The New York City Department of Correction (DOC) invites the community to attend an open house at the Brooklyn Detention Complex, more commonly known at the Brooklyn House of Detention or the “House of D’.”
…

The open house in being held in advance of the phased re-opening of the House of Detention. Approximately 100 inmates per week will be transferred to the facility beginning in February. This will be an opportunity to meet Warden Walter Nin, ask questions and tour the facility.

To take advantage of this (we hope) once in a lifetime opportunity, please RSVP to Delilah Ortega in the DOC Department of Public Information at Delilah.Ortega@doc.nyc.gov or (718) 546-0631.

Next Monday, December 12 at 10:00 a.m., Congressman Nadler, along with representatives of New York Lawyers for the Public Interest, NARAL, Planned Parenthood NYC and others, will assemble on the steps of City Hall to demand action to relieve this hazard to public health. For more information, contact kterenzi@NYLPI.org

“We were told by the state that the BQE was in danger of collapsing in the 80s,” CHA President Roy Sloane tells 1010 WINS. “It’s also pathetic that they put all these years and effort in, spent money on all sorts of designs and are now dropping it.”

NYT/Schoolbook: Though a handful of Cobble Hill parents said they wanted the school to open to mitigate waiting lists at other nearby schools, a majority of the audience was composed of parents and teachers from the two secondary schools, who criticized the plans’ effects on their schools.

The Brooklyn School for Global Studies and the School for International Studies share most of the school building.

Under the new plan, which will be voted on at the Dec. 14 meeting of the Panel for Educational Policy, each school would lose 10 to 12 regular-size classrooms over the next several years as the charter school expands.

Jeff Tripp, a teacher at the School for International Studies, criticized the city’s plan for giving more gym time to the charter school students than either of the secondary schools’ students. Mr. Tripp said the city’s space-sharing plan was like that of a “fire marshal giving a concert.”

Notification issued 11/14/11 at 12:00 PM. The Port Authority of New York and New Jersey will be testing their Early Warning Sirens at the Brooklyn Piers tomorrow, November 15, 2011 between 10:00 AM and 12:00 PM. These sirens may also be heard in lower Manhattan. This is only a drill.

The notice doesn’t specify which “Brooklyn Piers,” but we’re presuming they include ones adjacent to Columbia Street and Red Hook.

NY Daily News:  Success Charter Network CEO Eva Moskowitz‘s plan to bring a new charter school to Brownstone Brooklyn is getting mixed reviews.

In recent weeks, Moskowitz has been pitching Success Academy Cobble Hill to the booming population of young families in Cobble Hill, Boerum Hill and Carroll Gardens using a slew of community meetings and flyers.

Network officials last night handed out flyers at the annual Halloween parade in Cobble Hill Park.

But the former councilwoman isn’t always getting the warm reception she wants for what would be SCN’s second school in an upper-middle class neighborhood.

An initial meeting held last week at a house on Bergen Street was filled with 18 receptive parents who wanted to learn more about the proposed school.

“You’ve got a lot of schools here that aren’t working for a lot of families,” Moskowitz told the group last Wednesday night. “We see our schools as identifying talent and nurturing that talent.”

A Cobble Hill man was walking on Boerum Place towards Bergen Street  and a hoard of local teens.  One of the group accosted him, yelling “Boo”.  The amplitude of the youth’s taunt nearly knocked the victim over.  When he confronted the thug, he was met with a big fat knuckle sandwich:

Brooklyn Paper: The victim, who was wearing glasses, was hit in the left eye. His lens shattered, damaging his cornea.

“I fell backwards,” he said. “I couldn’t see anything. I was so dazed and confused that I fell against the wall. But the kids just laughed and hurried off.”

Cops are investigating, but assaults like this are not uncommon in Boerum Hill, where historic multi-million dollar brownstones are cushioned between the Wyckoff and Gowanus housing projects and there are cavernous gaps in the neighborhood’s median income level — from $23,900 to more than $108,000, according to the 2010 census.

The paper lists at least 5 additional attacks by youths in the area this year.

