Inner City Press' Bronx Reporter: 1.3 Million People, Redlining, EJ, Cultural Innovation,Invisible Money, Police Brutality, Housing Scandals

ICP has published a (double) book about a variety of Bronx-relevant topics -- a review in Commonweal magazine of Dec. 5, 2003, opines that "Predatory Bender... is as vivid an account of life in the Bronx as you are likely to read" -- click here for sample chapters, here for an interactive map, here for fast ordering and delivery, and here for other ordering information. See also, "City Lit: Roman a Klepto [Review of ‘Predatory Bender’]," by Matt Pacenza, City Limits, Sept.-Oct. 2004. CBS MarketWatch of April 23, 2004, says the the novel has "some very funny moments," and that the non-fiction mixes "global statistics and first-person accounts." The Washington Post of March 15, 2004, calls Predatory Bender: America in the Aughts "the first novel about predatory lending;" the London Times of April 15, 2004, "A Novel Approach," said it "has a cast of colorful characters." The Pittsburgh City Paper of Dec. 11, 2003, wrote that it "may, in fact, be the first great American lending malfeasance novel" including "low-level loan sharks, class-action lawyers, corporate bigwigs, hired muscle, corrupt politicians, Iraq War veterans, Wall Street analysts, reporters and one watchdog with a Web site." And all in The Bronx! Click here for that review; for more information, contact us.

When Mayor Mike Bloomberg rolled up to the park across First Avenue from the UN on June 23, he had climate change on his mind. But the Press questions quickly turned not only to the lack of safety in the UN's buildings and their fix-up, but also to the Bronx. Inner City Press asked for his response to the declining business of Bronx merchants near Yankee Stadium, despite the massive city subsidy to the facility. Bloomberg said that they might want to start selling other merchandise. Just another modality of gentrification?

Not only is the new Yankee Stadium too expensive for Bronxites (and others), not only have they failed to replace the park land they took away -- now the small promises of small business benefits are turning out to be false. Store owners around the stadium complain that they get fewer customers than last year. The Yankees try to lure them into their branded maw of Hard Rock Cafe and "official" merchandise. Few venture even a half block south of 161st Street. Who will be held accountable?

Despite the rainy weather, the sign that summer has arrived in Belmont, The Bronx is the St. Anthony Street Fair. In the drizzle on June 13, a band played while from plywood stands in front of Mount Carmel church frozen drinks were sold, zeppoles topped with powdered sugar, goldfish could be won. Who can know who will come each year to this "Feast"? On the corner of Hughes Avenue, the Albanian restaurant has closed, replaced by Mexican, the New York Empanada Factory. It looked empty and forlorn behind its "Grand Opening" plastic banner, but we predict that won't be for long. Unless they're too white bread. In the Bronx, you can forget the cross-over audience. Make your business on your people -- other than the Chinese, of course. If others come, it's a bonus.

In Washington, in the wake of the predatory lending meltdown, there is a Community Reinvestment Act modernization bill. And in the Bronx, there are thos who woder why Eliot Engel is not listed as a sponsor....

The "South Bronx" was all over the news last week, not only because of the Yankees, but in the flurry of coverage of the nomination to the Supreme Court of Sonia Sotomayor, described as growing up in "a housing project in the South Bronx." Some here, however, note that the Bronxdale Houses are not in the South Bronx as it is often defined, as Community Planning Districts 1-6, stopping on the Western shore of the Bronx River. The Bronxdale Houses are on the other side of the river. But that's an inconvenient fact, and therefore ignored...

The Cross-Bronx Expressway, despite the local damage it has caused it apparently here to stay. But the fight to demolish the Sheridan Expressway is gathering force, and appears in PBS' "Road to the Future" show along with bicycle issues. Inner City Press, passing through Copenhagen, Denmark, finds the comparison with the Bronx and New York City striking. In Copenhagen there are bikes everywhere, and people even leave them unlocked. There are bike lanes that are respected. In the Bronx, Inner City Press has been harassed by police for momentarily riding a bike on an otherwise empty sidewalk. In Denmark, it's bikes that have the right of way....

