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18 pages • Vol. 42, No. 23 • June 7–13, 2019
Feds: Gowanus rezoning can’t compromise cleanup
By Kevin Duggan
Brooklyn Paper
Uncle Sam isn’t taking any
of the city’s crap!
Federal environmental officials
are anxiously counting
the turds of some 20,000 new
residents that would move to
Gowanus in the wake of a citybacked
rezoning, and they’re
demanding local officials create
a plan to protect the neighborhood’s
notoriously fetid canal
from the extra waste amid
a more than $1.2 billion fed-
Former Chip Shop owner and Park Slope resident Chris Sell poses with his Reliant Robin.
Three-wheel drive!
Want a car famous for crashing? Here’s your chance
By Colin Mixson
Brooklyn Paper
It’s the deadliest thing to come out
of England since the Black Plague, and
it can be yours for only $5,000!
A Park Slope man is looking to sell
his 1982 Reliant Robin, a unique and
truly ridiculous experiment in British
car manufacturing, which features only
one front wheel and virtually no guarantee
of safety.
“It’s more unstable than my mother
was,” said Ninth Street resident Chris
Sell, “and that’s saying something!”
Sell imported his outrageous threewheeled
curiosity as an advertisement for
his Atlantic Avenue British food restaurant
Chip Shop in 2011, and many Park
Slope residents will recognize the car as
much by its bold Union Jack paint job,
as by its odd compliment of tires.
But Sell, who was forced to close Chip
Shop in December last year, said he’s
now eager to find another small business
owner to purchase his Robin as a
roving billboard for their shop, promising
there’s no other car like it in the
country.
“There’s only one of this model in the
country,” he said. “Wherever you are,
you’ll get so much attention.”
The Reliant Motor Company introduced
drivers to the Robin in cheery
1973, where it’s diminutive 750-cc engine
— later upgraded to 850 cc —
made the distinctly British mini an attractive
purchase for motorists during
the 1970s oil crisis.
Photo by Trey Pentecost
CANAL ORDER
eral cleanup of the waterway, according
to the fed in charge of cleaning Brooklyn’s
Nautical Purgatory.
“In the coming weeks and months and
years we will be looking at those numbers
and we will be asking the city and
the developers to take measures to mitigate
any effects that these big numbers
might have on the remedy,” said Christos
Tsiamis of the Environmental Protection
Agency at the May 28th meeting of
the local watchdog group the Gowanus
Community Advisory Group.
Current residents flush about 179,000
gallons of wastewater into the neighborhood’s
sewage system per day, and federal
officials had planned to install two
massive tanks — capable of holding four
and eight million gallons, respectively,
and priced together at $1.2 billion —
near the canal to accommodate sewage
overflow, which normally vents into the
waterway during heavy rain.
But as the prospect of a neighborhood
up-zoning looms, Department of City
Planning officials now predict that the
daily wastewater dump could swell to
a whopping 2 million gallons per day,
and Tsiamis said at the meeting Tuesday
that it’s up the city to strategize
how to prevent that waste from entering
the canal.
Tsiamis is also concerned that largescale
development will cause additional
rainwater to pour into city sewers, thereby
further exacerbating overflow, and Tsiamis
wrote to the Department of City
Planning to demand they analyze that
issue as well.
Gowanus Councilman Brad Lander
— whose vote, along with Boerum Hill
Councilman Stephen Levin’s, is key to
approving the city’s rezoning
scheme — suggested that
in lieu of expanding the already
hugely expensive tanks
planned by the feds, that developers
could be required
through the rezoning to install
their own retention facilities
when construction new
buildings.
“The CSO outfalls could
be tied into tunnel or tank infrastructure
being designed
for this purpose, which is the
public option” said Lander.
“The private option — if
it’s not feasible to tie it into
those, then developers could
in addition to having to detain
their stormwat er, detain
their grey water for a period
File photo by Stefano Giovannini
The city has to figure out how to keep all the waste
generated by the 20,000 new residents it’s planned
rezoning would bring out of the Gowanus Canal.
Cleaning the
Gowanus
of time, their sewage.”
As a proof of concept, Lander pointed
to a luxury condominium on the distant
Isle of Manhattan, called the Solaire,
which features a rooftop garden
that collects rainwater in a 10,000-gallon
tank .
And the local lawmaker added that,
while the increase in wastewater would
be significant, it is ultimately manageable
given existing treatment facilities,
including the Red Hook and Owls Head
treatment plants, which have capacities
of 60 million and 120 million gallons
per day, respectively, according to city
records.
“You have to look at that in context
of wastewater treatments,” Lander said.
“It’s not a trivial increase but relative to
the wastewater system it’s a relatively
modest increase.” See ROBIN on page 6
Anti-Semitism strikes children’s museum
By Kevin Duggan
Brooklyn Paper
Cops are hunting the lowlife
who left an anti-Semitic Post-it
note that read “Hitler is coming”
on a billboard outside the Jewish
Children’s Museum on Eastern
Parkway on May 30.
Witnesses reportedly saw a
teenage girl writing the note on
the wall — where the organization
has invited passersby to leave
Post-its describing how they would
transform the world — at around
8 p.m. Onlookers put up a search
for the vandal, but she had already
left the scene, according to the local
Jewish news site Collive.com.
