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View From The Middle
In this case, to start a chronology it might be necessary to do it in reverse and cite just two of the most startling changes — namely the announcement that South Shore High School will close, with the machinations to begin next year, phasing classes out so that the last school year would be the graduating class of the year 2010. The next startling announcement within the final weeks of 2006 was that Spring Creek Towers — better known to all of us for more than 30 years as Starrett City — is to go on the auction block next year. This sent literally thousands of residents, who are living there under subsidized housing circumstances, reeling and anxious to find out whether it will affect them, although management of the facility said, “Ninety percent of the subsidized residents won’t be affected by the sale.” We don’t want to put more fear into the minds of tenants, but doesn’t that mean that ten percent will be affected? Nothing like starting off with heavy controversy. So maybe we’ll start over; this time at the beginning — with the good news in January that riders on the 14th Street-Canarsie line won’t have to worry about whether conductors will be eliminated. Due to Transit talks that ended a Christmas 2005 strike, elimination of conductors will not happen — for at least three years. On January 26, as a matter of fact, we came out with the news that they were still testing computerized trains on the L line so that, in coming years, we could be without conductors. Talk about computerized! Early in February, shortly after 59th A.D. Assemblyman Frank Seddio relinquished his post so he could become a surrogate judge, it was announced that members of the Thomas Jefferson Democratic Club and the Kings County Democratic County Committee nominated longtime Seddio aide Alan Maisel as his successor. A special election was scheduled for February 28 to fill the vacancy. That same week, as thousands mourned the death of Coretta Scott King, the widow of Martin Luther King, Jr., we ran a series of tender remembrances from the likes of Congressman Ed Towns, State Assemblyman Nick Perry and Borough President Marty Markowitz, among others. Progress on a number of fronts was cited later in the month as residents around Canarsie Park saw construction equipment doing its thing on the western side of the park adjacent to East 80th Street. Turned out they were getting rid of compost, re-positioning the dirt, and preparing the land for part of the renovation, set to officially start next April. Meanwhile, a group of civic leaders and citizens gathered with the South Canarsie Civic Association (SCCA) to protest overdevelopment in the area, bringing in borough officials, including the deputy director of zoning and housing Development for the Borough President and the vice chairman of the Brooklyn division of an outfit called the Four Borough Neighborhood Preservation Alliance. Mary Anne Sallustro, president of the SCCA, cited a number of areas she feels are seats of “overbuilding” and that “something is very wrong here.” She and her proponents of stopping the overdevelopment are still working on it. Another happy note in February came with the news that South Shore High School football star Parker Cantey, 17, has been granted a full athletic scholarship to Syracuse University. The soft-spoken Cantey, a linebacker, held a news conference at the school and thanked Coach Tommy Salvato, who said of his top charge: “He’s the most dominant player — on both sides of the ball —who has ever played for me.” The U.S. Weather Service boasted in February that we had had the warmest January on record nationwide, but Mother Nature made up for it on February 12 when she dumped on us — literally. The Weather Service said 26.9 inches of snow fell in Central Park by the time the storm was over, they highest tally since they started keeping records in 1869. Crime came in a horrible, horrible way early in March when the naked body of John Jay College coed Imette St. Guillen, 24, was found strangled, wrapped in duct tape and covered with a small wool blanket in a thicket next to Spring Creek. She had been sexually assaulted. Her wrists and ankles had been tied and her face covered with see-through tape. A short time later, Darryl Littlejohn, a bouncer who worked at a bar where the victim went the night she was killed, was picked up and eventually indicted for her murder. The story itself, which originated close to Canarsie because that’s where her body was found, unfortunately got nationwide coverage due to the brutality involved. Later in March, a celebration was initiated heralding the consolidation of the three Catholic schools here — Holy Family, St. Jude and Our Lady of Miracles — to be called Our Lady of Trust School. The move was initiated because of the problematical enrollment and funding problems and, wisely, merging the three schools into one — with three campuses — would continue to bring a Catholic education to the community. In keeping with thoughts of overdevelopment and underdevelopment and overlapping development (and development development) — word came that, after years of abandonment and neglect, the Canarsie Theater on Avenue L at East 93rd Street was finally