And how does that saying go?  ”Out of the mouths of babes…”:

“My friends like to f–k with people. They find it funny,” said Tatiana Chambers, a ninth grader at the School of International Studies on Baltic Street between Court and Smith streets. “Some kids are really high-strung, and if they feel disrespected they’ll hit somebody.”

In an NYTimes article entitled, “The Outcast of Brownstone Brooklyn” a detailed examination of the negotiations concerning restitution in the now notorious PS 29 embezzlement scandal is provided.

Putting aside Ms. Providence Hogan’s admission to stealing $100,000 from the PS 29 PTA  to pay for rent, for her home and business, as well as fertility treatments, the question remains, when and if restitution will occur.  Alternatively, should she go to jail?  What do you think?

According to the NYTimes: “Both the district attorney’s office and parents at the school have argued that Ms. Hogan continues to live too well. She and her family occupy a carriage house in Carroll Gardens, for which they pay $3,600 a month, she told me. When I asked her why she hadn’t moved, she said that moving would, in itself, be too expensive, and that she sought to make amends where she lived. Ms. Hogan doesn’t buy clothes for herself or her daughter, she said, almost never leaves the neighborhood and walks everywhere she goes. Still, some members of the P.S. 29 community were furious, one mother said, when Ms. Hogan was spotted coming out of the Union Market, a gourmet grocery store near her home.”

Today, respected techblog Gigaom asks – How long can AOL stay committed to Patch?

Gigaom: But are there enough bloggers who can fill that gap? And will AOL be sharing any of the advertising revenue it hopes to generate with them?

Huffington Post has also been rolling out more locally-themed topic pages, including several recent ones aimed at readers in Detroit and Miami — and these efforts have also caused speculation about whether the company is more interested in an aggregation approach rather than unique content, since the former is substantially less expensive. The problem for Patch is that the more its sites become lookalike aggregators rather than having a unique voice, the less likely they are to appeal to the market they are aimed at, and the less desirable they will be as an advertising vehicle.

AOL’s management may be committed to Patch for now, but the company can’t continue pouring money into an unprofitable entity forever, no matter how much Webster talks about a “long-term” investment. AOL doesn’t really have the luxury of thinking long term at the moment — Armstrong has to show some positive movement to investors or his job is likely in jeopardy, and without him Patch loses its biggest champion.

The NYPD nabbed a few skells in connection to burglaries in Cobble Hill, Carroll Gardens and in areas covered by the 84th Precinct. A perp believed to be involved in the Cobble Hill and Carroll Gardens jobs spent some time on ice this week but the 76th reports that he’s been released “due to problems with the identification.” However, the boys in the precinct ain’t fallin’ for no banana in the tailpipe (as it were) and will assigning patrol units to “monitor this individual in an effort to deter him from committing further crimes.”

Also, two alleged burglars were busted in connection to jobs pulled on the 84th’s turf. Both of these low lifes are still in jail and the folks at the 76th predict a “substantial reduction” in burglaries due to these arrests. It’s believe these pereps entered their brownstone targets via the front window next to the top step.

Ladies watch out there’s a mad grabber on the loose! During the last week, the 76th reports that two young women were groped in our area. The pervy perp is described as a male hispanic in his mid-twenties.

The 76th invites the public to attend its Community Council Meeting on September 13, 7PM, at the station house. In addition if you’d like your a residential crime prevention survey done on your home, call Police Officer Bredy at 718-834-3211.

Notification issued 8/29/11 at 2:00 PM. The NYPD has issued a Missing Senior Notification for Parvez Khan, male, of Pakistani descent, age 66. He is 5’5″, 155 lbs, with brown eyes and black balding hair, wearing a white shirt, black pants, and white sneakers. He was last seen near Baltic St and Columbia St in BK on 8/23/11. Mr. Khan is in good physical condition but poor mental condition. For a photo see the attached link. If you see Mr. Khan call 800-577-TIPS (8477).

The sender included the following attachment:

https://attachments.sendwordnow.com/Attachments.aspx?token=08a71e38-b159-4f17-81be-4beb4d8cfc66

Along with Senator Squadron, Assemblywoman Joan Millman and City Council Members Stephen Levin and Brad Lander have agreed to the deal.

