Adriano Espaillat voted for a gas tax holiday -- which won't even help lower costs at the pump -- on the dime of the 70 percent of his constituents who don't own a car. Photo: Chu for Daily News

The New York State Senate voted for a “gas tax holiday” yesterday, moving to eliminate the three state taxes on fuel for the busy Memorial Day, Independence Day and Labor Day weekends this year. The estimated loss of revenue would be $60 million.

The 48 state senators who voted for the gas tax holiday wanted to ensure that drivers didn’t have to pay for the environmental and social costs of their actions — a misguided enough goal — but their desperate attempt to pander wouldn’t even have been a success on those grounds.

As economists from across the political spectrum have stated, a summertime gas tax holiday wouldn’t reduce the price at the pump. Oil companies would charge the same rate and pocket the difference. The libertarian Cato Institute, no friend of taxes, called gas tax holidays a “holiday from reality” in 2008. If we really must pander to motorists, surely we can all agree that New Yorkers deserve better panderers.

Those state senators, however, are savvy politicos. They can’t deliver the goods, but they know their audience. That’s where the gas tax vote is especially revealing.

Even if a gas tax holiday worked as promised, reducing the price at the pump instead of increasing Exxon’s profit margins, it’s a sure thing where the money comes from: the state’s transportation budget. If the gas tax holiday costs $60 million, that’s $60 million in new revenues needed for the MTA and state DOT, or $60 million more in cuts to things like education. While only drivers would even theoretically benefit, everyone else would pay the price.

Voting for a gas tax holiday means you’re worried about appeasing drivers in your district and not too concerned with sending everybody else the bill. That’s probably good politics if you’re Patrick Gallivan, the Western New York senator whose district has a 96 percent car ownership rate according to Streetsblog’s analysis of Census data. More outrageous is the fact that many New York City senators seem to agree.

The worst offender is new Upper Manhattan rep Adriano Espaillat. He voted for the gas tax holiday even though 70 percent of households in his district do not own a car. He thinks all of them need to pay to keep things easier for the other, wealthier, 30 percent. Almost as galling are the yes votes from Senate Transportation Committee chair Martin Dilan (whose district is 66 percent car-free), Ruben Diaz, Sr. (63 percent car free) and Eric Adams (62 percent car-free). Adams and Bronx Senator Jeff Klein had floated a similar idea in 2008, proposing to suspend tolls on bridges and tunnels while giving drivers a “gas tax rebate.”

Now that such a shameless pander has actually come up for a vote, kudos are due to Shirley Huntley, Toby Ann Stavisky and Diane Savino, the only three senators who voted against the gas tax holiday despite having a majority car-owning district. You can see the full, short list of senators who voted against handing the oil companies extra millions in the roll call.

Luckily, there is no indication that the Republican-sponsored plan is going anywhere in the State Assembly.

The four Democrats running to replace Eric Schneiderman in the State Senate - Miosotis Muñoz, Mark Levine, Anna Lewis, and Adriano Espaillat - met last night to debate transportation policy. They were joined by Green Ann Roos, not pictured.

Five candidates vying to become Upper Manhattan’s next state senator met in the 168th Street Armory last night to make their case to the car-free voters of Riverdale, Inwood, Washington Heights, West Harlem, and the Upper West Side. At a debate sponsored by Transportation Alternatives and WE ACT for Environmental Justice, important differences emerged over how best to solve the MTA’s budget crisis and make streets safe for pedestrians and cyclists.

Democrats Adriano Espaillat, Miosotis Muñoz, Mark Levine, and Anna Lewis were joined last night by Green Party candidate Ann Roos. Whoever wins, the victor’s first term will be dominated by the ongoing budget crisis afflicting the state of New York, which affects transit quite directly. State legislators made the MTA’s funding crisis even worse last December by stealing more than $100 million in dedicated transit taxes to plug gaps in the general fund. The debate began with a revealing discussion of how each candidate would secure adequate funding for transit given the current fiscal climate.

Assembly Member Espaillat, considered the front-runner due to an advantage in name recognition, strong fund-raising and prominent endorsements, began with a warning: “It would be irresponsible of me to say there’s not a deficit that’s going to hit across the board,” he said. Without new revenue, the legislature will be forced to make impossible choices between priorities like education, health care, and transportation.

