It seems to me that the drunken cops episode assumes its proper significance when viewed in the context the fight to save the studio complex at 111 First Street and utimately the PAD itself, and the extent to which Lloyd Goldman and his minions were willing to go to get what Goldman wanted.

What Lloyd wanted was to build a 22-storey hi-rise on that site. To accomplish this he would have had to overturn all the city ordinances and historic designations that were part of the original plan to redevelop the old warehouse district as the Powerhouse Arts District (PAD). That plan was worked out by the City and the Urban Land Institute and was supported by every successive mayor except Jerramiah T. Heally.

Goldman’s lawyers filed a barrage of lawsuits against the city, also targetting various other civic organiztions and individuals, attacking WALDO, and attacking the various historic landmark designations assigned to 111 First Street and to the entire PAD. His argument was that the State was interfering with his Constitutional right to turn as big a profit as possible on his speculative real estate investment, and that he had a Constitutional right to do whatever the hell he wanted to with his property. No shit. Keep in mind that the properties in question were not at the time nor have they ever been zoned for purely residential use. Ever.

So you’ve got cops on video drunk as a skunk, toting guns and badges, in front of the building they were hired to guard.

You’ve got Lloyd Goldman, billionaire landlord who hired the cops, who were just a small part of his agenda which was to evict the Arts Center, demolish 111 First Street and replace it with a 22-storey luxury hi-rise, apparently by whatever means necessary.

There’s the coincidental jump in the crime rate on those premises, including car bashings and arsons.

There’s the campaign of harassment by police and BLDG Management Co. personnel that included the dismantling of the heating system in winter and the typical civil rights violations, including forcibly entering residences without cause and forcibly seizing and ejecting members of the press.

The lackadaisical response of the Mayor, Internal Affairs, and the local press are a matter (just barely) of public record. So is the Mayor’s sudden flip-flopand withdrawal of city support for the Arts Center almost as soon as he was elected.

The array of lawsuits noted above were eventually resolved in the now infamous “settlement” between Goldman and the City, forcing Goldman to give up his plan to build a 22-storey luxury condo in the PAD and instead build two luxury condos of 40-plus storeys in the PAD. The other details of the deal are equally ludicrous but not worth the space to detail here. I’m sure there’s someone out there who will fill us in eventually.

The settlement was made public just a couple of days before it was summarily approved over the jeers an catcalls of the crowd of citizens who filled the Council chamber to protest. Other legal professionals at the hearing described Goldman’s lawsuits as unwinnable and frivolous, tantamount to a very expensive bluff, and urged the council to lay down the law to the rogue developer.

No politician in his right mind, however, wants a billionaire developer for an enemy when he could have him for a friend.

Parts of Lee Perry’s commentary along with the Japanese documentary footage give us only a partial picture of an invaluable and unique cultural resource Jersey City lost forever so Goldman could build his hi-rises.

Besides presiding over a municipal bureaucracy that is periodically in the news for all the wrong reasons, and besides periodically conducting himself in ways that are an ongoing embarassment to Jersey City, Jerramiah T. Healy has arguably done more damage to the arts community in Jersey City than any other mayor –ever. He and his cronies should be held accountable at least for that.

And yeah—stop pimping out the police force to people who use them dishonorably and reduce them to the level of thugs. The good cops deserve better than that and so do we.