Ridgewood Funeral Homes Adapt to New Populations
Posted on 27. Dec, 2009 by Carolyn Phenicie in Immigration, Money and Economy
By Carolyn Phenicie
For nearly 50 years, the Woodhaven branch of the Walsh-LaBella funeral home served over 150 families annually. Now the funeral home has manages, on average, one burial a week.
With an influx of new immigrants and fewer longtime residents remaining in the neighborhood after retirement, Walsh-Labella has lost about two thirds of its business annually, and like many funeral homes in the area, is trying to figure out how to adjust.
“You have to change with the community,” said John McNamara, a mortician at Walsh-LaBella, which has been open since 1959
Once a neighborhood with predominately German, Italian and Irish residents, Ridgewood now has residents with mostly Polish, Eastern European and Hispanic backgrounds. “This neighborhood used to be all German and Irish,” McNamara said. “Now it’s got the League of Nations.”
Currently, the area is about one-third Polish and Eastern European, one-third Latino and one-third German, Italian and Irish, according to Monsignor Edward Scharfenberger of St. Matthias Parish in Ridgewood.
Fewer families are coming to Walsh-LaBella because the new Hispanic population tends to patronize funeral homes that are run by Hispanics or have a Spanish-speaking staff, McNamara said.
Regina T. Smith, who teaches a course in the sociology of funeral service at the American Academy McAllister Institute of Funeral Service, said people want to use a funeral home with employees that understand their culture.
The overall number of people dying in the neighborhood is also decreasing as people retire to other parts of the state or elsewhere in the United States. St. Matthias had five or six funerals a week in the 1970s, Monsignor Scharfenberger said in an interview. Now, the average is two per week.
The church will celebrate a funeral mass in any language the family requests, Monsignor Scharfenberger said. He estimated that for every 20 funerals held, two are in Polish and two or three are in Spanish. There are also four to six per year in German. Those services are usually requested by the families of older people who believe it’s more dignified for the decedent and not necessarily for the language needs of those attending the service, as those held in Polish or Spanish are.
Many families are no longer sending remains back to their home country, said Robert Taylor, a mortician at the Peter J. Geis Funeral Home.
“Years ago we used to ship more to Romania and Yugoslavia. People have become more Americanized [and] they realized they can’t visit the grave if they ship the body back to the old country,” he said. “Plus, the cost is prohibitive.”
The requirements to send remains to another country varies depending on where the remains are being sent, and the cost of shipping the remains depends on the weight of the remains and the destination. Families essentially pay for the services of a funeral director twice, though, because a licensed mortician is required to pick up the remains in the receiving country, Taylor said.
Some families have begun doing the opposite: bringing the remains of family members who have passed away overseas or elsewhere in the U.S. back to be buried in New York. Walsh-LaBella brings in five to 10 bodies a year from overseas, most from Italy, and about 15 from elsewhere in the U.S., mostly Florida, McNamara said.
The trends are not limited to traditional burials, either. Formal acceptance by the Catholic Church in the 1960s plus a growing acceptance by younger people has caused the number of cremations to increase, according to J.P. Di Troia, president of Fresh Pond Crematory.
The trend is not limited to Ridgewood. Recent influxes of immigrant and refugee populations from Burma, Europe and Africa have changed the funeral business in upstate New York, Stewart Williams, a mortician at the Dimbley, Friedel, Williams & Edmunds Funeral Homes in New Hartford, N.Y. said in an interview.
Language is often the biggest barrier.
“You’re needing to always find a translator and just be very patient with families,” he said.
Changes have affected funeral homes all around the country, too, according to Bob Biggins, a funeral director in Rockland, Mass. and spokesman for the National Funeral Directors Association.
“It brings challenges to our members, but it also brings wonderful opportunities for them to continue to be beacons of service that our members have been for generations,” he said.
Hundreds rally against beating of a Queens gay man
Posted on 15. Dec, 2009 by Lulu Yilun Chen in Crime and Courts, Politics and Government, Queens
Hundreds rally against beating of a Queens gay man from luluyilun on Vimeo.
By Lulu Yilun Chen
Hundreds of people gathered on College Point Boulevard in Queens on a Saturday afternoon to denounce the beating of a gay man whom police say was a victim of a bias crime.
Standing across the street from the protest was about a dozen people who said they were friends of the two men arrested. They protested behind barracks set up by the police and held up signs saying that the public should not rush to conclusions to accuse the suspects of bias.
At about 4:30 a.m. on October 8th two men attacked Jack Price, 49, of College Point, outside a local deli at College Point Boulevard and 18 Avenue in Queens after he stopped to buy a pack of cigarettes on his way home. The two men repeatedly beat and kicked Mr. Price, all of which was caught on videotape from a security camera, according to police.
After the assault, the suspects fled the location, leaving Mr. Price with a shattered jaw, broken ribs and a collapsed lung. Mr. Price managed to return to his home and call 911. He was rushed to Booth Memorial Hospital where he is currently being treated. He was able to identify the two suspects and make an account of the crime, according to police.
Police said that Daniel Aleman, 26, was arrested three days after the assault and charged with felony assaults as a hate crime. Daniel Rodriguez, 21, was apprehended in Virginia five days after the attack.
