BENSONHURST'S PREMIER NEWS BLOG

Source: Thomas Good via Wikimedia Commons

Politicians in New York are looking to break ground by making New York the first state to raise the smoking age from 18 to 21. The New York Daily News is reporting that State Senator Diane Savino, an admitted ex-smoker, is leading the push to make it harder for teenagers to get their hands on tobacco products.

“If I could prevent one kid, one kid from ever developing that habit, this legislation is worth it. We’re going to get this passed and we are going to become a state where you can’t buy cigarettes unless you are over the age of 21,” the Daily News reported Savino saying.

As cigarette prices continue to climb in New York City, politicians are also looking to extend the price hikes state wide to prevent cross county purchases. Savino stressed the importance of these measures.

“Young people will go across the border. All of the cigarette sellers in the other counties said, ‘That’s great! You want to raise the age in New York City, they’ll just come to Nassau, they’ll come to Suffolk, they’ll come to Westchester, they’ll come to Rockland.”

These hard-line tobacco measures also have the backing of Council Speaker and mayoral front-runner Christine Quinn.

As for Mayor Michael Bloomberg, who is famous for his stern stances on public health issues, he was originally against the proposed bump in the smoking age but changed his mind, according to a report in the New York Post.

“Anything you can do to make it harder for teenagers to get hooked is a great contribution to their lives for the rest of their lives,” he said.

An aide who discussed the issue with the mayor said his only remaining concern was that the smoking age would be higher than the age for joining the military, which is 18.

When it was pointed out that the drinking age here is 21, the matter was settled.

“He signed off on it quickly,” said one source. “It was literally a five-minute conversation.”

Source: NYPD via brooklynews.com

The NYPD are after a thief who snatched a woman’s iPhone on the F Train.

The Brooklyn News reported that the thief, described as black male in his 20s, grabbed the 22-year-old woman’s iPhone from her hands on a Brooklyn-bound F Train, then bolted for an exit at the 18th Avenue stop.

If you have any information regarding the crime, the NYPD urges you to call the Crime Stoppers hotline at 1-800-577-TIPS (8477). You can also text tips to 274637 (CRIMES) then enter TIP577. You can also submit tips to www.nypdcrimestoppers.com. All calls are kept in strict confidentiality.

Source: crashmaster007 via flickr

When the economy is in bad shape for a long time, people expect crime to increase across the board. It comes as no surprise when gang related violence and robberies surge, but it is startling when strange crimes like animal kidnapping become more common. Such was the ordeal facing Prospect Heights resident Dina Sasson. A New York Daily News report  detailed the ridiculous yet scary situation Sasson found herself in when her dog was kidnapped and held for a $100 ransom.

The trouble started when Disco, Sasson’s 5-year-old Shih Tzu, escaped from Sasson’s mother’s front yard in Midwood two weeks ago. Two women who found the dog called the number on Disco’s collar and demanded a reward, threatening that if they weren’t compensated, Sasson wouldn’t see the dog again.

Fearing that alerting the police would bring harm to her dog, Sasson agreed to meet the kidnappers behind a Shop Rite located on Kings Highway and West 13th street in Gravesend.

“I was frantic,” Sasson told the Daily News. “I gave them the money and then walked away. I just wanted my dog back.”

According to the Daily News, animal kidnapping has been on the rise.

“They either steal dogs to keep for themselves, sell on the black market, give as gifts to others, or hold as ransom until the owners pay them money,” a spokeswoman for the American Kennel Club said.

Nationally, the group recorded 255 thefts in 2010, 444 in 2012, and a nearly 60% rise in the number of cases reported over the first quarter this year, she said.

The lesson here is that animal owners should take extra care in keeping an eye on their pets so that they aren’t forced into similar creepy situations.

Activists were displeased when the Parks Department decided to replace the wooden boardwalk on Coney Island with a cement and plastic one. Now, six months after Superstorm Sandy battered our shores, the New York Post is reporting that residents and business owners are complaining that sand is accumulating on the new boardwalk.

The barrage of sand upon the historic promenade has been so terrible that the city has been forced to assign extra workers to keep shoveling it back on to the beach. Boardwalk preservationists are blaming the new cement base for all the extra sand.

“With cement, there’s nowhere for the sand to fall through. There’s no doubt the new surfaces are causing the sand to pile up like never before…This is what you get when the city decides to make changes without doing a proper environmental review,” Todd Dobrin, president of the Friends of the Boardwalk and a candidate for City Councilman Domenic Recchia’s seat in the 47th District, told the Post.

Residents, including Maureen Masterson, 32, were also angry. While trying to maneuver her two-year-old daughter’s stroller through obstructive piles of sand, the Bensonhurst mother expressed negativity over the situation.

“This is horrible. It’s like Sandy never left,” Masterson told the Post.

The encroaching sand isn’t just bad for people trying to walk on the boardwalk. As sand accumulates, it starts blowing in people’s faces, which the city has been vigorously trying to prevent by wetting the sand down.

