Sculptor Oded Halahmy lit one of his own menorahs Monday night for a Hanukkah celebration at the Pomegranate Gallery in Soho. Halahmy, who makes a new menorah every year, said under Sephardic Jewish tradition, the primary candle or shamash is not lit first as it is done in Askenazi lightings.

The image of fi refi ghters rescuing a cat stuck in a tree is a feel-good cliché. But fi re- fi ghters rescuing dogs stuck in the subway — well, the answer seems to be “no way.” Dogs, that is — as in a run- away hot dog cart.

Tuesday night, just before 8 p.m., Mamun Alsasua was starting to move his hot dog cart from its usual spot at Spring St. and Sixth Ave., to head to his garage at Lafayette and E. Fourth Sts.,

and turned on its battery- powered motor, which helps the journey. But somehow the cart went shooting away like a rocket. Alsasua tried to stop it by directing it into the wall of the entrance to the C/E subway station — but the cart bounced off the handrail and went hurtling through the entrance, set- tling on a landing about 10 or 15 stairs below. Luckily, no one was on the usually busy stairs at the time.

Julie Menin will leave Community Board 1 in June, after chairing the board for five years.

“This was a very difficult personal decision for me,” Menin said as she made the announcement at Tuesday night’s monthly board meet- ing. “I can’t tell you how much I love this board. This has been such a huge part of my life.”

Menin, 42, said chair- ing the board is a full-time job, and she no longer has the time it demands. Menin launched a cable TV inter- view show earlier this year, and she said she also wants to spend time with her three young sons.

“In all fairness, the right thing to do is to have someone who can commit themselves full-time to the board,” Menin said. “I can’t do that at this time.”

Menin will stay on as chair until her term expires in June, but she announced her decision early because many board members were asking her about her plans. Menin has been edging out of local politics over the past year, since she decided not to run for City Council, and speculation was growing that she would not run again for chairperson. Her board membership term ends in April, but she said Borough President Scott Stringer has agreed to keep her on C.B. 1

The Metropolitan Transportation Authority unanimously approved mas- sive service cuts Wednesday to fi ll a sudden $400 million shortfall.

The cuts are still subject to pub- lic hearings and political negotiating, which could reduce their severity, and they would not take effect until the middle of next year. But for now, they paint a dismal picture of the M.T.A.’s

In Lower Manhattan, straphangers will lose the W and Z subway lines and the M6 and M8 buses. Other bus routes will close at night or on the weekend, and all subways will run less frequently. The M.T.A. also plans to phase out free MetroCards for students and reduce Access-A-Ride service for the handicapped and the elderly.

twice,” State Sen. Daniel Squadron said Tuesday. “There’s something wrong with this picture.”

Squadron said the M.T.A.’s constant wavering on a fi nancial cliff shows the need for a steady revenue stream, which could come from congestion pricing or tolls on the East River and Harlem River bridges, plans that failed to pass the state Legislature this year and last.

Councilmember Alan Gerson got a standing ovation Tuesday night when he spoke at his last Community Board 1 meeting before leaving offi ce. Gerson seemed in good spir- its, telling the board “this is my last presentation to you as councilmember, at least this time around.”

Tuesday night was also the last community board meet- ing for Barry Skolnick, who is moving to Rochester, Minn. in January after decades of fighting for quality of life issues Downtown. Many members of the community offered Skolnick thanks and good wishes, including Assembly Speaker Shelly Silver and C.B. 1 Chairperson Julie Menin, who presented Skolnick with a certificate.

Skolnick said he recently ran into Al Franken and intro- duced himself, telling the Minnesota senator that he had a new constituent.

Skolnick said he hoped to see the senator frequently in Rochester. If not, Franken can count on hearing from Skolnick.

Of all the sendoffs Skolnick received, perhaps the most appropriate came from his neighbor Linda Belfer: “Go get ’em, kid.”

When talk turned to struggling small businesses at Tuesday night’s C.B. 1 meeting, Bruce Ehrmann made a plea for Tribeca’s Square Diner.

his business has dropped even lower than it was after 9/11. The diner at the corner of Leonard and Varick Sts. has been in Karounos’ family since 1971 and it has been around for close to 100 years — Karounos found an old picture from the 1920s showing a wooden shack on the same lot, also

Kellund, owner of Metro Parties (the “strip club to go” or the “darlings of Wall St.,” he told us), says that one of Tiger’s alleged concubines, Loredana Ferriolo, used to “dance” for hedge fund managers Downtown about eight years ago. Ferriolo has denied news reports that she wanted $1 million from Woods to keep her silence. Kellund is upset that every- one wants to “jump on the bandwagon to try and get a few bucks,” and that Ferriolo is allowing her family’s name to be dragged through the mud.

She was a good girl from a nice Long Island family, he says. He said the women who work for him just strip and do not engage in prostitution. That’s why he wants them out of the business after two years — so they avoid spiraling downward. If only all sex trade operators were such feminist champions.

