Up Close: Times Square task force
NEW YORK (WABC) -- From Mayor de Blasio to Governor Cuomo, the message has been clear: those topless women in Times Square are not acceptable.
The mayor has formed a task force to consider different options, including tearing down the popular pedestrian plaza that the city and his predecessor, Michael Bloomberg, spent millions to build.
So what to do? Tear down what is arguably a wildly successful public space pedestrian walkway in the name of regulating obnoxious and, sometimes, R-rated panhandlers?
Or can the problem be solved in a different way?
Joining us to discuss this important urban question in one of the famous spots in the nation's biggest city are Tim Tompkins, President of the Times Square Alliance, and Manhattan Borough President Gale Brewer.
Also this week, seven months after a massive fire that left 500 people without homes in the Bergen County borough of Edgewater, fire officials have renewed their plea for tougher laws.
The fire last January quickly spread through the complex, destroying nearly half of it.
Following the destruction, the Bergen County Fire Chiefs Association led a push for tougher state laws.
Legislators promised action but no new laws or regulations were put into place.
Joining us is Glenn Corbett, a professor of fire science and chair of the department of protection management at John Jay College.
He's also a member of the Bergen County Fire Chiefs Association that is calling for tougher fire codes.
Finally, if we had told you in January that at the end of August, Donald Trump would be crushing every other Republican in the early going of the presidential nomination battle, you have thought us a bit odd.
But he is. The question is, can he keep the feeling of 'the Summer of Trump' alive?
With us is political analyst and Democratic consultant Hank Sheinkopf.
