The News goes for Yassky. This gives him a pretty nice sweep of the citywide endorsements – the Times, Crains and now now the News.
On the celebrity/politico endorsement front, Yassky is also doing pretty well. So far, he has Russell Simmons, Robert Kennedy, Jr. and some senator from New York. (Equal time – Ed Koch called this afternoon and asked me to vote for Melinda Katz.)
(l to r): Marie Esposito, Vinny from BARC, Bernadette and Gerry
I had no idea Gerry was a cat man:
Film and stage star Bernadette Peters announced today that she was endorsing Democrat Gerry Esposito for City Council, because of his phenomenal commitment to helping animals and the extensive work that he has done [on] behalf of the Brooklyn Animal Resource Coalition (BARC) in Williamsburg, Brooklyn… Esposito, who has six cats and takes care of three strays, said that it was an honor to receive Peters’ endorsement. “Bernadette Peters has been an inspiration to everyone who believes that animals deserve to be treated with dignity and love. I will eagerly seek out her insight when I am in the Council, because animal protection won’t just be on my agenda, it will be a priority for me.”
The Times is out with its endorsements for City Council, and in the local races, it is endorsing Jo Anne Simon in the 33rd and Diana Reyna in the 34th.
In the 33rd, the Times sees a three-way race, with something to be said for Simon, Steve Levin and Evan Thies:
There are several excellent candidates vying to replace Councilman David Yassky, who’s also running for comptroller. Stephen Levin would be a prime candidate except for his entanglement in the Brooklyn Democratic Party machine. Evan Thies, an aide to Mr. Yassky, has been active on reform and clean-air issues. Jo Anne Simon has an impressive legal background and has been a strong community organizer who has done important work for the disabled. We endorse Ms. Simon.
In the 34th, the Times sees a two-way race, with only one candidate worth considering:
Party bosses sometimes try to intimidate a rebellious politician by threatening to support a challenger in the next election. That is what has happened to Councilwoman Diana Reyna, who dared to oppose a housing development backed by Assemblyman Vito Lopez, the leader of Brooklyn’s Democrats. Mr. Lopez now supports Maritza Davila, a community activist who has worked with Mr. Lopez on development issues. Ms. Reyna’s show of independence should be enough to re-elect her. But she has also grown into a strong advocate for small businesses and struggling families in her area. We endorse Ms. Reyna in this race.
WNYC ran a brief piece on the 33rd Council District race, focusing on three leading candidates – Steve Levin, Jo Anne Simon and Evan Thies. The station has transcribed the piece in a blog post, complete with pictures. Good thing you can’t see pictures on the radio, because the image above is what you see in the slide show for Steve Levin. (For the 99.999999% of the world that doesn’t understand this post, that picture is from here, not here.)
Real Reform Brooklyn has taken down the photo that came with their stock WordPress template (ironically, a photo of Grand Street in Manhattan) and replaced it with a lovely historic picture of the Brooklyn Bridge. Clearly they are trying to curry favor with me by choosing to go the historic route. (BTW – the photo is looking east on the bridge, towards Brooklyn – you can tell by the belching smokestack off in the distance.)
Real Reform Brooklyn has redesigned its web site (for the better). We still don’t know who is behind Real Reform Brooklyn, but whoever it is must not be too good on New York City geography. They dumped the old tunnel photo on the masthead and have replaced it with a photo of Grand Street. Grand Street in Little Italy, that is.
Apparently, Glasslands has a major problem.
Kent Avenue, stripped.
In comments, reader JJ has a front-line report on the Kent Avenue repaving, which (as promised) started yesterday evening:
The transformation of Kent Ave. started last night. And kept me up most of the night as DOT crews tore up the asphalt between Broadway and S. 7th. Thank God!
Based on the condition of the street this morning, I can see why JJ didn’t get much sleep. This is more than just repainting the bike lanes – DOT is doing a full-on repaving.
JJ goes on to echo some of my own previous thoughts on the whole Kent Avenue tempest:
I’m glad to see some change, but the coming change is not the answer either. The bike lanes and no parking was a big mistake. It turned Kent Ave. already dangerous because of how people speed down it, into an open freeway… Kent Ave is not the West Side Highway, it’s not going to be the west side highway and the Brooklyn Greenway plan to make it into one was a mistake…
Indeed – the removal of parking on Kent Avenue has made the speeding (and passing) much worse. If you aren’t going at least 40, you have a good chance of being passed (either on the right or the left). DOT’s 2008 bike lane project did turn Kent into the West Side Highway (actually, it was already like that – the bike lane project just made it worse by eliminating all parking). The addition of parking and elimination of one lane of traffic should slow things down considerably.
What about pedestrians? how can the city have rezoned the whole waterfront for housing, on the other side of a truck route and not imagined that thousands of people a day might need to cross that street? The North side is still mostly without traffice lights to allow pedestrian crossing to the high rises and a state park — I mean come on get real.
Spot on – this is something I have been talking about since the bike lanes went in last year. The repaving of Kent Avenue that is going on right now is more than just painting new lines on the street – DOT is ripping up the street (a pretty new one, at that) to lay down new asphalt. They should be using this opportunity to put in an actual greenway, but they are not. But if DOT is not using this opportunity to put in traffic lights at at least three or four intersections between Grand and North 14th, they just don’t get it.
Clearly I’m catching up with what happened while I was away. Luckily, Aaron Short is catching up after his 10th reunion, so I’m just going to keep linking to him. This time on OSA –
Aaron authored a three part series on OSA in the Courier, which ended up finding a lot of smoke but no fire. The second article in the series included a number of accusations that turned out to be incorrect or unfounded. In his blog post today, Aaron does right by apologizing for those errors, and printing OSA’s letter to the editor in full (something the Courier didn’t do they just issued a terse correction).
(Part three of the series is here. The most important quote in this latest installment came from Phil DePaolo: “Parks will get hit hard… Next year, there won’t be an election year”.)
As for the accusations in part two, which continue to reverberate, clearly OSA needs to do a better job of defining what it is and isn’t. I’ve said before that OSA’s job is to work with the City to improve local parks.
OSA is a private organization, with its own board (and yes, its own bylaws). One of the more inane memes floating about is with regard to the requirements for being on the OSA board. Yes, board members are expected to bring in money (not necessarily contribute their own, but raise money). But most non-profit boards expect this of their board members. Well-run non-profits make the financial expectations explicit to board members. Directors in most non-profits are appointed for their expertise, connections and ability to fundraise – it’s not a democracy, and it shouldn’t be.
On the other hand, anyone can get involved in OSA through their community committees. OSA needs to do a better job (among other things) of making explicit the expectations of what the community committees do and do not do. I’m not involved with OSA, but its pretty clear that there are some people who have certain expectations for the organization – expectations that may or may not be realistic. OSA needs to be clear about what the organization’s role is, and how the community committee’s fit into that role.