The New York Times: After months of uncertainty over the fate of the popular Brooklyn Bridge Park, city and state officials plan to sign an agreement on Tuesday that would allow limited private housing to be built there, to help pay an expected annual operating cost of $16 million.

The agreement ensures that the park, which now measures 20 acres, will be completed, eventually expanding to 85 acres on five disused piers along the East River.

According to the Times story, the agreement will allow a building planned for John Street in DUMBO to proceed, but at a greatly reduced scale. The story does not mention the planned combination hotel and apartment complex on the landward side of Pier 1, for which the Brooklyn Bridge Park Corporation has announced its intention of issuing a request for proposal this month, and which apparently will not be affected by the agreement.

The big news is that the city has agreed to consider revenues from the sale of Watchtower properties as a source of park funding. Under the agreement, to which the Watchtower is not a party, should the Watchtower sell all or some of its properties in conjunction with its planned move upstate before January 1, 2014, the city will consider tax revenue from those properties as offsetting the need for payments in lieu of taxes from the residential buildings planned for Pier 6. Under the proposed offset formula, according to the Times, it would take sales of 1.5 million square feet of Watchtower property to eliminate the need for both Pier 6 buildings.

State Senator Daniel Squadron, who has been a strong advocate of use of revenues from the Watchtower properties to fund park opeartion and maintenance, and who, under the earlier agreement between the city and state authorizing the city to take over development of the Park, has been given veto power over the construction of housing on park land, is quoted by the Times as saying the new agreement is “not as extreme as the plan that we’re changing, but a way to build a great new park in tough times.”

The federal Defense of Marriage Act (DOMA), as well as the religious exemptions included in the New York marriage equality bill, create a number of obstacles and questions for same-sex couples, even if they’re married under New York law – including social security, health benefits, federal pension benefits, tax returns, interstate travel and relocation, and adoption.

Accordingly, local elected officials, including Congresswoman Nydia Velazquez, Borough President Marty Markowitz, State Senator Daniel Squadron, Assemblymember Joan Millman, Councilmembers Brad Lander and Stephen Levin, and the Senate sponsor of marriage equality State Senator Tom Duane, will host a public forum on the challenges that remain for married LGBT New Yorkers following this year’s historic passage of marriage equality. The forum, titled “After ‘I Do’: What’s Next for LGBT New Yorkers?” will be held on Tuesday, August 16th, 2011 at 6:30PM at the Borough of Manhattan Community College. More information is here.

Under an instructor’s eye, a student kayaker does a roll behind One Brooklyn Bridge Park.

The U.S. Coast Guard cutter Dependable is berthed at Pier 7.

Brooklyn Daily Eagle: Carey, a graduate of Syracuse University and the Harvard School of Public Health, has been with UHB since 2005, during which she oversaw major renovations of the 376-bed facility. Before joining the Downstate Medical Center team, she served as the associate executive director and CEO at Howard University Hospital in Washington, D.C. Prior to that, she held leadership positions at the University of Maryland and the Johns Hopkins Medical System.

Ms. Carey will have a short commute to her office at LICH. She lives at One Brooklyn Bridge Park.

One aspect of the DOT plan that proved contentious, but was not addressed in the resolution, is the proposed re-routing of city buses, which would no longer discharge and take on passengers at the foot of Atlantic but would be routed onto a loop of roads to the north, discharging and loading directly next to the park. DOT’s representative, Ted Wright, argued that this was safer than having people cross a road to get from bus to park or vice versa, and having buses make u-turns at the foot of Atlantic. A representative of One Brooklyn Bridge Park residents argued that this routing would be more hazardous because the buses would cross several pedestrian crosswalks on the new route. He also said that adding city buses to the already heavy tourist bus traffic would increase the safety problem, and would also make worse a noise and air pollution problem.

