I just heard about something called NY Loves Haiti:

I wanted to let you know about the site, NYlovesHaiti.com, some friends and I launched in response to the tragic events in Haiti.  While we are not medical workers or first responders, we aimed to help make a difference using our skill sets – so we developed the site which lists charities and local events, from hip hop to cocktail parties, being held to benefit Haiti recovery efforts.  We have been floored by the response  and number of people that have attended these events so far and would really appreciate if you would consider posting a short blurb, so that your readers can attend some of these event and perhaps be inspired to hold their own.

An OTBKB reader wrote to me about a fire last night. Anyone know more?

About the fire that was on Carroll St between Henry and Clinton last night- kept the whole block awake and left them without power this morning?  I’d be curious to hear what happened and anxious to hear that no one got hurt!

The Brooklyn Free School, a democratic, free school in Park Slope, just bought a building in Clinton Hill.

According to Brownstoner:

A few weeks ago we reported that Brooklyn Free School had purchased 372 Clinton Avenue, the five-story brownstone that had been on the market for ages. Well, the deal for the 6,500-square-foot property just hit public records, and it turns out that the school shelled out $1.75 million. The building was first listed for $2.5 million in August 2006, according to StreetEasy, and was last asking $1.99 million as of late 2008. The school, which is currently located in the South Slope, says on its website that it is raising money to renovate the building.

Now located located in the South Slope, the school accepts students ages 5 through 15 and there is no set curriculum except the establishment of an “all-inclusive democratic system that runs the school, and the communication of that system to all members of the school.” No grades, no assessments, no homework, at BFS, students are in charge of their education and are trusted to assess themselves and perform any additional work or learning outside of the school that’s in line with their interests.

Last week I reported that Scott Turner, pub quizzer at Rocky Sullivan’s in Red Hook, is moving to Seattle. But he hasn’t left yet. And hopefully he’ll keep sending his “greetings” from the great city of Seattle.

Greetings Pub Quiz Minutiaetistas…

We’re all motivated by simplicities.  Straight-forward declarations of love, joy, excitement, and plans that say, simply, “you’ll dig this.”

“We’re going to Paris!”
“Free pizza for everyone!”
“Bruce Ratner’s giving up!”
“C’mere, big boy…”

…that sort of thing.

Which is why the Obama presidency, thus far, has been a failure.

Everything that seemed clear and obvious when he was stressing HOPE and YES WE CAN.

Now, it’s HOPE FOR MIDDLE CLASS FAMILIES MAKING OVER $27,500 BUT LESS THAN $135,000 WITH TWO KIDS WHOSE HEALTH PLANS ARE PROVIDED BY BUT NOT LIMITED TO THEIR EMPLOYERS IN STATES WITH 10% OF THE NATION’S MEDIAN INCOME LEVELS AND WHO ARE ELIGIBLE FOR A NEW $1000 TAX CREDIT ON THEIR RETURN STARTING IN 2014 AT APPROXIMATELY THE SAME JUNCTURE AT WHICH OUR TROOPS WILL BEGIN A PHASED PULL-OUT OF AFGHANISTAN AS LONG AS 30% OF AFGHANI FORCES ARE POSITIONED TO TAKE OVER THE SECURITY CONCERNS IN OVER 50% OF PROVINCES CURRENTLY CONTESTED BY ENEMY COMBATANTS PROVIDED TARP MONIES ARE REPAID AT AN ECONOMY-SPURRING RATE OF RETURN WE CAN!!!

Agendas sure are tricky, in no way easy, and most certainly, not simple.  However, communicating them should be simple. Obama’s inability to pick a message and stick to it is really making a mess of things.

Teddy Roosevelt spoke softly and carried a big stick in the service of imperialism.  FDR formed agencies to provide jobs and build things the country needed, not small tax credits for families that can evaporate a hundred different ways by April 15th.  The recent junk — Reagan’s kill-commies and W’s kill-terrorists initiatives — was clearly laid out, and the giant gears of bureaucracy were retrofitted to grind those plans into reality.

Some will say it’s immature to expect clear, simple directives — that real life is complex and fixing problems doesn’t happen in the snap of a finger.  That’s true.  But just knowing there’s a point to it makes a big difference.

Hmmmmm…

You know what?  This is a all Sherlock comma shit comma no stuff.