Supporters of the victim marched down College Point Boulevard from 20th Avenue to 14th Avenue, joined by many city officials, including Helen Marshall, the Queens borough president, Scott Stinger, Manhattan borough president, and Christine C. Quinn, the City Council speaker, who is openly gay.
Daniel Dromm, the Democratic candidate for City Council district 25, led the crowd chanting, “Now is the moment. Now is the time. We say no to hate crime,” “LGBT, we celebrate diversity,” and “Jack Price was under attack. What do we do? Fight back!”
It was a diverse crowd that ranged from moms carrying seven-month-old babies to men with dressed-in-pink Chihuahuas and grey-haired women holding rainbow flags with the printed words “equality.”
About 300 people stopped at the nearby Popenhusen playground to give speeches, according to organizers. Family members of Mr. Price and city officials, including William Thompson, the City comptroller and mayoral candidate, delivered speeches to the crowd.
“The answer when it comes to hate crime,” said Thompson, “The answer is no.
“We are sending out a message of what we will allow in this city and what we will not,” added Thompson. “We will not be silent in any act, in any community. We will come together, we will let those people know it is wrong and you will not get away with it.”
Joanne Guaneri, 42, the sister-in-law of Mr. Price, embraced her daughter, Amanda Guaneri, 15, listening quietly to the speeches as they stood close to the stair-converted-stage in front of the crowd.
Joanne Guaneri then walked to the microphone and spoke in husky voice, “They beat my brother-in-law until near death. For $10. And for a pack of cigarettes.
“Put aside the hate crime on this, they beat a man to near death and that is why I am out here,” said Ms. Guaneri.
The youngest speaker was Jack Price’s niece, 15-year-old Amanda Guaneri, a student at Bayside High School.
“I am proud of him (Mr. Price) to be my uncle. Whatever he is, he is my uncle. I love him and I will stick behind him,” said Amanda Guaneri, “I want to say to the people following Daniel Rodriguez: Why? Why? He did wrong. You shouldn’t be behind him.”
Those words were directed at a group of 14 people, who supported Mr. Rodriguez and rallied right across the street on College Point Boulevard, arguing that the public should not jump to conclusions and define the beatings of Mr. Price as a hate crime.
Marcel Gelmi, 26, who has known Rodriguez for 11 years, said he was not biased toward gay people.
“Why is this a hate crime? Because Jack Price says so? Those cameras pick up no sound,” said Mr. Gelmi, 26. “Danny had a lot of gay friends.”
Hate crimes are not common in Queens, according to Christine C. Quinn, the City Council speaker.
“The two hateful people who we believe committed this crime are not representative of Queens County or College Point,” said Ms. Quinn. “The two men who did this are a minority.”
The last time an assault related to the gay community happened in Queens was in 2001, when Edgar Garzon was attacked outside of a gay club in Jackson Heights, Queens, and died because of the injuries.
However, incidents motivated by bias based on sexual orientation were up 5.5 percent within the past two years since 2006, accounting for 16.6 percent of hate crimes conducted in the United States, according to F.B.I. reports.
President Obama signed a bill on Wednesday that finally declared it a federal hate crime to assault people based on sexual orientation, gender and gender identity.
In the past 10 years, the House and the Senate separately approved the hate crimes expansion numerous times. But congressional Republicans repeatedly blocked final passage.
The new policy will expand the definition of a 1968 hate crime law that applies to people attacked because of their race, religion or national origin.
“I think it’s one small part of a large picture which needs to be painted in order to have a world where everyone can be a full person without being physically, psychologically, or legally punished because of their gender or sexuality,” said Marisa Ragonese, head of Generation Q, a program for young gay and lesbians.
Mr. Price underwent surgery for a puncture in his lung last Tuesday and is now in stable condition, according to Ms. Guaneri.
Effort to Transform Embankment Gets a Boost
Posted on 10. Dec, 2009 by Nathaniel Adams in Health and Environment, Living, Politics and Government
Jersey City’s Historical Embankment, subject of a long campaign to turn it into a park.
By Nathaniel Adams
Robert Hammond, the man behind Manhattan’s High Line Park, is partnering up with Jersey City’s Embankment Preservation Coalition to help them in their mission, hoping to use the success of the High Line to promote their project.
“They’re in a similar place to where we were in 2003,” said Hammond, “they need a real estate and political champion.”
The Embankment is an elevated freight train line that fell out of use many years ago and has been at the center of a 12-year-old fight to decide its fate. Unlike the High Line, a structure built in 1930, wide enough for two train tracks, and constructed as a steel frame raised on metal columns, the Embankment, built in 1902, carried seven tracks and is made of huge piles of earth surrounded by stone walls up to 30 feet high.
“We sort of think of the Embankment as a land art piece we want to preserve,” said Maureen Crowley, director of the Embankment Preservation Coalition.
The coalition and the Jersey City government have been trying for years to turn the structure, which is owned by private developer Steven Hyman, into a public park. Hyman has wanted to use the property to build luxury houses. The two sides have been involved in court battles for years.
The city and the coalition have worked to have the Embankment declared a historic landmark, have tried to acquire it through eminent domain, have blocked attempts by Hyman to demolish the structure, and have filed suit claiming that his purchase of the property was invalid. Hyman has appealed decisions, run campaigns against Jersey City Mayor Jerremiah Healy, and claimed economic hardship as a reason for wanting to replace the embankment with apartment buildings.