A major focus of concern was the problem of getting pedestrians safely across the entrance to the BQE on-ramp at the south side of Atlantic. At present, drivers are allowed to make a right on red from 7:00 to 10:00 a.m. on weekdays. Mr. Wright explained that this is because many drivers exit the BQE at Hamilton Avenue and take Hicks Street to Atlantic, where they re-enter the expressway, to avoid traffic jams. Many of those present urged that this exception to the no right on red rule be ended, but Mr. Wright said DOT was reluctant to do something that could have serious effects on traffic flow. Asked why DOT has only proposed to study installing a red light camera there to enforce the no turn rule during the times when it is in effect, he said that the state has allowed the city only a certain number of such cameras, and that it presently has the maximum number allowed.

Improving the Atlantic Avenue/Furman Street intersection by rerouting the bus turnaround, and adding pedestrian space and crosswalks.
Improving signal timing and the “no right on red” sign at the BQE entrance on Atlantic Avenue, to make it safer for pedestrians to cross.
Removing the greenway/bike path from the sidewalk on the west side of Columbia Street.
Adding a crosswalk across Columbia Street at the stop-light near the BQE entrance, and simplifying south-bound traffic on Columbia.

Details and illustrations of the existing and proposed traffic, bike and pedestrian routes and signals can be seen here. These proposals will be discussed at a meeting of the Community Board 6 Transportation Committee this Thursday evening, beginning at 6:30, in Room A at Long Island College Hospital (enter at 339 Hicks Street); members of the public are invited to attend and offer comments. If you can’t attend the meeting but want to make a comment, you may do so on Council Member Lander’s web page.

We are pleased to announce that Long Island College Hospital (LICH) is now officially part of the State University of New York (SUNY) Downstate Medical Center’s University Hospital of Brooklyn (UHB). The unprecedented joining of a community, not-for-profit teaching hospital with a university-based, publicly supported academic teaching hospital provides education, clinical care, research breakthroughs, and employment to the communities of Brooklyn Heights, Cobble Hill, Carroll Gardens, Red Hook and beyond.

Being a part of University Hospital of Brooklyn preserves LICH’s heritage. The agreement also will strengthen SUNY Downstate’s education and training mission and its standing as the hub of medical education in Brooklyn.

There’s more information at the http://cobblehillblog.com/?p=6390 Tonight’s Cobble Hill Association Annual Meeting, to be held at LICH, Conference Room A (enter at the main entrance, 339 Hicks Street, between Atlantic Avenue and Amity Street) starting at 7:30, will feature presentations on the past–distinguished architectural historian Francis Morrone on the construction of “the ditch” that divides Cobble Hill and the Columbia Street Waterfront–present–an update on plans to reconstruct the triple cantilevered roadway that skirts Brooklyn Heights–and possible future–a look at the BQE Enhancement Study which considers ways to “fix the ditch”–of the Brooklyn-Queens Expressway. The event is free and open to the public.

Brooklyn Eagle: Four teens who allegedly set fire to a school playground in Cobble Hill were attempting to film a video showing one of them sliding through a ring of fire, according to FDNY.

Fire Department spokesperson Frank Dwyer told the Brooklyn Eagle that two boys — Max Layton and Bairn Sweeny, both 16 — were charged as adults for setting the new playground equipment at P.S. 29 ablaze while staging the stunt in the early hours of Sunday, May 8. Two girls, both 13 and also at the scene of the crime, were charged as juveniles, according to Dwyer.

“The four had combustible material and rubbing alcohol. They poured alcohol on the jungle gym slide and lit a fire. The slide and the mat caught fire,” Dwyer said. “They caused tens of thousands of damage to the playground.”

Brooklyn Eagle: While Gregory was not at liberty to describe the actual method the teens used to burn down the play equipment pending the completion of the Fire Marshal’s investigation, it appears the conflagration was the result of horseplay gone horribly awry. “They didn’t intend to destroy the playground at the elementary school,” he said. “They’re neighborhood kids. Teens. It was dumb, but it was not an intentional act.”

Couple of things, first thanks to the Brooklyn Eagle for quoting our headline calling the “arsonists” “juvies“.  Secondly – please someone tell us what type of “horseplay” goes so wrong that a playground burns down?  Lightsaber training? Flamethrower tag?

Brooklyn Paper: The word on the street is that the culprits were a group of teenage girls, but police refused to confirm that lead.

“There is an element of some poorly behaved late-teenage kids in this neighborhood,” said resident Naidre Miller. “My gut reaction is that it’s malicious vandalism for the sake of it. Hooliganism.”