In the run-up to reviewing the Yankees' new monument to greed, Inner City Press last week ventured to Citi – or TARP – Field in Queens, for the Mets against the Braves. Best is that you can stand behind home plate, even if your ticket's in the upper deck. The hot dogs are pricey, but the onions and sauerkraut are hot. From above right field you can see Manhattan. Soon we will compare the Yankees.

For now in the Bronx, there's a new Mexican restaurant on 186^th Street by Hughes, in a former mechanics garage. Go, Puebla

This week again a restaurant review: the Belmont Cafe on 187th and Beaumont has dollar fifty burger (well, mini-burgers) and, a first for Belmont, bubble tea. It promises African style chicken, but twice as failed to have it. It has photographs of Fordham, including when the Third Avenue El was still standing. It's well worth it, for a dollar fifty...

This week, a poem on immigration, datelined not the Bronx but across the river(s) in Astoria Heights:

In front of the paint store
two blocks east of Steinway
two dozen Mexican men with backpacks
stand waiting for work

Some are old and some are beaten
still when they order tamales
at Casilda's taco stand
the girl calls them “campeon” --

Champion, is what it means, champion of immigration
who braved the freight trains from Oaxaca
the muggers and rapists of Juarez and Chihuahua
arriving here in Queens to stand again and wait

The city's hardly building
the yuppies all tapped out
and so the wait is longer
and the tacos more expensive

We need an explanation: the 4 train, usually local late at night, says it's going express. But in The Bronx, it jumps from 149 Grand Concourse to Burnside -- then all the way to Woodlawn. What happened to Fordham Road?

And a citywide MTA beef: using an unlimited MetroCard, you're prohibited from using it in less than 18 minutes.But if you rode one stop, you could easily need to use the card again within 18 minutes. What gives?

Spin war: "We're surprised and disappointed that Curtis Sliwa is attempting to sell tours that capitalize on the worst stereotypes about the Bronx," said Rafael Salaberrios, chairman of the Bronx Tourism Council. Salaberrios said tourists should instead be pointed to attractions such as the Bronx Zoo, New York Botanical Garden and Yankee Stadium, as well as the borough's lesser-known museums, galleries and restaurants.

The Bronx Zoo closed down its tram service. Yankee Stadium is wildly overpriced and stole parkland -- but Yankee fans about to see them lose by twenty runs on April 18 poured mucho dinero into dining on Arthur Avenue before and after the game. Trattoria Zero Otto Nove, the Roberto's spin-off in what used to be McDonald's is, upon review, amazing, with a faux Italian street scene in the back complete with fake windows and brick arches with intentionally peeling stucco. Fusilli, rabbit and carafes of wine: what could be better? But very few local people go.

Let's compare, this week, the Bronx and Bushwick, Brooklyn. A recent visit to the latter found the previously burned-down Broadway still rough and tumble, from Fat Albert's on Flushing to cuchifritos further out on Myrtle. But two blocks north of Broadway are knitware factories turned into lofts. On Broadway itself, a white hipster with dreadlocks was ridiculed by local teens.

Back in the Bronx, other than in Mott Haven, no such influx has taken place. Is it the distance from Manhattan, or the reputation for higher crime? Do Bushwick's long-time residents benefit from the lofts, or only see their rents raised? We will continue to compare.

Facing off in debate for Bronx Borough Presidency at 1200 Waters Place on April 8 at 7 pm are Assemblyman Ruben Diaz Jr. and Anthony Ribustello...

March 30, 2009 -- annals of environmental justice: the president of the Sierra Club wrote in the New York Times, March 26, that "We offer at-risk young people in the Bronx their first wilderness experience." No, we have some wilderness right here in The Bronx...