Currently, all sides are waiting for the U.S. District Court in Washington, D.C., to decide in the latest of a long series of cases and appeals whether or not the original sale of the property to Hyman by the Consolidated Rail Corporation was legal and valid.
On October 25th, Mr. Hammond visited the Embankment for the first time, walking the length of it at street level and snapping photos of the vivid autumn trees lining the top and the tendrils of ivy spilling over the sides and clinging to the solid, heavy stone walls. That night he spoke at the coalition’s monthly meeting, expressing his enthusiasm for the project and inspiring the organization to keep fighting.
Since Hammond’s visit, he has publicized the project on the High Line blog, which refers to the Embankment as a “sister project.” On November 10th, he met with the Embankment Preservation Coalition in private to discuss strategies.
“It’s all in the very inchoate stage,” said Crowley. “I think he’s going to help with publicity and fundraising ideas at this point.”
The High Line endorsement comes at a time when parks and conservancy projects throughout Jersey City, Hudson County and the entire state are experiencing a surge of popularity and success. In the November 3rd elections, an item allocating 400 million dollars for, among other environmental projects, parks and open spaces, was up for public vote on ballots across New Jersey. It passed 52% to 48%, despite incumbent Governor Democrat John Corzine, the only candidate who supported the bill, losing his office to Republican Chris Christie.
On November 10th, the Jersey City Council approved a resolution to purchase a former landfill next to the Hackensack River, to be turned into a park. The land, sitting beneath the steel skeleton of the Pulaski Skyway, will be connected to a larger planned public development along the Hackensack River which will run through all of Hudson County, from Bayonne to North Bergen.
On October 15th, environmental advocacy group Hackensack Riverkeeper honored Mayor Healy with its annual Friend of Hackensack Riverkeeper award for efforts in historic preservation, creating open spaces, and promoting green policies. The group cited the above projects and the city’s work to revitalize Reservoir 3.
The reservoir is a 14-acre site in the heart of the Heights, an urban residential area of the city. Built in the 1870s to provide clean water to a city susceptible to diseases such as typhoid, the reservoir was closed in 1990. When people started venturing back onto the site in 2001, they found a vibrant mini-ecosystem behind the reservoir’s 20-foot high stone walls.
The Jersey City Reservoir Preservation Alliance, started in 2002, has been working with the city to preserve, protect, and promote the site, offering kayaking programs, ample fishing in a lake populated with Sunnys and Largemouth Bass, and painting classes with natural subjects as diverse as lakeside cat-tails, old brick gatehouses, ducks, islands, falcons, and great blue herons.
This summer the city council passed a resolution allowing the alliance to hire an architecture firm specializing in historic preservation to first study and assess the site to create what alliance president Steven Latham calls “a place for nature to thrive.”
After Long Delay, Brazilian Duo Finds Radio Outlet
Posted on 01. Dec, 2009 by Christian Yarnell in Immigration
Ricardo Sarmento on the air at Radio America’s studio in Newark. Click here to listen live to Radio America.
By Christian Yarnell
Ricardo Sarmento, wearing jeans, a black T-shirt, and a New York Red Bulls baseball cap that partially covers his graying hair, waits for the song to finish in his D.J. studio. Then he cuts in. Speaking Portuguese in his deep voice, he says: “Radio America AM. Uma rádio feita pra você!” — “A radio made just for you!”
It took a long time for Sarmento to say those words.
He is half of a husband-and-wife team who founded Radio America, a Brazilian music and news station based in Newark’s Ironbound district, about 18 months ago.
Sarmento, 41, and wife Marcia Martins, 32, moved to the United States nine years ago. Sarmento had worked in radio in Brazil, at one point appearing on a weekly show, but his dream of becoming a full-time radio host remained unfulfilled after arriving in the United States as he faced the struggles of many immigrants, finding work and keeping his family together in a new country.
When they first arrived in the United States, Sarmento worked in construction and Martins, who was a kindergarten teacher in Brazil, as a bartender. Sarmento never gave up, though, on his dream to be on the radio, but it took some six years to get the radio station up and running.
He did not think that his biggest obstacle would be navigating the rules set by the Federal Communications Commission, which he described as tortuous. The breakthrough came at the beginning of 2008 when the FCC opened a new window for AM broadcasts, allowing Radio America to appear in March at the end of the dial on 1700 AM.
At first unable to secure studio space, Sarmento and Martins launched Radio America from their living room. “People thought we had a radio station. We didn’t mention we were at home,” Martins recalls. The station, now based in a small office on Monroe Street, features Brazilian music and news for the Brazilian community.
Brazilians came to Newark’s Ironbound in large numbers starting in the 1970s, in part because of their linguistic and cultural connection to the Portuguese who had settled in the area decades before. Adnor Pitanga, from the Brazilian American United Association or BAUA, estimates that about 70,000 Brazilians live in Newark and surrounding areas, with the highest concentration in the Ironbound.
Pitanga, 63, came to the United States 11 years ago. He was a filmmaker in Brazil and rose to become president of the country’s state-run film agency Embrafilme. Embrafilme was disbanded in 1990 during the failed presidency of Fernando Collor de Mello, whose resignation amid impeachment proceedings led to a purge of many who had served in prominent government positions.
