TWEETING TO THE RESCUE? HOW THE MAYOR OF NEWARK USED SOCIAL MEDIA TO IMPROVE PUBLIC SERVICE DELIVERY

Some news writers christened the 2010 Christmas weekend blizzard the Great Tsnownami or Snowmageddon. As nearly two feet of snow buried New York in deep drifts, in one of the five worst storms ever to hit the metropolitan region, thousands of flights were canceled and Amtrak was stalled for two days. Dozens of ambulances became stuck in drifts and even heavy front-loaders had to be tugged out of clogged city streets.

Local newspapers complained about the pace of snow removal. The website of the New York Daily News ran a photo of the Staten Island home of John Doherty, the sanitation commissioner. “Does your street look like this?” the website asked. That street, the Daily News said, “was plowed clean,” but “the dead-end streets on either side of his block remained a snow-choked winter blunderland.”1 (Links to an external site.)

New York Mayor Michael Bloomberg acknowledged that “many New Yorkers are suffering serious hardships.” He also said, however, “The world has not come to an end.” In fact, “The city is going fine. Broadway shows were full last night. There are lots of tourists here enjoying themselves. I think that the message is that the city goes on.” A New York Times writer thought wryly of Bloomberg’s comment as he was looking at two men trying to push a Cadillac Escalade out of a Brooklyn snowbank, with the smell of burning rubber from spinning tires in the air. Were they thinking of taking in a Broadway play, the writer asked? One of the men trying to free the Escalade was incredulous. “Take in a play?” he asked. “What does the mayor suggest? Walking?” Times Square, after all, was a ten-mile hike or a half-hour drive, even in good traffic without snow.2 (Links to an external site.)

Across the Hudson River, Newark Mayor Cory Booker was camped on Twitter (http://twitter.com/corybooker (Links to an external site.)) and was putting his own shoulder to the shovel. One woman said she was stuck and needed to get to a medical procedure. “I will dig you out. Where are you?” he tweeted. One Twitter follower worried about how Booker’s back was holding up. “Thanks 4 asking, back killing me,” he responded. “Breakfast: Advil and Diet Coke.”

Booker assured residents he was personally on the case. Two days after the storm ended, he tweeted, “Stepping off streets for hour or so 2 take a meeting I couldn’t cancel. We still have dozens of trucks & 100s of workers out clearing snow.” When he got out of the meeting, he told a worried resident, “I’m on my way to Treamont Ave now to help dig your mom out.” Then a tweet arrived: “don’t forget brunswick street by astor.” He was quickly back in touch. “Thanks for the heads up. I’m sending a crew. It will be there in a bit.” From a worried resident, about Booker’s trademark look: “Saw u out there on S Orange. Put a hat on that head. Us baldies can’t be going commando out there.” The reply: “No need I’ve got a hot head.”

Snow removal has a long history of causing officials heartburn, both political and administrative. Chicago Mayor Michael Bilandic lost a primary election in 1979 because, most local political analysts believed, local voters punished him for failing to respond quickly enough to a major blizzard. In 1969, another New York blizzard so politically crippled Mayor John Lindsay that he never recovered. When he visited Queens, residents scorned him. “You should be ashamed of yourself,” screamed one angry woman. Another said, “Get away, you bum.”3 (Links to an external site.)

Booker was determined to avoid that fate. A tweet arrived: “quitman/spruce need plowing. noone has touch those streets—becoming dangerous.” He shot back, “We r on it. DM me ur # if u want 2 talk.”

Notes

1. (Links to an external site.) Edgar Sandoval and Larry McShane, “Sanitation Boss John Doherty’s Street Plowed Clean, but Nearby Streets Remain Winter Blunderland,” New York Daily News (December 29, 2010), http://www.nydailynews.com/ny_local/2010/12/29/2010-12-29_a_madhouse_out_there_but_not_for_boss.html (Links to an external site.).

2. (Links to an external site.) Michael Powell, “For a Snow-Crippled City, a Morsel of Humble Pie from the Mayor,” New York Times (December 28, 2010), http://www.nytimes.com/2010/12/29/nyregion/29about.html (Links to an external site.).

3. (Links to an external site.) Sewall Chan, “Remembering a Snowstorm That Paralyzed the City,” New York Times (February 10, 2009), http://cityroom.blogs.nytimes.com/2009/02/10/remembering-a-snowstorm-that-paralyzed-the-city (Links to an external site.).

