10/24/06
6:15 PM
The State Politic
Gifford Miller Makes His Move
Gifford Miller has been teaching politics at NYU since the spring, avoiding the practice of politics since losing in last year's Democratic mayoral primary and being term-limited out of his job as City Council speaker. Until tonight.
Miller is launching "Fair Share New York" with a party at Georgette Mosbacher's Upper East Side apartment. "The city starts the game $20 billion behind," Miller says. "That's how much more in taxes we send to Albany and Washington than we get back." Fair Share will ask New York's prolific political donors — "six zip codes in the city contributed $61 million to federal candidates last year," Miller points out — to close their checkbooks until public officials promise a more equitable split for the city.
By decrying the imbalance, Miller joins an exalted line of advocates. Senator Daniel Patrick Moynihan started making the point early and eloquently in the seventies, and last April, Mayor Michael Bloomberg invited some of the city's biggest political cash machines to lunch at the Four Seasons and gave each a handy wallet-size card listing the demands they should make on the city's behalf. Not much has changed over the years, however. "Senators, governors, mayors, they have a lot on their plates," Miller says. "I think it will be valuable to have one organization that focuses only on this."
That the Republican doyenne Mosbacher is hosting Fair Share's event is only one indication of the eclectic, well-connected board Miller has assembled. It includes Bloomberg administration vets Marc Shaw and Bill Cunningham as well as Republican eminence John Whitehead and Democratic financier Robert Zimmerman. It's the kind of bipartisan coalition that a smart, 36-year-old former elected official looking to position himself for a new office might put together. Miller laughs. "This is not my political vehicle, and I'm not looking to be its face," he says. "I'm enjoying being out of office. My Microsoft Outlook calendar only runs until 2020. After that, I don't know."
— Chris Smith
What Up, G? [NYM]