“I had no way to work,” said Pitanga. “I couldn’t make movies anymore.”
When he first arrived in Newark, Pitanga found work as a handyman in a small hotel. Like Sarmento, however, Pitanga found a way back to his craft before too long. He now operates a video production company in New York City that films commercials and private events.
Listeners can tune into Radio America over the internet, but Sarmento and Martins want it to be a traditional radio outlet that serves the local community and offers some public service on their airwaves. They recently gave airtime to a local resident, 28-year-old Cleo Santos, one of many victimized by an unscrupulous moving company that targeted the Brazilian-American community. The company a year ago took $340 from Santos to deliver two boxes to her family in Brazil, but the boxes were never delivered. Workers from the moving company then moved on to a new company, which took another $200. The packages still did not come.
Santos says she was inspired to act because the shipment included Christmas presents for her 10-year-old daughter. She approached local newspapers with the story, but could not find an audience until Martins let her on Radio America. After the radio broadcast, other victims came forward, and many began working together. Brazilian Customs also contacted Santos, and they believe they have located her packages in the Port of Santos.
Radio America can be heard in Newark and a few surrounding towns. Sarmento and Martins are hoping to upgrade their antenna to expand the station’s reach, although the couple says they already run into many fans in the community.
“I can’t stop now,” says Sarmento. “We’re everywhere.”
Neighbors Are Shaken, but Not Surprised, by Pedestrian Deaths in Hell’s Kitchen
Posted on 23. Nov, 2009 by Candice Chan in Beats Blog, Crime and Courts, Manhattan, Metro
by Candice Chan
In the last eight weeks, two people have been killed in traffic accidents within a 13-block stretch of Midtown, on 8th and 9th avenues: a 22 year-old Asian man and a 37-year-old Hispanic woman.
Neighbors say they aren’t surprised.
The accidents come only four months after a commemorative funeral procession was held for the six pedestrians hit by motorists on 9th Avenue since 2001. Community advocates, including the Hell’s Kitchen Neighborhood Association and the Clinton/Hell’s Kitchen Coalition for Pedestrian Safety, organized June’s event to call for more traffic cops. The victim from November 4, who was struck by a bus as he was crossing 9th Avenue, is the fourth this year involved in an accident near the Port Authority Bus Terminal, police said.
New York’s traffic fatalities were at an all-time low in 2007, with 136 out of 271 total deaths attributed to pedestrians struck by vehicles. But even with falling numbers of motorist driven casualties, in 2001 the city had almost 120 more. Pedestrian deaths still comprise more than half of the total vehicle-related fatal accidents per year.
“The area on the weekends is pretty chaotic,” said a law enforcement official from Midtown South’s precinct, who preferred not to be identified because he hasn’t been authorized by his superiors to speak to reporters. “If you walk around at night, especially, you just see how many people are here.”
Mark Swick, 41, an employee of Siena pizza, was working the night a 37-year-old Hispanic woman was hit at the corner of 40th Street and 8th Avenue in early September. He said he believes a darkened street lamp on the corner may have contributed to the accident, but acknowledges that the area is dangerous even when the lights are working.
“Even the EMS guys said there have been a bunch of accidents like this around here,” Swick said.
Some Hell’s Kitchen residents hope that in coming months the city will find a way to engage some of its 30,000 police officers to ramp up traffic law enforcement.
Anthony Lopez, 44, is an assistant manager of World Famous Generations Menswear shop near the corner of 40th Street and 8th Avenue. He can recall the accident involving Fabiola Grande-Coyotl, a 23-year-old pregnant woman who was struck and killed by a truck at 38th Street and 9th Avenue last November.
“There were a lot of flowers and pictures then,” said Lopez. “Everyone was really upset.”
John Liu Wins Election for New York City Comptroller
Posted on 20. Nov, 2009 by Lulu Yilun Chen in Beats Blog, Politics and Government
John Liu, democratic candidate for comptroller and a Queens councilman, last night won the election for New York City Comptroller, the city’s chief financial officer, in a landslide victory, making him the first Asian American elected to citywide office in the city’s history.
Liu beat his competitor, Republican candidate Joseph Mendola, with 75.98 percent of the votes, adding up to 696,330 votes.
“I’m ready to make changes,” said Liu as he greeted voters near Washington Heights on Tuesday night. “It’s been an exciting campaign. It’s been over four years.”
The elections of Liu, as comptroller, along with Margaret Chin and Peter Koo to City Council seats represent a significant political watershed moment: Asian American politicians on the east coast rising to political power.
“Chinese Americans being elected at a city level will change the perceptions of New Yorkers toward Asian people,” said Cynthia Lee, 39, the chief curator of the Museum of Chinese in America based in Chinatown. She explained that Asian Americans have experienced greater difficulty being accepted as Americans compared to other white ethnic groups.
Liu, 42, moved from Taiwan to America at the age of 5. A former actuary who majored in mathematical physics at Binghamton University and graduated in 1988, he was first elected to the council in 2001, and defeated Councilman David Yassky in this September’s runoff election for the Democratic slot in this fall’s comptroller race.
