Standing Rock:

From Wendy: 

With all that’s at stake right now, and to honor the courage of the Native people protecting the waters,

Let’s meet in front of the National American Indian Museum at 10:30am on Thanksgiving (it opens at 10am, 1 Bowling Green)

We’ll walk over to the Labyrinth of Peace which is inside Battery Park, in the green section just north of the round Clinton Castle. Give Thanks. 

We can go on our way by 1130 or return to see the Museum’s exhibitions. Let’s contribute, call and reach out, as described here, too. 

Villager: “‘Father of LEED’ hopes to help spark LES Park building’s return to use“

We sang “The Star Spangled Banner”

As one dad said to his son: “We may not see your friends here – but everyone here is your friend”

What better antidote to the questions parents have been asked this week?

A few thousand came to be reminded of the power of ‘us’.

It is, after all, our country too. We are going to claim it in ways we may never have imagined.

Hawk sitings in SDR Park, Gardens’ last bursts of color, fall trees, sky & friends.

Rivington House: windows left open cause for concern and graffitied statement.

From State Senator Squadron:

Dear Friend,

Please join me tomorrow at Adam Yauch Park in Brooklyn Heights to stand against hate in our backyard, our city, and our country.

MEDIA ADVISORY

SQUADRON,  BEASTIE BOY “AD-ROCK,” VELÁZQUEZ, JAMES, LANDER, LEVIN, ELECTEDS, COMM LEADERS STAND UP AGAINST HATE MESSAGES IN ADAM YAUCH PARK

Squadron, Community Come Together to Denounce Hate and Intimidation in Brooklyn and Across the Country

NEW YORK – TOMORROW (SUNDAY), State Senator Daniel Squadron, Beastie Boys member Adam “Ad-Rock” Horovitz, Congresswoman Nydia Velázquez, Public Advocate James, City Councilmembers Stephen Levin & Brad Lander, elected officials, community and faith leaders will come together to stand against a hate incident at Adam Yauch Park in Brooklyn Heights. On Friday, Squadron’s office received a call regarding multiple swastikas and the message “Go Trump” appearing in Adam Yauch Park in Brooklyn Heights (picture below). 

The constituent and Squadron’s office connected with the NYPD and Park Department, who removed the hate messages and are in the process of investigating the incident.

WHO: State Senator Daniel Squadron, Beastie Boys member Adam “Ad-Rock” Horovitz, Congresswoman Velázquez, Public Advocate James, Councilmembers Lander & Levin, elected officials, community and faith leaders

WHAT: Stand up against hate in Brooklyn, NYC, and our country

WHEN: TOMORROW, Sunday (11/20), 11:30am

WHERE: Adam Yauch Park, State St (Btwn Columbia & Willow Place), Brooklyn 

Thanks to all who wrote in on behalf of Partnership for Parks! And Carol for also attending!

City Council Hearing: Partnerships for Parks                                                                            November 16, 2016

…The Sara Roosevelt Park Community Coalition came to add our voice to the chorus of volunteer park stewards on behalf of Partnerships for Parks’ suggested goal of an Outreach Coordinator for every Community Board.

We are a long –time Park’s advocacy group. We’ve been together since 1980 when the neighborhood organized to rid our park of drug dealers and pimps.

Since then we have created 5 community gardens, maintained a bird sanctuary, a turtle pond, and a chicken coop. We’ve held ladybug and firefly releases annually. We’ve advocated for funding and held community visionings for sports fields, playgrounds and several park houses. We’ve held countless festivals (to honor our diverse community), held film screenings run by teenagers and Coalition meetings to gather the neighborhood’s input on our park. And together we are fighting for the return of a beloved nursing home.

With Partnerships for Parks help, whether financial, logistical or material, we’ve always felt we had a partner who cared about how we were doing. And not just us, but the entire city has been offered a personal relationship to their park through the dedication of individual Outreach Coordinators. In our case, Kirsty Bambridge is all you’d ever want in an ally. She’s sharp, diplomatic, direct and a hard worker. She listens to and honors the local smarts of all her park stewards. And she has a sense of humor. Vital. But it’s harder to keep that sense of humor if you are fraying because you can’t provide the level of contact required to keep volunteers going.

I recently attended one of P4Pks mentoring programs. I met and formed a fast friendship with one of the smartest organizers I’ve ever met. And I was supposed to be the mentor. But in P4Pks settings it is always an exchange of information, we are always learning from everyone.

In these coming times more than ever, we need to invest in advocates who know that they are not only helping people to value their parks, but helping people fight for the kind of society that values them.

Let’s invest in our future as we build an electorate that is willing to make common cause with everyone in their neighborhood, who will respond to problems with solutions, and who will stand up for their neighbors and those in need of help because they will feel entitled to do so and will have already been practicing in their local park.

Thank you.

Thanks from Jane of M’Finda Kalunga Garden to her helpers on Halloween.

But before she ‘speaks’ thanks are in order for Jane too…for her remarkable skills of organizing, decorating, and caring for the people helping and those we were serving. She’s a Halloween artist of the first degree! Nicely done.

From Jane Barrer Co-Chair of M’Finda Kalunga Garden (the host).

“Well the Halloween party at MK Garden this year was a stunner – due to the wonderful folk who contributed time and energy and love to our community.  Thank you to all of you who worked so hard!

Firstly DEBRA  who ran and planned and organized and catered and picked up and put away and took care of all the volunteers – without you Debra the MK Garden parties would be flat, stale and unprofitable!

