Postcard from the Slope

PARK SLOPE’S BELOVED DANCE STUDIO LOOKING FOR NEW SPACE: CITY SECTION ARTICLE

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On Sunday, the City section ran a story about The Park Slope Dance Studio, which has been in existence for 25 years. Owner Jennifer Kliegel, was told by her landlords that she has to move out by summer. Kliegel, who is truly a force of nature, has taught thousands of Park Slope children, as well as adults. She sent out a letter a few weeks ago to many Park Slopers explaining the situation.

The story in the City Section should be a great shout out — and will possibly help her find an appropriate space.

Teen Spirit took gymnastics there years ago with Marian Fontana. I can still see him at the recital in a red polo shirt and shorts on the stage at the theater at Brooklyn College.

Later, OSFO took Tots-on-the-Go with Marian, where we discovered that she was quite coordinated when it came to somersaults and cartwheels.

For her 2nd, 3rd and 4th birthday, OSFO had Marian’s famed Tots-on-the-Go birthday parties. For me, it’s a special place because it’s the site of my weekly writer’s group.  Read the article here.

Civics and Urban Life

WHAT IS WRITERS AT THE BEACH?

This is from the Writers at the Beach website:

Many of you know the story by now, the one about how “Writers at the
Beach: Pure Sea Glass” came into being. It started as a whim, a
half-formed longing on my part, to raise money for the United
Mitochondrial Disease Foundation (UMDF), the organization devoted to
research of this incurable and often terminal disease that severely
afflicted my then 7 and 12 year old nephews, Sam and Zachary. In
October 2004 when the idea for this “Writers at the Beach” first
occurred to me, I conceived of it as a one-time event, never never
imagining how the writers, participants and sponsors would forever
alter my life.

In that first year, our authors came from
Delaware, Maryland and Virginia. They now hail from these states as
well as from California, New York, Pennsylvania, Rhode Island,
Tennessee, and West Virginia. All of them come here on their own dime
for a cause many had never before heard of. Their generosity has
allowed us to donate to UMDF over $10.000 each year while still keeping
the cost of this event substantially lower than any comparable writers’
conference, especially one boasting a line up of authors such as ours.

At
this year’s “Writers at the Beach,” you will have a choice of twenty
workshops in four different genres—including, for the first time,
songwriting; you’ll have an opportunity to dine with an author of your
choice on Saturday evening, as well as an opportunity to have your work
evaluated ahead of time by an author, then discussed one on one. You’ll
hear readings throughout the weekend by some of our country’s best
writers; and you’ll have the chance to listen to Keynote speaker,
Marion Fontana, author of Widow’s Walk, a 9/11 memoir about
the loss of her firefighter husband, Dave Fontana, talk about why, more
than ever before, stories are essential. 

Enjoy looking
through the amazing choices of workshops and conversations that the
authors have made unique, compelling and challenging. I know it won’t
be easy to choose. Take a moment, too, to appreciate the sea glass
image, the use of which has been donated by artist and photographer
Celia Pearson, as well as the work of Franklin Parrish of Franklin
Parrish Design Systems, who has worked tirelessly these past two
months, at his own cost, to design this web site.

For
those of you returning, all of us–the authors, the volunteers, my
family and I–look forward to seeing you again. For those joining us
for the first time, we are eager to meet you, to welcome you to an
event that will remind you that your story is important, that it should
be told, that writing, in a world that increasingly seems to devalue
words, still matters to us all a great deal. 

      
      
      
   
   

Postcard from the Slope

NEW BLOG ON THE BLOCK: SOMETHING LOUD AND ANNOYING THIS WAY COMES

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Hi, thanks for running a great blog.  I’ve put up a new blog, SOMETHING LOUD AND ANNOYING THIS WAY COMES, about a weird, loud, high-pitched sound that’s been sounding from somewhere near Montague and Court for the past two months. 

