Those were David Bauer's words Thursday night after a telephone conversation with Assemblymember Pete Grannis. He went on to say, "One day we're up, the next we're down, in terms of achieving what the people on the Island have expressed their desire for."

At that particular moment, Bauer said he felt somewhere between an up and a down. "Pete has said he will explore further what might be done to work with the Senate and Senator [Olga] Mendez on this. We appreciate that effort."

Grannis told The WIRE he sees problems in the version of the legislation generated by Senator Olga Mendez's office in consultation with representatives of the Governor. Those concerns center on the Island's financial needs, and in particular its capital requirements.

Those are the same concerns advanced by Residents Association President Patrick Stewart, in both public and private statements, and in his WIRE column (July 4 issue). Stewart has cited a long and expensive list of capital requirements that went begging during the three-year tenure of Dr. Jerome Blue in the Presidency of the Roosevelt Island Operating Corporation. Blue had declared the Island "self-sufficient," but only, Stewart says, by maintaining the Island "to an obviously decreased standard, so long as he neglected to address... the infrastructure maintenance that had historically cost $5 to 6.5 million a year."

As Stewart points out, a neglected infrastructure can turn on you.

One of the ambiguities lurking in the legislation has to do with just how much a reconstituted RIOC would be required to fund infrastructure maintenance and other capital needs from existing Island revenue streams. An MTG negotiating group had attempted to resolve that ambiguity in the Island's favor on a recent Albany trip by asking Senator Mendez to rewrite the bill to insure State help if the Island faced a capital need exceeding half a million dollars.

By Thursday the word had come from Mendez's office that the Governor's office seemed to be "softening" on the capital matter, but had concerns about other revisions requested by MTG - concerns that could not be resolved quickly.

In an MTG meeting Monday night (July 26), members had asked Patrick Stewart to withdraw his opposition to the current form of the legislation, citing a danger that without a resident-controlled RIOC Board, a good deal of ill-advised development might be undertaken soon. Stewart, leaving the meeting early, told MTG members that he had not made up his mind, but felt that flaws in the Mendez version of the legislation would keep it locked up in an Assembly committee.

After Stewart's departure from the MTG meeting, members of the organization talked about alternative scenarios (editorial). Under the first scenario, the State Legislature would pass the current bill (and the Governor would presumably sign it into law), flawed or not, in order to take development decisions out of the hands of a RIOC President and RIOC Board, all of whom are non-resident (save David Kraut; see interview, this issue). Such a move might later require amendments, but MTG members felt that residents would have an easier time coping with the financial problems that would come with self-governance than with a RIOC development engine that might be unresponsive to residents - perhaps even unstoppable.

Under a second scenario, the self-governance legislation would be improved, but it would not be enacted for some time, and election of a RIOC Board composed of Island residents would not occur until November, 2000, at the earliest. The fear is that in the interim, some irretrievable approvals of unwanted development might be given by the current RIOC Board.

Voting at the end of the meeting, MTG members unanimously supported taking action to get immediate passage of the existing bill. In the difficult trade-offs available, the group felt it important for a resident Board to take control, to forestall any development not in residents' interest. It was saying, in effect, that the financial problems under self-governance would be more manageable than the risks and problems residents would face under the present system.

But by Thursday, it appeared unlikely MTG would get immediate passage. There were the financial concerns put forward by Grannis, an uncertain schedule for the State Senate, and a commitment already in place from Mendez to seek involvement in the process of redeveloping legislation by the new President of RIOC, Robert Ryan.

Grannis told The WIRE the Legislature will be busy throughout the Fall season, and that work can continue on finding a workable formula that will satisfy his concerns, be acceptable to the Governor, and meet Roosevelt Island's needs. Mendez said Thursday afternoon that "next year" she wants to bring Grannis in at the very beginning to pursue self-governance legislation for Roosevelt Island "with a united front."