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.

The second speaker of the series will be Peg Tyre, author of The Good School: How Smart Parents Get Their Kids the Education They Deserve (Henry Holt, 2011). Currently a fellow at the Columbia Graduate School of Journalism, where she teaches writing about education, Tyre offers both practical advice and insight to cutting edge research on what works best in education. She is also the author of the NYTimes bestseller, The Trouble With Boys.
Future scheduled speakers include Paul Tough, author of Whatever It Takes: Geoffrey Canada’s Quest to Change Harlem and America. Tough’s appearance will coincide with publication of his new book on teaching character.

Diane Ravitch: January 10, 6:30 p.m.- 8. p.m.
Peg Tyre: March 7, 6:30 p.m.-8 p.m.
Paul Tough: September 2012

If you have questions, please contact Lesley Alderman (Lesley61@gmail.com) or Rebecca Johnson (Beckersny@yahoo.com).

Neighborhood HOLIDAY TREE RECYCLING

In Cooperation with Mulchfest 2012 by City of New York/ Parks and Recreation Department

Saturday, January 7 and Sunday, January 8, 2012

Drop off your Holiday trees at the location below.

Wreaths and garlands cannot be accepted. Please remove lights and decorations.  No artificial trees!

Location: Cobble Hill Park: Clinton and Verandah Place

9:30 am – 1:30 pm

MULCH BAGS WILL BE AVAILABLE FOR THOSE WISHING TO TAKE MULCH FOR THEIR GARDENS OR TREE PITS.

Trees will not be accepted after the scheduled times.

Sponsored by:

Cobble Hill Tree Fund ,  Cobble Hill Association,  Friends of Cobble Hill Park, and  Boy Scout Troops 213 & 815

NY Post: “Bored to Death” creator Jonathan Ames racked up a $1,600 bar tab by throwing a boozy wake for his canceled HBO show Wednesday. “Welcome to the premiere — I mean, the funeral,” Ames told one of many well-wishers who packed Boerum Hill’s Brooklyn Inn after he tweeted followers to come “at 10pm & i’ll buy you a drink!” The turnout surprised Ames. “I was not expecting this. I’m gonna lose a lot of money,” he joked, adding, “Everyone gets one drink. Don’t abuse the privilege.” The writer earlier treated the show’s crew to brews at nearby 61 Local. Borough President Marty Markowitz called during the Brooklyn Inn bash to say he wanted pictures for his newsletter. A flack said Markowitz and his wife were “huge fans” and “very disappointed and angry” the show was scrapped. Ames ambled out at 1:30 a.m. in search of an ATM: Like many Brooklyn hotspots, the Inn is cash-only. Stars John Hodgman and Heather Burns were on the scene. Ted Danson, Jason Schwartzman and Zach Galifianakis were in LA.

Pink dot is Sadies, area in green is Cobble Hill, red Carroll Gardens

The Brooklyn Paper writes about the newly opened Sadie’s Kitchen at 243 Degraw Street.  The paper does create some “confusion” in that it identifies the establishment as being in both Cobble Hill and Carroll Gardens.

Using our nifty color coded Cobble Hill or not Cobble Hill map, we’ve determined that Sadies is, in fact, in Cobble Hill.  Thus making the Brooklyn Paper half right (insert snarky comment here).

Brooklyn Paper: Can Sadie’s Kitchen — a Southern prepared foods shop-slash-gourmet mac and cheese parlor with a 1930s diner-meets-country kitchen interior (oh, another one of those!) — beat the curse of 243 Degraw St.?

The diminutive Cobble Hill spot has proved a graveyard of failed restaurant attempts in recent years, counting Chicory, Ultimate Burgers and Dogs, and Cielo Café as casualties.

“We actually considered ourselves lucky to get this space,” laughed Sadie’s co-owner Damien Vizuete, who — along with partner Peter Sibilia — has been opening restaurants from Manhattan to Miami Beach for over 20 years. “We know very well why businesses fail, and its not always bad food or service,” he added. “For example, this space has a totally electric kitchen — you can’t cook with gas. Previous people had tried three-course meals here, steaks, burgers — too ambitious.”

Whether you celebrate Christmas, Hannukah, or Kwanzaa, come join us as we celebrate the Holiday Season at the 5^th Annual Columbia Waterfront District Tree Lighting Event. The festivities start at 5:00 pm on Friday, December 9^th, 2011 at the Human Compass Garden, located at the corner of Sackett and Columbia Streets. This year’s event will feature live Holiday Jazz Music by the Less Magnetic Band and an assortment of free refreshments from local restaurants and businesses.  Santa Claus will also spread more cheer by handing out toys to children at the event.

