THE WALL STREET JOURNAL. **** Monday, February 24, 2020 |A10A
tors” who were backtracking
on gains important to Afri-
can-Americans and Hispanics.
Senators said their proposal
was still under development.
Assembly Democrats are
expected to propose raising
income taxes as a way to ad-
dress the state’s $6.1 billion
budget deficit. Ms. Stewart-
Cousins has said senatorsare reluctant to raise taxes.
Last year, Ms. Stewart-
Cousins and Mr. Heastie regu-
larly appeared in public to an-
nounce action on various bills
and they called themselves
the “wonder twins.” There
have been no such events
since lawmakers returned to
the Capitol on Jan. 8.
One senator said the new-STATE STREET|By Jimmy Vielkind
Democratic Legislative Leaders Split on Taxes, New Bail Law
After mov-
ing in tandem
for most of
2019, Senate
Majority
Leader An-
drea Stewart-Cousins and
Assembly Speaker Carl
Heastie are diverging over
taxes and criminal-justice
policy as budget negotiations
start in earnest.
The two legislative lead-
ers and the Democratic
members they represent
have been most pointedly at
odds over whether to amend
the state’s new bail law. That
measure, which took effect
Jan. 1, forbids the use of
cash bail for people charged
with most misdemeanor and
nonviolent felony offenses.
Democratic senators
floated a compromise that
would give additional discre-
tion to judges, but a half-
dozen Democratic Assembly
members denounced it dur-
ing a rally at the Capitol. As-
semblyman Michael Blake, of
the Bronx, called his Senate
colleagues “fake-ass legisla-
found distance could be ex-
plained by differing political
considerations. Ms. Stewart-
Cousins is most concerned
about protecting suburban
senators who helped Demo-
crats win the majority in No-
vember and is mindful of
those legislators’ concerns
about the bail law and their
susceptibility to GOP attacks,
the senator said.
Mr. Heastie is focused on
several longtime Assembly
members who are facing
Democratic primary chal-
lengers backed by progres-
sive groups. The incumbents
tout the new bail law, and
any changes to weaken it
could hurt them with voters.
A spokesman for Mr. Heastie
said the speaker sees the law
as a major part of his legacy.
Both legislative leaders
played down the conflict. Mr.
Heastie told reporters earlier
this month that despite dis-
agreements, “we’re all in re-
sponsible positions and re-
sponsible jobs, and we have
to continue to do our jobs.”
Ms. Stewart-Cousins’ spokes-man said she and Mr.
Heastie have “different ap-
proaches to the same goal,
but they have a great rela-
tionship and work together
as a united legislature to
help all of New York.”
The current state of af-
fairs could strengthen Gov.
Andrew Cuomo’s hand in
budget negotiations. The
state constitution restricts
the ways in which legislators
are able to amend spending
legislation, and any chance
of major changes would re-
quire close coordination.ROAD TRIPPIN’: As lawmak-
ers continue to talk about le-
galizing recreational mari-
juana in New York, Mr.
Cuomo said last week that
he wants to visit other states
where pot is sold legally to
check things out.
The Democratic governor
said he would visit neighbor-
ing Massachusetts—where
you can find cars with New
York license plates outside
the retail shop just over the
border in Pittsfield—as wellas Illinois and California.
Mr. Cuomo and top legisla-
tors say they want to legalize
marijuana but disagree over
how to distribute tax revenue
from pot sales. The governor
said he also wants to meet
with law-enforcement offi-
cials and industry experts to
see what other states’ experi-
ences have been.
But why not just pick up
the phone? Mr. Cuomo said
Friday during a conference
call that he wouldn’t be in-
gesting any cannabis on the
trip, joking instead that he
would designate an “official
taster.” (An administration
aide later called to say there
wouldn’t actually be an offi-
cial taster.)
Lawmakers from suburban
areas still have qualms about
legalization, which Mr.
Cuomo believes can only be
overcome if it is addressed
as part of the state budget
due by April 1. He said he
would take the trip during a
coming weekend.[email protected]As improvements were
made, the restaurant also
needed to be brought up to new
city codes. The process and
continual costs became “over-
whelming,” Mr. Weprin said.
For years after Sandy, Mr.
Weprin had something of a re-
frain for the locals and report-
ers who inquired about the
restaurant reopening: “We’re
about two months away!”
“I’m an optimistic guy,” Mr.
