What’s News, Breaking: Tuesday, March 7, 2023

March 7, 2023 Brooklyn Eagle Staff

Share this:

EATER NY NAMES NEW INDIAN RESTAURANT ‘MOST EXCITING’ FOR 2023

PARK SLOPE — A Park Slope Indian restaurant has been named as one of Brooklyn’s most exciting restaurants in a list by EATER NY, an online dining magazine that covers several of the borough’s neighborhoods, as well as other major U.S. cities. Masalawala & Sons, near the corner of 5^th Ave. and 5^th St., made Eater’s list of “The 15 Hottest New Restaurants In Brooklyn” for March, and its restaurateur, Roni Mazumdar, runs New York City’s only Michelin-starred Indian restaurant, Semma, as also reported in Patch.

Masalawala & Sons’ website pays tribute to Roni Mazumdar’s father, a 75-year-old immigrant man from Kolkata, saying, “His favorite memories of food have been recreated with utmost integrity, intricate age-old techniques, authentic cookware and family recipes.”

✰✰✰

$10M USDOT GRANT FURTHERS NYU TANDON RESEARCH ON TRAFFIC CONGESTION

Dr. Kaan Özbay, Professor of Civil and Urban Engineering and Founding Director of C2SMART. Photo: NYU Tandon School of Engineering.

DOWNTOWN BROOKLYN — NYU Tandon School of Engineering has been awarded a five-year, $10 million grant from the United States Department of Transportation, to lead a consortium of universities dedicated to and continuing multi-faceted research to understand and combat traffic congestion. The money, along with $5 million in non-federal matching funds, creates the Connected Communities for Smart Mobility Toward Accessible and Resilient Transportation for Equitably Reducing Congestion (C2SMARTER) Center, which the USDOT has selected as the only Tier 1 University Transportation Center designated under the Bipartisan Infrastructure Law to address a priority area of Reducing Congestion.

NYU Tandon Professor Kaan Özbay founded C2SMART and is its director. C2SMARTER will continue this work, which will involve emerging technologies such as artificial intelligence, machine learning and connected and autonomous vehicles that will be tested and deployed using a variety of “cyber-physical testbeds” that are already operational or in planning stages.

✰✰✰

NEW CONGRESSIONAL BILL WOULD PENALIZE LANDLORDS WHO DISCRIMINATE OR KEEP APARTMENTS OFF MARKET

NATIONWIDE — New legislation that Rep. Nydia M. Velázquez (D-7th District) has introduced in Congress aims to protect tenants, particularly those in the Section 8 program, from abuses by dishonest landlords. The Landlord Accountability Act of 2023 creates new violations under federal law for discrimination based upon a tenant’s source of income, and giving prospective tenants the right to seek remedies for discrimination under the Fair Housing Act if they receive any form of federal, state or local housing assistance, and fining landlords up to $100,000 for violations, with revenue going to aggrieved tenants.

The bill would also create new penalties for landlords who engage in the practice of “warehousing” — intentionally keeping rent-stabilized units off the market. According to media reports, more than 88,000 affordable units went unrented across the city in 2021.

✰✰✰

ARREST MADE IN FATAL CANARSIE HIT-AND-RUN

CANARSIE — Police have made an arrest in connection with a hit-and-run collision that killed a 65-year-old man last Labor Day weekend. Brierley Collymore, age 70 and residing on Avenue L, was arrested on March 7 and faces several charges related to Leaving the Scene of an Accident — death, injury and failure to show license. The defendant, driving a Nissan Pathfinder had struck a pedestrian on the sidewalk near the intersection of Remsen Ave. and Avenue M, in the 91st precinct, since identified as Ali A. Alshawesh, who had resided in the area.

Fleeing the scene, the defendant driving the Nissan then struck a parked, unoccupied Dodge Nitro.

✰✰✰

CENSUS BUREAU ONCE HIRED THE TELEPHONE’S INVENTOR

NATIONWIDE — This Friday, March 10, marks National Landline Telephone Day, the anniversary of Alexander Graham Bell’s far-reaching invention, and the U.S. Census Bureau’s Statistics in School program is encouraging teachers around the country to include lessons and activities related to this. The U.S. Census Bureau’s Statistics in Schools program brings subjects to life using real-world Census Bureau data to create materials for use at all grade levels, with its “History of the Telephone” curriculum covering the telephone’s impact on society and its evolution.

Alexander Graham Bell had his own historical connection with the Census Bureau, which hired him in 1900 as a special agent to write a report on the deaf and blind population.

