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Immigrant Entrepreneurs Shape a New Economy
By NINA BERNSTEIN
Manuel A. Miranda was 8 when his family immigrated to New York from Bogotá. His parents, who had been
lawyers, turned to selling home-cooked food from the trunk of their car. Manuel pitched in after school, grinding
corn by hand for traditional Colombian flatbreads called arepas.
Today Mr. Miranda, 32, runs a family business with 16 employees, producing 10 million arepas a year in the
Maspeth section of Queens. But the burst of Colombian immigration to the city has slowed; arepas customers are
spreading through the suburbs, and competition for them is fierce. Now, he says, his eye is on a vast, untapped
market: the rest of the country.
In the long run, like bagels, "you're going to have arepas in every store," predicted Mr. Miranda, whose
innovations include a "toaster-friendly" version (square instead of round), and an experimental Web site that
offers online sales nationwide. "But I don't have the connections. I don't know the people who can advise how to
take us to the next level."
What is Local Law 47?
Local Law 47 of 2005 requires the Department of Information Technology and Telecommunications (DoITT) to issue monthly reports to the City Council, the Public Advocate, Community Boards and the public regarding data collected on calls made to the 3-1-1 Citizen Service Center. Below you will find links to these reports, along with additional resources on NYC.gov describing the performance of City agencies.
Signed by Mayor Michael R. Bloomberg in May 2005, Local Law 47 is the result of DoITT's work with the City Council. The prime sponsor of the legislation was Council Member Gale A. Brewer, Chairperson of the Council's Committee on Technology in Government. Making agency performance data available is an important way to ensure open government, and this law provides the public with valuable information while protecting the privacy and confidentiality of callers to 3-1-1.
DoITT remains committed to improving these reports going forward, and periodic meetings will be held with representatives from the City's Community Boards to review the 3-1-1 Reports' content and format.
Finance takes into consideration the sales of similar recently sold properties when valuing New York City properties for tax purposes. As such, to make this process more transparent, the agency makes available a detailed listing of all property sales completed in the five boroughs within the past year, as well as historical data dating back to 2003. This information is a matter of public record.
The files linked to below are indexed by borough and neighborhood to facilitate easy lookups of properties, and are provided in two formats: PDF (smaller, more universally accessible files that require the Adobe Reader) and XLS (Microsoft Excel Spreadsheets for power users interested in creating their own sorts and reports). These listings include all properties sold in the last calendar year including cooperative apartments.