8 AWP December 2 Brooklyn Paper • www.BrooklynPaper.com • (718) 260-2500 7, 2019–January 2, 2020
2019 YEAR IN REVIEW
Continued from page 4
A champions networking event that honors top Brooklyn men for their outstanding
PRINT DIGITAL EVENTS BROADCASTING
SCHNEPSMEDIA.COM
MEET THE 2020 KINGS OF KINGS.
leadership and contributions to the community.
SHAWN
V. AUSTIN
Senior Vice President
Liberty Mutual Insurance
MARC
BATTIPAGLIA
Personal Injury Lawyer
Rubenstein & Rynecki
JONATHAN
BERMAN
Ariel Property Advisors
DR. VALENTIN
BRAGIN
Medical Director
Stress Relief & Memory Training Center
NYC Commercial
Market President
SANDER
CAMEAU
Co-CEOs
JUAN CHECO
Director of Hospital Police
NYC Hospital Police Department
MICHAEL
CHERNY
Chase Consumer
Banking
Managing Director
DR. RONALD
C. JACKSON
Vice President for Student Affairs
Brooklyn College
NOEL CORDERO
Business Banking
Relationships Manager
Ridgewood Savings Bank
Founding Principal
VP of External Affairs
Director, Center for K12 STEM Education
Partner
Co-CEOs
BENJAMIN
M. PINCZEWSKI
Attorney
Pinczewski & Shpelfogel, PC
MIKE NIEVES
President & CEO
HITN
Cardiologist
For more information on tickets, tables and sponsorship opportunities, please contact
Jasmin Freeman at jfreeman@schnepsmedia.com or call 718-260-4512.
Grand Prospect Hall
263 Prospect Ave,
Brooklyn, NY 11215
Thursday, January 23th, 2020
SHLOMI
BAGDADI
President
Tri State Commercial Realty
Investment Sales Professional
DR. LAWRENCE
BROWN
CEO
START Treatment & Recovery
RALPH
BUMBACA
TD Bank
The Real Word
STEPHEN
CHIAINO
Partner
Abrams, Fensterman, Fensterman,
Eisman, Formato, Ferrara, Wolf
& Carone, LLP.
TONY DANIELS
Cycle Architecture + Planning
KHARI
EDWARDS
One Brooklyn Health System
BEN ESNER
NYU Tandon School of Engineering
JOSEPH
GILLETTE
Ginsburg & Misk
DREW
GOLDSMITH
Vice President, Acquisitions
& Asset Management
Olnick Organization
THEODORE
G. TASOULAS
Principal
The A. Fantis School
RICKARD
JEAN-NOEL
The Real Word
DR. JOHN
KEHOE
Surgical Oncologist
John Kehoe MD
RANDY PEERS
President & CEO
Brooklyn Chamber of Commerce
SHEA
RUBENSTEIN
Founder
Jewish Community Council
of Marine Park
DEVIN SHOMAKER
Founder and Managing Partner
Rooftop Reds
JOHN WRIGHT
Principal
The Wright Group
LENUE (LENNY)
SINGLETARY
VP/Director of Government
Affairs
Brooklyn Hospital & Chair
of Community Board 2
ANTHONY &
SAL VIGILANTE
Co-Owners
Vigilante Plumbing
EDWARD L. LAI
AVP Business Development
Bensonhurst Center for
Rehabilitation and Healthcare
MANUEL
MANSYLLA
Principal
Totem
REV. KEVIN
MCCALL
Founding President
The Crisis Action Center
DR. MATHEW
O. JONES
BKLYNCardio
JOSHUA RABI
Founder
Serve. Us
ERWIN PAPILLON
CEO
Papillon Marketing Group
EDWARD W
SCHLOEMAN
Chairman/Founder
Operation Warrior Shield
zalez at a Manhattan press
conference on July 8 for putting
gunmen back on the street
— pointing to the prosecutor’s
youth diversion program
where young offenders who
plead guilty to weapons possession
charges can partake
in an 18- to 24-month educational
program in place
of incarceration. The district
attorney’s office fired
back, claiming the program
helped reduce the root causes
of crime.
