Around Brooklyn: Kathryn Garcia wants senior centers to reopen

May 14, 2021 Brooklyn Eagle Staff

Looking out from the Brooklyn Heights Promenade over New York Harbor. Photo: Will Hasty/Brooklyn Eagle

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Kathryn Garcia wants senior centers to reopen

Former Sanitation Commissioner Kathryn Garcia, a candidate for the Democratic nomination for mayor, recently joined with Justin Yu, president of the Chinese Consolidated Benevolent Association, at Open Door Senior Center in Chinatown to call on Mayor de Blasio to fully reopen senior centers. “Today, I am calling on the City to fully reopen our senior centers across the five boroughs,” she said. “Even with vaccination rates soaring and COVID infection rates plummeting, New York City’s senior centers are still closed, denying so many of our older New Yorkers the companionship and services they need. Schools are open. Bars are open. Gyms are open. But the senior centers our older folks rely on for social life and city services have remained shut.”

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History Center details anti-racism activism

An upcoming outdoor installation called “Brooklyn Resists” at Brooklyn Public Library’s Center for Brooklyn History will explore Brooklyn’s history of fighting against racism, from pre-Civil War abolitionism through to the 2020 Black Lives Matter protests. “When the protests broke out in 2020 and Brooklynites gathered to express their dissatisfaction and outrage, that’s part of a long history of discontent and protest against racial injustice,” said Dr. Brian Purnell. The exhibit will open on June 19, according to published reports.

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Website rates auto insurance in Brooklyn

Auto insurance premiums in Brooklyn are among the priciest in the United States — the average Brooklyn driver pays an annual cost of $2,970 for minimum coverage and $6,188 for full. Bankrate reviewed several carriers to see which ones offer the cheapest insurance rates while also offering high customer service ratings. They are, in order, Progressive, Geico, Erie, USAA and Allstate. Bankrate is a personal finance website.

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Restaurant to have in-house synagogue

Bass and Bourbon, a new upscale kosher restaurant featuring fish and pasta, is slated to open later this month on Hamilton Avenue in Brooklyn. A unique feature of the restaurant will be an in-house shul, or synagogue, with its own Torah scroll to accommodate those who wish to host circumcisions and other religious functions inside the restaurant. The eatery, right by the Brooklyn-Battery Tunnel, will also have a large billboard displaying Sabbath candle-lighting times, according to Col Live, an Orthodox Jewish website.

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New building planned in Williamsburg

A rendering has been revealed for a six-story, mixed-use building at 106 North Third St. in Williamsburg. Designed by Michael Muroff Architect and developed by David Kubresi, the structure will have 10 residences as well as ground-floor retail space, although it will not have enclosed parking. The homes will be one- and two-bedroom apartments, according to New York YIMBY.

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Craft brewery owner aims beers at Caribbeans

Black-owned breweries are only 1 percent of those in the U.S., according to the Brewers Association. Christopher Gandsy, the owner of Dale View Biscuits and Beer in Prospect-Lefferts Gardens, says many people don’t have the money to start a business or know how to secure funding. He added that craft beer in the past was mainly marketed to well-to-do young, single white people, and that craft breweries are often located in gentrified areas and cost more than mass-market beer. He has been trying out new beers that feature herbs and flavors to attract people in his own community, according to Fox 5 News.

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Chinese group defends SHSAT

A bill in the state legislature would repeal a law that says the only way into one of the city’s nine specialized high schools is to take the Specialized High School Admissions Test (SHSAT). While many in the Black and Latino communities say SHSAT discriminates against minority students, members of the Chinese-American Citizens Alliance of Greater New York say that the bill is “an undisguised racist attempt to expel Asians from the Specialized High Schools,” according to the Politics NY site. Asian-American students make up a large percentage of the students in these schools.

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Gang member nabbed in road rage killing

Police have arrested reputed Only The Fields gang member Marlon Quimbaya on Friday and charged him with running down Kyleef Barrow on a Jackie Robinson Parkway off-ramp in August. Barrow had pulled over on the Highland Boulevard off-ramp on the Jackie Robinson Parkway after Quimbaya’s SUV cut him off and was going to let him pass, police said. Quimbaya was already locked up on a $150,000 bond on an unrelated gun arrest in September, according to the Daily News.

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Brooklyn Dumpling Shop to open in East Village

Brooklyn Dumpling Shop plans to open at St. Mark’s Place in Manhattan’s East Village next Wednesday. The fully-automated restaurant brings the Automat technology of yesteryear into today’s world, using state-of-the-art technology. There is zero human interaction throughout the entire grab-and-go process. The restaurant will be open 24 hours a day, seven days a week for takeout and delivery, according to QSR, a food website.

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A ‘Hanging Garden’ is coming to Fort Greene Park

A new art installation featuring edible plants and light and sound effects is planned for Fort Greene Park this summer. The installation, “Hanging Garden,” hopefully will be followed by similar installations in other parks around the borough, according to Bed-Stuy artist Bryce Peterson. The Hanging Gardens project has so far gotten the go-ahead from the Fort Greene Park Conservancy and is being reviewed by the city’s Parks Department, according to Patch. It includes a sculptural pavilion made out of plywood and a hanging botanical garden that visitors can sit under.

Compiled by Raanan Geberer.