✰✰✰

PROPOSED RULE FROM CITY WILL PROVIDE MAJOR PAY RAISE FOR APP-BASED DELIVERISTAS

CITYWIDE — A revised proposed rule to establish a minimum pay rate for NYC’s more than 60,000 third-party app-based restaurant delivery workers was released on Tuesday, March 7, from Mayor Eric Adams and Department of Consumer and Worker Protection Commissioner Vilda Vera Mayuga. The revised rule, when fully implemented in 2025, provides for a pay rate of $19.96 per hour – nearly three times what delivery workers currently make, establishing pay equity with Uber and Lyft drivers and other workers who earn a minimum wage.

The revision was made following two public hearings and a lengthy public comment period which, together, brought in nearly 2,000 public comments, and was based on feedback from workers and the restaurant delivery apps. Another hearing is scheduled on April 7, 2023, and an opportunity to submit public comments on the revised proposed rule.

✰✰✰

CITY FILES SUIT AGAINST COLLEGE DORM MOVING SERVICE

CITYWIDE — Department of Consumer and Worker Protection Commissioner Vilda Vera Mayuga on Monday announced that her department had filed a lawsuit against Dorm2Dorm LLC, a moving and storage company that allegedly preyed on and willfully deceived NYC college students and their parents and guardians, and is seeking civil penalties, restitution for consumers and a court order instructing the company to cease its false and deceptive advertisements. The lawsuit follows an investigation launched in September 2022 after the department logged more than a dozen customer complaints about the company’s practices, including consistently late pickups and deliveries, misplacing and damaging possessions and making false promises of a 25% “instant rebate.”

“DCWP will not hesitate to hold predatory businesses like Dorm2Dorm accountable for their actions. Anyone who feels that they’ve been deceived by Dorm2Dorm should reach out to us immediately,” said Mayuga in a press statement, urging other unhappy customers to call 311 and say “Dorm2Dorm” or visit nyc.gov/dcwp to file a complaint; schools the company operated at include Pratt Institute, Long Island University and New York University, among others.

✰✰✰

METROPOLITAN BLACK BAR ASSN. TO HONOR ACLU PRESIDENT ARCHER AT GALA

CHELSEA — The Metropolitan Black Bar Association has announced that it will be honoring Brooklyn resident Deborah N. Archer as its Trailblazer of the Year at its 39th Anniversary Awards Gala in May this year. Archer, the daughter of Jamaican immigrants, is an alum of Smith College and Yale Law School, and in 2021 was elected as the first African-American president of the ACLU.

Archer joined the faculty of New York Law School in 2003, before moving to NYU School of Law in 2018, where she serves as “Associate Dean and Co-Director of Clinical and Advocacy Programs, Professor of Clinical Law, and Co-Faculty Director of the Center on Race, Inequality, and the Law.”

✰✰✰

MISSING BROOKLYN MAN POSSIBLY FOUND DEAD UPSTATE

ELLENVILLE — The family of Shehroz Tokhirov, reported missing from his Brooklyn apartment last summer, believes he may be the mystery man found dead last month in the small upstate town of Ellenville, near New Paltz, reports News 12, and have confirmed that details reported by the FBI on the dead man’s case are a match for Tokhirov’s. The dismembered body was discovered in two duffle bags behind a house in Ulster County in what state police describe as “an old dumping ground for the Russian mob.”

Shlomo Patchiav, also of Brooklyn, was arrested last week in connection with the murder after an investigation by the FBI’s Eurasian Organized Crime Task Force, which believes that Patchiav and an accomplice extorted money and a Mercedes from the victim before shooting him.

✰✰✰

CONEY ISLAND COMMUNITY PROTESTS CASINO PLAN

CONEY ISLAND — Coney Island residents are unhappy with a proposal to build a casino on the boardwalk, reports Gothamist, and protested outside a Monday night community meeting on the plan at the Coney Island YMCA. Unhappy locals said that they feared the casino would bring increased crime and traffic to the already-struggling neighborhood, while Borough President Antonio Reynoso, who organized the meeting, said he himself was undecided on the merits of the idea and wanted to ensure that residents had a say in the process.

Brooklyn’s Robert Cornegy has thrown his weight behind the Coney casino project, which represents only one of several possible options for three new downstate casino licenses.

✰✰✰

CITY BUDGET OFFICIAL FACES OFF WITH COUNCIL IN TENSE HEARING

CIVIC CENTER — NYC Budget Director Jacques Jiha faced hours of questioning at a preliminary budget hearing from the City Council on Monday over what the council described as “an abundance of pessimism” in the Office of Management and Budget’s assessment of the city’s economic prospects, reports City and State, suggesting that belt-tightening measures supported by the Adams administration were unnecessarily conservative. Councilmembers called for increased spending on social programs in next year’s budget, but Jiha said that the council’s expectations were overly rosy, and said NYC is “in a very difficult situation,” warning of a potential upcoming recession.