I don’t know the exact source (and the police have been unwilling to go looking for it) but I live near 166 Montague.  Could you refer your readers to the blog and pass along any suggestions if you have any?  Thank you!

http://montaguestreet-piercingalarm.blogspot.com/

Postcard from the Slope

Nicholas Pekearo: Auxillary Cop Killed in Greenwich Village Shooting

Just got this from my sister:

Just read in the NY Times that one of the auxillery policemen, Nicholas
Pekearo, who was killed lived in Park Slope. He was also a writer. He
worked at a bookstore on the Upper Eastside. The other man, Yvergeniy
Marshalik, 19, was a student at NYU. He was only 19. His family fled Chechnya  when he was a young boy. He lived in Brooklyn, as well.

Postcard from the Slope

SEEING GREEN ON ONE-WAY NO WAY MEETING

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Read Seeing Green’s report on the One-Way No Way meeting at Methodist Hospital. As always incisive and interesting. He is. Here’s an excerpt. Read more at his place.

It was quite a night at the DOT presentation of the One-Way Street
Proposal, sponsored by Community Board 6, held at New York Methodist’s
auditorium last night. Raucous, exciting, noisy, super-well-attended
and, no surprise after seeing the level of protests around Park Slope,
with a happy outcome (so far.)

I was lucky enough to have gotten there early enough to be able to
get a seat in the 200-seat room; there were literally hundreds of
people who had to stay outside, most in the hospital building, but
dozens and dozens of people overflowed into the street outside.

CB6 had set aside about 30 seats for board members and other VIPs
and there was a threatened revolt a few minutes before the start as the
audience started chanting "LET THEM IN!"…shades of the 60’s…A
sturdy and unsmiling security guard closed the door and stood akimbo.

Talking of which, the 60’s I mean, I found it both odd and oddly
reassuring, that the median age seemed to be 50 or so, and I fit right
in. All white haired and raring to go, I thought…where were the Gen
X-ers and Y-ers? Off for a spin in their SUVs? Or watching the latest
reality TV show instead of protesting as we were?

Civics and Urban Life

HEPCAT NEEDS A JOB: IT GUY/SOLUTIONS ARCHITECT

I want to thank the readers who responded to yesterday’s post about Hepcat needing a job. I am  just thrilled—and so is he. All leads are being followed up on. What a great bunch of LEADS. How can I thank all of you? In the off chance that you didn’t see yesterday’s post, I am running it again in the hopes of getting even more responses. You can never have too many — it’s so competitive out there.

It’s hard to do justice to the many skills of Hecpat (No Words_Daily Pix). But we’re gonna try.

The new-fangled word for what Hepcat does is SOLUTIONS ARCHITECT.
I like the sound of that. In old style language: he’s a brilliant IT
guy with skills, brains, and computer know-how up the wazoo. And he
needs a job. He’s a creative and expert problem solver with top notch
an analytical skills and much experience in the world of computing.

Resume and references available on request.  Send inquiries to louise_crawford@yahoo.com

Any headhunters or HR people out there?

Postcard from the Slope

500 PEOPLE TURN OUT FOR ONE WAY NO WAY

Read Gowanus Lounge’s report on the Community Board meeting at Methodist Hospital last night. I’m in Delaware so I wasn’t there. But there’s tons of coverage. Here’s an excerpt.

Nearly 500 people turned out for a Community Board meeting in Park Slope last night to oppose a Department of Transportation proposal to turn Sixth and Seventh Avenue into one-way streets.
More than 160 people squeezed into an auditorium before doors were
closed to chants of "Let them in! Let them in!" Another 200-250 people
listened in a vestibule outside the auditorium and even more people
stood outside on the sidewalk in the rain. The meeting was held at
Methodist Hospital in Park Slope.

The DOT plan was presented by Deputy Commissioner Michael Primeggia. He faced a sometimes hostile and mocking crowd and presented the rationale for making Sixth Avenue one-way northbound between 23rd Street and Atlantic Avenue and for making Seventh Avenue one-way Southbound between Flatbush Avenue and Prospect Avenue.
"First and foremost it improves safety," Mr. Primeggia said to jeers
from the skeptical audience. Under the plan, he said, "half of all
pedestrian crossings will be unopposed and conflict free." The B-67 bus
would also have to be re-routed because of the change. The DOT Deputy
Commissioner listed added benefits adding parking spaces where bus
stops are eliminated, introducing muni-meters, giving more "green time"
to lights on cross streets. (There is an overall perception in the
community that the proposal is being made to eventually ease the flow
of traffic through Park Slope to Atlantic Yards.) Another proposal, to
eliminate a lane of traffic in each direction from Fourth Avenue and to use them as turning lanes we greeted more openly by the audience.

