Charles Rangel, Ethics? Censure? Rent Control, Herman Badillo, Ed Koch
Read more articles on Finance and Politics and Real Estate.August 1, 2008
Posted by neillevine
August 1, 2008
Posted by neillevine
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It appears the Honorable Charles Rangel, powerful Chairman of the House Ways and Means Committee, has an ethics problem. Serious questions have been raised about his living arrangements, specifically his lease of not one, but four, rent controlled New York City apartments.
Rent Control is the local real estate law that keeps the cost of apartments below market rates so long as the place is the renter’s primary residence. There are also special terms and conditions attached to such a deal. For example, if the rent for the apartment goes over two thousand dollars a month or if the income of the renter is more than one hundred seventy five thousand per year for two consecutive years the rent for the apartment is supposed to go to market rate which is far more than what Chairman Rangel is paying. Since the good Democrat is paying over three thousand dollars per month he fails the rent test and since his annual income is also over the one hundred seventy five thousand dollar threshold he fails that criterion also. So the rent for his apartment should go up, way up. Yet this has not happened as of yetr. So he faces an official ethics probe because elected federal officials are not supposed to accept any favor or gift. A landlord who applies the rules to any tenant should apply them to the Chairman of the House Ways and Means Committee.
This raises the question of what is going on. Representative Rangel claims he has been renting three of the apartments for a very long time and has announced he is willing to give up the fourth apartment, which he had been using as a district office. But his actions thus far ignore the fundamental violation of the principal of f equality that he and his Democratic colleagues espouse so loudly.
Nor is Charles Rangel seeking to correct the situation immediately by agreeing to pay market rates and possibly giving up his extra rooms. This has given the Republicans fodder to make political hay over his lack of compliance with the rules. The tabling of the Motion to Censure Chairman Rangel is typical partisanship since the Republicans are looking to distract attention from Senator Ted Stevens problems. Tit for tat always assures the voting public of even handed fair play for all, don’t you know.
Then there is his fund raising activities for something called the Charles Rangel Center For Public Service. Talk about a big ego. It seems he has been using official government stationery to raise money. Except this is a private endeavor, not a government sponsored operation. He may be a very important person but he is not the United States government and should not make the slightest hint that he is.
One reason I am raising these issues is that a good while ago Congressman Rangel along with two colleagues at the time, Herman Badillo and Edward I. Koch, once offered to help me with a very important project.
That did not happen. So I continue to wait and complain and point out the political cynicism that patronage standards make on the public consciousness.
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