Jiha also broke with Adams at one point during the hearing, according to Gothamist, stating that the elimination of remote work was partially to blame for the city’s difficulty in filling necessary government jobs and that the city is considering rolling back Adams’ controversial “return to office” policy for government employees, which Adams in 2022 said was necessary to support the city’s retail and restaurant industries.

✰✰✰

MAYOR WANTS NO MORE FACE MASKS IN STORES

CITYWIDE — Mayor Adams on Monday joined the NYPD in calling for shop owners to demand customers remove face masks in their stores in order to reduce theft, reports Bloomberg News, in a sharp turnaround from policies just last year that required masks while shopping. Adams suggested owners require customers to remove masks while entering but said he thought that customers should be allowed to replace the masks after showing their faces initially.

Queens Councilmember Tiffany Cabán criticized the mayor on Twitter, saying that shoplifting concerns did not outweigh the safety benefits of masks during the ongoing pandemic, while others raised concerns that such a policy could violate the Americans with Disabilities Act and could expose workers to COVID, as current CDC guidelines call for people who test positive for COVID to wear masks for ten days.

✰✰✰

CHABAD OF DUMBO TO HOST FAMILY PURIM CARNIVAL

DUMBO — Chabad of DUMBO will be hosting a family carnival on Tuesday, March 7, in honor of the Jewish Purim holiday, which is traditionally celebrated with costumes, lots of food and readings from the Book of Esther. The carnival will feature clowns, juggling, snacks and games; all attendees who come in costume will receive a prize.

The carnival will be held from 4 p.m. to 6 p.m. at the DUMBO Loft; admission is open to all but suggested donations are $20 per family, and more information can be found on EventBrite.

✰✰✰

AIRTRAIN FARE TO INCREASE ONCE AGAIN

FAR ROCKAWAY — The Port Authority on Sunday raised the fare of the AirTrain, which connects the subway system to the city’s airports, from $8 to $8.25, reports Gothamist, blaming inflation and lost revenues during the COVID pandemic. The Port Authority had also raised fares from $7.75 to $8 in 2022, also supposedly due to inflation.

“Just the fact that there’s an AirTrain fare at all, and no free transfer to the bus, subway, or Long Island Rail Road, particularly while the state is undertaking a multibillion-dollar highway expansion cutting through Jamaica to JFK, says so much about our inequitable and inefficient transportation policy in New York,” transit advocacy group Riders Alliance spokesperson Danny Pearlstein told Gothamist.

✰✰✰

IN MEMORIAM: BISHOP FRANK GRISWOLD LED EPISCOPAL CHURCH DURING TIME OF TURMOIL

NATIONWIDE — Bishop Frank Tracy Griswold III, who led the Episcopal Church through a tumultuous debate over the place of women and LGBTQ clergy during the late 1990s and early 2000s, died Sunday, March 5, in Philadelphia, at 85, reports the Religion News Service. Elected in 1997, Griswold served as presiding bishop from 1998-2006, and presided at the ordination and consecration of the mainline denominations first-openly gay bishop, the Rt. Rev. Gene Robinson in 2003, causing a schism within conservative dioceses.

Bishop Griswold also focused on ecumenical and interfaith relations, inviting a Muslim leader to speak during his installation service, and helping bring the Episcopal Church and Evangelical Lutheran Church into full communion with each other.

✰✰✰

GREENWOOD LOOKS AT PIVOT TO GREEN CREMATION METHODS

SUNSET PARK — Management at Green-Wood cemetery is looking at turning the historic graveyard even greener, according to The New Yorker, which reports that cemetery president Richard J. Moylan and his staff have been searching for a new electric crematory furnace, partially in an effort to cut harmful carbon emissions and partially as a result of constant breakdowns of their current furnaces caused by increased usage during the pandemic. The cemetery is also pursuing other environmentally minded initiatives – customers have begun to request green burials with no caskets or embalming, and landscapers have allowed lawns to revert to meadows.

Moylan also said he believes cremation will only become more important for Green-Wood in future years, as the historic cemetery is close to running out of space for traditional burials entirely.

