There were 22 applicants and some pretty stiff competition, including Sharon Mesmer, Leon Freilich, Bob Hershon, They Might Be Giants, and Lynn Chandhok but on February 3rd during his State of the Borough Address, Marty Markowitz announced that Tina Chang of Park Slope is the borough’s new Poet Laureate, the first woman of the four poet laureates that have held the position.

“She has dedicated her life to poetry and is passionate about reaching and educating diverse communities. We heard from many talented and dedicated applicants for the position of Brooklyn poet laureate, and one thing is certain-our borough has no shortage of people with a gift for the written word,” Marty Markowitz said yesterday at the Park Slope Armory.

So who is Tina Chang?

Chang is the author of Half-Lit Houses and the editor of Language for a New Century: Contemporary Poetry from the Middle East, Asia and Beyond. She currently teaches at Hunter College and Sarah Lawrence College, and has collaborated with M.S. 51 through Poem in Your Pocket Day. She co-founded an annual collaborative reading series between the Asian American Writers’ Workshop and Cave Canem, to bring together writers of Asian American and African American descent.

She takes over for Ken Siegelman, who died last year. He was poet laureate since 2002.

And who was on the selection committee?

Poets Tracie Morris, Jessica Greenbaum, Julie Agoos; coordinator of the MFA Program in Poetry at Brooklyn College, where she is Tow Professor of English; Robert N. Casper, programs director for the Poetry Society of America; Linda Susan Jackson,  poet and associate professor of English at Medgar Evers College; Dionne Mack-Harvin, executive director, Brooklyn Public Library; and Anthony Vigorito, poet and retired teacher who assisted former poet laureate Ken Siegelman with Brooklyn Poetry Outreach.