Category: Linked

No one seems to know who is behind Real Reform Brooklyn. But it’s pretty clear that he/she/they do not like Steve Levin. (Or Jo Anne Simon for that matter, but he/she/they definitely does not like Levin more more than he/she/they doesn’t like Simon.)

Its nice to see someone engage on a local race like this, but it seems to me that there is much ado about nothing in a lot of Real Reform’s attacks on the various candidates (including their “deconstruction” of Evan Thies). Take, for instance, the Levin carpetbagging claim. I don’t doubt that Steve moved into the 33rd District in order to run for Councilmember* – candidates do that all the time.

So what?

It would make a difference if Steve had no track record of community involvement, but that’s not true. He has worked in the community for many years, and has made a name for himself. Yes, Steve is Vito Lopez’s candidate. He might be his “own man” once he gets into office, but for now, he is running on his resume as Vito’s Chief of Staff (and he has built up a nice resume there). You might not like him because of his connections to Vito, but it’s a big stretch to call him an outsider.

Keep it real – focus on real issues.

*(Claims by Levin supporters commenters that he only moved “down the street” are just plain silly – 26 blocks is not “down the street”.)

Aaron Short continues his series of candidate profiles for the 33rd Council District with Doug Biviano. If I were voting on biography alone, Biviano would be my choice (he had me at sailing).

[I know I linked to Thies, who was the first in the series, but was on vacation when Simon ran – you can find Jo Anne’s profile here. I’ll dig around the Courier archives (always a painful process) to see if there were others. And Aaron – any chance you’ll be giving the 34th the Short profile treatment?]

[Photo: Aaron Short]

Build Big
Photo: JustiNYC via 11211 flickr pool

Yes, we’ll bring the haggis industry to its knees.

(Leave it to the Irish to take advantage of the situation.)

Coney Island is ‘closed now’.

Pathetic.

A tipster writes to Curbed:

Today marks the first day of the Kent Avenue change in traffic direction (one of your favorite topics). And of course, despite assurances by the planners, traffic has been diverted to Wythe Avenue, not Roebling as proposed.

Saw this myself this morning – 18-wheelers trying to make the turn from Broadway onto Wythe (can’t do it in one pass). From what I saw, it wasn’t a case of traffic being diverted onto Wythe, but rather a case of no signs and no police directing traffic anywhere.

Score one point for those who were worried that the City would drop the ball on this.

The Times announced its endorsement for City Comptroller today, choosing David Yassky over Melinda Katz, John Liu and David Weprin. Late last week, an ABC-TV poll had Katz and Liu running neck and neck, with Yassky a distant third (and Undecided beating them all). Given the obscurity of the race (after all, it’s only the second or third most important elected position in the City of New York), the Times endorsement will probably change those polling results, moving a lot of those undecideds.

NAG’s Ryan Kuonen is leading a bike tour of Newtown Creek, “including the industrial heritage, oil spills and pollution plumes, combined sewage overflows, and the ecosystem of estuaries”.

[via Laura]

Warhola was a firefighter at Engine 221 on South 2nd Street. He died last week when he suffered a stroke while responding to a call on Kent Avenue. Our condolences to his family and to his fellow firefighters at 221.

Wow – Brownstoner has it right when he says the Finger building is the gift that keeps giving. Ever since GFI Capital acquired the building last Spring, there has been speculation as to how they will actually build this thing. The BSA has cleared the way for a 16-story building, but the current skeleton stops at 10 (or 10 and a half – there is some steel sticking out the top). There were early rumors that said it would 10 stories, but these were immediately tamped down by GFI reps. Last week, Crain’s quoted a Yassky staff person as saying that it would – really, truly – only rise to 10 stories*. Now the Observer has the construction manager on site saying it will be 14 stories (which is pretty much in line with what GFI’s rep said last Spring). For context, the Observer interviews two retailers on North 7th Street that didn’t even exist when the Finger broke ground – that’s how long this saga has been going on.

There’s more interesting stuff in the Observer article, though – a quote from the manager of Planet Thailand that they are closing down next week. The manager says that “the scaffolding [on North 7th Street] has ‘really hurt this business'”. Of course Planet Thailand shuttered the Berry Street side of the restaurant some months ago – that would be the side that did not have a sidewalk shed in front of it. I think what really hurt Planet Thailand’s business was its increasing irrelevance in a neighborhood that has seen a huge increase in the number of quality restaurants over the 10 years that it has been at this location. When Planet Thailand was on Bedford and was a Thai restaurant, it was one of the only games in town and it served really good Thai food. When it moved to Berry, it adopted a pan-everything menu that didn’t do anything well and soon had to compete with the likes of Sea (who have essentially the same business model, but (for reasons that completely escape me) attract a ton of people).

[At the end of the article, the Observer says that BSA capped the building at 10 stories and that it was GFI that won the approval for 16 stories. If memory serves, DOB capped the development at 10 stories while the BSA and air rights cases were worked out. GFI only acquired the building a month before BSA ruled to let it rise to 16 stories – GFI (or HSBC) was along for the ride at that point. Or 14 stories. Whatever.]

* Curbed link because Crain’s is subscription only.