Thank you to BOB who decorated and welcomed and created his dopfelganger, Faux Bob the Scarecrow, so we will always have an attendant at the gate,  (Take a look if you haven’t seen him already there’s a scary resemblance.)

Thank you to the stalwart TED who created an awesome “Guess the creepy substance table” that even fooled a doctor with his “brains,” and who shopped and planned and cleaned up too.

Thank you to the effervescent JENIFER who took care of the little ones with creative collage projects and general hands-on garden joy.

Thank you to BUD who manfully manned the art table for hours, made bird feeders on the side, and gave expert advice to the face-painters.

Thank you to KERRY and small son JACK  for running the pumpkin beanbag toss event, to K for solving the sound issues with good old-fashioned improvisation and for massive amounts of clean-up before and after, to ELIZABETH and STEVE for clean-up and general smiling cheer, to JASMINE who brought many hands to make light.

Thank you to the lovely students who selflessly gave of their time and energy to help wherever they were asked to – from Dual Language HS, Emma Lazarus HS, Millennium HS and Research and Service HS.

We were lucky with the weather and we are lucky to have such lovely people volunteering their time, labor and goodwill.

Peace and love and see you in the springtime!

Jane”

Upcoming Partnerships for Parks City Council Hearing – 

 Thursday, November 17th 10:00 am 250 Broadway 14th Floor New York, NY 10007

We can go to the hearing to testify in person.

We can sign on to the online letter of support and add our own comments. The deadline to sign on to the letter is Thursday, November 17th by 5 pm.

We can also send testimony to our Councilmember Margaret Chin: chin@council.nyc.gov

We can also send it to Councilmember Mark Levine, the chair of the Parks Committee: District7@council.nyc.gov

NY City Council is holding its first oversight hearing solely dedicated to Partnerships for Parks. The hearing is being held by the City Council’s Parks Committee, chaired by Council Member Mark Levine. The Council has been supporting P4Pks programs through the Parks Equity Initiative, this is a great opportunity to demonstrate how, together, we are transforming our parks and neighborhoods. This is a public hearing, anyone who has ever benefited from Partnerships Programming is encouraged to attend.

Senator Daniel Squadron’s Community Town Hall  happened last night, Tuesday, November 15 @ DCTV Firehouse Building, 87 Lafayette Street, Manhattan. (btwn White and Walker Streets below Canal). It was packed.

The Senator answered questions, encouraged activism and calmed fears without pretense.

We went to remind our Senator that we are here, paying attention and to remind him of our ‘asks’. We went to support his efforts – to let them know we have his back. Our role is to help politicians govern better and smarter.

Daniel is a good bet. He’s principled and very very smart. That doesn’t mean we will always agree on everything.

Many of us will be going to ask for help on getting Parks to return Park buildings in SDR Park to public use and to think about the earth and environmental sustainability State-wide.

Many of us will go to encourage him to be even more active in fighting for Rivington Houses return. And to ask for his help creating a more inclusive and human approach to elder care, disabled care, caregivers and institutions such as nursing homes.

SDR Park.

Sen. Squadron has been a good supporter of the park and greenspaces in general. He organized and led a park’s equity group (SDR Coalition was a part of) to figure out ways to support parks that had no wealthy advocates.

In these coming times we will need publicly accessible community spaces to meet in and to anchor all of our efforts as stewards here. The Stanton Street Building could play that role.

We could provide an intelligent push on the environment. Senator Squadron understands climate change, but how should that translate in terms of his job as a Senator? What kind of legislation should he be looking to craft (that could pass the NY State Senate! or could send a message or educate his colleagues)? What are the points of common interests in the entire State of NY?

Rivington House

Senator Squadron immediately joined the voices to protest Rivington House debacle and supported the community wish to fight for the return of Rivington House.

Rivington House: Neighbors to Save Rivington House supported his Rivington House Bill S8208.

This bill would ensure that the community is warned of any potential nursing home closures. In addition to the community being warned (which this bill ensures), we agree that language should be added to make sure the residents and their families are also warned (at least a year’s notice). Follow up on the issue. How can we help?

At the City Council hearing on DCAS failures it was noted by CM Landers that nursing home residents have fewer (or no?) rights than even those in rent stabilized apartments. We mentioned this to Sen. Squadron who said he’d take it to Albany. It will be good to follow up.

Positions Sen. Squadron fought for: Below are his positions on parks, housing, and a bill off of what happened with Rivington House (RH):

An advocate for parks and open space, Squadron made a proposal that led to over $15 million for neighborhood parks through a voluntary agreement with the largest park conservancies, an agreement that was hailed by New York Times columnist Ginia Bellafante as one of the “surprises from 2015, and reasons for hope.” He has long worked towards a Harbor Park — a Central Park for the center of the city. He  helped secure the future of Brooklyn Bridge Park, Governors Island, and the Lower East Side’s Pier 42, and brought the Macy’s fireworks back to the East River.

A fighter for affordable housing, Squadron sponsored the law bringing over $1 billion in federal funds to NYC public housing, and worked to end the practice of charging public housing residents for policing. Squadron successfully led the charge to ensure families were not charged rent by city shelters. He has also pushed for better protections for rent stabilized tenants, including individual apartment improvement rent increase (IAI) reforms. In 2013, Squadron passed a law expanding eligibility for middle class families in Mitchell-Lama housing.

Senate Bill S8208

Relates to the approval of the closure of nursing homes and residential health care facilities by the commissioner of health.