OK, maybe it is a bit impatient to expect the changes of the Spitzer administration to percolate down to Roosevelt Island in the first dozen days of his governorship.

That said, "Day One... Everything Changes" can’t come soon enough.

There are important matters in the works here on Roosevelt Island, not the least of which are the pending proposals for resident ownership in Island House and Westview.

But as Deborah Beck points out in the transcript interview published in this issue (and unabridged on Website NYC10044 nyc10044.com), the business of those buildings is not the only matter on hold while we wait for Albany. Throughout much of the Pataki administration, DHCR has had issues before it having to do with how Mitchell-Lama and the Island’s General Development Plan intersect, and it would be good to face that matter early on.

We’d like to see some movement on a rational future for the Steam Plant.

We’d like any plan to privatize Motorgate killed off once and for all.

There’s more.

Wednesday night, RIRA talked yet again about what to do about Public Safety, a keener issue now that some of Chief Jim Fry’s time has been split off to fulfill the duties of an operations chief for the whole Island. Someone pointed out, complete with figures, that a kind of rent-an-NYPD-cop program could, for the same money spent on the Public Safety Department, get us a reasonably serious police presence here.

Stand by for a time of change... But hey, let’s have a little less standing by. And a little more change, a little faster.

DL