Civics and Urban Life

NOTES FROM THE WRITERS CONFERENCE ON THE BEACH

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I’m in Delaware attending the Writers at the Beach writer’s conference rooming in a slightly faded  mid-century modern hotel with a good friend.

It’s kinda like a slumber party. Fun to be sharing a room, talking, listening to music. Laughing a lot.

Dreary, dark rainy morning but it’s fun to be doing this — getting out of the normal routine — living the groovy writer’s life. At the beach in winter.

Something about being at the beach in winter. I’m thinking of Louis Malle’s "Atlantic City" or "Julia" with Jane Fonda as Lillian Hellman.

Last night, after dinner at an ultra-Victorian style restaurants with fringed lampshades, pink velvet and teacups on dispaly, we took a walk on the dark, empty beach until the rain starting coming down.

I love the moodiness of this place. In the summer, I hear it’s quite the hot spot.

Last night there was a ‘meet and greet’ in the hotel restaurant but the band — kind of a funky, New Orleans style group — was too loud. You couldn’t really talk and my friend got a sore throat. We drank Bailey’s Irish Cream and talked to a English teacher from Baltimore, who spends summers at the beach.

Sounds like Rebobeth Beach has quite a writer’s community — a writer’s guild, writing groups, etc. The Browsabout Bookstore seems to be the epicenter of activity on the boardwalk.

This morning: registration, lunch and opening remarks, a reading and  a three-hour workshop. Most of the workshops are sold out so we don’t what we’re gonna do.

Maybe go to one of the town’s multiple outlet malls and do some shopping. Or not. 

Postcard from the Slope

HEPCAT NEEDS A JOB: IT GUY/SOLUTIONS ARCHITECT

It’s hard to do justice to the many skills of Hecpat (No Words_Daily Pix). But we’re gonna try.

The new-fangled word for what Hepcat does is SOLUTIONS ARCHITECT.  I like the sound of that. In old style language: he’s a brilliant IT guy with skills, brains, and computer know-how up the wazoo. And he needs a job. He’s a creative and expert problem solver with top notch an analytical skills and much experience in the world of computing.

Resume and references available on request.  Send inquiries to louise_crawford@yahoo.com

Any headhunters or HR people out there?


 

Civics and Urban Life

DIVORCE JUDGE ON TRIAL

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Saw this on Park Slope Parents.

For any one who has or is going through a divorce in Brooklyn, you may be interested to know that the Judge Gerald Garson is finally on trial in Brooklyn. 

Jury selection is taking place this week and the trial will go on for several weeks.

It is open court and a number of concerned citizens are attending the
trial to show that we will not tolerate corruption in the Brooklyn Courts.

Garson is charged with accepteing bribes to fix a number of divorce and
custody cases, often with detrimental outcomes to the children.  Google
the name and his cousin will come up, too.  Seems it runs in the
family.

There will be a number of concerned citizens there but we are hoping
that more people will attend.

Supreme courthouse
at 320 Jay Street
the new tall supreme court building

2nd floor – use escalators…Special Courtroom 1

M-Th 9am-4:30pm , no Fridays

Judge Berry  has asked for no cell phones..so please…..don’t bring
them

NOTE–  the DA has made it clear that a protest would be fine……they
would be very happy with plenty of attention on this case.  So lets
bring it!

 

Continue reading DIVORCE JUDGE ON TRIAL →

Postcard from the Slope

PS 282 PARENTS CLARIFY THEIR POSITION

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I got this email today from the PS 282 parents who wrote the letter to Chancellor Klein yesterday. They wanted to clarify their position — and thought that I may have misinterpreted their email. Yes, it’s true I may have misconstrued the meaning of their email. Or maybe they weren’t clear. Their inclusion of the link to the Militant Islam Monitor was misleading. This letter helps to clarify their position.