Liu said he plans to implement reforms to the city comptroller’s office within his first six months in office. Some of Liu’s top agenda items, listed on his official website, include dealing with the economic slump, leveling the playing field for minority and small businesses, creating jobs, and eliminating waste from the city budget.
Having had no sleep on the night before the election, Liu began his day at around 7:00 am on Tuesday. He greeted morning commuters in Queens dressed in a black suit and red tie, with his hair waxed and combed back.
“Who needs sleep? Sleep is overrated,” said Liu, with his customary energy.
Crowds gathered around Liu and he acknowledged their handshakes and hugs with a big smile and words of thanks.
“John Liu did well in the eight years he was councilman in Flushing. That’s why I voted for him,” said Zhang Lihong, a Chinese immigrant in Flushing.
Backed by strong support from the Chinese community, Liu boosted his chances of winning by reaching out to different communities and ethnic groups in New York.
“It’s different neighborhoods, but it’s one city,” said Liu. “We’re trying to unify the city and make sure that everyone gets counted.”
Liu is following on the steps of more successful Asian politicians on the West Coast. According to Linda Akutagawa, the vice president for resource and business development based in California, Asian Americans who have done well in elections pay special attention to coalition strategies – reaching out to different neighborhoods.
This has been a challenge for many Asian American candidates in New York, according to Hu Jie, the vice president for the Beijing Association of New York, based in Flushing.
“We know the Asian Americans candidates well, but it’s a challenge for them to let other ethnic groups understand them and trust them,” Hu said in Chinese. “They have to work on that hard.”
During his campaign, Liu not only traveled in different neighborhoods in New York, but also used social networking websites to promote his campaign. Even on the night before Election Day, at around 4 a.m., Liu was responding to Facebook messages and posting links to promotion videos on Youtube.
At around 4:00 p.m. on Election Day, Liu traveled to Fulton Street and Nostrand Avenue in Brooklyn, a predominantly black neighborhood, and greeted commuters as they got off from work.
“His family struggled when he first moved here as an immigrant. He understands what common people need,” said Gregory Collins, 51, who has lived in Brooklyn for more than 40 years.
After numerous handshakes and several photos shot with commuters, Liu rushed off to 125th Street and St. Nicholas Street to join Bill Thompson in Washington Heights, a predominantly Dominican neighborhood. The two Democrats greeted commuters as they traveled down the street and popped their heads into buses parked at stations, urging people to vote.
Liu ended his day’s trip on 43rd Street between Eighth and Ninth avenues in Manhattan where he received the news of his victory.
According to Lee, the Chinese Museum chief curator, the change in demography has played an important role in helping Asian American rise to political power this year.
Asian Americans on the west coast have risen to political power faster than those on the east coast because for a long time Asians were demographically concentrated on the west coast, said Akutagawa, the vice president for the Business Development organization in California.
That is changing now. The Chinese population in New York grew by 19 percent, according to an estimate from 2000 to 2007, while the city’s total population grew only by three percent over the same period, according to studies released by the Asian American Federation.
About 5.4 percent of all New York City residents are from China, up from 4.7 percent from the 2000 Census, according to the federation.
New Renovation Plans for Ridgewood Reservoir
Posted on 19. Nov, 2009 by Carolyn Phenicie in Health and Environment, Metro, Politics and Government
The Ridgewood Reservoir in western Queens has been allowed to re-grow into a marsh and birch forest.
By Carolyn Phenicie
Ivy has grown up a seven-foot-high fence, obscuring the view of a natural woodland where grey birch, red maple and black cherry trees grow from the leaf-covered forest floor. The whoosh of traffic on the adjacent Jackie Robinson Parkway is the only clue that indicates this little pocket of nature, the Ridgewood Reservoir in southern Queens, lies within New York City limits.
But this quiet leafy corner is about to change under a plan to renovate the area that would replace existing fences with shorter ones, install lights and repair the existing running path. This plan, like the proposals that came before it, has angered some local residents who said they feel the Parks Department is not listening to their input on the project. Many said that they believe that with the exception of a few cosmetic improvements, the area should be left in its natural state.
The reservoir, which held 154 million gallons of water, was built in 1856 and used as a source of drinking water for the growing population in Brooklyn from 1858 to 1959. Two of the three basins were drained after the Catskills aqueduct was built, and one remained a backup water supply until 1989. The Department of Environmental Protection completely decommissioned the site the next year. Since then, the area has returned to its natural habitat. Basins One and Three, about 10 and 21 acres respectively, have become forests of birch, maple, cherry and sweet gum tree. The central basin, 11.85-acre Basin Two, contains water and has returned to a marsh full of phragmites, an invasive type of reed not native to the area.
In 2004, Mayor Michael R. Bloomberg gave authority over the nearly 43-acre reservoir to the Department of Parks and Recreation. At the time, the department intended to turn one of the basins into a park with ball fields. That proposal has since been abandoned because the budget for the project got cut, but it angered many area residents who believed it should be left alone.
“It’s so counterintuitive for a mayor who says he’s environmentally minded to go in and destroy an important habitat like that,” Rob Jett, who maintains the blog Save Ridgewood Reservoir, said in a phone interview.