Though he didn’t make a specific revenue proposal during the debate, afterwards Espaillat told me that “congestion pricing is certainly something that we must bring back to the table.” He argued against cobbling together a piecemeal funding scheme for transit, saying that “the main engine of economic development in our community” needs a “solid revenue stream.” Even so, he maintained his opposition to any tolls over the Harlem River bridges, which carry torrents of toll-shopping drivers through the district.

Mark Levine, considered to be a close second to Espaillat, also argued that congestion pricing would be the best solution. “I also support, short of that, a plan to toll the East River bridges,” he explained. Harlem River bridge tolls were conspicuously absent, however, a stance that he earlier explained to Streetsblog by characterizing those bridges as essentially local streets.

The other two Democrats, Muñoz and Lewis, each suggested reinstating the commuter tax to raise revenue.

While each candidate disregarded moderator instructions to offer transit solutions aside from the standard calls to better manage the MTA, Lewis was particularly vociferous in her denouncements of the authority. “I don’t believe it’s because they’re underfunded,” she argued in response to Espaillat and Levine. “What they’ve done is, for the most part, cooked their books. It’s all a lie.”

Roos rejected any attempt to balance the budget that would affect working- or middle-class New Yorkers — which, in her view, even encompassed road-pricing solutions that would benefit lower-income residents. “I am opposed to fare hikes,” she said. “I am opposed to service cuts. I am opposed to borrowing. I am opposed to congestion pricing. I am opposed to tolls on the East River Bridges. I am opposed to a commuter tax.” What isn’t Roos opposed to? A more progressive income tax and a stock transfer tax, she said, could fund transit and more.

In contrast to some other districts, none of the candidates here dwelled on the most recent round of service cuts. Instead, they emphasized the need for more capital improvements. With tiles falling from station ceilings and broken elevators making it difficult to reach the deeply-buried stations uptown, poor maintenance seemed to be a higher priority than lost bus lines.

After station repairs, though, each had a different priority for improving local transit. Levine would restore lost bus services, while Lewis would work on accessibility for the disabled. Espaillat suggested adding two new Select Bus Service routes to the district — which includes the Fordham Road SBS — one along 181st Street into the Bronx and one connecting to downtown.

When it came to improving street safety, each candidate promised to support the construction of more protected bike lanes, to the extent that they could as a state representative. Levine, who began his remarks by noting that he is a T.A. member and that his whole family bikes, praised the bike lanes on Ninth Avenue and Broadway, saying they’ve “proved the fears of local businesspeople to be unfounded. I think this is ultimately economic development.”

Other suggestions varied widely, however. Lewis put the burden of safety on the victims, pushing helmet laws for cyclists and suggesting that when walking down poorly lit streets, “perhaps we need to ask ourselves to wear protective outerwear to make it easier to see people.” The latter suggestion drew some muffled laughter from the audience.

Levine laid out a laundry list of improvements, including narrowing lanes, expanding medians, and installing countdown clocks at every pedestrian crossing. “Enforcement of the current laws is unacceptably weak,” he said, arguing that police in Upper Manhattan were even less attentive to traffic safety than in the rest of the borough. Overall, he suggested, “I don’t think that motor vehicles should have a monopoly on our streets.”

Muñoz suggested increasing penalties on unsafe drivers. “You’re in a vehicle, you’re in a weapon,” she said.

Espaillat began by calling for lower speed limits, “because it is often speed that leads to these very tragic accidents.” He spent the bulk of his time, though, proposing a comprehensive traffic study of the area. The study would focus on the prevalence of two-way north-south avenues, he suggested, saying that the pedestrian crashes he heard about usually involved cars turning off of those avenues. The DOT’s recently-released pedestrian safety study backs up Espaillat’s intuition, finding that almost half of all pedestrian fatalities in the borough occur on major two-way streets.

In a lightning round of questions at the end of the debate, each candidate promised to support a residential parking permit program and bike/ped access on the state-run Henry Hudson Bridge.

Voters will choose between the four Democrats soon: Election Day is less than a week away, on Tuesday, September 14.