Huh? Female Hooligans? Like in Grease? WTF?

Brooklyn Paper: The mourners came from all walks of life, including councilmembers, college-aged strivers, judges and public housing residents flooded the funeral to console family members and each other over the untimely death of the lifelong Boerum Hill resident.

Council Speaker Christine Quinn honored the deceased with a posthumous city proclamation, and Rabbi Joseph Potasnik urged mourners to honor Reichbach’s memory by helping people in the community.

Other attendees included Assemblyman Vito Lopez; dozens of members Lopez and Levin’s collective staffs; former Councilman, now Taxi Commissioner David Yassky, Councilmembers Brad Lander, Letitia James, Jumaane Williams, Mark Weprin, and Domenic Recchia; Comptroller John Liu; Public Advocate Bill DeBlasio; Borough President Markowitz; state Sens. Eric Adams and Daniel Squadron; Assemblymembers Joseph Lentol, Dov Hikind and Joan Millman.

NY Post: “This is the neighborhood where the mob puts their mothers,” a friend explained to me recently. So the nice, friendly men playing cards in the social clubs on Henry Street? Don’t ask, I was told. I’m still the newcomer.

But as certainly as real-estate climbs to dizzying heights, the Carroll Gardens I learned to love disappeared overnight. Strollers took over the sidewalks, along with kids’ trophy-wife moms and investment-banker daddies, while Heath Ledger and seemingly half of Hollywood took up residence in next-door Boerum Hill. Residents got priced out, or sold their homes at a tidy profit to make way for sushi bars, Starbucks and American Apparel.

Now, it seems the old days never really went away. They just went to sleep.

Earlier this month, in an incident straight out of the Brooklyn of old novels, fancy pizza man Mark Iancono got into a knife fight on Carroll Gardens’ posh Smith Street. In broad daylight. With mob-connected ex-con Benny Geritano, whom he’s known for decades. How could this happen in 2011?

As one neighbor told me, “Kids were coming out of school. They had to huddle in the doorways of stores to escape.”

All of a sudden, gossip, the neighborhood’s currency, has dwindled. A man I’ve known for years told me, “I’m not saying anything.”

Others say the beef was over a dame. Though I’ve heard that the fight may not have been over Annette Angeloni, a card-store owner who’s been named as the femme fatale in this piece. (Was it over a Geritano relative?)

Meanwhile, Geritano’s family, including an uncle who owns nearby Bagels by the Park (yummy schmears), are said to be furious that he’s bringing shame on a nabe that’s gone legit.

But Geritano is not saying much of anything. Nor is Iancono, who twirled pizzas at Lucali, a celeb-friendly joint where I’ve waited in line for a table. But cops are discouraged from eating there because of alleged mob ties. Both men have been charged with attempted murder.

Crain’s New York Business: [Columbia Street] doesn’t have a single gay bar. Nor do rainbow-hued flags flutter outside the café, the antique shop or any of the other new businesses dotting the neighborhood’s main thoroughfare. And, for the record, there are no plans to move Brooklyn’s annual gay pride parade there from its longtime route along Park Slope’s Fifth Avenue.

This scenario may surprise some, since the neighborhood has a greater proportion of same-sex households than any other area of the city.

Ah, but it’s that phrase “same-sex households” that I find puzzling. The Crain’s article doesn’t tell how the Census Bureau defines such a “household.” Would it include two or more same sex roommates sharing space for economic reasons? Even if it includes only same sex couples living together in a “relationship,” it could produce distorted results. Many gays and lesbians live alone or in shared living quarters with others who may or may not be of the same gender or sexual orientation. My guess is that many of these singles prefer to live in areas like Chelsea and the Village that have lively gay and lesbian social scenes instead of places like Columbia Street that don’t. So what the data seem to show is that Columbia Street has a high percentage of gays and lesbians living together in long-term relationships. Given the small size of the community–Crain’s estimates its population at 1,500–and assuming an average size of a “same sex household” as slightly over two (some may have children), there may be something like seventy or eighty such households in the District; hardly a surprising number.