Jett said the area doesn’t need any more recreation space. The reservoir is next to Highland Park, which already has two baseball fields, a basketball court, a football field and concrete area for skateboarding.
Queens Borough President Helen M. Marshall believes the area should be preserved as a natural habitat, Dan Andrews, the borough president’s press secretary, said in a phone interview.
Those calling for the preservation of the area also found vocal allies in Comptroller Bill Thompson and Robert F. Kennedy, Jr., who published an op-ed in The New York Times in May 2008 calling for the preservation of the area.
“Ridgewood Reservoir offers visitors a rare chance to lose themselves in a forest, to hear bird song, to touch wilderness and to sense the divine,” they wrote. “The city shouldn’t let that slip away.”
When the project was first proposed in 2004, the parks department held a series of public meetings with the community, Jett said. Those who attended felt the department wasn’t really listening to their ideas: primarily, to leave the reservoir mostly untouched and refurbish the recreation areas at Highland Park.
There’s not a lot of trust between the agencies involved and the public because many decisions are made behind closed doors, Geoffrey Croft, NYC Park Advocates president, said in a phone interview.
“It’s not the way these projects are supposed to work,” Croft said.
The current incarnation of the plan is the result of four listening sessions held with the public, according to Patricia Bertuccio, a press officer with the parks department. Since that time, designers and contractors have been working on three conceptual designs for the first phase of the project. The broad concepts will go through several phases of review before construction.
Despite the public meetings for the downsized project, Jett and others said they feel the department is once again not listening to residents’ concerns. Specifically, he said, community boards don’t like plans for new lighting. Also there are no plans for the installation of exercise stations or park benches along the existing track that runs around the reservoir, as residents had requested.
The department has worked “very diligently” with the community, citing meetings during which members of the community could speak directly with project designers, Bertuccio said in a phone interview.
“We think we’ve been doing a great job working with the community and we’ve gotten some positive feedback from them,” she said.
MTA tries to squeeze in more commuters
Posted on 19. Nov, 2009 by Siddharth Philip in Living, Metro, Money and Economy
By Siddharth Philip
How does the Metropolitan Transit Authority in New York City intend to manage the problem of fitting more commuters into already cramped subway cars? Simple – it just gets rid of the seats.
At the end of November, the transit authority will introduce a pilot project that eliminates seating in some subway cars during rush hours so that more people can fit by standing. Officials say removing some of the seats will increase capacity by 18 percent.
The project will comprise a single train with four modified cars, and six regular ones. According to Deirdre Parker, a spokesperson for New York City Transit, these cars will feature flip up seats that will be locked during rush hours, to increase standing room in the trains. After the rush hours, workers will unlock the seats and return them to their normal positions.
Ishan Singh, 26, an investment banker who commutes between the Upper East Side and Wall Street on the 4 train, said he felt that this was a step in the right direction.
“Every morning, the crush loads on the train ensure that I have to wait for at least three trains to pass to even get a toehold in the subway,” Singh said. “Thanks to the overcrowded trains, I have to leave home almost an hour early just so that I’m not late for work.”
Sarah Stewart, a receptionist at a law firm in the Lower East Side who lives in Brooklyn said that she didn’t mind commuting standing all the way from her home in Williamsburg to her workplace as long as it ensures she gets to work on time. Sipping her coffee and reading email on her Blackberry, Stewart waited for a V train at Delancey Street, having transferred from the J train.
While Singh will have to wait a while for his journey on the seatless train, Stewart might get a chance to decide after a ride on the seatless compartment. Parker of NYC Transit said that the train with seatless cars will be piloted on the lettered lines (A, B, C, D, E, J, L and M).
Not everyone is pleased about this new development. John Richard, 75, who commutes between the Upper West Side and Chelsea, said he felt the move would make commuting difficult for the elderly, disabled and pregnant women. “As it is, we have to deal with stations that haven’t yet been equipped with elevators,” he said. “Now they want us to stand all the way? What do we pay taxes for? Is it to make our public transit even less accessible?”
He said that he was not going to start riding the Access-A-Ride bus, the special transit service run by NYC transit for disabled and elderly people who cannot access the subway or buses.
Gene Russianoff, the staff attorney and chief spokesperson of the Straphangers Alliance, a public transport advocacy group, said that he doesn’t agree with the project.
“I absolutely hate it,” he said. “I understand that lots of lines are running far beyond their capacity, but this isn’t the way to go.”
Russianoff said the idea of having to stand the entire ride from Brooklyn, for example, was revolting. “We’ve been lobbying for longer trains, and an upgrade of the signaling system to a modern, computerized system. The manual system that is presently in use limits the number of trains that can run in a given span of time.”
Russianoff said that his organization is raising questions about the pilot project but will wait for a reaction from the public before jumping to any conclusions.
“The long-distance riders will suffer while the winners will be short-haul riders who only travel a few stops.”
Parker of NYC Transit said that since only four out of 10 cars would be seatless, those who want to sit can make their way to the other six cars. Richard, on the other hand, said he felt that this will increase the pressure on the other six cars as everyone will try and get a seat.
Both Russianoff and Parker said, however, it was hasty to jump to conclusions until the train, which is still being assembled at an MTA workshop, rolls onto the track and the pilot project begins.
“Let’s wait for the train before passing judgment,” said Parker.