We take note this week of the re-start of Columbia Journalism School's Bronx Beat publication. Before even getting to a substantive critique -- we'll get there, rest assured -- something seems to be wrong. From their website, clicking on an article seemingly about foreclosures leads to a page of ads hosted by Go Daddy and, as an aside, the hard copies mailed to Inner City Press now used the wrong PO Box - it's 580188. What's happened, over the winter? Our overall critique is that there's not enough follow up from year to year. But this is too much.

Some neighbor -- the Botanical Garden, which previously sued saying that a radio town across Southern Boulevant from it was an eyesore, now owns an eyesore of its own, a vacant lot on Webster and Bedford Park Avenues on which it said it would build a parking lot. But now the funding's in doubt, and the lot is sitting there. The Garden asks for understanding. But did the Garden show it?

Lies, damn lies and statistics: from the suburbs to the North, "Frederick Arnold, a resident of the Town of Mamaroneck since 1995, is a “numbers guy” and the newly elected president of the board of RAINN (Rape Abuse & Incest National Network), the nation’s largest organization working to prevent sexual assault and help victims of this crime. 'the incidence of crime is as high in Larchmont, per capita as it is in the South Bronx,'" he said. Some "numbers guy"...

Oh really? It's reported that "there were cheers in the South Bronx, where there is hardly an Indian-American to be seen, when Slumdog Millionaire won the best-picture Oscar." Funny, we didn't hear them...

Months ago we wrote on a practice of Metro North Railroad, in which trains from Connecticut stop at the Fordham Road station in the Bronx but announce that while passengers can get off, no one can get on. This is true even for customers who have paid Metro North for a monthly pass between Fordham Road and 125th Street or Grand Central. Inner City Press got on, and was told by a conductor to "go argue with the MTA big shots" about the policy's absurdity. And so we did.

At a public meeting of the MTA in its headquarters on Madison Avenue in March 2008, Inner City Press informed the board of directors of the policy, and of its impact on Bronx residents. Some members laughed, others expressed surprise. Then-chief Peter Cannito explained the practice in financial terms: the State of Connecticut pays 60% of the cost of the red New Haven line trains. Apparently, even within the MTA, they had and have found no way to transfer money from the New York State Harlem line, which also stops at the Fordham Station, and the Connecticut New Haven Line.

With even some of his board members shaking their heads at this inefficiency, Cannito told Inner City Press things were not as bad as its testimony described. You can get on the train, he said, and just pay the extra fare between Fordham and the previous stop on the New Haven line, Mount Vernon East. Inner City Press bought a ticket for just this purpose.

On February 20, with the 9:16 Harlem line train running late, a red New Haven line train pulled into Fordham Station. Inner City Press got on. The conductor announced over the public address system, "This train takes no passengers." Those in the bar car in which Inner City Press had sat down rolled their eyes. Inner City Press started walking toward the front car with the conductor in it, but the train pulled out of the station. Inner City Press returned to the bar car.

The conductor came through the train and said, "I told you to get off." Inner City Press explained what the head of the MTA said at the public meeting. "Do you got that in writing?" the conductor demanded. No, the head of the company said it. "What was his name?" The last Metro North chief, the Italian guy.

"I'm the conductor. I'm supposed to enforce the rules. If I don't they crack down on me. I was out on the street for twenty days, supposedly assaulting a customer. They give us these hand held computers that freeze up all the time, then write us up if we don't collect fares with them, even when they're not working." He paused, looking like he might throw the hand-held computer, somehow reminiscent of the model in the NYC Parking Violations Bureau scandal, also with Bronx connections, years ago. "You tell me the big shots said you could do this. Do you have a letter that says that?"

It seemed fair to assume that what the head of Metro North said was the policy was in fact the policy.

"Oh, Cannito. His son in law made this software for this stupid computer that freezes up all the time. Great. Cannito told you." The conductor stormed out of the car. Welcome to Metro North.

