The Vanishing City (2010)
Battle For Brooklyn (2011)
The Domino Effect (Fall 2011)
A compelling documentary, “The Vanishing City,”contains a startling quote from Mayor Michael Bloomberg: “If New York is a business it’s a high-end product, it isn’t Wal-Mart…It’s a luxury product. New York offers tremendous value, but only for those companies able to capitalize on it.” The statement stings like a slap in the face to tax-paying residents, be they renter or owner, who thought the City was first and foremost a place to live and work. Or are we all meant to shop Fendi and lunch at the Oak Room?
So, what’s wrong with a plutocracy? Winning Best Short Documentary at the 2010 Harlem International Film Festival, and, closer to home, Best Feature Documentary in the 2010 Williamsburg International Film Festival, filmmakers Fiore DeRosa and Jen Senko go back to the economic downturn of the 1970s—and the proposed recovery that became the model for today’s New York open for-global business. The likes of J.P. Morgan Chase, Goldman Sachs, and Merrill Lynch were offered sweet tax deals to stay in town. But, many jobs were outsourced anyway, and some corporations left New York for cheaper pastures. The policy model that big business would save New York translated into trouble for small businesses serving communities. And, as soon became clear, the mega-corporate model put all the city’s economic eggs in one undiversified basket, as small businesses suddenly faced real estate values and taxation that ripped them apart.