The Wall Street Journal - 11.09.2019

THE WALL STREET JOURNAL. ** Wednesday, September 11, 2019 |A12A

take on this consulting role,

but it has evolved that way.

“We’re as surprised by it as

anyone else,” said Alice M.

Greenwald, president and chief

executive of the institution.

The memorial opened in

2011, and the museum fol-

lowed three years later. Both

have become among New York

City’s most significant tourist

attractions, with the memorial

alone having drawn 48 million

visitors in the past eight years.

In many ways, the September

11 Memorial & Museum has been

pressed into the advisory role

because there are few U.S. insti-

tutions charged with its mission:

to chronicle an event in recent

history and place that event in a

larger, ever-evolving context.

Wedded to that is a level of

empathy the September 11 Me-

morial & Museum offers, said

Barbara Poma, owner of Or-

lando’s Pulse nightclub. As she

began considering a memorial,

Ms. Poma reached out to the

institution’s team. “When they

received my call, it was with

open arms,” she said.

The assistance offered by the

September 11 Memorial & Mu-

seum takes different forms, in-

stitution officials said. In many

instances, they advise communi-

ties about the kind of material

to gather and archive following

a tragedy—from the oral testi-

monies of those connected to

the event to the notes and trin-

kets left at makeshift memorials.

Archiving these modern-day

tragedies is challenging be-

cause there are few estab-

lished protocols for what to

do, said Erica Marin, registrar

of the El Paso Museum of His-

tory. The museum reached out

to the September 11 team fol-

lowing the Walmart shooting.

But the advice provided by

the New York museum and me-

morial staffers comes in other

forms. Ms. Poma said she

sought counsel about board

development for the Pulse me-

morial foundation.

In the case of the 2018

shooting at the Marjory Stone-

man Douglas High School in

Parkland, Fla., the September 11

Memorial & Museum simply

made itself available to students

when they visited New York and

connected them with family

members of 9/11 victims. “We

wanted to give them a human

touch,” Ms. Greenwald said.

The idea, Ms. Greenwald said,

is for the institution to serve as

a gathering place and a source of

information and ideas. “We can

provide perspective,” she said.

New Jersey already has a

background-check law for gun

purchases within the state. Mr.

Murphy’s executive order aims

to persuade the gun industry

to adopt such measures and

other best practices in states

with less stringent firearm

laws than New Jersey’s.

Lawrence Keane, general

counsel for the National

Shooting Sports Foundation,

which represents gun makers

and retailers, said the execu-

tive order would exceed the

governor’s authority by trying

to regulate interstate com-

merce if Mr. Murphy’s aim is

GREATER NEW YORK

tions into criminal possession

of firearms.

New Jersey spends about

$70 million annually on guns,

parts and ammunition, largely

for law enforcement.

“If we find folks not living

up to our standards, we re-

serve the right to stop doing

business with them moving

forward,” Mr. Murphy said at

a news conference. “And

where we find a retailer who

is doing the right things but

doesn’t yet have the ability to

compete for state contracts,

we will gladly open the door

for doing business with good

actors.”

The governor said New Jer-

sey hasn’t codified require-

ments for gun manufacturers

and retailers to do business

with the state.

“This is not intended at day

one to be an adversarial act,”

he said. “This is to express a

broad statement of principles

and values that matter to us

deeply.”

to influence the actions of li-

censed gun dealers beyond

New Jersey.

“The governor views li-

censed and law-abiding small

businesses that are just trying

to earn a living, and are en-

gaged in the lawful commerce

of a constitutionally protected

product, [as] somehow the

problem,” Mr. Keane said.

The executive order also di-

rects the state treasurer’s of-

fice to ask financial institu-

tions doing business with New

Jersey to disclose whether

they have adopted standards

for their dealings with the gun

industry.

The state, which pays about

$1 billion annually in fees to

these institutions, could cut fi-

nancial ties with any that give

unsatisfactory responses, Mr.

Murphy said.

The executive order “en-

sures that taxpayer dollars are

being used wisely to procure

goods and services from com-

panies that act responsibly

when it comes to firearms and

ammunition,” state Treasurer

Elizabeth Maher Muoio said.