✰✰✰

MORE FIXES COMING TO NEW BROOKLYN LIRR SERVICE: GOVERNOR

PROSPECT HEIGHTS — Governor Hochul on Sunday directed the MTA to make immediate modifications to the new LIRR train schedules, to take effect on Monday, following a week of criticism and confusion focused on the changes to service between Jamaica and Atlantic Terminal. The governor said that the LIRR will add two additional trainsets to the Atlantic Avenue rotation in order to reduce wait times to below nine minutes, as well as deploying 30 extra customer service workers to help direct riders at Jamaica and establishing a “platform controller” to more efficiently direct departures of and coordinate connections for Atlantic-bound trains.

“These changes are intended to ensure that during rush hours, the platform at Jamaica serving Brooklyn trains will have a train waiting at the platform with doors open and will not depart until a second train has arrived on the opposite track. During the afternoon/evening rush, a similar system will be in place at Atlantic Terminal,” the MTA said in a press statement.

✰✰✰

MARCHERS HALT TRAFFIC ON MANHATTAN BRIDGE TO DEMAND PASSAGE OF UNEMPLOYMENT INSURANCE FOR ALL

DOWNTOWN BROOKLYN — Excluded workers, in company with the advocacy group New York Communities for Change, took over the Manhattan Bridge, shutting down traffic during the morning rush hour on Monday, March 6, to demand that Governor Kathy Hochul and the leaders of state legislature pass the Unemployment Bridge Program to create a safety net for all workers, according to the social media giant Twitter and other sources. The web page for the Pass The Unemployment Bridge Program defines excluded workers as freelancers, undocumented workers, workers in re-entry, street vendors, day laborers who are barred from the state unemployment system even though they perform essential work and asserts that unemployment insurance is a basic labor right.

The march, which began at the Downtown Brooklyn end of the Manhattan Bridge, had concluded by 10 a.m., with Notify NYC broadcasting a message that the bridge reopened.

✰✰✰

BROOKLYN ORGS TO ATTEND LANDMARKS REFORM RALLY

CIVIC CENTER — Several Brooklyn organizations are set to attend a rally near City Hall calling for reform of the Landmarks Preservation Committee on Tuesday, including Preserve our Brooklyn Neighborhoods, Citizens for Responsible Neighborhood Planning of Clinton Hill and Fort Greene, and the Society for Clinton Hill.The rally, organized by Humanscale, will protest what the group says is a capture of the committee by real estate interests that has led to opaque operations and the destruction of historic buildings across the city.

The rally is open to the public and will kick off at 9:15 a.m. on Tuesday outside 250 Broadway in Manhattan; participants are encouraged to bring signs.

✰✰✰

MADISON-MARINE-HOMECREST CIVIC ASSN. TO DISCUSS VACANCIES

MARINE PARK — The Madison-Marine-Homecrest Civic Association will be holding a meeting next week to discuss increasing commercial vacancy rates in southern Brooklyn, featuring a talk from Brooklyn Chamber of Commerce President and Marine Park resident Randy Peers – as well as Irish soda bread, in honor of St. Patrick’s Day. “We’d like to focus on challenges facing our southern Brooklyn community, especially from the proliferation of large, vacant business properties. We hope that neighborhood small business owners will attend,” wrote Liz Morrissey, president of the civic group.

Attendees are asked to wear masks to the meeting, set for March 16 at 7 p.m. in the Carmine Carro Community Center; for more information phone 917-734-2614, or email [email protected].

✰✰✰

COUNCIL SPEAKER ADAMS DECRIES NEW BUDGET’S FAILURE TO ADDRESS CRITICAL ROLE VACANCIES

CITYWIDE — New York City Council on Monday, March 6, began a series of hearings on the Mayor’s Fiscal Year 2024 Preliminary $102.7 billion Budget. During the hearings, the respective committee will examine the allotments to various agencies, hear testimony from their leadership and from the public. City Council Speaker Adrienne Adams, while praising the increased revenue projections of $738 million, expressed grave concern in her opening remarks that the Preliminary Budget was $1.7 billion less than presented last November, stressed importance of protecting the city’s ability to provide essential services that support New Yorkers, and reiterated that while the city may face economic challenges and uncertainty, the failure to fill critical-role vacancies particularly in housing, economic opportunity and public safety undermines the well-being of New Yorkers.

“The fact that these cuts are not distributed evenly only magnifies this concern,” said Adams.

✰✰✰

CITY AWARDS GRAND ARMY ARCH RESTORATION CONTRACT

PROSPECT HEIGHTS — The city on Thursday awarded a $5 million contract for the restoration of Brooklyn’s Grand Army Plaza arch, formally known as the Soldiers’ and Sailors’ Memorial Monument, reports Patch NYC. The restoration of the plaza was announced in 2018 but only began last year with landscaping restoration, while work on the arch itself is not expected to begin until 2024.

