4 times • JUNE 25, 2015 FOR BREAKING NEWS VISIT www.timesnewsweekly.com Housing, education highlight Ridgewood forum BY KELLY MARIE MANCUSO [email protected] @KellyMMancuso Tenants’ rights, education and park space dominated the third “Ridgewood: Your Voice, Your Issues” open forum Monday night at Ridgewood Presbyterian Church. The discussion was hosted by the Ridgewood Tenants and Neighborhood Association (RTNA) and moderated by RTNA co-founder Glenn Dyer. Much like the second forum back in April, attendees broke up into four groups focused on education, parks and green space, housing and Ridgewood’s social climate. Angela Mirabile of the Greater Ridgewood Restoration Corporation (GRRC) chaired the housing panel. Tenants’ rights, illegal conversions and rent stabilization dominated their discussion. Mirabile explained that the GRRC is waging a two-pronged effort to help stem the tide of rising rents and tenant flight. First, Mirabile provides information and legal advice to tenants who are being harassed out of their apartments by unscrupulous landlords. Second, her group has partnered with the Department of Buildings to fight against illegally subdivided apartments and dwellings such as basements and attics. Mirabile urged tenants to document all interactions and harassment in a journal and to report violations or harassment to 311. She also asked tenants to report suspicious construction or illegal conversions to the GRRC. RTNA co-founder Matt Peterson chaired the group on parks and the local environment. The need for green space in Ridgewood was the topic of conversation. The replacement of grass with Astroturf in Mafera Park was one concern mentioned. Community Board 5 (CB5) member John Maier suggested working to create green space on derelict plots of land, such as the triangle of unused land near Stop and Shop on Myrtle Avenue and Cypress Hills Street just over the neighborhood’s border in Glendale. The group also circulated a petition seeking funds from Councilwoman Elizabeth Crowley to help repair and restore Rosemary’s Playground. Lydia Martinez, parent coordinator at Grover Cleveland High School, chaired the education group, which examined school class size, overcrowding, zoning issues and enrollment. For Martinez, the absence of parents’ participation was a big concern. She cited a workshop hosted by her school in which only two parents attended as a prime example of this problem. “We lack parental involvement,” she said. “They need to know what their kids are learning. They need to come up to school.” CB 5 member Henry Cross proposed the creation of monthly parental support groups in which both parents and teens could get together to deal with both school and personal issues. Cross is currently working to help implement a similar support group in District 14. “There is money that goes to the students, but we forget that the direct providers, whether it’s teachers or parents, need support systems as well,” he explained. Finally, Queens College professor Stephanie Wakefield chaired the group discussion of Ridgewood’s social environment. The group brainstormed ways to foster stronger ties within the neighborhood while bridging the gap between new and existing residents. Ideas included neighborhood cookouts, tenant coops and creation of community spaces, such as the garden at Woodbine (1882 Woodbine St.). RIDGEWOOD TIMES/Photo by Kelly Marie Mancuso Ridgewood residents focused on issues such as housing, education and parkland during Monday’s Ridgewood Tenants and Neighbors Association open forum. In Middle Village, calls for rail waste CURES BY ANTHONY GIUDICE [email protected] @A_GiudiceReport They’re not giving up the fight. The leader of a coalition aimed at changing the way waste is shipped by rail through Glendale and Middle Village urged residents at the June 18 Juniper Park Civic Association meeting in Middle Village to join them in their cause. Mary Parisen, chair of Civics United for Railroad and Environmental Solutions (CURES), informed those in attendance at Our Lady of Hope School of the group’s efforts to convince state lawmakers to ensure that any train cars carrying waste through local rail lines are capped to prevent residents from being exposed to dust and foul odors. “We have now been working very hard on this issue, asking our electeds to push back hard, and on June 17 we got a new answer,” Parisen said. “And the answer is, I don’t think we need to convince the state anymore that it has to be done. They have come and said, ‘We are going to entertain some type of closure for these rail cars.’” Parisen explained that One World Recycling, a partner company in Tunnel Hill Partners whose rail cars travel through the Fresh Pond Rail Yard in Glendale and Middle Village, plans to ship bales of household waste in container cars topped with construction and demolition (C&D) debris. This combination of trash would then be considered municipal solid waste (MSW) and would be covered with a lid. “If it’s just construction and demolition debris, which is what we see, there’s not going to be any sort of a seal,” Parisen said. The community has until July 10 to comment on the One World Recycling permit while it is still in the draft stage. Another partner in Tunnel Hill Partners, Coastal Distribution, wants to try three different options of covering their waste. They have a permit in the draft stage, which states that the options include using a synthetic tarp cover, a mineral spray or a flexible lid, according to Parisen. “What they want to do is give them the permit, and then test this out, test each one of these options out and have our communities be the guinea pigs,” Parisen explained. “What CURES has been advocating from the very beginning is the total sealing of all rail cars containing any sort of waste. So this is totally unacceptable. We are not guinea pigs. None of this is going to seal odors, or dust, or prohibit vectors.” Parisen urged the community to call and write letters to Joseph Martens, commissioner of New York State Department of Environmental Conservation (NYSDEC), informing him that they will not accept anything less than hard lid coverage on all types of waste traveling in rail cars. RIDGEWOOD TIMES/Photo by Anthony Giudice Mary Parisen, chair of CURES, updating the community on the fight to containerize all waste-by-rail at the Juniper Park Civic Association meeting. TIMES NEWSWEEKLY (USPS 465-940) is published weekly by Schneps NY Media LLC, 38-15 Bell Blvd., Bayside, NY 11361. Periodicals postage paid at Flushing, NY. POSTMASTER: Send address changes to: Times Newsweekly/Ridgewood Times, P.O. Box 863299, Ridgewood, N.Y. 11386-0299.
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