State Reduces Parking at Barclays Center Lot from 1,100 to 550

Move eliminates need for dreaded "stack parking," but critics say the ESDC needs to do more to protect area residents.

  The state has halved the number of required parking spaces at the Barclay’s Center surface lot, enabling developer Forest City Ratner to throw out its plan for the loud and slow “stack-parking."  The technique uses hydraulic lifts to load as many as four cars on vertical structures. But the process has been criticized as being loud and tedious, slowing traffic to a crawl when the 18,000-seat arena opens in the fall. At Wednesday night’s forum with Atlantic Yards-area stakeholders at Brooklyn Borough Hall, Empire State Development Corporation head Kenneth Adams said the state organization has agreed to reduce the number of mandated spaces from 1,100 to just under 550 at the lot located between Carlton, Vanderbilt, Dean and Pacific, …

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Tish James Joins Lawsuit Against NYPD Handling of OWS Protestors

The suit claims that the NYPD has violated free speech rights and used excessive force; wants to see a independent police monitor.

Councilwoman Letitia James, D-Brooklyn, has filed a lawsuit against the NYPD for their handling of Occupy Wall Street protestors, says the Associated Press (re-printed on the Huffington Post). The suit alleges that the city and police violated demonstrators' free speech rights, used excessive force, arrested protesters on false charges and interfered with the work of journalists and council members at the protest, according to the article. The suit, which James filed with Council Members Melissa Mark-Viverito, D-Manhattan, Ydanis Rodriguez, D-Manhattan, and Jumaane Williams, D-Brooklyn, was filed on April 30, the day before a planned “May Day” protest, says the AP. According to the article, the elected officials want a court-appointed …

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Tish James Says NYPD Should Have Consulted with Community on Barclays Policing

A police annex at the Barclays Center and a collaborate effort between police precincts would have been more effective, she says.

Earlier this week, the NYPD chose the 78th Precinct to keep order at the Barclays Center because of it’s station house’s proximity to the under-construction arena, but Councilmember Letitia James, D-Brooklyn, says there should have been more of a discussion between the police, elected officials and community groups before the decision. The Barclays Center is technically located within the 88th Precinct’s borders, but it is a half-mile away from the precinct’s station house in Clinton Hill, while only a block away from the 78th Precinct’s station house on Sixth Avenue in Park Slope.  “Police precinct boundaries are required to be coterminous with local district boundaries,” James said, in a statement. “The NYPD unilaterally making decisions…

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Gregg Hall

1:01 pm on Saturday, April 28, 2012

You need an "advanced degree" to figure out it's wrong to fleece the taxpayers for Ratner's folly? Really?   more ›

Tenants Group Demands Change at Brooklyn Housing Court

The new coalition, Brooklyn Tenants United, was created to fight for tenant justice in court.

Nonprofit community and legal groups joined together yesterday in Downtown Brooklyn to announce a new coalition to fight for the rights of tenants in Brooklyn Housing Court. The new group, Brooklyn Tenants United, has partnered with Council Members Letitia James and Diana Reyna and Assemblyman Hakeem Jeffries to release a new Make the Road New York report, “Home Court Advantage: How Landlords Are Winning and Tenants Are Losing at Brooklyn Housing Court.” The report has found that in Brooklyn Housing Court, 85% of landlords are represented in court while approximately 95% of tenants are not. According to the Daily News, leaders of the coalition met with Deputy Chief Administrative Judge Fern Fisher last month to discuss ways to fix the …

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Occupy Crown Heights, Bed-Stuy and Brownsville? Councilwoman Says Yes

Brooklyn pol proposes expanding protests against corporate greed into residential neighborhoods.

Grand Army Plaza may not be the only Brooklyn locale to get "Occupied." With protesters against what they call corporate greed run amok planning a return to the borough next Saturday, one local elected official suggested that the rest of Brooklyn also get into the act. "People are disenfranchised and dissatisfied with their government, and that's what Occupy Wall Street is all about," said Councilwoman Letitia James, D-Brooklyn, at FUREE's 9th Annual Convention on Saturday. "That's why we're also trying to do Occupy Crown Heights, Occupy Bed-Stuy, Occupy Brownsville." No word yet on possible locations for the protests, which up to this point have been mostly held in public spaces adjacent to commercial districts and not primarily …

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Help Wanted: BAM Hiring Ticket Servers

Arts institution seeking part-time workers for its Ticket Service Department.

The Brooklyn Academy of Music is hiring. In a post Tuesday on Councilwoman Letitia James' Team Tish blog, the Fort Greene arts mainstay announced a search for an unspecificed number of part-time employees for its Ticket Service Department. The positions pay at a rate of $11/hr. for 25-30 hours of work per week. Duties include selling subscriptions to live events, updating customer contacts and scheduling bus trips. Applicants should have one year of customer service, ticketing and/or performing arts experience.  Applicants are encouraged to apply online.

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Area Residents Will Not Get Priority For Red Apple Supermarket Jobs

Company representatives say laid-off workers elsewhere in the city to get first dibs at 100 positions at the long-promised Myrtle Avenue grocer.

For residents eagerly awaiting the arrival of badly-needed fruit and vegetables—not to mention jobs—it was an important first step. Beginning this week, the office of Councilwoman Letitia James, D-Brooklyn, will be accepting applications on behalf of the Red Apple supermarket slated to open this September in The Andrea building at the corner of Myrtle Avenue and Ashland Place.  That's the good news.  Now make room for the not-so-good: according to representatives of the Red Apple Group, laid-off workers elsewhere in city, many of whom are members of UFCW Local 1500, will get first dibs on the approximately 100 positions created at the new market.  While those union rules provide important protections for existing workers, that means there …

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As F+S Tire Shop Reopens, Many Questions Remain Unanswered

Despite lingering concerns about the city agency that closed the store, residents focus on celebrating the rebirth of a beloved family-owned business.

Update, 12:45 p.m.: A DOB spokeswoman contested Jean Joseph's account of a possible $25,000 fine, saying that the penalty for the one remaining violation in the agency's system — in regards to a support beam in F+S Tire Shop's cellar — had yet to be determined by the city's Environmental Control Board.  The DOB spokeswoman also sought to dispel criticism over the second, more serious violation issued to the Josephs earlier this year involving the building's certificate of occupancy. Due to what the DOB rep called an "administrative error," that violation was never entered into the agency's system. Community members joined Councilwoman Letitia James, D-Brooklyn, to help celebrate a "soft" reopening Tuesday of F+S Tire Shop on the Fulton …

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Black History Month in Ft. Greene

Florence Timothy: A Lifelong Community Activist

The native of Trinidad and Tobago has dedicated much of her life to Fort Greene.

Locals refer to Florence Timothy as “ Miss Florence,” a title that hints at the respect she has earned through a lifetime of community activism in Fort Greene. Raised by a devout Christian family in Trinidad and Tobago, Timothy immigrated to New York in the 1960s to make a better life for her family. She worked for years at the flagship Saks Fifth Avenue store in Manhattan as a manager in the fine jewelry department and eventually used her business skills to open a wedding and special occasion’ s boutique in Fort Greene before retiring many years later. In 2005, after several years assisting adult vendors, Florence started the Young Entrepreneur Sidewalk Sale on Clinton Avenue, an annual gathering for local kids in the neighborhood to show…

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