Pedal power: Mayor Bill
de Blasio announced an aggressive
expansion of the
city’s bike lane network on
July 25. The $58.4 Million
plan requires the city install 80
miles of protected bike lanes
per year, with several priority
zones falling in Brooklyn, including
Bay Ridge, Borough
Park, Midwood, Sheepshead
Bay, Coney Island, East Flatbush,
and Bedford-Stuyvesant.
The announcement came
amid a bloody year for cyclists,
who suffered 29 fatalities
citywide, and 18 in
Brooklyn.
AUGUST
Slip up! A Williamsburg
basketball court became dangerously
slippery after a Looney
Tunes-inspired paint job
made it unsafe to play on Aug.
23. To address locals’ concerns,
the city’s Parks Department
days later added a layer
of clear paint mixed with silica
sand after local ballers complained
that the paint job created
a slipping hazard. The
city also widened the court,
repainted its lines to better
suit the court, and replaced
its backboards from distracting
cartoon-covered surfaces
to clear boards.
Not O-KKK! Borough
President Eric Adams put
his foot in it when he compared
a critic on social media
to the Ku Klux Klan. Twitter
user CorruptBrooklyn had
slammed the beep and local
Councilman Stephen Levin
for their weak stance on the
rampant placard parking
abuse in Downtown Brooklyn
on Aug. 27. Adams shot
back, likening his detractor to
people who “hid themselves
with white hoods,” and the
internet reacted swiftly to
condemn the Beep’s bone
headed move.
Bridging the gap: The
Kosciuszko Bridge’s decadesin
the-works second span
opened on Aug. 29. The cablestayed
bridge for the Brooklyn
bound side of the Brooklyn
Queens Expressway was
ready for a fresh stream of
traffic, more than two years
after the grand opening of its
Queens-bound side. The $873
million state project also included
a pedestrian and bike
path, and replaced the original
1939 built span, which was
dismantled after the first section’s
completion in 2017.
Pond rescue: The NYPD
brought out the big guns to rescue
an allegedly “emotionally
disturbed” man from Prospect
Park’s shallow lake. Scuba
cops rappelled into the water
from a helicopter to reach
the lone swimmer, who was
cast away in the manmade
lake that reaches a maximum
depth of about 7 feet.
Assembly corruption: A
staffer for Assemblyman Felix
Ortiz was arrested for allegedly
embezzling funds from
the Sunset Park pols campaign
in August, before a jury found
him guilty in September. The
staffer, Maruf Alam, served
Ortiz’s office in several different
roles, including chief
of staff. According to a federal
complaint, Alam filed
false disclosure forms with
the New York State Board
of Elections, and cut several
checks for himself while
serving as the campaigns
treasurer.
SEPTEMBER
Child Victims Act:
Eighty-seven victims of childhood
sex abuse filed suits in
Brooklyn Supreme Court in
the first month since state law-
makers open up a yearlong
lookback window — known
as the Child Victims Act. The
law enacted on Aug. 14 gives
child sex abuse victims a renewed
chance to seek justice
against their abusers regardless
of statute of limitations.
In September, 10 victims filed
separate lawsuits against the
Catholic Church’s Brooklyn
Diocese and multiple Brooklyn
based clergyman, claiming
they were abused between
1950 and 1980.
Fast as F: The Metropolitan
Transportation Authority
debuted a controversial express
version the F-train on
Sept. 16. The agency scheduled
two Manhattan-bound
and two Coney Island-bound
express trains in the mornings
and evenings, respectively,
skipping six stations
between Jay Street-Metro-
Tech and Church Avenue.
The move divided the borough
along north-south lines,
with southern residents happy
to have a quicker commute
to the distant Isle and their
northern counterparts angry
because the speedier shuttles
skip many stops in brownstone
neighborhoods that
are already at capacity during
rush hours.
Dog poop: The Gowanus
Canal showed higher levels
of microscopic poop following
three storms last spring,
which one local water tester
attributed to dog poop flushing
into the putrid waterway
via a new drainage system designed
to keep sewage from
further polluting Brooklyn’s
Nautical Purgatory. Reporter
Kevin Duggan and Eymund
Diegel — a member of the
Gowanus Canal Community
Advisory Group, which
watches over the waterway’s
federal cleanup — took their
lives into their own hands during
a weekly morning sampling
session of the water on
Sept. 26.