Senate District 31 contenders Miosotis Muñoz, Mark Levine, Anna Lewis, and Adriano Espaillat

Eric Schneiderman has represented District 31 since 1998. Though he has distinguished himself as a progressive who lauded PlaNYC and publicly blamed Albany for abandoning transit riders, Senator Schneiderman has basically been a no-show when it comes to the current MTA budget crisis. Now that Schneiderman's bid for state attorney general has opened up the seat, transit-dependent voters in the district's Democratic primary will have to choose from a field of candidates with varying views on providing the MTA with adequate, long-term funding -- though none are calling for road pricing to shift part of the burden to drivers entering their neighborhoods.

Among District 31 aspirants, Adriano Espaillat is probably the most widely known. That is, the Assembly member is known to be inconsistent when it comes to supporting stable revenue streams for the city's transit system. Espaillat was a vocal supporter of congestion pricing. But a year later he came out strongly against tolling the "free" bridges of Upper Manhattan, and never mind that some 80 percent of households in his Assembly district do not own a car. Espaillat also lambasted the MTA for its plan to cut student MetroCards, insisting that Albany had done its part to shore up transit finances. (Full disclosure: Espaillat, like Schneiderman, represents part of Inwood, where I live. In addition to covering Espaillat's maneuvering for Streetsblog, I posted the occasional related rant on my now-defunct neighborhood blog. Espaillat once accused me of making false statements about his record, but did not respond when pressed for specifics.)

Miosotis Muñoz is a former aide to Congressman Charlie Rangel who served as a Latino organizer for Barack Obama during the 2008 presidential primary. She worked for former Manhattan borough presidents Ruth Messinger and C. Virginia Fields and did a short stint as district manager for Community Board 11. Muñoz told Streetsblog that maintaining and expanding transit service is essential to providing access to jobs while keeping cars off the roads, and cited the Second Avenue subway as a "critical" project.

However, though she supports a return of the commuter tax, Muñoz said she would have to be convinced of the merits of bridge tolls. "To begin with, people are financially strained," said Muñoz, "and they have to go to places where they're going to be able to get the best buck for their money sometimes. To continue to tax people that are already financially strained is going to cause a much more difficult situation for families in terms of how they're going to be able to pay the rent and take care of the essentials." Muñoz said she favors carpool lanes as an incentive to reduce traffic. 

In order to concentrate on his Senate campaign, Mark Levine left his spot on Community Board 12, where he served as chair of the transportation committee. A former teacher and founder of a credit union for low-income Upper Manhattanites, Levine is also a Democratic district leader.

"We need new revenue so [the MTA is] not perpetually on the brink of fiscal insolvency," Levine said. "Albany's been underfunding them for 15 years or more, and we're totally paying the price now."

Levine supports reinstating the commuter tax "in a way that's dedicated to transit," and is in favor of the recently imposed payroll tax on suburban counties. Not surprisingly, Levine is against fare increases. He also believes there is merit to the charge that the MTA suffers from bloat and waste, citing the recent "$100,000 club" storyline as an example. "My sense is that there's probably some room to cut in the central bureaucracy. I know that's generally a cliche that people put forward to avoid tough decisions, but I actually sincerely believe that that needs to be looked at seriously, with so many people making $100,000 or more."

Levine backs tolling the East River bridges, but like Espaillat, he stops short of endorsing a charge for Harlem River crossings. Levine recognizes the cognitive dissonance there, and when I pointed out that bus and subway riders already pay to cross the Broadway and University Heights Bridges, he conceded the point. "I consider myself a very strong advocate for the livable streets agenda," Levine said. However, he concluded, "The sentiment is that those bridges are essentially local streets."

With a slew of big-time endorsements, including that of Schneiderman, Espaillat is the Democratic establishment candidate of choice in this primary. Also in the running is attorney Anna Lewis, who at deadline had not responded to our request for comment on transit funding.

Whomever the voters choose, it looks as if toll-shopping suburban motorists will have nothing to fear from District 31's next representative.

When Albany slapped a Band-Aid over the MTA budget hole last spring, no one except the architects of the plan pretended that the transit system was actually on sound financial footing. As yet another day of reckoning approaches, lawmakers continue to go to bizarre extremes to avoid admitting that their slipshod funding package has failed.

Though hailing from opposite sides of the aisle, Golden and Espaillat agree: Albany has done its part for city transit riders. Photos: Village Voice/Grand Street News

In describing proposed cuts as "a serious threat by the MTA to get the state legislature to act," Golden seems be acknowledging, in a weird, circular manner, that it’s up to him and his colleagues to properly fund the transit system. But beyond his plan to "call a town hall meeting," what has he brought to the table that would help his constituents who rely on MTA buses and trains?