The spokesperson is Errol Cockfield, who was answering questions about the L.M.D.C. a couple years ago as spokes- person for the agency’s parent organization, the Empire State Development Corp. Since then, Cockfield has worked as an adviser on intergovernmental affairs to Gov.David

The L.M.D.C. may not sound as exciting as Albany politics, but Cockfield said he was happy to be back Downtown representing the L.M.D.C. He got a warm reception Monday night from Community Board 1’s World Trade Center Redevelopment Committee, where members appreciated his detailed presentation on the Deutsche Bank building.

EDITORIAL PAGES............20-21 YOUTH. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .22 ARTS. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .23-26

The upcoming week’s schedule of Community Board 1 committee meetings is below. Unless otherwise noted, all committee meetings are held at the board office, located at 49-51 Chambers St., room 709 at 6 p.m.

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Assembly Speaker Sheldon Silver told Downtown Express Tuesday that “everything is on the table” to avoid the cuts, including congestion pricing and bridge tolls. However, Silver said those plans would only work if the M.T.A. improved its credibility and spent the toll money on improvements like express buses for the outer boroughs

The M.T.A. needs “to use the funds that are raised to enhance — to enhance— mass transit,” Silver said, “not to buy back a doomsday budget, so you’re buying back the same thing over and over and over again. That’s unacceptable.”

While Silver said he could support congestion pricing, he scoffed at Mayor Michael Bloomberg’s mention of it during an interview with CNBC at a climate conference in Copenhagen Tuesday. Silver said Bloomberg would have to fight more effectively for congestion pricing in order for it to have a chance to pass. The mayor said he thought Albany would have no choice but to consider some form of traffic pricing, but it’ll be up to the Legislature.

Silver was more supportive of a plan floated earlier this week by Gene Russianoff, from the Straphangers Campaign, and Council Speaker Christine Quinn. They proposed using $90 million in federal stimulus funds to help fill the M.T.A.’s operating budget gap. Silver said it made sense to use stimulus funds because the economic downturn is partly responsible for the M.T.A.’s problems, though he also want- ed the agency to make additional administrative cuts. The Russianoff-Quinn plan also calls for the M.T.A. to transfer $50 million from its capital budget to its operating budget. Together with the stimulus money, that would prevent the bus and subway cuts.

The M.T.A.’s fi nancial trouble only surfaced recently, when several things happened almost simultaneously: The state cut the M.T.A.’s budget by $143 million; the revenue from the payroll tax fell $100 million short of the state’s projections; and the M.T.A. lost a $91 million dispute with a union.

Earlier this year, when the state Legislature put together a package including the payroll tax to avoid the M.T.A.’s previ- ous doomsday budget, the M.T.A. promised not to make any service cuts and not to raise fares in 2010, though increases are coming in 2011 and 2012.

The M.T.A. is keeping its promise on no fare increase next year, but service cuts are a different matter. Bus riders will notice some of the biggest changes Downtown: In addi- tion to axing the M6, which runs along Broadway, Church St. and Sixth Ave., and the M8, which runs on Eighth St., the M.T.A. would end weekend service on the M21 (Houston St. to Bellevue Hospital) and M22 (Battery Park City to the Lower East Side). The M22 would also stop running over- night, as would the M1, which goes along Broadway. Other lines that will see cutbacks include the M11 (Harlem to the

Subways won’t fare much better. The W will stop running down Broadway, but its route will be covered by the R and the N, which will begin running local in Manhattan. The M.T.A.’s previous doomsday plan would have closed R/W stations below Canal St. late at night, but all stations will stay open under this new plan.

The M.T.A. is also cutting the Z train, which runs from the Chambers St. to Brooklyn, and is discontinuing rush-hour ser- vice on the M train from Lower Manhattan to Bay Parkway.

The Downtown Alliance said in a press release that the M.T.A. cuts “could do a disproportionate amount of harm” in Lower Manhattan, since 90 percent of the people who work Downtown take mass transit or walk. Many businesses

Pat Moore, chairperson of C.B. 1’s Quality of Life Committee, said the service cuts would be even more dif- ficult to take on top of the regular subway outages related to construction. All subway lines serving Lower Manhattan will see weekend closures over the next couple years because of the World Trade Center and Fulton Transit Center work.

Three women visiting Caring Community’s senior center at Independence Plaza Wednesday said the cuts would affect them, but said they were most concerned about the families who would have to pay to send their children to school. The M.T.A. plans to eliminate half of the student MetroCards next fall and the rest in fall 2011. Lenore, who like one of her friends declined to give her last name and age, said her grandchildren live with her in Tribeca and take the subway to school.

In the warmer months, Joyce Perciaccanto takes three buses to get to her doctor on the Upper East Side including the M20, which will have reduced hours.

She takes Access-A-Ride when it’s cold and said she didn’t want to be driven to cold bus stops or handicapped- accessible subways, as the M.T.A. is planning. She said she couldn’t imagine waiting any longer for the M20. “It’s bad enough as it is,” she said.

“Let Bloomberg pay for it, he’s got plenty of billions,” said Pat, who uses the M6 and M20. But Perciaccanto was skeptical the cuts would really happen.

The Metropolitan Transportation Authority
preliminarily approved these Lower Manhattan
service cuts Wednesday. They would not take
effect until early next year.