The Department of Transportation is also considering designating Grand Army Plaza to be made a car-free zone as part of the restoration plan, but has not confirmed any concrete plans for this yet.

✰✰✰

CITIZEN BIKE LANE REPORTING BILL MOVES FORWARD, WITHOUT BOUNTY

CITYWIDE — A contested bill sponsored by Lincoln Restler that would have allowed New Yorkers to earn bounties for reporting cars illegally parked in bike lanes is now moving forward in the City Council – but without its star feature, reports Streetsblog. The council’s updated draft of the bill omits the proposed $25 bounty, but would allow any New Yorker who takes a short course on appropriate reporting to file an official complaint, using a mobile app, for unattended vehicles left in bus or bike lanes virtually anywhere in the city following a phased-in enforcement period.

While commenters were angered by the loss of the potential reward, activist groups did not feel it was a major problem: “I know some will be disappointed by removal of the ‘bounty,’ but that’s actually something that would have provided constant political ammunition for the drive-or-die and parking corruption crowds,” Bike New York Advocacy Director Jon Orcutt told Streetsblog, praising the “fantastic news.”

✰✰✰

NEW STEM PARTNERSHIPS CREATED IN RENEWABLE ENERGY

RED HOOK AND CROWN HEIGHTS — Community Offshore Wind, a joint venture with National Grid and RWE, has created over 10 new partnerships increasing youth access to STEM education to foster future careers in the renewable energy industry. During the recent Engineers Week (Feb. 19-25), Community Offshore Wind sent 75 students from Red Hook Initiative, Good Shepherd Services at the Joseph Miccio Community Center and other downstate programs to museums — including the Brooklyn Children’s Museum in Crown Heights — outdoor spaces, and environmental and marine education programs for hands-on learning experiences.

One month after submitting a proposal to provide New York State with clean energy and record economic investment from offshore wind, Community Offshore Wind is also investing over $100,000 into STEM and environmental education programs to prepare the offshore wind workforce of the future.

✰✰✰

TOWER REMNANTS UNCOVERED AT VINEGAR HILL CONSTRUCTION PROJECT

VINEGAR HILL — Local blog Brownstoner helped solve an architectural mystery after a reader snapped photos of the remnants of two large circular tower structures uncovered at a construction site in Vinegar Hill. A search of historic records revealed that the towers had been massive tanks used to hold coal gas by the Brooklyn Union Gas Company prior to their demolition in the 1930s, after which point warehouses appear to have been built on top.

Brownstoner says that the developers of the site, which is slated for a 218-unit apartment complex, will be remediating any environmental damage left over from the gas.

Historic photos show the giant tanks in 1927 and 1938. Photos by Percy Loomis Sperr. Photo: Brooklyn Public Library.

✰✰✰

SOCIAL MEDIA SITES HELP PROSECUTE WOMEN FOR ABORTIONS

NATIONWIDE — Social media companies are working with law enforcement agencies to put women who get abortions behind bars, according to Business Insider, who reports that Facebook parent company Meta has already provided key evidence in the prosecution of a Nebraska woman who helped her teen daughter get abortion pills. Activists fear that search and social media companies may be now and in the future providing highly personal data to police in conservative states, both voluntarily and when compelled by warrants, and are warning women to take steps to anonymize their online activity, as well as calling for legislation that would prioritize consumer privacy.

While many Republican-led states have passed laws restricting abortion in the wake of the fall of Roe v. Wade, New York’s lawmakers have taken steps to enshrine it in its constitution, voting in January to place the addition of pregnancy status to the state’s Equal Protection Amendment on the statewide ballot for ratification in 2024.

✰✰✰

NEW BILL WOULD REDUCE WORK-PERMIT WAITING PERIOD FOR ASYLUM SEEKERS

NATIONWIDE — The Asylum Seeker Work Authorization Act, with Congressmember Dan Goldman (D-10) as a co-sponsor, would reduce the current 180-day waiting period for work authorization eligibility to only 30 days, allowing any asylum seeker to apply for a work permit as soon as 30 days after applying for asylum. While this legislation would make no changes to any laws or regulations relating to the asylum process, it would address the bureaucratic backlog by eliminating the unwieldy two-year renewal schedule, and allow families to begin assimilating more quickly.

Current federal law passed in 1996 requires asylum seekers to wait half-a-year after filing an asylum petition before obtaining authorization to work. To prevent any gaps in employment, the US Citizenship and Immigration Services last May automatically extended the work permits of certain Employment Authorization Document Renewal Applicants’ work permits for 540 days (almost a year and a half).