Dear Louise Crawford,

We are sorry if you have misunderstood the meaning of what we were writing, or maybe we didn’t express ourselves well.
Our letter was written as a personal missive and the meaning that you attribute to it is misleading.

As has already been quoted regarding this blog, "The potential controversy about the school adds a potentially destructive further layer of complication to the situation. It’s clear that the Khalil Gibran International Academy will face opposition by MIM and like-minded ideologues wherever it goes."

This is the reason why the extreme radical article was included; only to show the worst of what outside feelings are already being voiced about the proposed addition to our school.

We would be happy to have both arabic language and middle east studies added to our current curriculum. Children should have the opportunity to learn about Aristotele as well as Ibn Rushd and of Plato as well as Abū ‘Alī al-Husayn; they should know were our mathematic and astrological systems come from and read the most beautiful poems by arab poets such as Omar Khayyám. Certainly this field of study has been largely ignored in American childhood public education.

Our children have a beautiful school with enough space to enable them in their learning that would be reduced substantially by the new installment. If you attended the PTA meeting you would probably agree that the group of presenters did not appear to have given any consideration to the effects it would have on the current school population. In fact they admitted that they had only looked at the "square foot per child" ratio of the building and were unprepared to address any issues of sharing between 5 yr old children and teenagers of school facilities like the cafeteria and bathrooms. Not to mention security issues.

If the promoters of the Khalill Gibran International Academy are given entry to our school so will their critics, and we think that by reporting what you could easily find with a simple google search, shows how low could be the tone of the debate. Whether or not you or we want it, this is the pressure that we are talking about and one element that our community, by default, will have to confront.
In addition to the loss of space and other physical adjustments, we as a community have to be aware of the kind of pressure this new school could put on our children.

thank you for taking the time and giving space on your blog for this discussion and allowing us to clarify our opinions, again we apologize if our intentions were misleading or misunderstood.

best regards

Postcard from the Slope

WANTED: SOMEONE TO WRITE ABOUT THE NO WAY MEETING FOR OTBKB

OTBKB can’t be at tonight’s meeting but would love for a few people to report back on the meeting. The event will obviously be well covered by the local bloggers and media (the big guns will surely be there). I am looking for bloggy details: slice of life, interesting quotes, atmospheric reporting. What was the VIBE? How are people feeling? What was the upshot of the meeting?

In other words, anyone want to be a guest blogger? Please send bloggy reporting to louise_crawford@yahoo.com and I will post it.

Let me know in advance if you’re interested.

Postcard from the Slope

TONIGHT’S THE NIGHT: BIG MEETING ON ONE WAY 7TH AVE INITIATIVE

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Aaron Naparstek, the man responsible for convincing Commerce Bank to RETHINK its plans to make a drive through on Fifth Avenue, is at it again. (They didn’t build the drive-thru as everyone knows).

His Streetsblog has become the central locus of important information pertaining to the initiative by the DOT to change the direction of 6th and 7th Avenues. Today, he has a video on  his site that is well worth looking at. Check out the video ad compare and contrast. As he says, "Which type
of street is more conducive to neighborhood life?"

In Park Slope, Brooklyn, the Department of Transportation has put forward a plan to convert a pair of two-way neighborhood avenues to one-way operation. DOT says that the plan is designed strictly "to make it safer for pedestrians crossing the street,"
but the noisy, fast-moving traffic that we filmed on one-way Eighth
Avenue, just a block up the hill, suggests that this plan is more about
moving traffic than helping kids and elderly people cross the street.
Watch as we use a speed gun and a noise meter to compare one-way Eighth
Avenue and two-way Seventh Avenue. Then decide for yourself: Which type
of street is more conducive to neighborhood life?

Tonight is the BIG MEETING, the community’s chance to express their opposition to this plan, at  the Methodist Hospital auditorium at 6:30 p.m. Entrance on 6th Street between 7th and 8th Avenue.

Postcard from the Slope

NO LAND GRAB ROUND-UP ON ONE WAY NO WAY

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Here’s No Land Grab’s round up of One Way No Way activity on blogs and elsewhere.