In the arena of head-spinning nonsensery, Golden has to take a back seat to Adriano Espaillat. As reported in the Manhattan Times, at an event to promote those free student MetroCards that Albany chose to stop funding -- hosted by City Council member, protege, and fellow road pricing critic Ydanis Rodriguez -- the senator from Upper Manhattan unloaded this whopper:

Espaillat said the state government had already filled a hole in the MTA’s budget in the fall, and the authority should find another way to balance its books.

“We gave them money. They should fix our trains. … We gave them money to do that. But we don’t want them to take money about from our children,” he said.

He said he believes threatening the cuts are just a bargaining chip to get the city or state to fill the budget shortfalls of the authority, similar to the 2008-2009 threat to toll East River bridges.

“We stopped them and we can stop them again,” he said.

In other words, Espaillat is boasting that he stopped a funding stream that would have helped "fix our trains."

Contemplating the demise of the M line -- a.k.a. his ride to work -- John Petro of the Drum Major Institute has a piece over at the Huffington Post that plainly lays out Albany's choice: make drivers pay their share for a transit system that reduces traffic, helps the environment, and powers the region's economy, or subject all New Yorkers to a future that resembles the dark days of the city's past.

We wondered a few months back why Upper Manhattan Assembly Member Adriano Espaillat, a supporter of congestion pricing, would side with the usual suspects in opposing Ravitch-backed East and Harlem River bridge tolls. At the time, Espaillat told Streetsblog readers that new tolls would place an unfair burden on his district, and blamed MTA financial woes on "contemptible bookkeeping and abject failure to control spending."

Et tu, Adriano? Photo: Brad Aaron

At a "town hall" meeting in Inwood last Thursday, Streetsblog reader Peter Brinkmann again found the assemblyman indifferent to concerns about auto-inflicted quality of life issues. Writes Peter:

In response to my question about distorted traffic patterns caused by car commuters who take the Broadway bridge [into and out of Inwood] in order to avoid paying the toll for Henry Hudson Bridge, he launched into his usual routine about how East River bridge tolls would be a regressive tax on families; he didn't address the issue of a residential neighborhood serving as a bypass for a major artery. When asked about possibly repaving 218th Street, he seemed to be in favor, in part because 218th Street draws a lot of traffic from drivers who want to avoid Henry Hudson Bridge. In other words, he's aware of distorted traffic patterns and doesn't seem to have a problem with them.

Peter says Espaillat "dismissed the upcoming MTA fare hike as nothing more than a regular increase and didn't address the bigger problem of service cuts." If you're confused as to how a representative from a district where 80 percent of the population relies on transit could be so disconnected, here is Espaillat on the subject of planned improvements to two Inwood 1 train elevated platforms:

When talking about the upcoming renovation of the Dyckman and 207th St stations, he kept talking about the "1 and 9" trains. That might just be some NY verbal tic, like having to say "Z" after saying "J," but I suspect that he doesn't take the subway and hasn't noticed that the 9 train has gone the way of the dodo.

Based on Espaillat's performance during and since the doomsday debacle, we wouldn't be surprised.

Doomsday damage to Inwood (10034) as seen on RPA's live map of planned MTA service cuts

It was a little surprising to see Upper Manhattan Assembly Member Adriano Espaillat, one of the few state electeds to support congestion pricing without reservation, come out so strongly against the Ravitch MTA rescue plan, and the tolling of East and Harlem River bridges in particular. Now we have this recent post from an e-mail list for Inwood parents:

I spoke to Espaillat's office. They insisted that people in the area would rather have higher subway fares and reduced service than tolled bridges. They said the merchants in the area and the car services oppose the bridge tolls.

When MTA doomsday service cuts go into effect, residents of Espaillat's district [PDF] will lose the Bx20 and M18 buses, will see reduced service on the M100 and M2, and will face longer wait times on the A and 1 trains. As an Upper Manhattanite myself, I find it very hard to believe that most of my neighbors -- roughly 80 percent of whom don't own cars -- are willing to accept more crowded buses and trains, which will be fewer in number and cost more to board, so drivers from Westchester can continue to drive through Inwood and Washington Heights for free.