The governor also directed

New Jersey’s Department of

Banking and Insurance to pro-

hibit or limit the sale of insur-

ance products that encourage

improper use of firearms. The

department will scrutinize lia-

bility insurance for personal

firearm use that protects

against civil claims, which are

legal in New Jersey, and deter-

mine whether such programs

should be allowed to continue,

the governor’s office said.

Mr. Murphy signed a pack-

age of gun-control bills into

law in 2018, including banning

magazines that can hold more

than 10 rounds, and instituting

mandatory background checks

for private firearm sales.

Former Gov. Chris Christie,

a Republican, had vetoed

tighter gun measures passed

by the Democratic-controlled

state Legislature during his

two terms.

New Jersey Gov. Phil Mur-
phy said the state may end
business relationships with re-
tailers and makers of guns if
they don’t adopt measures to
curb illegal firearm sales.
The Democratic governor
signed an executive order
Tuesday directing state offi-
cials to ask all gun makers or
retailers that sell weapons to
New Jersey to disclose how
they screen for straw purchas-
ers or firearms traffickers and
prevent sales to people barred
from owning guns.
Under the order, the state
also will ask the retailers and
gun manufacturers how they
promote gun safety and assist
law-enforcement investiga-

BYJOSEPHDEAVILA

N.J. Turns Up Pressure on Gun Industry

Governor signs order

to pull business from

makers, retailers that

don’t tighten controls

Handguns are displayed at a shooting range in Randolph, N.J.

JEWEL SAMAD/AGENCE FRANCE-PRESSE/GETTY IMAGES

On any given day, the Na-

tional September 11 Memorial &

Museum welcomes thousands

to its site where the former

World Trade Center stood. But

as the institution prepares to

mark the 18th anniversary on

Wednesday of the event that

claimed nearly 3,000 lives, it is

finding a role for itself far be-

yond its lower Manhattan home.

Increasingly, it is being

tapped to advise communities

that have faced tragedies of

their own. They include Boston,

scene of the 2013 Boston Mara-

thon bombing; Orlando, Fla.,

site of the 2016 Pulse nightclub

shooting; and El Paso, Texas,

where there was a mass shoot-

ing Aug. 3 at a Walmart.

Museum officials said it

wasn’t their initial intention to

BYCHARLESPASSY

9/11 Memorial Is a Beacon for Many

Christine Shiels, from England, visited the National September 11 Memorial & Museum, one of the city’s most significant tourist attractions.

OSCAR DURAND FOR THE WALL STREET JOURNAL

“Thanks to the policies of

this administration, we have

improved the lives of the most

vulnerable New Yorkers and are

on track to move 800,000 peo-

ple out of poverty by 2025,”

Laura Feyer, the spokeswoman,

said. The measure of inequality

used in the report changes too

slowly to fully capture the im-

provements in the city since Mr.

de Blasio was elected, she said.

Robert Hawkins, a McSilver

associate professor of poverty

studies at New York Univer-

sity, said the increased Gini co-

efficient isn’t promising even

if it doesn’t show the entire

economic picture of the city.

“It is moving in the wrong

direction,” he said. “It sug-

gests what we already see on

the ground; we know there’s

income inequality in New York

City and little has really been

done to address it.”

Other markers of change in

New York City have shown

mixed results, according to the

report. The number of New

Yorkers receiving cash-assis-

tance programs such as the

Supplemental Nutrition Assis-

tance Program, or food

stamps, rose through 2015 but

then declined, according to

data compiled by the report.

However, the mayor’s traf-

fic-safety plan, Vision Zero,

has regressed slightly, with re-

cord-high cyclist deaths occur-

ring this year, the report said.

Mr. Armlovich said there

were some positive changes

during Mr. de Blasio’s tenure,

notably his free prekindergarten

program and the NYC Ferry ser-

vice. But other initiatives such

as guaranteeing paid time off

for workers, haven’t done

enough to make significant

strides in closing the income-in-

equality gap, he said.