Everyone’s talking about One Way No Way in the Slope. I overheard Angela, the PS 321 crossing guard on 2nd Street, explaining to a parent why it’s such a terrible idea. "I don’t want children to get killed…" I overheard her saying.

I hope she’s planning on going to tonight’s meeting at the Methodist Hospital auditorium at 6:30 p.m. entrance on 6th Street between 7th and 8th Avenue.

Alas, I won’t be there. Going out of town.

EDUCATION

MILITANT ISLAM MONITOR CALLS KALIL GIBRAN A “JIHAD SCHOOL”: COME ON NOW

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The Militant Islam Monitor asserts that the Kalil Gibran Internation Academy, that may go into the school building that houses PS 282 on Sixth Avenue at Lincoln Place  in Park Slope, will be a magnet for Jihadi militantism.

That’s the most ridiculous thing I’ve ever heard.

The MIM believes (erroniously) that the school would serve as an INSTITUTION OF INDOCTRINATION with its staff and curriculum "mirroring the same
ideology as the 9/11 hijackers.:

To me, this sounds like such a load of racist crap. Here’s an excerpt from a post on MIM’s website. They want to block the creation of the Kalil Gibran Internation Academy: 

Slated to be the school’s principal, Dhabah [aka "Debbie"]
Almontaser was presented an award by the Council on American Islamic
Relations [CAIR, the Saudi funded front group for Hamas and a
co-defendant in a 9/11 terrorism lawsuit] and more importantly, the
curriculum of her school has been designed by the radical American Arab
Anti Discrimination Committee [ADC].

The ADC’s funder [and recipient of the ADC’s "Global
Achievement Award"] Saudi Prince Alwaleed Bin Talal’s 10 million dollar
donation to the 9/11 victims charity was rejected by then NY Mayor
Giuliani because of Talal’s claim that American policy towards Israel
was the reason for the terrorist outrage. Talal has also raised money
to reward the family’s of suicide bombers.

The ADC is also in the forefront of filing discrimination
lawsuits and legal challenges aimed at obstructing the FBI, JTTF and
Homeland Security from investigating Arab and Muslims who pose
potential terrorism threats. source http://www.militantislammonitor.org/article/id/671

Six years after the attacks and still no memorial at Ground
Zero, instead 2007 will see the opening of the taxpayer funded Brooklyn
based madrassah aka "The Khalil Gibran International Academy for Arabic
and Islamic Culture."


EDUCATION

PARENTS OPPOSE KALIL GIBRAN BECAUSE OF OVERCROWDING

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Let’s be clear.

–Some parents at PS 282 oppose a new middle and high school going into their elementary school building on Sixth Avenue and Lincoln Place in Park Slope on grounds that it will overcrowd the school.  The proposed school is called the Kalil Gibran International Academy. The parents would oppose the inclusion of any proposed middle or high school in their building.

—The Militant Islam Monitor opposes the Kalil Gibran International Academy on the crazy ground that it has a Jihadi agenda. They will oppose this school wherever it goes.

These are separate arguments. The parents will continue to oppose the new school going in. The MIM will also continue to oppose the school — but for very different reasons.

Including links to the MIM in a letter about a parent’s opposition to the school really muddies the waters.

Don’t you think?

EDUCATION

NEW MIDDLE AND HIGH SCHOOL MAY GO INTO PS 282 IN PARK SLOPE

6 Comments

What’s all this I hear about a new middle school and high school going into the building that houses PS 282, a local elementary school on Sixth Avenue and Lincoln Place?

Two parents  at PS 282 wrote a letter to Chancellor Klein and sent it to me. I don’t know the whole story but I got a very weird feeling from the email I was sent.

The Kalil Gibran International Academy will be a school for arabic middle and high schoolers (100 pupils). Debbie Alontaser, who was listed on the Park Slope 100, is slated to be principal. Here’s a description of the school in today’s New York Sun:

A new public secondary school that is to include Middle Eastern
studies in its curriculum will focus on culture, not the region’s
political conflicts, Department of Education officials said yesterday.
"The school will not be a vehicle for political ideology," a Department
of Education spokesman, David Cantor, said of the Khalil Gibran
International Academy, due to open this September in Brooklyn.