Weprin said. “But honestly,
there was a lot of emotion in-
volved in this process, too.
This was my parents’ baby;
this was a place that had sur-
vived centuries, and it was dy-
ing on my end.”
South Street Seaport and
the Bridge Cafe were very dif-
ferent places when Mr. We-
prin’s father, Jack, purchased
the building in 1979. Then
much grittier, the neighbor-
hood was still home to the
Fulton Fish Market, and the
restaurant was called McCor-
mick’s, a bar where fishmon-
gers would eat, hang out and
sometimes gamble, Mr. Weprin
said.
Under his father, the Bridge
Cafe turned into a white-table-
cloth restaurant, where the
city’s power players, includingformer Mayor Ed Koch, were
lunchtime regulars. But the
old-timers were still part of
the scene. “It was that only-in-
New York mix of customers,”
Mr. Weprin said.
Mr. Weprin started working
behind the restaurant’s im-
pressive oak bar during col-
lege, then eventually became
the manager. “Hospitality is in
my bones,” he said.While Mr. Weprin looked
into the potential of running
another restaurant in recent
years, he keeps coming back to
his family’s vacant business.
“This place is filled with mem-
ories,” he said.
He plans to meet with a
contractor and an expediter to
assist him through the city
permitting process, one more
time, to see if he can open theMr. Murphy, 62 years old,
took office in 2018, succeed-
ing former Republican Gov.
Chris Christie. A former Gold-man Sachs executive, Mr.
Murphy hadn’t previously
held elected office. He served
as U.S. ambassador to Ger-GREATER NEW YORK
In subsequent tweets, the
governor wrote that health
care is a right and “we need
to continue fighting for af-
fordable health care for all.”
“Over 50,000 New Jersey-
ans will hear the words ‘you
have cancer’ this year, so I’m
far from alone here,” he
added.
Mr. Murphy’s doctor discov-
ered the 3-centimeter-wide tu-
mor on his left kidney during a
recent checkup, a spokesman
for the governor said.
A partial nephrectomy is a
surgery that removes a tumor
or diseased tissue but leaves
the healthy portion of a kid-
ney in place. It is a less dras-
tic procedure than a full ne-
phrectomy, in which surgeons
remove the kidney.many from 2009 to 2013.
Local and regional officials
sent the governor good
wishes over the weekend.
“My thoughts are with
@GovMurphy and his entire
family as we wish him a full
and speedy recovery,” New
York Gov. Andrew Cuomo, a
Democrat, wrote on Twitter.
“NY has your back, Governor.”
New Jersey Assembly
Speaker Craig Coughlin, also a
Democrat, said in a statement
that he had spoken to the
governor earlier. “His good
health is foremost in our
minds and hearts,” Mr. Cough-
lin said.
Mr. Murphy is scheduled to
give his budget address Tues-
day at the State House in
Trenton.New Jersey Gov. Phil Mur-
phy is set to undergo surgery
next month to remove a likely
cancerous tumor on his kidney.
“Friends—I’ve got a tumor
on my left kidney and will un-
dergo a partial nephrectomy
in early March to remove it,”
Mr. Murphy, a Democrat,
wrote on Twitter on Saturday
evening. “The prognosis is
very good and I’m profoundly
grateful to my doctors for de-
tecting the tumor early.”
BYCORINNERAMEY
N.J. Governor Has Kidney Tumor
Murphy says he will
undergo surgery
to remove likely
cancerous growth
New Jersey Gov. Phil Murphy, shown last month at his State of
the State address in Trenton, says his prognosis is ‘very good.’SETH WENIG/ASSOCIATED PRESSFour recent cases of neona-
tal herpes infection following
a Jewish circumcision ritual
have health officials once
again urging parents in New
York City’s ultra-Orthodox
population to avoid the prac-
tice or at least limit its risks.
Health officials on Sunday
said there have been three
cases of herpes simplex virus 1
infections in infant boys re-
ported to the New York City
Department of Health and
Mental Hygiene since Dec. 1,- The fourth case was re-
ported in September 2019.
Health officials don’t be-
lieve the cases are linked. The
infants were hospitalized, re-
ceived intravenous antiviral
drugs and are now recovering,
health officials said.
Rabbi David Zwiebel, execu-
tive vice president of Agudath
Israel of America, an ultra-Or-
thodox umbrella group, de-
clined to comment.
