I guess Brooklyn Councilmember Bill de Blasio is vexed about Long Island Community Hospital’s decision to close their maternity department and sell off buildings in order to get out from under a $117 million debt. He released the following statement this morning.

“I am extremely troubled by LICH’s plan to close its maternity ward. This closing, coupled with the recent termination of the hospital’s rape crisis center, is part of a disturbing pattern of taking important medical services away from Brooklyn families.

“The possibility of LICH closing is unacceptable. Brooklyn cannot afford to lose the services this hospital provides. LICH must work with the community to create a long-term plan for combating its financial problems, and for serving the needs of the Brooklyn.”

Who can orget Richie Haven’s incredible performance as the opening act at Woodstock. I wasn’t there but I saw the movie and have heard that song umpteen times. Freedom, freedom, freedom. Was that the opening of "Sometimes I Feel Like a Motherless Child."

I’ve always loved Richie Havens. And according to Park Slope’s Ben Greenman in the New Yorker, he has a great new album just out called Nobody Left to Crown.

“Nobody Left to Crown” (Verve Forecast), Havens’s first
recording in four years, opens with a pair of originals, “The Key” and
“Say It Isn’t So,” which manage to address spiritual themes without
sounding overly earnest, a trick that sometimes eluded the artist in
his younger years. The centerpiece of the album is a majestic cover of
“Won’t Get Fooled Again.” Over his trademark open-tuned strumming,
Havens delivers a commanding vocal performance that fully restores the
revolutionary impulse of The Who’s original; he somehow gets blood from
a song that has been ossified for years. Nothing else quite rises to
that level, though there’s an urgent version of Jackson Browne’s “Lives
in the Balance” and several strong tracks in which Haven applies
Eastern-style enlightenment to Realpolitik—including the quietly
furious title song, which slyly quotes “Home on the Range.”

And he’s a Brooklyn boy to boot. Born in Bed-Stuy. Here’s the blurbage about BAM’s R&B Festival at Metrotech, where Havens will be performing on August 7 at noon. Marcus Carl Franklin, the incredible kid who played one of the Bob Dylan’s in "Im Not There" WILL BE THERE. Note to self: Don’t miss this.

Born in Bed-Stuy, Richie Havens is gifted with one of the most recognizable voices in popular music—a fiery, poignant singing style that has remained ageless since he first emerged from the burgeoning Greenwich Village folk scene in the early 1960s. His blistering performance at Woodstock helped Havens reach a worldwide audience of millions, and for decades he has used music to convey messages of brotherhood and personal freedom. Joining him is teenage blues guitarist Marcus Carl Franklin, who portrayed a young Bob Dylan in the 2007 fictionalized biopic of Bob Dylan I’m Not There appearing in a telling scene with Havens.      

Jonathan Butler and Eric Demby, who run the Brooklyn Flea are working double-time to keep the neighborhood happy despite heated gripes that came spilling out at a recent community meeting in a local church.

The complaints: The Flea is bad for parking. It’s noisy and disruptive to neighborhood life on a summer Sunday.  There are also complaints about the large number of bikes locked up outside the Brooklyn Flea in Fort Greene. So the latest innovation to keep the neighbors happy: valet parking for bikes.

Starting this Sunday, we are pleased to announce that bike parking
at the Flea just got a whole lot easier. Bike valet is coming to the
Flea! Even better, it’s free.

We love folks to bike, walk, subway, bus, or blade-scooter to the
Flea–and now you can just hop off your bike, park it with our trusty
valet guy/gal right in front of the Lafayette entrance, get your
ticket, and pick up your bike on the way out. No muss, no worries, no
sweat.

The fine folks at Transportation Alternatives
provide this service at a few spots around town, and we’re hoping that
this new partnership with the Flea will kick bike valet into high gear
as a viable option for cyclists around the city at big or small events.

Good bye and good luck to Gabby, Brownstoner’s current managing editor and writer. Today is her last day at Brownstoner and she is leaving to  pursue a freelance career. I ran into Gabby once on Seventh Avenue and we had a really nice chat.

Gabby, we wish you the very best in your new adventure. Jonathan Butler, publisher of Brownstoner, had this to say about Gabby’s excellent work on the blog.

Gabby’s coverage of real estate and retail
development in Park Slope and Gowanus, in particular, have been second
to none and her reliability at staying on top of the news has given us
a chance to step back a little from the day-to-day grind to focus on
the larger direction of the site and related new projects like The
Flea.

And to replace Gabby, Butler has hired writer Lisa Selin Davis, who will begin as the full-time managing editor and writer on Monday. Lisa covers real estate and travel for the New York
Times, Metropolis, Interior Design and This Old House.