A Battle to Define Sunset Park: Zoning Changes Spark Lawsuit
Posted on 14. Nov, 2009 by Jeannette Neumann in Immigration, Money and Economy, Politics and Government
By Jeannette Neumann
For more than two decades, Ruben Sosa has worked as a community organizer in Sunset Park, helping the neighborhood’s many low-income residents access affordable housing and find help for domestic violence.
Now, Sosa, 54, said he is facing his biggest challenge to protect Sunset Park’s residents: the city’s plan to change the zoning for 128 blocks in the neighborhood by allowing more commercial development and larger buildings along the avenues.
The City Council recently voted 42-2 in favor of the plan, which supporters say protects the low-rise, residential character of the neighborhood by setting height limits on buildings along the side streets, but that opponents fear will accelerate gentrification, displacing low-income residents.
“They’re going to push the rest of us out – the working class people,” said Sosa, community outreach director for the Sunset Park Alliance of Neighbors.
Many of the buildings affected by the changes in zoning are rent-stabilized. If developers tear them down and replace them with more expensive condos, Sosa and others fear it will leave fewer options for Sunset Park’s low-income residents.
“It’s not that people are against rezoning, but they want rezoning to protect them, rather than kick them out,” said Bethany Li of the Asian American Legal Defense and Education Fund.
But a spokesman for City Councilwoman Sara Gonzalez said she voted in favor of the rezoning for her district precisely to protect working-class people.
“Displacement will be kept at a minimum,” said Mike Schweingsburg, communications director for Councilwoman Gonzalez.
A study by the Department of City Planning says the proposed rezoning won’t trigger major new developments like luxury condos that could price people out of Sunset Park.
But Sosa and a handful of other Sunset Park residents, community organizations and churches say it will, and they are suing the city for moving forward with the rezoning after what they say was an incomplete study of the impact of the plan on the neighborhood. If they win the lawsuit, a judge will grant an injunction against the zoning changes.
“We firmly believe it’s a flawed rezoning plan and the city should have at least disclosed all the flaws,” said Rachel Hannaford, 31, a lawyer with South Brooklyn Legal Services representing the plaintiffs. Hannaford and Li filed the lawsuit on Oct. 2.
The rezoning plan is now in legal limbo, awaiting the next hearing on Nov. 16 in New York State Supreme Court in Manhattan.
A decision could take months, leaving the battle to define Sunset Park unsettled.
Sunset Park residents realized the impact zoning has on their community two-and-a-half years ago when a developer tried to construct a 12-story building on a street of two-story houses. Uproar from residents concerned the building would change the look and feel of their street stymied the developer, but legally he could have moved forward with construction since there were no height restrictions. The incident spurred Sunset Park residents and political figures to push for rezoning, Schweingsburg said.
Now, proposed zoning changes place a four- to five-story height limit on narrow residential side streets – a plan that has received wide support.
But if the city places height restrictions on one section of a neighborhood, it typically allows bigger buildings elsewhere – part of a tradeoff to maintain a neighborhood’s character while accommodating a burgeoning population citywide, explained Paula Crespo, a planner at the Pratt Center for Community Development.
The proposed zoning changes also allow a height increase to 80 feet along 4th and 7th Avenues, two heavy traffic corridors running the length of Sunset Park.
That height increase could create greater incentives for developers to demolish existing buildings and construct their own, Crespo said, because they can earn more money adding square footage.
That could be a threat to the more than 1,000 rent-regulated housing units along 4th and 7th Aves.
As of 2007, the income of one in five families in Sunset Park was below the poverty level, according to the most recent estimate by the American Community Survey, an ongoing project of the U.S. Census Bureau. The neighborhood is home to the city’s largest Mexican population and the third largest Chinatown after Flushing and Manhattan.
More recent poverty figures aren’t available, but the number of people at the weekly food pantry at Fourth Avenue United Methodist Church has quadrupled in the past few months to nearly 400, as the economy continues to shed jobs, said Reverend Hector Laporta, 53. He said he has spoken out against the rezoning at Sunday sermons because he believes the changes will encourage developers to demolish lower-income housing and construct luxury condos.
Jeremy Laufer, district manager for Community Board 7, said the rezoning could actually help alleviate the housing shortage since it provides incentives for developers to construct larger buildings if they include moderately priced homes – part of the city’s inclusionary housing program.
Opponents counter that because the incentives are optional, few developers will opt to include low-income housing.
Councilman Charles Barron was one of the two councilmembers to vote against the zoning changes. Rezonings have triggered gentrification in his own district, he said, which includes parts of East New York, Brownsville, East Flatbush and Canarsie.
“It seems that Bloomberg and others are still promoting development for the affluent rather than the lower income communities,” Barron said of New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg. “The city is in danger – black and Latino communities and low-income communities are in danger of gentrification.”
The effect of the zoning changes depend largely on the market, said Crespo. Now, few developers are eager to spend the money to demolish a building and put up a luxury condo.
But as the economy improves, incentives for developers to build in Sunset Park could increase, she said.
“If there’s a demand for housing in Sunset Park combined with a robust market, you will probably see some bigger buildings on 4th and 7th Avenues,” Crespo said.