It seems that either Espaillat really has his finger on the pulse of the public, or the merchants and car services have Espaillat's ear. We have a message in with his office in hopes of confirming which is true.

Adriano Espaillat doesn't believe in bridge tolls or parking laws.

Meanwhile, Espaillat's Upper Manhattan colleague Herman "Denny" Farrell, the outspoken (and uninformed) congestion pricing foe, recently made news as the lone Assembly member to report zero personal use of his state-provided vehicle. Has he eschewed his car keys for a MetroCard? Not exactly, as NY Politics reports:

Farrell’s office said the lawmaker never drives his state car for personal use, preferring to tool around in his own convertibles. 

Good to know.

Espaillat and Sander in March 2008. Photo: Brad Aaron.

Nearly a year later, Espaillat stands with Rory Lancman and David Weprin in opposing East and Harlem River bridge tolls. Espaillat, one of 20 state lawmakers to sign an anti-toll letter delivered to Sheldon Silver this week, says he favors a proposal by comptroller and mayoral candidate William Thompson to increase vehicle registration fees -- a plan that has no traction in Albany and would do nothing to cut congestion in Northern Manhattan.

Though just 20 percent of households in Espaillat's district own vehicles, the area is burdened with heavy auto traffic -- a "very serious problem," as Espaillat used to say -- much of it on its way to and from free bridges. Yet rather than get behind a viable, long-overdue plan that would both reduce cut-through driving and spare the majority of his constituents from crushing transit fare hikes and massive service cuts, Espaillat has joined the crowd that wants to keep the floodgates open to Westchester County.

More traffic, more asthma, and a transit system in collapse. What's rational and practical about that?

The red lines show southbound routes through the South Bronx via the "free" Third Ave. Bridge and the tolled Triborough. The blue line charts the toll-free northbound route from the FDR across the Willis Avenue Bridge.

All the gnashing of teeth over East River bridge tolls has for the most part drowned out discussion of the Ravitch Commission's proposal to charge motorists for Harlem River crossings as well. Though the tolls would be substantially lower -- matching the (currently) $2 transit base fare -- it's still too much for two officials from the Bronx and Upper Manhattan.

From Thursday's Daily News, reporting on Richard Ravitch's testimony to state Assembly members:

At Wednesday's hearing, Assemblymen Adriano Espaillat (D-Manhattan) and Carl Heastie (D-Bronx) worried about the impact tolls would have on constituents already struggling to make ends meet.

"As a legislator from the Bronx, you have to understand that the tolling of the bridges is a tough one," Heastie said.

Ravitch agreed, but said drivers would see significant improvements, including expanded bus service so they could consider ditching their cars, less traffic as drivers switch to mass transit and less pollution.

The commission also recommended discounts for drivers not crossing during rush hours, he said.

Not exactly fire-and-brimstone oratory from the Assemblymen, to be sure. Still, Espaillat and Heastie, both of whom backed congestion pricing, know that hundreds of thousands of their constituents are "already struggling to make ends meet" while paying up to $4 each workday for round-trip transit service -- service that will suffer without new MTA revenue streams. Bronx Democratic boss Heastie must also know that "free" Harlem River bridges are an invitation to suburban drivers to trek through his borough.

After the jump, thoughts from a South Bronxite tipster on the plague of the toll-shoppers.

If you live in Connecticut or eastern Westchester County, and you want to get to Manhattan, you would have to be an idiot to pay the $4.15 or $5 Triborough toll. Every Fairfield County resident knows that it is just as easy to take the free Third Avenue Bridge into town and the free Willis Avenue Bridge back home.

The only cost of their free ride is borne by the low-income, minority communities of the South Bronx. East 135th Street might as well be an interstate highway with traffic lights. If you stood for a while in the playground of P.S. 154, between Alexander and Willis, or at the soot-stained ramp to the Third Avenue Bridge, you'd see more than a few toll-shopping Connecticut-plated vehicles.

Why would Bronx politicians allow their borough to be the doormat for wealthy Connecticut drivers?  Not to mention, of course, that over-reliance on the automobile was a major contributor to the 1970s and 80s depopulation of the Bronx, and the arson, crime and mayhem that gave the borough a frightening reputation, spurring further suburbanization and asthma-causing through traffic.