I met Lisa when she read excerpts from her novel, Belly, a novel set amid horse racing set in Saratoga Springs, NY, at Brooklyn Reading Works a couple of years ago.

Good Luck to both Gabby and Lisa.

A gaggle of TV and print news reporters gathered near the path to Lookout Hill in Prospect Park yesterday waiting for news from the Police Department about the man who was murdered there.

The TV journalists stayed in one area, the print journalists and photographers in another. It was an interesting scene.

The reporter from the Daily News announced that the area was called Lookout Hill. Reporters shot out questions to the cops that were guarding the path about the geography.

"The road over there is called Wellhouse Drive," one cop said referring to the path that goes south to north next to the Lake.

Most of the unconfirmed information about the body came from the reporters. One TV reporter, who was rushing off to edit her story, told me incorrectly that they found a skeleton under a pile of leaves and that it was probably an old murder. She was absolutely wrong about that.

A reporter who actually climbed up the hill before the police closed off the area saw the body and said he saw a male, probably hispanic, in a white t-shirt and blue jeans, lying in an area near Lookout Hill.

The reporters stopped runners, who slowed down to see why there were so many police cars, and asked them how they felt about a Homicide in Prospect Park. One reporter said something to the effect of: We need to fan the flames of tabloid-dom. One young  photographer said  to me: I’m supposed to stop people on the road  and ask them how they feel but it’s embarrassing.

Bikers and runners did react to news of the crime. People kept walking up to me to find out what was going on. People looked shocked but not surprised that something like this could happen in our park. One person said, "I’m not going to tell my wife about this because she’s in this park every day."

Some wanted to know if Lookout Hill is a gay cruising spot—as if that would somehow explain a crime of this nature. One guy, a news photographer said, "Some guy was bludgeoned about a year and a half ago on the other side of the park. A known homosexual. It was in the Vale of Cashmere."

Others acknowledged that the inner paths of the park are dark and mysterious and not a place they’d want to go after dark or alone.

I overheard some policemen talking about the hill as the site of the  Battle of Brooklyn, which was fought on August 27th 1776. I didn’t write down what they said so I looked it up today. Here’s Dalton Rooney:

The setting for the first major battle of the Revolutionary War. The
Continental Army lost the battle, but they held the British back long
enough for Washington and his troops to escape to New Jersey.

The reporters watched as the medical examiner’s van drove up the narrow path. Later four detectives in natty suits went up the hill. One looked like Liam Neeson and had a wide white tie.

Finally the van holding the body came down the hill. Someone, I think it was one of the cops said, "Hey guys, here’s your shot."

The photographers positioned themselves to get a picture of the van as it drove by. Later some cops,wearing plastic gloves and holding large brown paper bags, came down.

"No comment," they said brusquely. 

When the well-dressed detectives emerged, some reporters asked for a comment but none was forthcoming.

The TV crews were waiting for permission to go up the path. "Can we go up to the tape?" the attractive news anchor asked again and again. But I don’t think anyone was allowed near the crime scene yesterday. Once most of the police left the scene, the reporters did, too.

The park was peaceful. In other areas no one seemed aware that a man was murdered in the park. They just went about their day at the playground, running the drive, in Long Meadow.

A humid and peaceful weekday in the park.

Photo of Lookout Hill taken by Dalton Rooney. 

BAMcinematek presents Elliot Gould: Star for an Uptight Age August 1-21th. What a great idea for a festival. Brooklyn-born, Elliot Gould starred in a bunch of iconic films of the 1970’s: MASH, The Long Goodbye, Bob, Carol, Ted & Alice, California Split, I Love My Wife.

He was even in a 1971 Ingmar Bergman film called The Touch. Perhaps he is best known for his work with the great Robert Altman. Check the BAM website for the full schedule. Gould will do a Q&A after the 6:30 showing of Little Murders (written by Jules Feiffer and directed by Alan Arkin) on Friday August 8th. He will will also do a &A  after the 6:30 showing of The Long Goodbye (directed by Altman) on August 9th. Here’s the BAM blurgage:

1970: the year of M*A*S*H,
when Brooklyn-born Elliott Gould became a full-fledged movie
star. Time Magazine christened him “Star for an Uptight Age,”
suggesting that the audiences of the 70s, with their own insecurities
and neuroses now reflected onscreen, were welcoming a new kind of
leading man who possessed a greater depth, complexity and a willingness
to go further as a performer. We are pleased to welcome Elliott Gould
to BAMcinématek with this special focus on his extraordinary work in
the 70s, including his three legendary collaborations with Robert
Altman and a rare screening of Bergman’s The Touch.
 

