New York City Council Member Stephen Levin will hold a public meeting to hear feedback from Greenpoint parents on the plans to build a 600-seat elementary school on a vacant lot across the street from the Nuhart Plastics Superfund site (280 Franklin St.), which will be remediated in the next few years after the proposed cleanup plan (PDF) is approved. The meeting will take place on Thursday, Nov. 8, at 7:30 p.m. at the Dupont Senior Center (80 Dupont St.). The school would take around three to five years to complete following approval. Continue reading →
Next Thursday, November 8th, NYC Council Member Stephen Levin will hold a community meeting at the Dupont Senior Center (80 Dupont St.) for concerned parents to discuss the proposed site for Greenpoint’s newest K-8 school.
Levin stipulates that this meeting will not focus on the Superfund site so much as on the school itself. He said in a Facebook post: “We would like to meet with Greenpoint parents to discuss the school that will be getting built in the area. We have had several meetings about the Nuhart site but would like to concentrate the school and what people need to know and have questions about regarding the school itself.”
Despite opposition from community groups including North Brooklyn Neighbors (formerly NAG), the proposed location for the school, to be built by developers at Greenpoint Landing, is at the corner of Dupont and Franklin Streets, across from the Nuhart Plastics site, a designated state Superfund.
At the meeting, you can weigh in on issues surrounding the school, and voice your opinion about where it should be built.
If you prefer to lament, or compliment, the cleanup plan in the company of your neighbors, then you’re in luck: North Brooklyn Neighbors and NYC Council Member Stephen Levin are hosting a comment-athon this Wed. Oct. 24, from 6 p.m. to 8 p.m. at Threes Brewing (113 Franklin St.). Continue reading →
The school is slated to sit on the corner of Dupont and Franklin Streets, across the street from NuHart Plastics, which was declared a state-level super-fund site in 2010 because it is highly contaminated with thousands of gallons of hazardous chemicals, including two underground plumes of trichloroethylene (TCE), and as much as 60,000 gallons of uncontrolled phthalates, which have leeched from the site out toward surrounding streets.
According to NAG’s petition, “exposure to these chemicals have been linked to liver and kidney damage, congenital heart defects, central nervous system defects, changes in sex hormones, low sperm count, obesity, reduced female fertility, birth defects, low birth weight, and altered behavior in toddlers.” Continue reading →
Councilman Stephen Levin was arrested outside of City Hall on Wednesday morning. Levin, who chairs the General Welfare Committee was arrested along with other protestors during a demonstration urging Mayor de Blasio to release the results of a study on supervised opioid consumption spaces.
Safer Consumption Spaces (SCS) are Supervised Injection Facilities where opioid addicts can consume pre-obtained drugs under medical supervision. The Drug Policy Alliance, which advocates for drug policy based on “science, compassion, health and human rights,” sees SCS as one of the most successful approaches to the opioid epidemic, with the potential to save thousands of lives. Continue reading →
The NYC Department of Transportation is getting ready to release the results of a Transportation Study for Brooklyn Community Board 1 (That’s us)! The study, focusing on issues like street design, traffic flow, public safety and environmental impact, was funded by Councilman Stephen Levin’s office. While North Brooklyn residents have already contributed over 400 unique comments and concerns to the study, Levin’s office is now inviting community members to submit last minute input “to make sure this process reflects everyone’s voices.”
The North Brooklyn streetscape is not the first to be surveyed by the NYC DOT. For example, the department assessed conditions on Jay Street in 2016. Past studies like this one have analyzed existing issues on the street, then offered solutions based on public input, so your ideas are essential to the process. Continue reading →
Greenpointers have been watching the changing East River Waterfront. A community development meeting on Wednesday allowed residents to hear from developers, and voice their concerns about on-going construction projects in North Brooklyn. While the luxury towers seem to leave a lot of Greenpointers out in the cold, this week The Brooklyn Eagle toured Level BK, in Williamsburg, offering a look inside.
Transmitter Park is one of the great gems of the Greenpoint waterfront, but the oasis has turned terrifying for pet owners. A shaggy, unleashed, black dog has brutally attacked several other dogs in the park without cause or warning. Continue reading →
Democratic City Council Member Stephen Levin was re-elected to represent Greenpoint and the rest of the 33rd District on the New York City Council this Tuesday, November 7th. Levin received more than 18,600 votes, or over eighty-eight percent of the ballots cast. His opponent was a native Greenpointer, Victoria Cambranes, a novice politician who received some two thousand seven hundred votes, or about eleven percent of the vote. Cambranes cut into Levin’s victory total in 2013 when Levin received over ninety-one percent of the vote. Cambranes attracted some support because of her Polish and Latina background, but still fell far short of the very popular Levin.
A rendering for the Pfzier Rezoning Plan, via NewYorkYimby
Yesterday, when Joe Rickets, the billionaire founder of TD Ameritrade, who owned DNAinfo and Gothamist shut down those sites – putting 115 people out of work – following the reporters’ vote to unionize, we got another reminder of how easily a powerful individual can wantonly affect the lives of so many people according to his whims.
Powerful business interests have been flexing their muscles here in Greenpoint, too. Both the waterfront development firm Greenpoint Landing Associates, and the pharmaceutical conglomerate Pharmaceutical Research and Manufacturers of America (PhRMA) scored some good press this week by making grants to the local community. Greenpoint Landing Associates donated $250,000 to the Greenpoint YMCA (99 Meserole Ave) to renovate the gym, fitness room and spin center. PhRMA pledged $2,000 to P.S. 34 Oliver H. Perry Elementary to support the school’s science, technology, engineering and math (STEM) programs. Continue reading →
