Council Member James: departure of Cathie Black, along with Atlantic Yards, a sign of Bloomberg's "third-term curse"

In response to Mayor Mike Bloomberg's dissmissal of the much-criticized, little-qualified Schools Chncellor Cathie Black, City Council Member Letitia James, a leading critic of the publishing executive, said, "The Blizzard of 2011, CityTime, the Atlantic Yards project, and now this; many would consider this the third term curse.”

(Gothamist noted that the blizzard actually happened at the end of last year.)

James was a leading critic of Bloomberg's effort to overturn term limits and engineer a third term.

Atlantic Yards a third-term curse?

James is not exactly shy in her rhetoric, and there's a good deal of media fatigue regarding Atlantic Yards, but there's reason to consider Atlantic Yards a third-term curse:

• the impact of delays and changes (like modular construction) on expected revenues
• Bloomberg's willingness to go to bat for Forest City Ratner's dubious effort to raise cheap money from immigrant investors seeking green cards
  

Actually, Atlantic Yards might be better considered an first-term (and ongoing) curse, since Bloomberg backed the project unquestioningly from the start.