Brownstoner broke the story. McBrooklyn’s been following it. Brooklyn Paper had this:

There goes the “there goes the neighborhood” story.

Word that the federal court system would open a probation office on Pierrepont Street, next to St. Ann’s School, spread like wildfire through Brooklyn Heights on Friday, with residents fretting that the facility posed a clear and present danger to neighborhood kids — but it turns out that two such offices have been operating in the area since the 1970s.

The “new” center would actually be a consolidation of the existing probation offices, one of which is at 75 Clinton St., between Montague and Remsen streets, near the Packer Collegiate Institute; and the other at 111 Livingston St. at Adams Street, near a Quaker elementary school. But few knew that the offices were operating in the area — and an initial report on the Web site Brownstoner.com only fanned the flames.

“Unbelievable; it is almost like there is a group conspiring to ruin all of the progress made over the last 10 years or so,” one person posted below the Brownstoner report.

Elected officials were flooded with calls from scandalized parents, prompting Rep. Nydia Velazquez (D–Gowanus) to issue this statement: “Locating a parole office just steps away from a school is extremely troubling from a school is extremely troubling. Anything that puts the security of our children at risk is unacceptable.”