First Pot, than sex, than infanticide – yes we need a BID to help us take back our morals, our society and our businesses. Our socialistic Mayer, the corrosive business policies, the FREE FREE FREE items to all – and “they” want to charge us more for a BID?
The designers of this disaster will not be here to pay for this distribution of our income. They are from the past, with failed ancient ideas and zero business acumen. Who put them in charge? You? Me? I don’t remember anyone asking us if we needed their help – if we did we would have PAID for their failed Merchant Association.
Perhaps “they” want us to open a “pot” parlor with “happy endings” and provide low income housing in the back to illegal aliens – if we did that they would pay us! – maybe the right idea – thoughts?
A BID will not stop the decay of our neighborhood nor help our businesses – JUST SAY NO TO THE 3rd AVE BID!
NYPD Commish calls for ‘thoughtful’ approach to sex work legalization
James O’Neill voiced “great concern” over proposals to legalize marijuana and prostitution, but did not expressly oppose
Mayor Bill de Blasio’s police commissioner expressed reservations about sex work legalization at a Crain’s forum on Thursday—but did not come out against it.
Addressing a crowd at the New York Athletic Club, O’Neill sounded a cautious, hesitant note on a proposal in the state Legislature that would remove from the penal code the soliciting and promotion of prostitution, as well as loitering for prostitution, so long as the sex worker is over 18 years old. The proposal would also bar law enforcement from charging a person compelled into prostitution with a crime.
O’Neill expressed “great concern” over this proposal, but signaled that there was a path to decriminalizing sex work “thoughtfully.” He pointed out, however, that many sex workers are human trafficking victims, and captives to the individuals and illicit organizations who advertise their activities and collect money from them.
“Who’s involved in sex work?” he said, recalling his time in the department’s vice unit. “If this is what the people of New York State want, it has to be done carefully. And we have to think about victims. And most of the women involved in the sex trade—and other people involved in the sex trade—they’re the victims. They’re there not because they want to be. So we have to be very thoughtful about this.”
The commissioner said his department had focused on arresting promoters of prostitution, not the sex workers themselves. He asserted that even when police arrest prostitutes, they look to put them into social service programs instead of prison.
The commissioner later lumped sex work decriminalization with two other de Blasio-backed proposals he felt “great concern” over: bail reform and marijuana legalization, both of which he described as inevitable.
“I am in favor of bail reform. Again, as with sex workers, it’s got to be done thoughtfully. As with marijuana, it’s got to be done thoughtfully,” O’Neill said. “Because there are real impacts on quality of life, some serious, some not so serious.
O’Neill repeatedly pointed out that the NYPD does not set laws, but only hopes to have input in their creation. The mayor—who controls the NYPD—has said he is not comfortable with eliminating the penalties for prostitution.