More money in less time: Workers’ cooperative in Sunset Park helps immigrants weather economic downturn
Posted on 14. Nov, 2009 by Jeannette Neumann in Health and Environment, Immigration, Money and Economy
By Jeannette Neumann
Alicia Chavez used to work 48 hours a week at a Sunset Park baking factory, shuttling hundreds of loaves an hour from oven to cooling rack during her 5 pm to 1.30 am shift. She earned $350 a week for herself and family – two adolescent boys and her husband, who still works there.
Two years later, she earns slightly more money in less than half the time.
Chavez, 34, is president of Si Se Puede! We Can Do It! Inc., an all female workers’ cooperative based in Sunset Park, Brooklyn. The 23 members provide housecleaning services to more than 400 regular clients.
“Now, I’m a business woman,” Chavez said. “Before, everyday was the same. I was like a machine at my old job. Now, I see everything differently. I have a better salary and more job security.”
Like all workers’ cooperatives, We Can Do It is owned and controlled by the workers. Twenty of the women are from Mexico, two are from the Dominican Republic, and one is from Bangladesh. Although there is a hierarchy, including president and treasurer, for instance, there is no board of directors, meaning decision-making is democratic; Chavez refers to all of the women in the housecleaning cooperative as “directoras.”
Employees at the Center for Family Life in Sunset Park, a 30-year-old community service nonprofit, were instrumental in starting the co-op and continue to act as consultants for the women, helping to organize monthly meetings. Potential and regular clients call the Center directly to hire the women. The nonprofit recently started two other workers’ co-ops, one for babysitting and one for house repairs, called We Can Fix It.
Since We Can Do It opened in August 2006, the women’s wages have increased from $8 to more than $20 an hour. Chavez and the other women attribute part of that increase to a monthly marketing campaign, often held in neighboring Park Slope, aimed at attracting clients who prefer to pay workers directly, rather than a middleman, as it is customary in many housecleaning agencies.
Wages and quality of life – greater pay for fewer hours worked, for example – often do increase over time in workers’ co-ops since the members set the priorities for their business, said Lynn Pitman, associate outreach specialist at the University of Wisconsin Center for Cooperatives in Madison.
That makes cooperatives especially attractive in a downturn, said Jim Jenkins, director of communications at the National Cooperative Business Association in Washington, DC.
“Historically, when there’s an economic or social crisis, people tend to turn to co-ops as a way to move beyond their current situation,” Jenkins wrote in an email. “As more and more consumers grow skeptical of big business, they tend to look for business models with more integrity, transparency and value – cooperatives are the often the model they tend to trust.”
But Pitman cautioned that a workers’ cooperative is still susceptible to the challenges all businesses face.
“If the members say ‘we really want to pay our workers this amount of money,’ but there’s not a demand for those services – it doesn’t matter if you’re a co-op or not,” she said. “You have to deal with what the market is demanding.”
Chavez said she has seen the demand from her 20 regular clients dip only slightly amid the downturn.
“I haven’t experienced the recession,” Chavez said.
Two other coop members, Margarita Pavon, 31, and Daniela Salazar, 27, said they have received fewer calls from clients since January. Despite the ebb in workflow, they said they feel lucky to have a job, as friends and family struggle to find employment.
As of 2007, the income of one in five families in Sunset Park was below the poverty level, according to the most recent estimate by the American Community Survey, an ongoing project of the U.S. Census Bureau. In neighboring Park Slope and Red Hook, the poverty rate was a little less than one in ten families during the same period.
Current data documenting the impact of the economic downturn on Sunset Park’s low-income residents isn’t available yet, but there is evidence that many are scrambling to secure a salary.
Migdalia Garcia, 40, said nearly 200 people sit down every week in the unemployment office where she works on 4th Avenue to fill out paperwork, hoping to qualify for one of the 25 jobs available at any given time. About 9 in 10 are men, most from Mexico, she said. Sunset Park is home to the city’s largest Mexican population, according to the 2000 census.
“Three years ago, it used to be that there were more jobs than people looking for them,” Garcia said. “Now, it’s completely the contrary.”
Pavon said that since she joined the co-op in February 2008 she’s worked fewer hours for a better salary. But most importantly, she said, there’s more time for the things that really matter to her.
An aunt used to pick up her two children, America, 8, and Alan, 12, from school at 3pm because Pavon was always working.
“They didn’t like that,” said Pavon, shaking her head and wrinkling her nose at her daughter, America, who nodded her head in agreement.
Now, Pavon walks America and Alan home.
“I decide my time,” Pavon said. “I’m my own boss.”
In September, the Congressional Hispanic Caucus in Washington, DC invited the 23 women to their annual conference, highlighting We Can Do It as an example of Latino entrepreneurs who have started a successful “green” business. For health and environmental reasons, the women encourage their clients to use organic cleaning products – such as baking soda and vinegar. About 70 percent of their clients use organic products now, Pavon said.
The recognition has reminded the women of the importance of their work, Chavez said.
“Before, I felt like I didn’t have a life here or there,” she said, referring to her native Mexico. “I hadn’t done anything important in my life and I felt like I was in limbo.”
Now, she said, she has a purpose.
“Working at the co-op, our children have less probability of ending up in the street because we’re home more,” Chavez said. “We’re helping the environment and our community.”
