Well, Spotty stirred up the hornet's nest in NYCHA's Executive ranks. And if what we're now told proves true, the hornets will feed on one of their own!
Within minutes of Issue 32 getting faxed into 250 Broadway, the finger pointing began. Roy Sinclair (Deputy General Manager/Finance) was quick to blame Cardenas (DiDirector/Computer Services) for leaking the email (Click Here) that we published in Issue 32 on the Website (NYCHA-Spotlight.com).
(If they would read Issue 7, they should see that we are no fans of Cardenas. But they'd rather believe that their lamb is the source of our info than realize that folks they believe to be in their camp are now fed-up with NYCHA's disregard for the tenants and mistreatment of employees. Those are our sources. But, blame Cardenas if you like, that's alright with us!)
The email in question is the one in which Sinclair admits that after NYCHA has given millions of dollars in contract fees for a modern timekeeping system to Vice-Chair Finkel's (The Fink) friends at Interboro, NYCHA still can't figure out how to use it, or even decide if it's worth using!!!
But, as usual with NYCHA, there is also a sub-agenda being played out in that email. And it's a beaut!
We're being told that the powers-that-(really)-be at NYCHA are preparing sacrificial Y2K lambs that can be led to slaughter on January 1, 2000, and Cardenas is their first pick. This victimization is necessary because:
- 1) NYCHA is NOT ready for the Y2K problem.
- 2) Even NYCHA's long-term work on an updated payroll system has fallen, and the paychecks are now processed through NY City's computers.
- 3) NYCHA has run out of Y2K funding.
So, when something fails in the opening days of the New Year, the cry from the 9th floor at 250 Broadway will be "Off with Cardenas's head!" That's why he was dissed by Sinclair
Of course, NYCHA had sent someone from Computer Services to school to learn everything there was to know about preparing for Y2K, and they sent that person in plenty of time to work the various fixes needed prior to the New Year. Back in 1995-1996 they sent Bruce Gatewood, the then Director of Computer Services. And if Finkel/Franco would have acted on one of the first few sexual harassment complaints against Bruce, they might have punished him administratively, forced him into some program to enlighten the perve, and then still retained the Y2K knowledge that NYCHA had purchased.
But, no! Bruce was under the protection of Vice-Chair Finkel, so nothing was done until Bruce had assaulted/offended enough women to possibly qualify for the world record in short term sexual harassment. So many complaints that even the Fink couldn't protect him any longer and he, along with NYCHA's Y2K fixes, were gone!
Ah, but I digress.
So, having Cardenas groomed to take the fall, the Y2K problem becomes less of an embarrassment to NYCHA.
However, those powers-that-be* are not used to placing blame directly on a fellow NYCHA Executive. It scares the hell out of them that someday they might be held responsible for problems in their respective Department/Units. The usual way to handle embarrassing problems is to blame the lowest salaried individual unlucky enough to have left a fingerprint somewhere in the vicinity of the glitch.
Therefore, they are also preparing other lambs for that slaughter.
They are whispering about a problem involving 700 NYCHA computers. The whisperers are placing blame on another Computer Services member, and they hope to lump Cardenas and this person into a Y2K camouflaged "blind", behind which they can hide from HUD or the City Council, if either body deigned to concern themselves with NYCHA and its many problems.
So take this as a Spotlight word of warning. Stay away from Computer Services, or anything that in any way might be effected by the Y2K double-digit date problem. Because those powers-that-be* just might want a few more lambs to sacrifice!
© 1999 Public Housing Spotlight and John Ballinger. All rights reserved.
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