NY Times.
Check out the New York Time’s piece on Tom, the “Concierge of Court Street,” and a neighborhood fixture. Unbeknownst to me, Tom wasn’t homeless. Care to share any memories or stories?
Tom was the guy who held the door as you walked in and out of the Super Deli, outside of which he was a daily fixture, on Court Street between Baltic and Kane Streets in Cobble Hill, Brooklyn. He was the guy who offered to carry your shopping bags, or simply offered a bit of conversation. Tips were welcomed but not required.
“Tom was genuinely friendly, even to people who never gave him money,” recalled Ursula Alexander, who lives nearby. “He was good-natured, one of those people in the city who have a big impact, even though we never get to know them.”
So when word spread on Court Street that Tom died last month, he was honored with a sidewalk memorial of posters, flowers and photographs. It was stomach cancer, somebody heard. How old was he? Somewhere around 50, it seemed. Supposedly he lived with his mother in nearby public housing projects: Wyckoff Gardens, was it? Or maybe Gowanus Houses. And what was his last name, again?
The impending closure of the Little Room has brought about several efforts to keep it open long enough for it to find a suitable new home. A petition can be signed at Save the Little Room to ask the Brooklyn Heights Montessori School (BHMS) to keep the Little Room open for the next year, in order to give it more time to find a new sponsor. A letter from Senator Daniel Squadron and Assembly Member Joan Millman to the Chair of BHMS’s Board of Directors urges the Board to take one of two paths: to extend the Little Room’s termination date from August 2010 to August 2011, or to allow YAI (the organization that is currently trying to take over the program in the face of many prohibitive obstacles) to operate the Little Room beginning September 2010 in its current location at BHMS. For more information, read the recent coverage from the New York Times and the Post.
The plan for SUNY Downstate to take over the financially troubled Long Island College Hospital as a second campus that has been discussed since last year is almost finalized. The merger would transfer management of LICH from Continuum Health Partners to Downstate. Read more at Brooklyn Heights Blog.
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