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

Curbed: Jon Sherman, founder and head designer of the wallpaper firm Flavor Paper,packed up and moved himself and his business to the commercial hinterlands of Cobble Hill, Brooklyn, he must have known the new place would have to make a splash. The new industrial-looking building, designed by Jeff Kovel of Skylab Architecture, is kitted out on the interior with some of Flavor Paper’s most striking designs. The roof garden is bordered by bright purple paneling, the master bedroom of Sherman’s personal penthouse is done up in faux fur, and the skylit living room features a deeply textured modern fireplace. Quite a showplace for Flavor Paper’s products, enough to keep clients like Lenny Kravitz and Frank Gehry coming across the river.

“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.”

Gowanus Canal, Photo by Andrew Nicholas

The Gowanus Canal Conservancy has devised a great way to gift yourself while giving to a local cause this holiday season, with the inception of its first annual Winter Festival fundraiser.

Billed as “a celebration of local food, beer, and music on the Gowanus Canal,” the event will feature a three-course dinner followed by a three-hour concert on Saturday, December 3, at Build It Green! NYC’s warehouse space on 69 9th Street.

“On the one hand, this fundraiser is important to our lifeline” said Hans Hesselein, Director of Special Projects at the watershed stewardship organization. “On the other hand, a lot of what we’re trying to achieve is social and environmental change around the canal. A great way to get people aware is to have social functions like these that bring the community together.”

In keeping with the spirit of community, the Winter Festival’s dinner will be provided by Lot 2, the farm-to-table restaurant on 687 6th Avenue that is located within the Gowanus Canal watershed. “The stormwater that lands on their property usually ends up in the canal, so they’re physically connected to it,” Hesselein noted. “But also, their mission to bring sustainably farmed local foods to their restaurant and to the people that dine there is very much in line with the conservancy. Although we are not a food advocacy organization, we certainly appreciate and support sustainable food practices, which is what Lot 2 is all about.”

Lot 2 will serve up chicken and sausage gumbo, coleslaw with pickled pepper vinaigrette, buttermilk and honey cornbread, and apple crumble bars. The sausage and tasso for the gumbo will be provided by locally based Brooklyn Cured, and the drink selection will include beers from New York microbreweries Butternuts Beer & Ale and Captain Lawrence. Dinner will be served from 6:30 – 9 pm and will be accompanied by a DJ set and silent auction.

After dinner, the concert will kick off, with live music by performers Amanda Palmer, The Suzan, Savoir Adore, and Ambassadors. “I’m really excited,” said Hesselein of the Winter Festival’s musical lineup, which he describes as indie rock pop that is experimental, yet dancy. “It should be a lot of fun.” The concert is scheduled to begin at 9 pm and wrap up at midnight.

Three types of tickets are being sold for the fundraiser – a $15 ticket for the concert only (with a cash bar), a $40 ticket for the concert and dinner (including two beers), and a $60 ticket for the concert, dinner, and conservancy membership. Tickets are available for purchase at Brown Paper Tickets.

All proceeds will benefit the Gowanus Canal Conservancy, including the organization’s Clean & Green Volunteer Program, Compost Program, and Rain Garden projects. “The fundraiser is going to support our volunteer program and help us continue to bring exciting capital investments to the community,” Hesselein explained, noting that two of the conservancy’s current projects are the 6th Street Green Corridor and the 2nd Street Sponge Park, which will create gardens designed to capture and clean the stormwater runoff that presently drains into the canal.

“We’re focused on bringing sustainable environmental practices and green development to the Gowanus Canal and its watershed,” Hesselein added. “In order to support those goals, we have a bunch of different initiatives – from our green infrastructure capital projects… to our meetings with elected officials to try to bring the most effective and green solutions to stormwater management and environmental problems as possible.”

Fruity. Nutty. Savory. Sweet.

From cobblers, crisps, buckles and pandowdies to whoopie pies, tarts, strudels, empanadas, borek, Chinese egg custard tarts, pasteles, crostatas – EVERYTHING pie-inspired will be on hand, as PS 29 in Cobble Hill embraces the hottest food trend of 2011 with EAT, PIE & SHOP.