Local business owner Dennis Vourderis, co-owner of Deno’s Wonder Wheel Park, told the Post that the sand has never been worse. It is “even piling up in the amusement district — which still maintains a wooden boardwalk,” he said, blaming the extra sand on Sandy “pushing it closer to the boardwalk and making it ‘finer’ so it blows more freely.”

“This is the worst we’ve seen it,” said Vourderis, who recently put up netting outside Deno’s to block sand from damaging his rides’ motor systems. “We have to shovel all week just to be ready for the weekend.”

For its part, the Parks Department is blaming Mother Nature and isn’t accepting the idea that the new boardwalk has anything to do with all the extra sand.

“Sand will accumulate on a boardwalk without regard to the decking or the foundation,” the Post reported Parks Department spokeswoman Meghan Lalor as saying.

St. Athanasius. Source: Google Maps

St. Athanasius Church, a beloved Bensonhurst religious institution at 2154 61st Street, is celebrating its 100th year with a series of celebrations for the community. According to The New York Daily News, the church will ring in their centennial this Thursday, May 2 during a 7:00 p.m. Mass:

After the Feast of St. Athanasius Mass, a mariachi band will lead the worshipers — most of them Italian or Hispanic — from the church across Bay Parkway to a free-to-everyone cake and coffee party in the basement of the school where an all-star doo-wop band called the Tercels will perform.

Msgr. David Cassato will present a Distinguished Parishioner Award to ex-NYPD Chief of Department Joseph Esposito, who reached mandatory retirement last month after 44 years as a cop, with 12 years in the top uniformed post.

Cassato praised Esposito in the Daily News for attending Mass with his family every Sunday and spoke to the church’s staying power:

“We’re perfectly located in the heart of Bensonhurst, attracting traditional Italian families and a swelling flock of new immigrants, especially Hispanics. They love our Spanish-language masses said by Father Gabriel, our music and the message of hope and light that has been spread from here for 100 years into the streets of Brooklyn.”

Esposito, who credited Cassato for the church’s staying power, reciprocated the love, calling him “amazing” and citing his dedication to reaching out to new immigrants and young people, “[a]nd his homilies are better than a comedy show, with a regular neighborhood-guy touch.”

According to Cassato, the special Mass marking the church’s 100th year is just one of the special activities that have been ongoing all year. They have been inviting back former parishioners who have moved away to Staten Island and New Jersey, and last December they held a tree lighting and doo-wop fund-raiser. Earlier in the year, the church welcomed home its former nuns, and former “St. A” priests also came back to say one more Mass each.

As for the future, Cassato spoke to the importance of attracting youth to the church. In June, they are planning a carnival with an anti-bullying theme.

“Music, dancing, laser light show. It’s great to celebrate 100 years of St. Athanasius. But without the kids we’ll never make another 100 years,” Cassato told the Daily News.

Other upcoming events include a July trip for 65 lucky parishioners who are going on a pilgrimage to the tomb of St. Athansius in Venice, Italy. In October, Bishop Nicholas DiMarzio will give a special closing centennial Mass, and in November a gala dinner dance will be held in the El Caribe catering hall.

Source: jpotisch / Flickr

With the exception of the minor stretch between 59th Street and 36th Street along the N line running local, if you’re into trains running express, then this is the week for you.

D TRAIN

From 11:45 p.m. to 5:00 a.m., Monday to Friday, April 29 to May 3, 205th Street-bound D trains run express from 36th Street to Atlantic Avenue-Barclays Center.

F TRAIN

From 11:45 a.m. to 5:00 a.m., Monday to Friday, April 29 to May 3,179th Street-bound F trains will be running express from West 4th Street to 34th Street-Herald Square.

Also: Effective as of last week, F train service has been restored at Smith-9th streets in both directions.

N TRAIN

From 11:45 p.m. to 5:00 a.m., Monday to Friday, April 29 to May 3, Ditmars Boulevard-bound N trains run express from 36th Street to Atlantic Avenue-Barclays Center.

R TRAIN

From 11:45 p.m. to 5:00 a.m., Monday to Friday, April 29 to May 3, there will be no R trains running between 59th Street and 36th Street, Brooklyn. Take the N train instead. R trains run between Bay Ridge-95th Street and 59th Street, Brooklyn.

This service change affects one or more ADA accessible stations. Call 511 for help with planning your trip. If you are deaf or hard of hearing, use your preferred relay service provider or the free 711 relay. For more information, click on the mta.info link and read station signs.

On the six month anniversary of Superstorm Sandy yesterday, local politicians, activists, and neighbors gathered once again to decry the waste transfer station proposed for the Bensonhurst waterfront, saying that the station could turn a Sandy-like storm into a toxic maelstrom.

Close to 200 people rallied on Sunday, April 28, on the Bay Parkway Promenade near Ceasar’s Bay to support the cause. Their message was clear: A united Southern Brooklyn will continue to fight and oppose the waste station pitched to stand by 25th Avenue and Bay 41st Street.

Assemblyman William Colton joined Brooklyn activist and New Utrecht High School teacher Mark Treyger to fight against what they say will be a “dire strain on this community.”

