Bid Adieu?

The Crain's Insider is reporting this morning that State Supreme Court Justice Lucy Billings, the judge who threw out the award of a 15 acre site in Hunts Point to Baldor's Foods, "may order sweeping changes in the way EDC operates..." The result could very well lead to a ruling that would "specify how EDC is to handle future bids."

For all of us who have marveled at the nimble nature of the EDC bidding process this prospect promotes nothing but anticipatory glee. Anything that creates a degree of transparency and fairness in the awarding of land use contracts is only to the good.

Not that we think any ruling will be earth shattering. These processes tend to revert to form through altered channels once a new direction is mandated. What would be really revolutionary would be the creation of a COIB that actually acted in an independent manner. In fact maybe the City Council, instead of firing pop guns at lobbyists, could look into the Deputy Dan/Steve Ross decision of the COIB as a first step towards making the agency truly independent.