Police are currently anticipating
a harassment charge — not vandalism
— due to the semi-public
nature of the wall, according to
a police spokesman.
“My understanding this is an
area where people were welcome
to come and leave notes,” said Det.
Michael DeBonis. “It isn’t a traditional
vandalism, or graffiti.”
The case is being pursued by
the department’s Hate Crimes
Task Force, and any charges issued
may be upgraded if investigators
can prove bias in the incident,
DeBonis said.
The museum’s spokesperson
did not return requests for comment.
Gov. Andrew Cuomo condemned
the act and directed the
state’s Hate Crimes Task Force
to assist NYPD with their investigation.
“To ensure those responsible
for this heinous act are held accountable
to the fullest extent of
the law, I am directing the State
Police Hate Crimes Task Force to
immediately provide the NYPD
with any resources needed to assist
in the investigation of this
incident,” Cuomo said in a May
30 statement. “Now and always,
there is no place for hate in our
state.”
The state’s commander-in-chief
noted the rise of anti-Semitic episodes
across the country, calling
for both unity — and condemnation.
“In the wake of a rise in anti-
Semitic and other hate crimes in
our nation, it is more important
than ever that we stand united to
condemn these despicable acts of
violence and root out hate in all
its forms,” the pol said.
The event comes just more than
a week after another malcontent
drew a swastika on a Jewish community
center in Clinton Hill.
Police are investigating the Postit
note left on a mural outside
the Jewish Children’s Museum
in Crown Heights on May 30.
Mordechai Lightstone/@Mottel via Twitter
A kick in the Hank’s
Revived dive bar must close its new location
By Kevin Duggan
Brooklyn Paper
Hank’s for all the memories.
Hank’s Saloon will shut down
for the second time after only five
months at its Adams Street location,
according to its owner.
The Downtown dive bar will
close its doors on June 14 because
the owners of Hill Country Food
Park — the recently-shuttered
food hall that houses the watering
hole on its second floor near
Willoughby Street — will hand
over the building’s lease to a new
operator, the storied saloon’s owner
said on social media .
“After five amazing months and
working our asses off non-stop,
Hill Country told us a few days
ago that someone else will be taking
over their lease asap on the entire
building on Adams Street, and
that the people taking over don’t
really have any interest in continuing
to house Hank’s Saloon
(they will transforming it into
a different venue),” Julie Ipcar
wrote on the troubled tavern’s
Facebook page on May 25.
Hill Country’s owners Marc
and Kristen Glosserman already
closed the food hall on May 3,
according to spokeswoman Leah
Morgan, and the new operators
will bring in eateries from “very
well known hospitality brands”
later this year, the company said
in a separate statement.
“Hill Country Food Park has
closed for the season to make
way for some big changes,” the
statement read. “While we have
enjoyed stretching our culinary
wings at Food Park, we have decided
to focus on growing our
other Hill Country restaurants and
will be handing over the reins to a
new operator, who will be curating
a collection of exciting new
food offerings from some very
well-known hospitality brands
planned for later this year. Details
are being finalized, and more information
regarding the new operator
as well as our involvement
will be coming soon.”
Hank’s Saloon took over a second
floor nook of the space at the
beginning of this year , after closing
down its original century-old
Boerum Hill location at the end
of last year.
The honkey-tonk taproom had
just started to rebuild a strong
following over the past couple
of months and hosted a number
of live gigs on its stage despite
a challenging environment, according
to Ipcar’s post.
“In the short time we were on
Adams Street, the bar did extremely
well. We were rocking
it with packed happy hours and
fantastic nights of music, and had
just started building a community
in a neighborhood that we were
told was going to be impossible
to make work,” it read.
She thanked the bar’s staff for
making their alehouse in America’s
Downtown reminiscent of
their original digs and added that
she hopes to get lucky again with
a new location.
“I’m gonna say goodbye for
now, but hopefully we will be
lucky one more time and find
somewhere else so we can continue
what we started,” she said.
Photo by Kevin Duggan
Hank’s Saloon will close its location in Downtown Brooklyn
because the operators of the Hill Country Food Market —
where the bar uses the second floor — are departing.
LGBTQ-friendly senior
housing in Ft. Greene
By Matt Tracy
for Brooklyn Paper
Lottery applications
for the city’s
first LGBTQfriendly
senior
residential building
ide M nth! PrPride Moontnth!
— Ingersoll
Senior Residences
in Fort Greene— opened
on May 29.
The building at 112 Edwards
St. near Myrtle Avenue, which
is on pace to open in the fall, is
a product of a partnership between
Services and Advocacy
for GLBT Elders (SAGE) and
BFC Partners and will boast 145
units in a 17-story building, with
a lounge, a reading and card playing
room, laundry facilities, and
roof decks lined with plants on
several floors.
building will also
house a 6,500-squarefoot
senior center
providing social,
health, and wellness
services,
arts and cultural
activities,
and technology
training. That
center will include a computer
facility and library, an area for
fitness classes, dining space, and
a large kitchen that will be utilized
for both cooking classes
and catering.
Applicants must have a household
member who is at least 62
years old and qualify under city
guidelines for affordable housing.
The residences will not be
exclusive to LGBTQ people, but
-
The bu
housef
t
See SENIOR on page 15
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/Collive.com