As for the sorts of topics the school will cover, the CEO of the
Office of New Schools, Garth Harries, gave as an example a math lesson
plan that would mention that an Arabic mathematician invented the
concept of zero. "It’s going to follow Department of Education
regulations," the director of the Arab-American Family Support Center,
Lena Alhusseini, who helped design the school, said. "It’s going to be
exactly like all the schools in the city, the same curriculum."

I am alarmed that at the bottom of this parent’s email to Cancellor Klein, the authors included links to the Militant Islam Monitor, which is vehemently opposing the creation of this school on the crazy grounds that it has a Jihadi agenda.

While I have heard that the PTA opposes a new school being "stuffed into" their long-standing elementary school, including links like Miltant Islam Monitor is incendiary and so off the topic — it really makes me wonder.  What is the issue here, really? Is this racism or just a parent’s concerns about the future of their school. Here’s is the the email two parents sent to Chancellor Klein. 

Dear Chancellor Klein,

This evening we were given, along with almost the entire PS282  
community, some alarming news.  What was most alarming to us however  
was not the intention that you and New Visions have to open the  
Khalil Gibran International Academy within our walls, it's the  
arrogance with which it was done.  This was the first communication  
to anyone, except our principal who held back the news until the math  
tests were over, and it was presented to us as if we have no choice.   
When we asked Robert Hughes, president of New Visions, if he had  
looked at the population of the school that he is about to invade  
(yes, the parents feel it is an invasion) he told us that he hadn't  
but that he had looked at the building's capacity. Both the breakdown  
of the school's population and the building's capacity are on the  
same report easily accessible on the DOE website!

Please know that the parents are mobilizing and organizing a protest  
that will not end until this plan has been rethought.  We will  
contact every news outlet in the city and in the country.

Our son is in the third grade LEAD program, he and his classmates  
have the highest test scores of the school, he is one of few non- 
african americans in his class.  He is fluently bilingual and bi- 
cultural and we want him to keep an open mind, and it is for this  
that we chose PS282 over other neighborhood schools, public and  
private.  We will not keep him in the school if he loses one piece of  
the curriculum that he is presently offered or the space for that to  
take place in, nor will we keep him in an educational environment  
that "is an abdication of the basic principle behind public education  
to set up separate schools to teach uncritically one history and one  
culture."

Although the news has been public only for a short time, please read  
below what a quick google search comes up with about your new  
school.  Why do you want to put this kind of pressure on a small,  
neighborhood school in the midst of growing with such great potential?


Sincerely,

Jennifer Bacon Fossati and Filippo Fossati
parents of Paolo Fossati, class 3-209, PS282
Civics and Urban Life

PASTOR MEETER ON THE MORAL ISSUES SURROUNDING THE ATLANTIC YARDS

Read Pastor Meeter’s fascinating thoughts on the moral issues surrounding the Atlantic Yards controversy. Meeter, the pastor of the Old First Dutch Reformed Church, evokes the Tower of Babel, the Garden of Eden, and Naboth’s Vineyard. Read more at Pastor Meeter’s blog, yes he’s a member of Park Slope’s blogging clergy (see Andy Bachman,too).

The moral issue is what kind of country do we want? What kind of
concentrations of power? What protections of private property? Who
determines the public good, especially when the differences in scale
are so great, and the government is drawn to the interests of the
economically powerful? In the Torah, the public good is determined by
the interests of the small piece of private property.

The second Biblical image is the Tower of Babel. It’s in Genesis 11. The Torah is pretty clear on this. God was against it.

Not
because God is against big buildings and skyscrapers as such, but
because of the concentration of power which the Tower represents. Such
concentrations always require hierarchies, and bosses, and dictators,
and centralizations, and the sublimation of the individual to the
vision of the leadership.

The second reason that God was against
the Tower is because it represents the refusal to accept our limits. We
don’t know when to stop. We don’t know how to say No, Enough.

