Conflict-of-interest concerns loom over NYC helipad contract
An aviation company with ties to a board member at New York City’s economic development agency is set to receive a lucrative contract to operate the agency’s downtown Manhattan helicopter pad, raising concerns about a potential conflict of interest, the Daily News has learned.
The city Economic Development Corporation, a nonprofit controlled by mayoral appointees, posted notice Thursday that, after a competitive bidding process, it intends to award the five-year contract for running the Downtown Manhattan Heliport at Pier 6 to Saker Aviation, a New York-based publicly traded company.
The longtime chairman of Saker’s board is William Wachtel, who’s also the founder and managing partner of law firm Wachtel Missry.
The other managing partner of that law firm is Morris Missry — who sits on the Economic Development Corporation’s board of directors, a role that comes with oversight of the agency.
An Economic Development Corporation spokesman confirmed Friday that Missry has not recused himself from the Saker matter. However, the spokesman said the board “as a matter of course” does not involve itself directly in the corporation’s “individual procurements.”
“There was nothing to recuse since it never went to the board,” the spokesman said.
Wachtel told The News his law partner had “no involvement whatsoever” in the Saker contract. “I believe that is because the matter has not reached the board of directors,” Wachtel added.
Under the Economic Development Corporation’s ethics bylaws, board members must withdraw themselves from any matter where “personal and/or financial interest conflicts or may conflict with the interest of the Corporation.” They must also disclose any such conflicts on annual disclosure forms.
Missry did not return a request for comment Friday.
The heliport, owned by the Economic Development Corporation, is primarily used by choppers catering to wealthy tourists and business executives who work in the area, and Saker would stand to take in tens of millions of dollars under the new contract, according to the Economic Development Corporation’s solicitation request. Saker has already operated the pad for years, meaning the new contract is effectively a renewal.
John Kaehny, executive director of the Reinvent Albany good government group, argued the connection between Missry and Wachtel poses a conflict of interest. He said Missry should have preemptively recused himself from any involvement on the helipad contract.
“This is just another example of the many conflicts that exist in the EDC board,” he said, using an acronym for the corporation. “The entire concept of the EDC board is a bad joke, because the reality is that the board is inherently conflicted because its made up almost entirely of people with personal connections to the people who come before them.”
Brooklyn Councilman Lincoln Restler, a Democrat who has long lamented the proliferation of nonessential helicopter traffic in the city, agreed that the Wachtel’s ties to Missry “raises ethical alarm bells” about the helicopter contract.
“The key point is that we should be shuttering this helipad,” he said. “Our climate crisis necessitates that we eliminate nonessential helicopter travel that causes noise and pollution across our city. Whether it’s providing flights for the uber-elite to get out to the Hamptons faster or tourist travel, it has no business in the heart of the densest city in the U.S.”
Saker’s contract has to be approved at a March 3 hearing by the Economic Development Corporation and Mayor Adams’ Office of Contract Services. Kaehny, whose group monitors the Economic Development Corporation, said such approvals tend to be “rubber-stamps.”
At least two other companies, Atlantic Aviation and Thoroughbred Sea & Air, submitted bids for the Pier 6 contract after it was first put out for solicitations last July, according to EDC records.