Matronage in Brooklyn

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A son should be willing to do anything for his mother, but East New York school board member DeCosta Headley, Jr. has taken familial fealty one step farther: He’s voted mama a job as a lunchroom aide.

Parental Dissent

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School councils are supposed to be a forum for parent participation and a tool for power, but Rudy Crew is keeping them under wraps and under his thumb.

Latino

Immigrant Song and Dance

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The city and the state have hyped their effort to rescue welfare and food stamps for legal immigrants. But the bureacracy is having a hard time changing gears.

Staten Island

Garbage Wars

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Rudy Guiliani has vowed to close down Staten Island’s Fresh Kills dump by New Year’s Day 2002. All he needs to do to meet that deadline is redesign the city’s entire rail and road infrastructure, figure out a way to float 13,000 tons of garbage a day to Virginia and convince the city’s poorest neighborhoods that they would love a reeking waste transfer station in their backyard. Four years and ticking.

Left Behind in Sandtown

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The Enterprise Foundation spearheaded an effort to rebuild a blighted Baltimore neighborhood. They spent too much time on construction–and not enough on renewing a community.

Elva’s Endgame

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An East New York apartment complex suffered for years under HUD’s un-watchful eye. Now they are moving toward a future of tenant ownership and better living conditions–if only the city will give them a tax break.

Staten Island

Dreading the Needle

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The Clinton Administration knows that needle exchange programs protect addicts against HIV and even give them access to the help they need to kick the habit. Yet, politics and timidity have kept Washington from giving harm reduction the seal of approval.