Why stop at “Tweed”?

Several years ago NYC billionaire mayor Michael Bloomberg moved the Board of Education headquarters (Department of Education, I guess) to 52 Chambers Street. That building is named the “Tweed Courthouse.”  I figured, most decent people figured, they’d just call it 52 Chambers. Afterall, Boss Tweed was the posterchild of NYC municipal corruption.

But I figured wrong. Not only do Bloomberg and his chancellor not run away from the symbolism of corruption, they actually emphasize it. Not the “Tweed Courthouse.” Just “Tweed.” Without a twinge of embarassment.

Why stop there? We could begin renaming schools.I don’t know if Keating 5 or Abscam would make good school names. Elliot Spitzer’s career is dead, but the man lives on, so no Spitzer, not yet (and imagine Hygiene class at Spitzer…). Nixon, Haldeman, Dean, Bill Casey…

But some people will object to losing honored names… Stuyvesant, Bowne, Cardozo, Lehman, Wagner, Francis Lewis… Maybe changing existing names is not so cool… (then again, Bloomberg has decimated or closed JFK, Columbus, Stevenson, Lafayette, etc, etc)

New names for nameless places?

Regional Operation Centers. ROCs. Integrated Service Centers. ISCs. Nameless. Faceless. Practically useless. Let’s jazz them up, Bloomberg-style.

Tweed is DoE headquarters? Try these in the boroughs:

Simon and Friedman ISC (in the Bronx)

Stanley Steingut ISC (in Brooklyn)

Donald Manes ISC (in Queens)

And why not just be done with it? In the spirit of Tweed, Michael Bloomberg ROC in Manhattan.