This holiday festival, flea market and pie-tasting bonanza’s big draw is not only a gigantic TASTING opportunity (more than 300 pies expected) –but also a celebrity-judged PIE BAKING CONTEST (celebrity judges include Gail Simmons, Food & Wine and “Top Chef,” Danielle Kyrillos, “Top Chef: Just Desserts, Chef Marc Anthony Bynum of Food Network’s Chopped).

EAT, PIE & SHOP
Sunday, December 4th
11am till 4pm
PS 29 – 425 Henry Street, Brooklyn

Other draws include a flea market featuring dozens of local, artisan holiday gifts – and activities for the kids.

Event FEATURES:
Pie Social – Home Baked AND Professional Pies
Pie Contest – featuring TOP CHEF celebrity judge panel
Gift Fair – Artisan products with over 20 vendors
Kids Activities – workshops by Children’s Museum of the Arts

SPONSORS: Half Pint Citizen, Fork & Pencil, Brooklyn Farmacy & Soda Fountain, Shake Shack, Children’s Museum of the Arts and Mini Max Toys & Cuts!

PS 29 is hoping that by embracing the 2011 pie trend, they’ll increase the take from this annual event – as the school’s PTA must raise more than $600 per child to maintain it’s current programs.

For more event information: www.eatpieandshop.org

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.

Sadie’s Kitchen, the cheerful new cafe taking over the cursed space at 243 Degraw St., looks like it’s getting ready to open doors any minute. As you can see, it’s looking comfy and happy through the window–and the menu on the door feels very southern countrified, with an entire page dedicated to baked goods. We wish them luck. It’s a great spot and we’re ready for someone to stay for a while!

NY Post: They had been living in Cobble Hill and needed more space.

“We had looked at about five places, and then we went to get dinner [at a neighborhood Thai restaurant on Court Street owned by a friend]. And our friend’s like, ‘You guys look bushed,’” recalls De Marrais. “He told us, ‘I’m moving out of my apartment; you should go check it out. Here’s the keys. Go check it out now.’”

They did, and it was love at first sight. “We were walking around like, ‘Are you kidding me?’ This place is amazing, and we would dance around this place the first few years we lived here.”

Brooklyn Ink: Food for Occupiers in Zuccotti Park is being cooked in Boerum Hill and East New York, shipped to Lower Manhattan in donated vans and, occasionally, yellow taxi cabs.

The amount of food required to meet demand has reached a peak since the protests began in mid-September, Chef Eric Smith said. The voluntary kitchen staff, constantly shuttling food in from Brooklyn, is now preparing three meals a day for nearly 2,000 people.

Sean Dolan, chief cook at the protest, says one problem organizers face is an inability to “discriminate” between protestors and freeloaders.

“Rich people can come looking like homeless men, protestors can come in suits,” he explained. “We have to serve everyone.”

 

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.”

This week’s episode of Bored to Death has many twists and turns but it will probably go down in history as coining the phrase “baby cocaine”.

One of the episode’s main plotlines begins when Ray (Zach Galifianakis) visits Cobble Hill Park with his son Spencer.

Watch the episode? Comment below!

NY Times: Warren Street between Bond and Nevins offers many of the things well-off buyers seek in brownstone Brooklyn: a pastoral, leafy feel; long rows of 19th-century town houses; proximity to transportation and charming little restaurants; young families on the block.

But the block also has something that those buyers have traditionally seemed to avoid: two large public housing projects that stand tall at either end, to many New Yorkers enduring symbols of danger, social dysfunction and blight. The map showing the neighborhood on the Web site of the Boerum Hill Association — a group dedicated to preserving and enhancing “the unique qualities of our neighborhood” — includes Warren Street but runs up and around to Wyckoff at points to cut the projects out.

Our prodigal daughter Ryoko is coming back to NY from her travels in Europe. She is only here from the middle of Dec to the beginning of Jan, so if you are looking to finish something, add, or get something new,check with us quick, she is sure to book up quickly.

Record Collecting for Girls: Unleashing Your Inner Music Nerd, One Album at a Time

Smith’s book gives some solid advice to young female music fans just discovering music beyond Miley Cyrus.  Ironically, Smith warns her audience to steer clear of dating fans of… The Smiths saying, “Seriously. Think about your mindset when you listen to The Smiths. Do you not put them on when you’re depressed and self-indulgent? When you feel the world has done you wrong? When you feel unloved and sulky? I absolutely indulge in The Smiths now and then, when circumstances demand it. However, a totally-in-love superfan? No, I don’t want to date that. It’s just not my cup of tea. We can still be friends though. Possibly.”

