuse.

It's slightly smaller – where Syracuse is about the 91st largest demographic area in the country, Springfield is the 109th. Both cities have similar media structures (though Springfield has fewer major network affiliates), and both are mixed economically and racially. Springfield has three small private universities and a community college, while Syracuse has a large private and a small private university, a couple of small public universities and a community college. Both have AHL hockey teams that play downtown.

I rode my bike yesterday morning through my alma mater's campus, and then pointed my bike toward downtown. I hadn't yet seen the Dr. Seuss memorial exhibit, which sits on the Quadrangle, the area between the main library branch and the museums. And while I didn't go downtown from there, the whole of downtown is walkable from there, two blocks away, and it extends about six blocks north-and-south, and two blocks east-and-west. The riverfront, which is cut off by the elevated Interstate 91, is also developed with a park, restaurants, the Basketball Hall of Fame, and some businesses.

And the bus station in Springfield is downtown, so the hub-and-spoke system makes more sense there than it does in Syracuse, which has a transit center in a pocket on the north side, and clogs up downtown's streets using the area as its hub.

I think it's time for the mayor and common council to get in the car and take a little road trip.

Alive in CNY contributer Angela and I went down to the Inner Harbor for fireworks on Friday (along with Angela's sister). A few thousand people turned out, and I was left wanting for this place to be developed. In a hurry.

NYCO's safety concerns are things that could be addressed pretty easily, I think, so long as someone takes the time to notice them, which any private developer likely would.

The other complaints people had would be solved as part of development:

• Parking: Obviously, if you want people to come to a place often, you'll need to give them more than a few hundred parking spots spread out throughout the area. People had backed up over curbs to leave their cars somewhere, and traffic was insane getting out. Thankfully, we were able to walk down, so that wasn't an issue for us.
• Bathrooms: Again, if you develop Inner Harbor with the intention of having hundreds or thousands of people come down every day, you're not going to have eight port-a-loos for everyone to use.
• Food: People had to wait in long lines for food – this was certainly a lack of faith on the part of vendors, who must not have thought people would actually show. Now the city knows it needs to draft more vendors for events like this, and vendors will know that people come out.

The show was fantastic, and sitting across the harbor from the launch site had us sitting in falling ash, which I actually enjoy when I'm seeing fireworks.