The findings of the Straphangers 2008 Subway Report Card are in and there’s lots to read over at their website. Here’s an overview from the site:

–Our findings show the following picture of how New York City’s subways are doing:

–The best subway line in the city is the L with a MetroCard Rating of $1.40.
The L ranked highest because it performs best in the system on two
measures—regularity of service and announcements—and well above average
on three other measures: frequency of scheduled service, delays caused
by mechanical breakdowns and the percentage of dirty cars. The line did
not get a higher rating because it performed well below average on: a
chance of getting a seat during rush hour. The L runs between 14th
Street/Eighth Avenue in Manhattan and Canarsie in Brooklyn. The
previous top-rated line—the 1—dropped to a fourth-place tie.
 

–The
7 came in second behind the L with a MetroCard Rating of $1.30. Both
the 7 and L are in a pilot “Line General Managers” program, which
appears to be benefiting riders. According to New York City
Transit leadership: “the new positions will be responsible for
virtually all elements of the day-to-day operations on both of these
lines [and] will be given their own railroads and the responsibility
for running them to the satisfaction of our customers.”⁶
The 7 performed above average on four measures: frequency of scheduled
service, regularity of service, delays caused by mechanical breakdowns
and chance of getting a seat during rush hour. The line did not get a
higher rating because it performed below average on: the percentage of
dirty cars and adequate announcements. The 7 runs between Times Square
in Manhattan and Flushing, Queens.

–The W was ranked the worst subway line, with a MetroCard Rating of 70 cents. The
W line has a low level of scheduled service and performs below average
on four other measures: regularity of service, car breakdowns, car
cleanliness and announcements. The W did not receive a lower rating
because it performed above average on: a chance of getting a seat
during rush hour. The W line operates between Whitehall Street in lower
Manhattan and Astoria, Queens. In last year’s survey, the W tied for
the worst line with the C.
 

–Overall,
we found a weak showing for subway service. Car breakdowns worsened
from a mechanical failure every 156,624 miles in 2006 to one every
149,646 miles in 2007. Subway car announcements deteriorated from 90%
in the second half of 2006 to 85% in the second half of 2007. Two other
measures showed no sign of improvement: regularity of arriving trains
and car cleanliness. (We were unable to compare the      remaining two measures.)

What is going on in Kensington?

On July 27, 2008 between 6:30 and 6:50 a.m., twelve cars had their tires slashed on Cortelyou Road between Ocean Parkway and East 7th Street.

A group calling itself the Kensington Action Force wants to know if anyone observed this activity on Sunday morning. Send replies to Kaforce(at)yahoo(dot)com

According to the Kensington Action Group and the local NYPD precinct, car vandalism has spiked
recently in the Kensington community. Here’s something that was posted on Kensington Blog.

there’s been about 20-30 car break-in, usually 2-4 a night, that I have seen personally around Ocean Parkway and Cortelyou, along Cortelyou, and on East 7th Street by the side of the
church and between the school,

I usually hit around midnight to 5am,
since i walk my dog regularly at 6am. The best police have done is park
unmanned golf cart decoys on the block. this regular occurance is an
outrage since its obvious to me that they are targeting large suv’s
with out of state plates, always around the same time and always parked
in spots that are not exactly in front of a residence or apt bldg.

This is bad news for Park Slope foodies. The A&S Pork Store, a Fifth Avenue institution since 1948, is set to close in October. What we’re losing: a fantastic butcher, deli, and maker of prepared foods that are absolutely delicious. What is my family going to do without their Chicken, eggplant and veal parmesan.

And their breads…I love their foccacia bread, their mozzarella, their other delicious specialties.

And that’s not all: we’re losing the last butcher shop in Park Slope. The very last. And that’s patently ridiculous. We lost Great Western Fine Foods last month and now this. I was a frequent Western Fine Foods customer and noticed that they were showing the space to interested parties.

Now this.

A&S has been a fixture on Park Slope’s Fifth Avenue for a long time. Anthony Scicchitano opened the business on Fifth Avenue in 1948 and eventually expanded to 26 franchises across the city.

As reported in the Daily News, the current sibling owners of A&S, Salvatore and Enzo Bonnello, took over the shop five years ago. According to the Daily News, they were told by Scicchitano that their future was secure. But Sccicchitano died 18 months ago and his daughter wanted to sell the building. The brothers can’t afford to relocate in Park Slope. Their current rent is $5,000. and the market value for other store ronts is now $12,000.

Every time I went into A&S I wanted to tell them: you can’t close this shop, you can’t close this shop, you’re all we have left. The last butcher but also one of the last vestiges of mom and pop Park Slope.

Is there some way that they can stay in Park Slope. Any one out there have an idea?