I saw Marty exercise walking with a friend around Prospect Park Saturday morning. He looked just like all the other runners and walkers going around the Park. And very thin, I might add. For the most part, his privacy was observed. One biker shouted, "Hey Marty." But then he got back to being a private citizen on an exercise walk in the park. I wondered if he craved the "Hey, Marty’s" or if he enjoyed the chance to be do his walk in peace.

I ran ahead of them and got to thinking about Marty now versus Marty in the old days when he was State Senator. He used to be Brooklyn’s best cheerleader. He never missed an event, a chance to add his wacky enthusiasm to a PTA meeting, a middle school graduation, Little League Day in the Prospect Park or the Brooklyn Pride parade.

The Atlantic Yards changed all that. One of the most heated and divisive urban controversies in recent memory, it  has divided Brooklyn; and for his support of it, Marty has been demonized by many.

While I don’t agree with his views on AY, I still have good memories of the old Marty. He may have been annoying at times but he exuded a passionate Brooklyn brashness and enthusiasm that brought a lot of attention and to a borough that was, at one time, pretty much off of the NYC radar.

Things are different now. The stakes are so much higher, much meaner, much tougher. The AY developer has lots of money and political support. The opposition has a lot of smarts — but not enough money or power to stop it.

Marty may have expected his fan base to support his push for the Yards — just like they supported the kinds of things he did as State Senator. But he was wrong. In an interview in City Hall, he makes a telling remark about his own inexperience and his inability to get people to go along with him on this one. And he sounds very bewildered by it all.

CH: When it comes to Atlantic Yards, have you been surprised by the process?

MM:
Well I have to tell you, this is my first experience at it. You
understand, when I was a state senator for 23 years, out of 62 state
senators, you’re pretty much hit by the group.  Then you become borough
president or mayor and you’re one out of one. And it really came as a
significant surprise that for the first time in my professional life, I
was not able to bring people together. I have to tell you, I tried my
best. I really did. I have to tell you I tried my best, my support of
Atlantic Yards and my enthusiasm for Atlantic Yards is based on my
true, sincere, full belief that it’s for the best of this and future
generations of Brooklynites, there’s no question about it. And yet in
the first time of my life, I’ve run into a number of people,
significant number of people, feel that anyone who’s for Atlantic Yards
is a sellout, is being schtupped, is being bribed, is being corrupt,
and those are nice words. And never in my life have I met a group of
people that if you’re not with them, you’re the enemy. I’ve never had
that. I’ve had many disagreements when I first started Albany. Gay
rights, abortion rights, those were contentious issues, believe me. But
never with the hostility and hate that I’ve experienced during this
process.