Really.

Here’re some other completely obvious things, presented in an orderly bulleted list.

* Bruce Ratner is a turd
* Michael Bloomberg is a wealthier turd than Bruce Ratner
* The Mets haven’t a clue
* Atlantic Yards will disappoint the people who believe in it
* Harold Ford’s kinda hard to pin down
* J-E-T-S
* Coffee is a delicious beverage
* My first ever toy was a Winnie the Pooh bear based on the old A.A. Milne books, not the Disney bear
* I play a Fender guitar with DAYS OF HEAVEN stickered on the back below the year 1916
* Everyone should read The Autobiography of Malcolm X
* Terrence Malick’s new film, Tree of Life, if gonna be spectacular
* Lady Gaga is fun but in possession of a real long shelf life
* The Cincinnati Reds were nicknamed The Big Red Machine because they were the Reds
* Pillow talk can be muffled
* Walnuts are called walnuts because they grow on walls spelled with just one “L”
* I like The Clash
* The Scholastic Book of Lists lists Simple Machines as “incline plane, screw, lever, wheel and axle, pulley and wedge” and Complex Machines as “airplanes, automobiles, cameras, computers, telephones and televisions.”
* Some of the Grateful Dead are
* The U.S. Postal Service’s code for American Samoa is AS
* It’s often fun to say “Jalalabad”
* Brooklyn Brewery still stinks for supporting the Atlantic Yards project
* Many people have seen the film Avatar
* The U.S. Department of Transportation’s new law prohibiting truckers and bus drivers from texting on the road is a very useful
* Apple has a new gadget, a tablet of some sort
* Teenagers seem to like Twilight.  Good for them!
* Port-au-Prince is a frakkin’ mess
* One of the two Mars rovers, Spirit, may never roll again and has shut down to hibernate for the Martian winter.
* Firefly is the greatest television show ever
* For the next two weeks we will hear more sappy crap about what the Saints mean to a still-recovering New Orleans than we can possibly stomach
* The Tickemaster-Live Nation merger will mean concerts will cost more than the car you drive to them
* Randy Newman is the greatest American songwriter of our generation, even if a critic once said he sounds like a frightened water buffalo when he sings
* If you’re rich, you have it made in Michael Bloomberg’s New York — excepting Bernie Madoff, of course

Brought to you by The Feldman family from their weather tower in Park Slope.

Park Slope resident Jenifer Jones Austin is a 42-year-old wife and mother of two children ages 12 and 7 . She has been diagnosed with Acute Myeloid Leukemia. Her chances of surviving the disease are slim unless she undergoes a bone marrow transplant.

That’s where you come in.

A bone marrow transplant requires a 100% compatability match. Unfortunately, Jenifer’s siblings were not a match. Her best chance of finding a match is to go to the National Bone Marrow Registry. Her greatest liklihood of success is with a donor of African American or Hispanic descent.

You can help.

On February 6 from 10 AM until 2 PM, you can add your bone marrow to the Registry. Maybe you’ll be a match for Jennifer:

Be the Match on February 6, 2020 from 10 AM until 2 PM. The Berkeley Carroll School. 181 Lincoln Place between 7th & 8th Avenues. Brooklyn, NY 11217

In the New Yorker this week, Ian Frazier in the Talk of the Town covers the scene at Freddy’s Bar in recent weeks. Here are the “key words” the New Yorker posted next to this article online: Freddy Bar & Backroom, Brooklyn, NY, Atlantic Yards, Eminent Domain, Real Estate, Steve de Seve, Homeless Shelters…You get the idea. Here’s an excerpt:

In the windows of Freddy’s Bar & Backroom, a neighborhood place at the corner of Dean Street and Sixth Avenue, in Brooklyn, the neon beer signs hang upside down, as if sending out the international distress signal for bars. Freddy’s Bar & Backroom is indeed in distress, sitting as it does in the “footprint” of the massive, multibillion-dollar Atlantic Yards project, which hopes to turn an odd-shaped patch of land between Atlantic and Flatbush Avenues into a twenty-thousand-seat sports arena, etc. Sipping an ale in a corner booth by the stuffed swordfish, you can almost feel the giant shoe descending from above.