It’s not wholly different from the original sin of Adam in the Garden. The chance to not
eat the fruit is what made Adam a human being, and the opportunity to
say no to the fruit is what gave him wisdom. He had to use his
judgment. He had to accept his limits.

STUFF AND THINGS

LECTURE ON MARGARET SANGER AT THE OLD STONE HOUSE

The Old Stone House presents its  annual Herb Yellin
Memorial Lecture on Wednesday, March 21 at 7 pm. 

NYU professor Esther Katz, the director of the Margaret Sanger Papers
Project will speak. Sanger – reformer, activist and crusader for women’s rights – was a
fascinating and complex personality whose life exemplifies the exceptional
circumstances and sacrifices still confronted by women today. Tickers are $5 and include
refreshments. Books will be
available. 

For more
information, please contact OSH.
Kim
Maier
718-768-3195
New York 1

SUNSET RESIDENTS BLOCK HIGH-RISE

This from New York 1:

Residents rejoiced Sunday after blocking the construction of a
high-rise apartment building in their low-rise neighborhood in the
Sunset Park neighborhood of Brooklyn.

After pressure from the Sunset Park Alliance of Neighbors, a
proposed 12-story building that was to go up on a former parking lot on
42nd Street will instead be trimmed down to five and half stories.

The group calls it the first of many victories.

"We created an organization, Sunset Park Alliance of Neighbors, to
mobilize this effort and push our elected officials to make that
change, and it worked,” said Ivette Cabrea.

"I think that when the community come united and unified against a
project with the same objectives they know they can accomplish a lot,”
said Brooklyn Assemblyman Felix Ortiz.

The group says it plans to keep fighting what it calls "out of context development" in Sunset Park.

Postcard from the Slope

SEVENTH GRADER TRYING TO FIX B67 BUS PROBLEMS

Remember that story in OTBKB about Daniel Epelbaum, a seventh grader at the Brooklyn Friends School, who wrote a letter to Borough President Marty Markowitz about the B67 bus and how it doesn’t run often enough.

Well, that’s a problem many Park Slopers can relate to. That bus, that bus. It never comes. It’s always crowded, etc.

On that day at Sweet Melissa, Daniel Epelbaum had just gotten a response from Marty. He was overjoyed. Here’s a very detailed response from the Borough President to Epelbaum,

Props to Daniel Epelbaum. Because of his letter and his interest, New York City Transit may make some much needed improvements to that bus line which serves Park Slope and downtown Brooklyn.

You can fight City Hall. Go Daniel!

Mr.
Daniel Epelbaum

Seventh Grade Student

Brooklyn Friends School
375 Pearl Street
Brooklyn, NY
11215

Dear Mr. Epelbaum:

 

I have received a response to the letter I sent on January
29, 2007 to Transit President Lawrence Reuter on your behalf. You may have read
that Mr. Lawrence Reuter is no longer President of New York City Transit, having dedicated
many years of his life to improving our Transit system. However, I have received
a response from Acting President Millard Seay, who advises me that Transit is
considering your concerns.

 

In his response, which I have enclosed for your
information, Mr. Seay addresses a number of issues in this
matter:

 

  • Your
      letter was forwarded to Transit’s Division of Operations Planning for their
      consideration and response.
  • The
      Department of Buses was directed to closely monitor the southbound B67 service
      leaving Downtown Brooklyn during the evening peak travel period and take appropriate
    action to ensure that the service is operating closely to
    schedule.
  • He
      encourages you to forward any pertinent information to Bus Customer Relations
      if you experience any inordinate delay on your homeward bound
      trip.

 

I believe that it is important for public spirited citizens
such as yourself to voice any legitimate concern about the public service to
which we are entitled. In a democracy,

participation of the public in reporting the performance of
public services is the best guarantee that our concerns are addressed and
remedied.

 

By calling attention to the service deficiencies you
observed, you have played a valuable role for those of us who are concerned
about maintaining the quality of life and the balanced growth of Downtown
Brooklyn.  

 

Thank you for bringing this matter to my attention.

 

Sincerely,

 

 

 

Marty Markowitz

Serving Park Slope and Beyond