Cobble Hill Association: In our continuing efforts to green the neighborhood, the Cobble Hill Association and amazing folks at PS29 are yet again holding an electronics recycling event with the Lower East Side Ecology Center. What’s more, it’ll include plenty of other recycling opportunities too throughout the day!
• 10a.. to 4pm…Old computers and electronics will be collected by Lower East Side Ecology Center, in conjunction with Cobble Hill Association. See www.lesecologycenter.org to review the list of accepted items at bottom.
• Composting Workshop led by The NYC Compost Project in Brooklyn. Backyard composters will also be for sale.
• Computer hard drive shredding provided by eRecycleNY, PS 29 parent owned EPA compliant electronics recycling company serving the NYC area.
• Clothing rummage sale, proceeds go to PS 29 PTA. Wearable Collections will be picking up remaining clothes, as well as stained & ripped clothing, textiles & stuffed animals.
• Confidential Documents shredded on-site (& then recycled) for a small fee. by Time Shred Services

Residents were also urged to begin contributing to the Cobble Hill wiki site to add their own facts about the area.

Brooklyn Eagle: Morrone spoke Monday night at the annual meeting of the Cobble Hill Association at Long Island College Hospital. He is a teacher at New York University and the author of five books, including An Architectural Guide to Brooklyn.

One of the best physical (as opposed to online) resources, he says, is the library of the Brooklyn Historical Society in Brooklyn Heights. Among other things, it contains several Brooklyn atlases, dating from about 1855 through 1930. These were published by private companies, mainly for fire insurance purposes, and show detailed maps of each street — block by block, lot by lot.

The library also contains “land conveyance [or property] records” from the 19th century. Particularly for older neighborhoods such as Cobble Hill, said Morrone, these are important because the former City of Brooklyn’s Department of Buildings only began keeping records in the 1870s or afterwards.

Walls and Bridges, the Franco/American arts and ideas festival, is returning to New York Oct 19 – 28 for its third season.  The festival brings together French and American performers, artists, philosophers, and writers who otherwise only encounter each other remotely.  There are 14 events over 10 days, bringing the total of Walls & Bridges events in NYC over 2011 to nearly 50.

Over the course of next weekend, Walls and Bridges will present five events at The Invisible Dog in Cobble Hill and all but one are free.

On Saturday we have:

A Tale of Two Chefs: a pop-up restaurant featuring Mathieu Rostaing Tayard (“one of Europe’s most exciting young chefs”-WSJ) paired with Brian Leth of Vinegar Hill House. The two will mix styles and prepare a $20 haute-cuisine lunch box that’ll be served up with discussion of who and what influenced their cooking in surprising ways. $20

• Screening Identities with Danny Glover and Malian filmmaker Mathia Diawara in discussion about African and African-American filmmaking  FREE
• Playing with Cinema: an exploration of French cinema through live representationin a set of performances pairing American choreographers and theater companies with famous scenes from French films by Godard, Tati, Melville and Demy. Performances by Migues Gutierrez, The National Theater of the United States of America, Annie-B Parson, & Dan SaferFREE
• Stranger Strangers: 4 French performance acts premiere in NYC, including digital juggling, a group that wears realistic pig costumes to explore our fascination/abhorrence with pigs,a performance of Professor Bad Trip, and a performer with an unhealthy obsession with Derek JarmanFREE (my pick of the weekend)

On Sunday we have just one show:

• Please Kill Me, the rock musical based on the lauded book of the same title by Legs McNeil, which used hundreds of hours of interviews to present the punk days of NYC, featuring the Velvet Underground, the Ramones, The New York Dolls and more. The show received raves in France, including from La Monde, and will be performed here for one night only.  In English.  FREE

Full event calendar here.

Last week’s episode of Bored to Death featured “faux” Jonathan, played by Jason Schwartzman, spinning on a wheel while having knives thrown at him during a book signing at (where else?) Book Court.  Here’s a video of the REAL Ames doing a similar stunt last year.

So, how you likin’ this season so far?

Bococaland: I admit, when I first saw the signage for the now open Mooburger (240 Court St.) back in January, I was skeptical. Organic burgers, snacks, drinks and more is what it was touting. I figured we’d get a small space with plastic tables selling outrageously over-priced burgers to families and the after-school crowd. But when I stopped in Friday night, I was fairly overwhelmed. The restaurant was packed, and the draw of seasonal wine and beers made clear it was open to everyone. The decor was wood and steel, the lighting low and the menu impressive for a burger joint.

Have you checked it out yet?