QUESTION:

1. The rise of social media has changed the decision-making landscape — both in how officials make decisions and how they are seen to make decisions. In 2 paragraphs or less, explain how might we use social media (or technology) to improve the delivery of public goods and services.  You should use a specific type of social media and a specific good or service.  

Reflection (20 points)

Dear Students,

Before we move on to chapters in Part IV, I want us to take a little break this week to reflect on Forensic Linguistics.

Please respond to the following TWO questions (10 points each):

1. We have read 8 chapters from the textbook so far. Which chapter did you find most fascinating? Explain with specifics. (100-150 words)

2. Do you think what you have learned so far in forensic linguistics will help you in your career? Explain how or why not (100-150 words)

the topic that I have chosen to use is: The Use of Private Prisons and how they are unethical, cost more than public prisons, and do not lessen the tax burden on tax-paying citizens. I am attaching the guidelines.

You are a new police officer.  You have a daughter, and a family who greets you at home after every work shift.  One day, you are assigned to a rough neighborhood.  You’ve heard about this neighborhood from fellow officers.  Previous officers have been shot and killed in this neighborhood.  So you patrol the neighborhood on high alert. 

As you and your partner patrol, you notice an old white car with a broken tail light driving down the lane at a legal speed.  You pull the car over.  You approach the car and notice a man in the driver’s seat, a woman in the passenger seat, and a young female child in the backseat.  You inform the driver that his tail light is out and ask for his license and registration.  He calmly and respectfully hands you his registration.  As he is reaching for his license, he informs you that he has a firearm on his body.  You immediately go on high alert. You inform him not to reach for his firearm, but he continues to reach for his license.

Problem-Solving Application Case entitled, “Why Are Some Companies Yanking Forced Ranking?”

Applying the 3-step Problem Solving Approach to OB, provide your responses to the three steps. Keep you submission concise and responsive. Three to four sentences each in response to 1) Define the Problem; 2) Identify Causes of the Problem; and 3) Make Recommendations for Solving the Problem 

Need help with my Law question – I’m studying for my class.

Effective goal setting is a critical aspect of effective performance management. An important way to improve your performance and your ability to manage the performance of others is to create better goals. Both performance and learning goals are important, but employees are unlikely to achieve their performance goals if they lack skills or experience that could be fostered through learning goals.

To more effectively manage the goal-setting process, you should understand the importance of setting goals, the need to promote goal commitment, how to provide support and feedback, and how to create action plans. It is important to learn how to write “SMART” goals—goals which are specific, measurable, attainable, results oriented, and time bound. You can increase your commitment to your goals by writing them down, by identifying key obstacles to success and sources of support, understanding the benefits to you of achieving the goal, by breaking large goals down into smaller goals, by being organized, and by rewarding yourself for progress along the way to goal attainment and at final goal attainment.

For this Discussion, select an important goal at school, AND one outside of school. Make them both “SMART” by being sure that they are: specific, measurable, attainable, results oriented, and time bound. Refine them further still by assuring that they begin with “to ______,” and pay particular attention to how it will be measured.

I don’t know how to handle this Law question and need guidance.

Explain why the decade of the 1980s was such a fruitful period for the emergence of these and other moral panics.

How have things changed, for better or worse, today? While technology is certainly very different than available just a few years ago, it is also important to consider the role of dominant political ideologies. What, for example, is gained by creating a moral panic over imagined violence from BLM and “antifa.”

• What recent examples of criminal or deviant behavior can you think of that might be described as “moral panics”? What is the primary source of the labeling of “demons” in your chosen cases

What kinds of crime are not the subjects of moral panics, and what effect does this have on public perceptions of crime?

some of the sources that you will need

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cpFa5jinb5Q

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=u1a8-BJD8qg1
 

1.1 Discuss the purpose and various critiques of lifetime appointments for federal judges.

1.2 Define and discuss the value of precedent.

2.1 Define and distinguish the three types of scrutiny under the Equal Protection Clause. 

2.2 What are the four functions central to democracy performed by freedom of expression under the First Amendment as identified by Thomas I. Emerson? 

3.1 Briefly compare and contrast the concepts of constructive and joint possession against actual (regular) possession. Discuss why you believe constructive and joint possession should or should not be permissible as legal offenses.

3.2 What is the doctrine of transferred intent, and what is the rationale for the doctrine?