Newell pulled 23 percent of the vote, Henry nine percent. Though the vote tally wasn't close, some pundits are speculating that in mounting the first serious challenge to Silver in years -- reducing him to knocking on doors, of all things -- the Newell campaign may affect the way the speaker conducts business in Albany. That remains to be seen, of course, but Newell had this to say to the Observer early this week:

"I'm running to get the most votes in this election. That said, there's no question we've already brought change. We've already taken on Albany. There's no question about that. And people are scared."

Those scared people, Newell said, are thinking, "Wow, a 33-year-old community organizer can put together a campaign that is going to rock Sheldon Silver with his $3 million in his account, and $8 million in his Speaker's P.A.C. or whatever it is that he's got."

"If we're successful, you're going to see forty or fifty challengers to incumbents in 2010, in both parties," Newell said, adding, "I don't think there's any doubt we had a role in that."

Silver's last primary challenge was in 1986, when John Bal got 20 percent of the vote.  

In the Senate, the talk of the day locally was the defeat of Martin Connor, the 30-year incumbent upended by 28-year-old Daniel Squadron. As Streetsblog readers know, Connor was one of many Albany lawmakers to hold their tongues as congestion pricing went down in April, for which Squadron took him to task during the campaign. What impact pricing had on the race is open to debate, particularly since Connor's Senate District 25 encompasses Assembly District 64 -- home to Sheldon Silver.

In other results, vocal pricing backer Adriano Espaillat held off City Council Member Miguel Martinez in Assembly District 72, which covers Upper Manhattan.

Photo: New York Observer

In the 64th Assembly district, Paul Newell is riding a wave of endorsements from the three major dailies in his campaign against Speaker Sheldon Silver. Newell and fellow challenger Luke Henry have both taken Silver to task over his handling of the congestion pricing vote in April.

Likewise, in the 25th Senate district (which also includes parts of Brooklyn), challenger Dan Squadron has pounced on 30-year incumbent Martin Connor's timid stance on pricing. The back-and-forth battle of endorsements -- Squadron has his mentor Chuck Schumer and Mayor Bloomberg on his side, Connor has fellow Albany Dems on his -- plus Squadron's prodigious fundraising, have made this one of the most closely watched elections this cycle.

Up in the 72nd Assembly district, incumbent Adriano Espaillat faces a challenge from City Council member Miguel Martinez. Both supported congestion pricing, but Espaillat was one of the plan's fiercest advocates. Espaillat also supported the traffic-reducing Gansevoort Waste Transfer Station, which, while outside his district, ran against the wishes of prominent Manhattan Assembly members.

There are plenty of other seats at stake where candidates' views may affect streets and transit. If there's an election with implications for livable streets in your district, or if you've got a story to share from the polls today, tell us all about it in the comments.

Photo: Vidiot/Flickr

Here's a dispatch from one of New York's little-known pedestrian-only streets. Residents of Inwood may see a decade of lobbying pay off over the next year, as the city last week announced the upcoming rehabilitation of the hazardous 215th Step-Street, a block-long staircase connecting Broadway to residential blocks at the northern tip of the neighborhood, along with Isham Park and Inwood Hill Park.

Hilly Northern Manhattan is dotted with step-streets in varying stages of repair, as are the Bronx and areas of Staten Island and Brooklyn. As explained by Forgotten New York, step-streets "were placed on hills that were too steep to build a road, yet in a rare concession to pedestrians, it was determined to allow them access to the streets denied to motor transportation."

Step-streets are maintained by DOT. According to Mark Levine, chair of Community Board 12's Traffic and Transportation Committee (and likely challenger to Denny Farrell for Robert Jackson's term-limited City Council seat), Northern Manhattanites have been asking the city to rebuild the 215th staircase since at least 1999. Writes Levine on his blog:

The stairs have crumbled and cracked with age. Landings have poor drainage and routinely flood, creating hazardous conditions which only worsen in winter when the pools of water turn to ice. Many of the pre-WWII era lamps are broken, leaving stretches of the steps in darkness at night. Hand railings are only partially usable.

Calls for repairs were renewed last year when an Inwood woman tripped on a hole in the stairs, cutting her legs and face. She was carried away by ambulance.

On Monday, August 18, DOT officials joined Assembly Member Adriano Espaillat at the foot of the staircase to announce the reconstruction project, which Espaillat's office tells Streetsblog will be completed next year -- though Levine notes a similar photo op took place in 2005.

Photo: Brad Aaron