Footnote: while a half dozen people in the car spoke against the Metro North practice, after the conductor left, one working man pointed out, you put him in a tough spot, you should have gotten off the train and put in for a refund, or get a letter from Metro North. Suggestions and reactions welcome.

At Inner City Press, we usually review restaurant on the affordable or even sidewalk side. But we're compelled to note Zero Otto Nove, a so-called trattoria on Arthur Avenue where the ill-fated McDonald's used to be. For some months, seeing a near-empty bar in the front behind a light blue clown car on the street outside, one assumed the restaurant was having trouble. Dead wrong. Inside, down a long corridor, is what resembles a side street in an Italian village, complete with fake windows and perspectives, a staircase up to a second floor, all under a skylight. At night candle come out, adding to the flicker from the wood pizza oven. There's light-fried zucchini, pasta with chick peas and bread crumbs, rabbit stew and more. Beware of what they call a carafe of wine: it's really a pitcher, costs $25 and leaves one staggering out afterwards. The lemon sherbet is tart, the coffee strong, Roberto's restaurant a success. The main thing lacking was Bronxites, something we hereby try to address.

2-1, 12:30 a.m. – 2407 Beaumont Ave. Police were alerted that a man had been shot numerous times. The unidentified victim was admitted to St. Barnabas Hospital in stable condition. Local sleuths will conduct the inquiry.
2-1, 1:35 p.m. – 922 East Tremont Ave. A search was conducted for a middle aged Hispanic male. Victims believe that the male Latino is in his 50’s who robbed a store at gunpoint. An unknown amount of money was taken, but no injuries were reported.

As the Bronx Zoo opens a Madagascar-themed exhibit, in the real Madagascar, security forces fired into crowds of protesters, killing 25... And the Skyfari has been discontinued forever.

New York Magazine reviews city restaurants in Manhattan, Brooklyn and Queens -- only.

"You nak buat kondo di slum area?" (You want to build condominiums in a slum area?). Raised eyebrows accompanied those words when real-estate developer Datuk Abdul Rahim Mohd Ibrahim told a friend of his plans to build a block of condominiums in Kampung Baru, a Malay settlement located at the heart of the city... Abdul Rahim's friends had labeled Kampung Baru in the same mould as Bronx, a slum area in the north of New York populated mostly by the colored communities and they were skeptical whether there would be buyers for the condominiums. Today, they have to eat their words as the condominium units are selling like hot cakes. The public knows that Kampung Baru is not a squatter settlement as the area was carved out as a Malay settlement in 1899 and known as the Malay Agriculture Settlement."

As we reported last spring, Key Food, in the mall at Bruckner Blvd. and White Plains Road, announced that landlord Vornado Realty was increasing its rent. DN: "The rent increase was scheduled to take effect in December, when the lease expired. But Vornado has not begun any eviction action, which Purcell and others speculate is because of the souring rental market." Yep...

In the wake of the US Air flight from LaGuardia to Charlotte driving into the Hudson River by a flock of geese, the Bronx connection slowly becomes clear. The day of the crash, a girl from Belmont in The Bronx called in to say she'd seen the plane's engines explode. It seemed incongruous, since the plane landed off the shore of midtown Manhattan. But later it emerged that as the plane curved over The Bronx, reported over the Zoo, it hit a flock of geese and began falling. There's been talk of hunting down geese in the area to avoid a repetition.

On Saturday, January 24 on Fordham University's grass circle a flock of geese lazed around on the snow, with nary a hunter in sight....

JPMorgan Chase will be closing a slew of Washington Mutual branches, click here for Inner City Press' January 23 article...

The new pizzeria on lower Arthur Avenue, with the garlic knots and free Internet, has already failed. In its place is a sign to look out for Frankie's Frank, the "Italian" hot dog. Will it fare any better?

