14 The Courier sun • august 1, 2013 for breaking news visit www.couriersun.com PHOTOS COURTESY OF THE DEP Construction of wetlands and dredging in Springfield Lake is expected to bring flood relief to Springfield Gardens. Bill would ‘uncluster’ shelters BY MAGIE HAYES mhayes@queenscourier.com Queens shelters may soon be finding new homes. Councilmembers Ruben Wills and Leroy Comrie started work in 2011 on a bill that would disperse homeless shelters evenly throughout each borough. Wills said research revealed that Community Board (CB) 12 contains 10 of the 18 shelters in all of Queens. CB 12 includes Jamaica, Hollis, St. Albans, Springfield Gardens, Baisley Park, Rochdale Village and South Jamaica. “The DHS Department of Homeless Services is clustering all of these shelters,” Wills said. “All of these undesirable land uses are in certain community boards. We perceived that to be a huge problem.” Under the bill, Wills and Comrie proposed limiting the number of shelters in any community board to one-third of the borough’s total. “Homelessness is a problem we have to tackle together,” Comrie said. “The legislation will ensure that all communities in Queens are responsible for taking care of the families and individuals who are most in need.” Wills said placing shelters in one specific type of community, such as CB 12, is not in response to any increase in the homeless population. “It is not fair that southeast Queens has the majority of homeless shelters in the borough,” Comrie said. For the existing shelters, Wills suggested they make relocation plans so they and their residents are prepared to move when any site’s lease expires. He said it was important to put shelters in areas with convenient transportation. The council pair proposed an additional bill under which the DHS would determine whether any shelter resident is a sex offender. If so, the department would notify the local community board, councilmember and police precinct. The department would also conduct mental health and criminal background assessments on all adults entering shelters. If passed, the bill will go into effect on January 1, 2014. COMMUNITY LICKS LIQUOR STORE PLANS BY MAGIE HAYES mhayes@queenscourier.com The southeast Queens community has successfully shut down a proposal to put a liquor store mere steps from Springfield Gardens High School. The shop was set to move into a new building on North Conduit Avenue, right across the street from the high school. Councilmember Donovan Richards, State Senator James Sanders and the community rallied against the proposal and won the fight when the New York State Liquor Authority rejected the proposal in June. “I’ve seen what alcohol can do to a child’s life,” said resident Cookie Kojak. “We want to make sure this is it and the owners don’t try again.” According to state law, a liquor store cannot open within 200 feet of an educational facility. The liquor store itself, located inside the new shopping mall-style building, would have exceeded that distance. Regardless, the site’s close proximity to a high school left the community feeling uneasy. “The environment which the students occupy has to promote their development, not deter it,” Richards said. He added that establishing a liquor store in this area is an “abomination” and doesn’t depict “who we are as a community.” “Developing young minds and constructing them into leaders is very crucial,” Richards said. Once the neighborhood high school’s dismissal bell rings, hundreds of students flood Springfield Boulevard and North Conduit Avenue. Officials worried with such a great number of minors walking around, some of them could wander into the proposed liquor store. In another case, Richards said, a minor could have the opportunity to pay somebody of age to buy them liquor from the nearby site. Platinum Realty, owners of the building, let Gurmel Singh, the hopeful liquor store owner, sign a lease to set up shop. But since the liquor authority stepped in, their plans have been squashed. Community leaders and local officials hope to instead use the building for more educational purposes, such as a library or “some sort of tutoring center,” Richards said. Platinum Realty and Singh did not return requests for comment. THE COURIER/Photo by Maggie Hayes The southeast Queens community won the fight to keep a liquor store from opening across the street from Springfield Gardens High School. SEWER PROJECT SET TO BRING FLOOD RELIEF BY MAGIE HAYES mhayes@queenscourier.com Springfield Gardens may soon get relief from years of flooding problems. Depar t m e n t of Environmental Protection (DEP) Commissioner Carter Strickland announced the start of work to dredge Springfield Lake and double its depth. It will then become part of a new network of Bluebelt wetlands designed to receive stormwater through a new sewer system. Stormwater will collect in the sewer system from neighborhood streets, sidewalks and roofs; once it is distributed into the lake, it will be filtered before heading into Jamaica Bay. “This ensures we are better prepared for an uncertain future,” said Seth Pinksky, president of the city’s Economic Development Corporation (EDC). The project, managed by the EDC, is part of a $69 million project that will bring three miles of new water mains, storm sewers, roadways and sidewalks to Springfield Gardens. It is the fourth phase in a $175 million neighborhood upgrade, consisting of additional storm sewer lines, water mains, fire hydrants and more. Strickland said once completed, the project will “improve living conditions for local residents and promote economic growth while helping to protect the health of Jamaica Bay.” Installation of the water mains is already 95 percent complete and the work on the Bluebelt wetlands is ongoing. Installation of the sewers began in June. The project broke ground last fall and is expected to be completed by the fall of 2014.
SC08012013
To see the actual publication please follow the link above