Treyger, a City Council candidate and the founder of the Sandy Taskforce Recovery Organized by Neighborhood Groups, or STRONG, said that Bensonhurst is not alone in their efforts.

“Today’s rally showed that this hyperlocal movement has swelled into a South Brooklyn movement.” Treyger said.

Treyger added that Sandy has taught some hard lessons that have bolstered their argument against the waste station.

“This time, our message is stronger. [Superstorm] Sandy showed us, once again, why this dumping station shouldn’t be here,” he said.

In the last big rally against the garbage station in August 2012, Treyger paired with Colton to raise awareness of the toxins lurking in Gravesend Bay that could be stirred up by the dredging required to build the station.

Last August, Colton said: “Scientists have confirmed what many in the community feared…There were unsafe levels of mercury and other harmful toxins found at the bottom of Gravesend Bay. The samples were taken by just scratching the surface rather than by digging deep below the surface where the dredging will reach. This leads others and me to wonder: What other dangers lie further below Gravesend Bay?” asked Colton. “And how will this toxic material impact the adjacent beaches of Coney Island and Manhattan Beach?”

Colton attempted to drive the point home by citing the disastrous effects caused by Superstorm Sandy. Colton stressed his anxiety about the dangerous toxins that will be unearthed in locals’ homes should another coastal storm occur.

“Mold is hard enough to clean out. Imagine if it was mercury,” Colton said.

Ari Kagan, the 45th Assembly Democratic District Leader running for City Council in Sheepshead Bay, agreed.

“It’s not just Bensonhurst that this affects. It’s Brighton… Coney Island… Sheepshead Bay… Bay Ridge. It affects all of us, all over Brooklyn,” Kagan said.

Paying tribute to the local beaches and prominent fishing community, Kagan added: “We need to help the community after Hurricane Sandy, not destroy it. I don’t see a single person in South Brooklyn who supports this. Enough is enough.”

Other activists joined in the cry to ‘Dump the dump,’ citing the neighborhood’s children, elderly, and overall residential population as reasons that the proposed waste station is unsatisfactory.

Ludger Balan, a member of the Urban Divers Estuary Conservancy, said that this quality of life issue isn’t just harmful for Bensonhurst locals, but that it will affect everybody in this borough.

Referencing another daunting idea in the completion of this project, Balan spoke in an interview with Bensonhurst Bean of the 1500 rounds of 20mm munitions discovered from a capsized WWII military barge in Gravesend Bay, the focus of a public statement made during the protest by Ida Sanoff , executive director of the Natural Resources Protective Association. According to Balan, Sanoff and Colton, dredging for this waste site could even lead to an explosion of those munitions.

“They could not have chosen a worse place to put this project,” Balan said.

And now, in the wake of an election year, activists are urging Bensonhurst locals to see where candidates running for office stand in regard to this garbage transfer site.

“We need politicians that are really for the people,” Treyger said.

“The next mayor will have the power to continue or end this. The next mayor will make a decision. Before we vote, we will listen to their position on this issue. You want our votes? Stand with our community. This location is just not suitable,” he said.

Source: KB35/Flickr

Bad news for anyone going to or from Sunset Park and Gowanus, and some mediocre news for F train riders. Here’s your weekend subway service advisory roundup for Bensonhurst-area lines.

D, N & R LINES

Late night trips (11:45 p.m. to 6:30 a.m.) on the D and N will be a headache for some commuters heading to or from Sunset Park or Gowanus. There will be no Manhattan-bound local service from 36th Street to Atlantic Avenue.

For service to 25 St, Prospect Av, 4 Av-9 St and Union St, take the D or N to Atlantic Av-Barclays Ctr and transfer to a Coney Island-bound train. For service from these stations, take a Coney Island-bound D or N to 36 St and transfer to a Manhattan-bound train.

F LINE

Here’s the goodnews, in the MTA’s own tone-deaf words: “Effective 11 AM, Friday, April 26, 2013, F train is service restored at Smith-9 Sts in both directions.” Woohoo.

Now the bad news: Beginning 11:15 p.m. Friday and lasting all the way ’til 5 a.m. Monday, Coney Island-bound F trains are rerouted via the M after 36 St, Queens to 47-50 Sts. Meanwhile,  Coney Island-bound F trains are rerouted via the A from W 4 St to Jay St-MetroTech.

I passed by the New Utrecht Reformed Church (1827 84th Street) this week, and spotted this sign out front for their free feeding program. The sign told me to share the love, so here I am doing that.

The program takes place Saturday, April 27, at 1 p.m. Come one, come all, and say hi to Mikey Church, the awesome groundskeeper.

Faithful Friends Animal Hospital is coming to 2455 McDonald Avenue, off the corner of Avenue W in Gravesend.

Our friend Mary, of Ditmas Park Corner, tells us that the head vet, Dr. Suzanne Caruso, previously served our fuzzy fellows at Pet Haven Animal Hospital in Kensington. From the Yelp reviews, it seems our neighborhood is getting the better end of that split.

Welcome to the neighborhood, Faithful Friends. Unfortunately for you, I won’t need you because my doggy will never die. You hear me? Never!