The Bronx is now entering its eighth year since Borough President Ruben Diaz killed plans for a mall at the Kingsbridge Armory that would෴ have brought 1,200 new jobs.
And with a courtꦺ ruling last month on a replacement projectꦫ, there’s no telling when the facility will ever become useful.
Diaz blew up plans for the mall in 2009 by insisting it provide jobs that pay a “prevailing wage” — refusing anything less than $10 an hour. The notion that “any job is better t💮han no job no longer applies,” he claimed, and never mind that The Bronx boasted the state’s highest unemployment rate.
When the proje𓂃ct officially died, his response was telling — a♑nd pathetic: “Boy, does that feel good,” he said.
Nothing happened for years. But sin♑ce 2013, ex-hockey star Mark Messier has been trying to turn the vacant 100-year-old facility into a𒁏 national ice rink that would gin up at least 200 jobs. That’s something, anyway.
Yet Messier and his partners have had to fight with the city 💮over the lease and financing. So they sued. But last month Bronx Supreme Court Justice Rub🦋en Franco tossed the case and urged the parties to work out their differences.
How much longer before anyone sees an💯y jobs at Kingsbridge? And here’s a rich irony:💞 Had the mall gone forward, workers today would have been well on track to earn $15 an hour by the end of 2018.
Does Diaz still “feel good?”