The ritual is known as
metzitzah b’peh. A mohel, a
religious leader who performs
the circumcision during a bris,
uses his mouth to suck blood
from the cut. Since April 2006,
when reporting of cases be-
came mandatory, 22 babies
were reported to have devel-
oped infections following
metzitzah b’peh. Two died.
City health officials have
struggled through several at-
tempts to stem the practice.
Five commissioner’s orders, in-
cluding one recent one, have
been issued since 2014 to mo-
hels. The order prohibits them
from engaging in direct oro-
genital suction. Violating the
order is a misdemeanor.
Beginning in 2012, the city
required parents to sign a con-
sent form that warned of the
ritual’s dangers. Health officials
said the form, which was in-
tended to be educational,
eroded trust with the commu-
nity. The form was replaced
with an educational brochure
in 2015, which is still in use, ac-
cording to Demetre Daskalakis,
the deputy commissioner for
the division of disease control
at the city’s health department.
While the city continues to
stress that avoiding the prac-
tice is the only way to effec-
tively eliminate the risk of
herpes transmission, said Dr.
Daskalakis, the city is also
adopting a new harm-reduc-
tion strategy. Health profes-
sionals are being urged to in-
form parents and religious
leaders that steps can be taken
to reduce the risk of disease
transmission, including asking
the mohel to use antiseptic
mouthwash immediately be-
fore performing direct orogen-
ital suction to reduce viable
herpes virus in the saliva.
Trying to undo a ritual that
is thousands of years old is
challenging, said Dr. Daskala-
kis. Offering the option of
don’t do it, but also instruc-
tions on how to keep an infant
healthy, is, he said, “the best
we’re going to do.”
BYMELANIEGRAYCEWESTHerpes
In Babies
Prompts
Warning
space, he said. He knows he
would have to replace the
floors again; they have buck-
led since he replaced them af-
ter Sandy. And there are likely
bigger changes to be made to
bring the restaurant up to the
city’s fire code.
“I want to try again, with
less emotion and a clear head,”
he said. “If it doesn’t make
sense, I will finally let it go.”Standing inside a 226-year-
old building at the edge of
cobblestoned Water Street in
Manhattan’s South Street Sea-
port, Adam Weprin conjured
up a plan to awaken old
ghosts.
“We used to hear them, the
ghosts stomping upstairs,”
said Mr. Weprin, 54 years old,
walking through the small,
dusty barroom of the Bridge
Cafe.
The property, which dates
to 1794, has been owned by
Mr. Weprin’s family for more
than 40 years. Its landmarked
building, on a now-quiet street
in the shadow of the Brooklyn
Bridge, has been home at
times to a gritty saloon for
river pirates, a gambling den
and a brothel, and was the site
of at least two 19th-century
murders.
But for Mr. Weprin, that
isn’t the roughest part of its
history. What’s most difficult,
he said, is more personal: see-
ing the restaurant he managed
for more than 12 years—and a
bar that had been one of the
city’s oldest continually run-
ning taverns—sit empty.
Nearly eight years ago,
when superstorm Sandy
struck New York, murky flood-
waters from the East River
gushed through South Street
Seaport. The storm caused se-
vere damage to much of the
historic area’s businesses and
homes. Recovery was slow and
costly, and especially tough
for the neighborhood’s aging
properties.
The basement of the We-
prins’ red, three-story building
at 279 Water St.—the only
surviving wood-frame prop-
erty in the district—was
flooded. Much of the restau-
rant was inundated with more
than 5 feet of water.
Fixing the space, with its
ancient wood beams, was
tricky. Mr. Weprin replaced
the entire kitchen, overhauled
the basement and redid his
wooden floors. The family
sank several hundred thou-
sand dollars into the repairs,
he said.
“But every time we fixed
something, something else
would crop up,” Mr. Weprin
said.
BYIRENEPLAGIANOS
Historic Seaport Tavern Has One Last Shot
The Bridge Cafe, located in a landmarked wood-frame building that dates to 1794, has been closed since it was hit by superstorm
Sandy. Adam Weprin, below, whose family purchased the property in 1979, hopes to reopen it but says there are challenges.JAMES SPRANKLE FOR THE WALL STREET JOURNAL (2)Senate Majority LeaderAndrea Stewart-Cousins and Assembly
Speaker Carl Heastie have both played down the disagreements.HANS PENNINK/ASSOCIATED PRESSNY