Mayor Bill de Blasio cam-
paigned on a promise to end
income inequality in New York
City, but a report finds the city
has only made modest gains in
closing the gap between its
richest and poorest residents.
The report, released Wednes-
day by the Manhattan Institute,
a conservative think tank, found
that the disparity in income be-
tween the two groups in the
city has remained essentially
the same since Mr. de Blasio, a
Democrat, took office in 2014.
The report’s analysis used U.S.
Census data to find the “Gini
coefficient,” a measurement of
income distribution.
The city received a Gini co-
efficient score of 0.5504 in
2017, which is the latest year
the data is available. In 2013,
the city had a score of 0.547. It
was 0.551 in 2016. A score of
zero represents equal distribu-
tion of income.
“We were promised huge
changes, an end to the ‘tale of
two cities,’ and it hasn’t hap-
pened,” Alex Armlovich, an ur-
ban-policy expert at the organ-
ization, said in an interview.
He has released similar re-
ports since Mr. de Blasio took
office, and the marker that
measures inequality has re-
mained about the same.
Mr. de Blasio has empha-
sized his “tale of two cities”
message as he runs for the
2020 Democratic presidential
nomination, pushing for a
larger tax on the wealthy, for
example.
A spokeswoman for Mr. de
Blasio said the report, and the
income-inequality measure-
ment, don’t show the full pic-
ture of gains made since the
mayor took office.

BYKATIEHONAN

Little Progress

On Income Gap

cades of progress we have

made in fighting youth nico-

tine use,” New York City

Health Commissioner Dr. Oxiris

Barbot said in a statement.

Data show current e-ciga-

rette use among those sur-

veyed was lowest among

sixth-graders at 2.6%, rising to

9% in seventh grade and 8.4%

in eighth grade, during 2018.

It was the city’s first survey

of e-cigarette use among pub-

lic middle-school students.

Data was collected in the fall

of 2018 from more than 2,

students. The city previously

reported in a 2017 survey that

one in six high-school students

reported using e-cigarettes.

Dr. Barbot has supported

pending City Council legisla-

tion banning the sale of fla-

vored e-cigarettes, which pub-

lic-health experts and others

say target minors. This month,

Michigan became the first state

to ban flavored e-cigarettes.

The new data on e-cigarette

use among middle-school stu-

dents was announced a day af-

ter New York Gov. Andrew

Cuomo said he would intro-

duce legislation to ban flavored

e-cigarettes after state law-

makers reconvene in January.

Last November, the state’s

Department of Health issued

regulations that would have

banned flavored e-cigarettes,

but quickly rescinded them

amid concerns about its au-

thority to do so. In his pro-

posed budget legislation this

year, the governor included

language clarifying the depart-

ment’s power to regulate e-

cigarettes, but it was pulled

before the final spending plan

was adopted in April.

The U.S. Food and Drug Ad-

ministration said in March it

would restrict sales of some

flavored e-cigarettes, effec-

tively banning them from gas

stations and convenience

stores, but those restrictions

haven’t been implemented.

Assemblywoman Linda

Rosenthal, a Manhattan Demo-

crat, started pushing in 2017

for a bill that would have the

same effect. It was approved by

the chamber’s health commit-

tee but didn’t come to a floor

vote. “I think that Tobacco

2.0—the e-cigarette lobby—

peeled people off,” she said.

Ms. Rosenthal submitted

another bill on Monday that

would prohibit the sale of all

e-cigarettes unless the FDA

says the devices are a safe

way to quit smoking.

A spokesman for Juul said

the company “exists to help

adult smokers switch off com-

bustible cigarettes, which are

the leading cause of prevent-

able death and contribute to

over 28,000 deaths per year in

New York. We do not want or

need new non-nicotine users.”

Juul has “never marketed

to youth,” the spokesman said.

One in 15 middle-school
students in New York City
public schools report having
recently used an e-cigarette,
according to a new report re-
leased Tuesday by the New
York City Department of
Health and Mental Hygiene.
The report also shows
nearly 15% of middle-school
students reported having tried
e-cigarettes, including one in
five eighth-grade students.
“E-cigarettes threaten de-

BYMELANIEGRAYCEWEST
ANDJIMMYVIELKIND

One of 15 City Middle-School Students Vaped Recently

NY