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Friday, February 21, 2020
Vol. 95, No. 8
GUIDE TO SPECIAL OCCASIONS
KATZ TARGETS BIZ DISTRICT IN PLAZA
REASSESSMENT SUIT MOVES FORWARD
PAGES 27-38
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Ex-Bloomberg employee recalls alleged sexism
WINNERS
Great Neck’s David Zielenziger claims he witnessed comments BY R OB E RT PE L A E Z When Great Neck resident David Zielenziger worked for Bloomberg LP in the 1990s, he overheard an interaction between a fellow employee and Michael Bloomberg that he said left him shocked. Zielenziger said he witnessed a conversation between Bloomberg, who is now running for president, and co-worker Sekiko Sakai Garrison on April 11, 1995. According to a complaint filed by Garrison in Federal District Court on Feb. 24, 1998, Bloomberg ridiculed recently married employees. In this instance, the complaint states, Garrison informed Bloomberg her married life was “great” and that she was pregnant. In response to this, Bloomberg said, “Kill it!” according to the complaint. When asked to repeat himself, Bloomberg said, “Kill it!” and then muttered “Great! Number 16!”
suggesting his unhappiness that 16 women in the company had a maternity-related status, according to the complaint. Zielenziger, who was working as a journalist for the company at the time, said the interaction left him stunned. “Normal people don’t say stuff like that,” Zielenziger said. “He had a good relationship with the women in his life even after a divorce. I just don’t know why he would even say that.” Zielenziger first gave his account to The Washington Post, which ran a front page article on Saturday morning. The article has sparked political figures to speak out on the comments Bloomberg allegedly made. “The way Michael Bloomberg treated female employees ... to have created that kind of culture, that unsafe workplace, to feel that you’re being harassed because of your gender, that is problematic,” Continued on Page 63
PHOTO COURTESY OF BROOKHAVEN NATIONAL LABORATORY
The South High School team with their Regional Science Bowl banner and trophy. See story on page 20.
Judge, G.N. resident Weinstein retires at 98 BY R OB E RT PELAEZ
Monday after 53 years on the bench. Weinstein, 98, a former Jack Weinstein, a longtime chief judge of the U.S. Eastern Great Neck resident and the District of New York in Brooknation’s longest-serving fed- lyn and World War II veteran, eral judge, officially retired on was appointed as a federal
judge in 1967. Weinstein worked on the NAACP Legal Defense Fund with Thurgood Marshall, who would later become the first black U.S. Supreme Court Continued on Page 51
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