Council Member Gave $7,500 to Nonexistent Fund

A City Council member who represents parts of the Bronx, Maria Baez, gave $7,500 in discretionary council funds this year to a tenants association in her district that residents say doesn't exist, the New York Post reported yesterday.

At the building where the Davidson Avenue Tenants Association was supposed to have been located, the building superintendent and more than a dozen residents said there was no tenants association.

"We don't have one anymore," Vicky Reyes, who had been listed as the treasurer of the group on a flier, told the Post. Ms. Baez declined to answer specific questions about the tenant organization, saying: "I will not allow anyone to assassinate my character as a Latina woman," the Post reported.

Earlier this month two council aides were indicted on charges that they stole some $145,000 from a city-funded community organization. The council's budget and finances are being investigated by the U.S. attorney's office and Department of Investigation.