3
BROOKLYN WEEKLY, MARCH 15, 2020
CAN I GET AN A-MEND: One participant at the March 5 event, shown holding a copy of the Constitution, discusses a possible
28th Amendment. Photo by Gregg Richards
BY KEVIN DUGGAN
We the People of Brooklyn, in
Order to form a more perfect
Union, are going to make some
changes!
A series of town-hall meetings
across the borough, organized
by the Brooklyn Public
Library, is crowdsourcing ideas
for the next update to the country’s
founding document. The
dozen-or-so “28th Amendment
Town Hall” sessions will capture
the needs of modern Americans
in a way, according to the
series organizer.
“Constitutions are almost poetic
documents because you try
to describe the life of the community
and the society,” said
Jacob Orsos, the library’s Vice
President of arts and culture.
The Constitution was last
amended 1992, when the 27th
Amendment regulated wage
changes for members of Congress,
and Orsos hopes the forums
will suggest ways to adapt
the text to refl ect the technological
and societal changes of the
last 28 years.
At the fi rst session, at Bedford
Stuyvesant’s Macon library
branch on March 5, dozens
of people made a wide range
of proposals for the 28th Amendment,
including allowing formerly
incarcerated people to
vote, help people struggling
with housing, and providing
universal health care.
Others advocated getting rid
of the 231-year-old document entirely
and starting from a clean
slate, said Orsos.
The talks, taking place at
branches of the book lending
agency, high schools, correctional
facilities, and possibly
senior centers, will each feature
one or two moderators who
guide the discussions, while library
staffers record the suggestions
from the audience.
By the end of the series, a
half-dozen “Framers” will create
a draft proposal for a new
Amendment for the U.S. Constitution
based on those meetings,
and a fi nal, refi ned amendment
should be ready by mid-October,
a few weeks ahead of the November
presidential election.
Orsos, a Hungarian native,
thought up the project when
he became a US citizen, and he
worked with the library and the
American Civil Liberties Union
to create the fi ve-month series.
During his naturalization
process, he learned about the
Constitution and how it has
changed over the centuries.
“The nature of these efforts
is ever-changing, but always
looks back at its original form,”
he said. “It’s a moving effort
of mankind to try to describe
mankind.”
“28th Amendment Town
Hall” every two weeks at various
locations. Visit www.bklynlibrary.
org for more information.
BY KEVIN DUGGAN
The city has fi nally kicked
off a years-in-the-works project
to make the Brooklyn War Memorial
at Cadman Plaza Park
wheelchair accessible, according
to offi cials.
The city’s Parks Department
began work on the nearly
$4 million renovation in January
after years of rescheduling
the start of construction. The
project consists of installing
an elevator and a ramp at the
Downtown Brooklyn memorial,
which honors Brooklynites who
fought during World War II.
One veteran said it’s about
time.
“After all these years they’re
fi nally doing something now,”
said Marine Park resident Jack
Vanasco, 92, who served as an
army corporal form 1939 to
1947.
Contractors with the city set
up a fence around the shrine’s
western section some time at
the beginning of the year, where
they plan to build a ramp. Workers
will also install an elevator
from the ground fl oor restroom
to the fi rst fl oor auditorium,
where a wall bares the names
of 11,500 Brooklyn boys who
fought and died during the confl
ict.
The project is scheduled to
wrap in January 2021, according
to the agency’s capital project
tracker, though its launch
follows years of delays since it
was fi rst announced in 2017.
One local park steward who
lobbied for the upgrade is relieved
that the city’s slow-moving
bureaucracy is fi nally moving
forward.
“We’re incredibly encouraged
by this,” said Cadman
Plaza Park Conservancy President
Toba Potosky. “For too
long the city neglected the memorial.”
Potosky, who lives right
across the street from the park,
noted that he’s seen the fence,
but has yet to witness workers
break ground on the site.
The overhaul was originally
supposed to start in 2018, but
was stalled for a year due to an
accounting error, parks honchos
claimed.
The agency then pushed
the start date back for several
months to November because of
trouble with the elevator manufacturer,
and yet again missed
that deadline because they had
to do some last-minute asbestos
remediation, according to
spokeswoman Anessa Hodgson.
The city built the granite
and limestone memorial in
1951 under the auspices of then-
Parks Commissioner and master
builder Robert Moses, who
planned to erect a similar monument
in each of the fi ve boroughs.
However, only the Kings
County memorial ever materialized.
The interior hall was open for
special events and by appointment
until the early 1990s, when
the city shuttered it due to lack
of accessibility features and after
the passing of the 1990 Americans
with Disabilities Act.
Vanasco, a Fort Greene native,
said he hopes to see the
tribute back open in his lifetime
so he can honor his fallen
brethren.
“We have at least 25 to 30 people
that are friends of ours from
the neighborhood that are on
that wall,” he said. “Most people
don’t even know about it.”
The city started work to bring the Brooklyn memorial up to code in January.
Photo by Amalia Arms
KINGS’ COUNTRY
Bklyn library launches town hall series to amend US Constitution
Progress on stalled
upgrades at BKLYN
War Memorial
/www.bklyn-library.org
/www.bklyn-library.org
/www.bklyn-library.org