A group made up of Picture the Homeless, FUREE (Families United for Racial and Economic Equality), Fightin’ Freddy’s (patrons of Freddy’s Bar, near the shelter), and City Council member Letitia James, plan to arrest Bruce Ratner on Wednesday, January 27th at 1 PM.

The group say they would like to arrest Ratner “for the moral crime of closing a desperately needed family homeless shelter in the Winter on Martin Luther King’s birthday. We will instead be arresting him to stand trial for allegedly, and possibly admittedly bribing a public official in the State of New York, where such activity is against the law.”

Most importantly, the group’s aim is to get the Pacific Dean Family Homeless Shelter re-opened until Spring. “To this end we intend to see Ratner charged before this coming Friday’s hearing that could give Ratner control of the facility, which he plans to tear down to make a parking lot for the Barclays Center stadium,” says a recent press release.

Close a homeless shelter to make way for parking lot for the Barclay’s Stadium?

That was Forest CIty Ratner’s idea and it’s getting them a tremendous amount of bad press and generating a good deal of community agitation.

To make matters worse, the shelter was closed in the dead of winter, on January 15th, which is Martin Luther King’s actual birthday. Talk about bad timing.

An emergency rally was held the next day at Freddy’s Bar with Crystal Waters, F.U.R.E.E. (Families United for Racial and Economic Equality), Picture the Homeless, the Dean Street Block Association, New York City Council member Tish James, and State Senator Velmanette Montgomery, who pledged to put her body in front of the bulldozers should the shelter be torn down as planned

On Martin Luther King Monday, a vigil was held in front of the day care center to see if Forest City Ratner would reverse its request to close the day care center down.

No response from Ratner was forthcoming. Activists vowed to keep fighting and now they’re going to arrest the man.

Continue reading Wed: Citizen’s Arrest of Bruce Ratner Planned →

Vendors, suppliers, and members of the NYC film community have pulled together for the relief effort in Jacmel, Haiti.

Lighting equipment including generators in the 6,500 watt range were loaded at Eastern Effects on DeGraw Street in Brooklyn and will be shipped in a container for arrival in the port of Jacmel on Feb 2.

Good job!

Betsy Reid and Nora Killoran are putting together a mission, which, I assume means that film industry folks from here will be going there. They are now talking about a one week commitment between Feb 1 and Feb 8.

This group is working with Partners and Health in order to sponsor and organize their mission. For more information you can email Charlie Libin (clibin(at)luminaria(dot)com

From the Brooklyn Paper. Anyone with information is asked to call (718) 638-1260.

If you see an African Grey Parrot near Flatbush Avenue in Park Slope over the next few days, don’t just mutter to yourself about the miracle of Mother Nature — call Lora Myers at once!

Myers’s 12-year-old pet — whom she has had since he was a little chick — flew away from her Prospect Place home on Thursday night and has not been seen since. He was last seen heading towards Flatbush Avenue.

“We are frantic,” Myers told us, tearing up. “Anything you can do to help is much appreciated. We’ve had him 12 years. This is my child!”

Myers described Gracie as a “strong flyer” who might not come if called.

“He has a limited vocabulary,” she said. “What he does most often is whistle. He’s almost a composer.”

David Pechefsky wrote to me last night from Liberia, where he is setting up a budget office for the Liberian Congress. He told me about his Op-Ed in yesterday’s New York Times. He says it was written during the campaign but they didn’t publish until now. Pechefsy, who lives in Park Slope, is a former assistant director of the New York City Council’s finance division. He ran for City Council in the 39th district on the Green Party ticket in 2009.

IN Mayor Michael Bloomberg’s State of the City speech on Wednesday, he spoke of the City Council as if it were an equal partner in government. Indeed, the mayor’s surprisingly close re-election, the unusual defeat of a handful of council members and some spirited races in the general election in a city where winning the Democratic primary is tantamount to victory, might lead one to expect the 51-member body to be imbued with new democratic vigor. However, the council members inaugurated this month have joined a body whose governance structure is hardly more democratic than a high school student council’s — where the principal calls the shots.

Ultimately, all City Council decisions are made by the speaker and the speaker’s staff. The speaker controls which members get to sit on which committees and who heads those committees, what legislation comes up for a vote, the hiring and firing of the 250-plus central staff and the money that members get to dole out to their districts.