OCTOBER
Judged: Kings County
Supreme Court Judge Sylvia
Ash was arrested on Oct. 11
for alleged obstruction of justice
related to an investigation
into multibillion-dollar financial
services company Municipal
Credit Union. Authorities
said the credit union leadership
stole millions of dollars
from the company, and Ash
— who served as its Chair
of the Board — attempted to
help them evade authorities
by destroying her cell phone
and providing false testimony
to investigators.
Gambling den shoot
out: Four people were fatally
shot and three others
were injured in a mass shooting
at an underground casino
in Crown Heights on
Oct. 12. Police responded
to a call about the shooting
at Utica Avenue between
Dean and Michael Griffith
streets at just before 7 am,
where they found four deceased
victims. The incident
sparked an outcry from the
local community who held a
vigil on the following Monday,
where several politicians
— like Borough President
Eric Adams — claimed the
incident showed how the
county was “dismissive of
mass shootings in communities
of color.”
Industry City rezoning:
Executives kicked off a controversial
plan to rezone of Industry
City in October, setting
up a prolonged fight with various
community stakeholders
over the fate of massive industrial
complex — particularly
Councilman Carlos
Menchaca, who vowed to kill
the proposal if Industry City
bigwigs failed to meet a number
of his demands. Among
other things, Menchaca
wanted the additional 1.45
million square feet of space
that would result from the 12-
year, $1 billion redevelopment
to include space for a public
school, and remove hotels
and some retail space. Industry
city reps quickly agreed,
but then later submitted his
application on Oct. 28 without
including Menchaca’s requests
— which is currently
under review from various
city agencies.
NOVEMBER
Back on air: Listenerfunded
radio station WBAI
resumed broadcast on Nov.
7 after a month-long closure.
The Boerum Hill station came
back on the air after a state
judge ordered its parent company
— California-based nonprofit
Pacifica Foundation —
to lay off its attempts to silence
the channel. Pacifica executive
John Vernile ordered the
station closed on Oct. 7, claiming
the non-for-profit could
no longer support WBAI and
its multimillion-dollar debt,
which led to protest from hosts
and listeners.
Seeing red: The Prospect
Park Zoo’s cutest new residents
made their public debut
in November, when the newest
batch of red panda cubs
strutted their stuff in the public
eye for the first time. The
rouge tinted raccoons were
born over the summer and
cared for by their mother in
their indoor den until they
were ready to explore their
enclosure, and they did not
disappoint.
DECEMBER
Williamsburg beachfront:
Developers unveiled
plans on Dec. 12 for two massive
skyscrapers along with
new beaches and parkland
planned for the Williamsburg
waterfront. Two Trees
Management want to erect the
650- and 600-foot towers at
a former industrial fuel-oilstorage
once owned by Con
Edison which the firm had
purchased the day prior. The
development will house a
YMCA featuring a pool on
its first floor. Of it’s 1,000 residential
units, 250 will be reserved
for apartment-seekers
making between 40-60 percent
of the city’s area median
income.
New Years Destitution:
Residents of a Bedford
Stuyvesant homeless
shelter were forced to pack
their bags and move to other
shelters in the city’s system,
after the shelter was “flipped”
to accommodate homeless
men with mental health issues.
Shelter residents say it’s
just another chapter in the Department
of Homeless Services
web of cruel bureaucracy,
while neighbors and
elected officials claim the
change was dropped on their
head with no warning, giving
them little time to prepare for
a new element in the neighborhood
and say goodbye to the
women of the shelter.
(Clockwise from above)
Reporter Kevin Duggan
helped gather
samples of Gowanus
water where dog poop
pollutes the putrid waterway
in September.
Red pandas arrived at
Propsect Park Zoo in
November. NYPD divers
rescued the emotionally
disturbed man
from Prospect Park Lake
in August. Activists are
petitioning to keep
open a Bed-Stuy homeles
shelter for women in
December.
Photo by Caroline Ourso Photo by Trey Pentecost
Photo by Paul Martinka Photo by Ben Verde
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