sold and would undergo sweeping, uh, development, to become a huge, hopefully successful restaurant, banquet and catering hall. We had heard utterings like that before, so skeptics just nodded at the announcement and walked away. Not so fast, though, folks. The place is almost finished at this writing and is supposed to be completed by spring. And speaking of expansion, it’s unfortunate that the BayView Recreation Center is located on East 102nd Street in the southern-most, nearly invisible section of our community. Nevertheless, it’s almost completed…Sad note in the continuing transition of the shopping community came when it was announced that Abe’s Radio, which had been a veritable symbol of commerce on the Rockaway Parkway shopping strip between Glenwood and Farragut roads for 75 years, was pulling up its stakes and heading for other pastures. Because of rising costs and so many other changes, including a lack of walk-in business, the store stayed in Canarsie, however, and only moved around the corner to 458 East 99th Street, between Avenue D and Foster Avenue. Such loyalty! At a meeting with officials of Gateway National Recreation Area, it was announced that those two huge mountains to our east — formerly the Pennsylvania Avenue and the Fountain Avenue landfills — are being modified for recreational uses and are scheduled to be open to the public by 2009. All that work being done — on both landfills — will become nature trails, bike and hiking paths, bird watching areas and even overnight camping grounds. Sorry, the understructure won’t hold ball parks or Fields of Dreams, but it sure will look nice! And it didn’t seem that looking nice was in the cards for Sal Beneduce, owner of Big John’s Department Store on Avenue L on the late afternoon of May 24th when he looked up from talking to customers to see the entire front of the store crumbling in front of him. Luckily, no one was passing by the structure at the time, and Sal said he and the others “just ducked.” “It looked like London during the Blitz,” one passerby said. Word came in the middle of summer about the death of a little dog, belonging to a Mill Basin resident and her eight-year-old daughter, by an overheated dryer in a grooming salon on Ralph Avenue. The accident precipitated a lot of news coverage and brought an adamant State Senator Carl Kruger to the ring so he could fight and hopefully establish legislation regulating pet groomers’ policies. The legislation is still in committee. The eight-year-old, incidentally, was given another dog by a Flatbush Avenue pet store owner. It didn’t replace the deceased canine, but it helped assuage the little girl and the situation. In June we got word that a subway train being moved around the Canarsie yards, just off the Rockaway Parkway terminal, crashed at the northwest end of the station. There were no passengers aboard the train, but the train operator was taken to the hospital because he apparently suffered a seisure while trying to park the train. Two other workers aboard the train were treated at the hospital for cuts and bruises and released. A couple of days later, we were informed by Kings County District Attorney Charles Hynes that Assemblywoman Diane Gordon, whose 40th Assembly District encompasses Starrett City and parts of Canarsie was being indicted for bribery, among other charges. Within part of the indictment, Gordon was told she would get leniency if she would help to trap others in an investigation of corruption. A couple of obituaries hit the paper in late July-early August when we learned of the passing of long-time community activist Harold Mondschein at the age of 94. Harold was a stalwart in the community and took an interest in everything connected to it, having been a member of many civic groups and a member of Community Board 18 for years. Another passing to be noted was that of Justice Louis Marrero, a native Canarsien, who held the Republican flag here in Canarsie’s Democratic territory for scores of years. He was a member of the New York Republican State Committee for 25 years and headed the Dirksen Republican Club here. It was the middle of summer when many of those boat owners in Mill Basin and Bergen Beach, etc. were taking advantage of that type of transportation to help them cope with the oppressive heat. Another mode of transportation at the time was the jet ski. Seems that there was a Mill Basin 17-year-old who became involved in a crash on about June 30 and his body mysteriously disappeared. It wasn’t until August 10 that the body of Paul Zaccarias washed up on a bank of rocks. Family and friends were devastated. Canarsie’s citizens with West Indian backgrounds got together and made their way to the traditional West Indian American Day Parade on Labor Day. Although there had been a little trouble in previous years, everyone got together this time and made it a wonderful event with lots of costumes and laughter, together with a great deal of pride. Sounds like a pretty good recipe! New meetings took place regarding the Paerdegat Basin Project. Called the Combined Sewer Overflow project, at Ralph Avenue and Bergen Avenue, which includes a $10 million natural park, along with restored wetland areas and reconstruction of Bergen Avenue, the project is taking approximately $345 million to complete, but, according to sources, should be ready for next year..maybe. In September, we were glad to run the headline about Joseph Carrington. He’s the killer who gunned down Army Sergeant Terrence Balkinson and wounded his brother Lawrence in 2005. The soldier was home on leave from Iraq — scheduled to go back a couple of days after he encountered Carrington in the Ambiance Restaurant on Avenue L, got into a fight, and Carrington shot him to death. After a number of postponements, Carrington received a sentence of 40 years-to-life. It wasn’t long after that tragic happening that we learned of the death of a Canarsie soldier — Mario Nelson, 26 — who was killed in the line of duty with the U.S. Army in Iraq. “Big Mo,” as he was referred to by his Canarsie friends, joined the service shortly after joining the National Guard and searching through the remains of victims at Ground Zero. Relatives said his philosophy about the Army was, “ˆIt’s my job and I’ll do what I have to do.” Excavation on the grounds of the new house being built on Canarsie Road was abruptly stopped by inspectors from the City Department of Buildings when it was discovered digging at the site was a danger to the occupants of a next- door house. The inspectors found there apparently wasn’t enough shoring against the existing houses and, while it took a week or so to make things right and for the construction outfit to begin work again, it awakened the furor of civic associations, which once again brought up the charges of overdevelopment. Once again, we might have to hark to the present time to bring up the past. Just as the Concorde SST was brought to Floyd Bennett Field last weekend as a showpiece while the Intrepid Air-Space Museum is being berthed for renovations for a couple of years, we celebrated the 75th anniversary of the former airport. Now run by Gateway National Recreation Area, Floyd Bennett has a special place in the history of flight, with the likes of Charles Lindbergh and Howard Hughes and Amelia Earhart making that history. And the field is right in our own back yard. Remember the Canarsie Jewish Center? Located on East 107th Street between Flatlands Avenue and Avenue J, it was an orthodox synagogue for years until, sadly, the congregation dwindled to the point that it had to be closed. The building still stands, however, and discussion centered last year on its being bought by the City Department of Education so they can use the property for a new public school. However, instead of using the old building and refurbishing it, they want to knock it down and build an entirely new school there — a small one, at that. Anyway, the School Construction Authority is handling it at this point but neighborhood residents don’t like the idea that construction vehicles, etc. will be running all over their property and they are asking for reasonable compensation. City Councilman Charles Barron is in the fray on the side of the home owners, but even he says the residents knew about the deal a long time ago and it looks like a done deal. Meanwhile, he’s willing to fight for them. Oh, those Chiefs! It was pure bragging time in the community when the Canarsie High School’s varsity gridders beat the tar out of rival South Shore H.S. Vikings last month. The score was 12-8, which gave longtime Chiefs’ head coach Mike Camardese the right to praise the victory and carry the Bragging Rights Trophy off the field. Congrats to everybody! All Canarsiens (well, many.....well, a few) were seen looking over their own shoulders as the NYPD planted a few hundred surveillance cameras around town. The “town,” in this case, could be Manhattan, Queens or Brooklyn — that’s us. Originating as a housing complex implementation to fight crime, police said it helped in the projects, so why not everywhere? Sounds like Big Brother. On the other hand, some people feel safer as a result of the program....November brought with it national and, thus, international news which saw Congress change hands from being overwhelmingly Republican to Democrat (not necessarily overwhelmingly, but still a new majority). That means, just a few short days after this writing, the Republican president will have a Democratic congress — both houses — to deal with. I want to say more, but somehow I can’t. On November 15, as hundreds of commuters were leaving the Rockaway Parkway station, gunshots rang out and an innocent bystander was shot in the back and killed. Thank heavens no other bystanders were hurt, but two of the men involved in the argument were wounded. Within minutes, nearby police tackled the suspected shooter, Wayne Holmes, 23, a Canarsien. They brought him to the Foster Avenue station house for booking. As the year 2007 looms closer every day, we still have many changes to come. That is not to say we should face them with fear. Courage is one of the many attributes of the human experience; another is rationality. We must learn to think before we leap. Will the leap lead to a positive or profitable change? Or must we blindly follow the tried and true? If the latter is the answer, God help us, for we would never have experienced the changes that have made us grow. Have a happy and healthy new year!
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