Meanwhile in the same nabe, a recent arrival asked in the Mount Carmel post office on January 17 how to get his mail. Go to Tremont, he was told. Where's that? And the person working at the window, and the supervisor on duty, said they didn't know. Welcome to The Bronx...

As the Bloomberg Administration tries to gentrify the South Bronx, a recent visit to Bushwick in Brooklyn found both the brutality and banality of what has happened in the often similar place. Take the L train seven stop in, to Jefferson and Wyckoff. Competing the restaurants like Las Palmas on the corner of Starr are chic cafes like the North East Kingdom -- apparently named after the top part of Vermont -- and a music venue known as the Bushwick Starr, in the second floor of a former factory building at 207 Starr Street. Inside on a black-painted stage four youth men are thrashing; the band is called Drew and the Medicinal Pen. In front an entirely white crowd of young twenty-somethings jump up and down. Generally, their rents are paid by parents. Perhaps some of them will be artists, many however will not. But the impact on rent levels, on the economist ecosystem of Bushwick, will stay long after they leave. To Bloomberg, this may be progress. To locals it is harmful, it is unfair, it is reason against a third term.

This week Mayor Bloomberg said that if someone attacked you or your family, he'd want the NYPD to respond with everything they had. While in the South Bronx, NYPD officers beat up the Serrano family on Brook Avenue, Bloomberg flew to the Middle East in a "show of solidarity." Click here for Inner City Press' January 3 coverage of that region.

Click here for Inner City Press' review-of-2008 UN Top Ten debate

WED, DEC. 10th, 9:00 a.m. – 1003 Woodycrest Ave. In the Highbridge section, local police arrested a city worker. A sanitation worker was taken into custody after a civilian informed officers that the city worker struck the victim with a stick after they had a verbal dispute.

TUES, DEC. 16th, 11:00 a.m. – Tiebout Ave. and East 183 St. Another city worker was taken into custody by patrol officers. This time a city Sanitation employee was arrested and charged with driving while intoxicated.

We've done it before, and we'll do it again -- the Ecuadorian restaurant on Hughes Ave and 186th Street stands alone, both for refusing to have a menu, and for ultimately serving up cooking that makes up for it. Most recently the dish of the day was bistek with papers, yellow rice with a friend egg on top, and French fries. The quesadillas were spicy, with chicken. The "sopa de bolas" was, in fact, dominated by a ball made of green plantains, peas and boiled egg, sort of like a stew made of pastelles. Outside, they sold steaming tamales on the icy sidewalk.

Of Bronx and NYC housing officials slated to move on to DC, we'll have more over the holiday. Happy holidays! Viva Ecuador!

St. Barnabas Hospital is bragging that even in the face of the financial meltdown, it still plans to spend $30 million building a parking garage. Of course, in the past this project was blocked because St. Barnabas could not even spring for lights for kids who use the sports fields on Quarry Road behind the hospital. But the activist who led that community fight-back has since passed away, and now St. Barnabas says it's ready to move forward. We'll see.

Given the difficulty that long-time South Bronx residents are facing in keeping up with rising rents, how could an executive of a non-profit purportedly working for the interest of such people offer unqualified praise for "upscale" real estate investment in area? Oh but it has happened, in the December 5 Daily News: "Peter Cantillo, president of SEBCO Development, a group that has been building affordable housing in the neighborhood since 1968 [said] 'The Bank Note is exactly the kind of upscale draw this neighborhood has worked toward.'" Speak for yourself...

Metro North spokeswoman Marjorie Anders was quoted last week that "Metro-North would love to run some of its Hudson Line trains across the Spuyten Duyvil and down the Amtrak rails on the West Side to Penn Station, not to mention running some New Haven Line trains on Amtrak rails through the underserved East Bronx to Penn Station... Metro-North has had a feasibility study for such a project partly done for some time."

Hey, if Metro North so badly wants to serve the "underserved" Bronx, why does it persist in having its New Haven Line trains stop at Fordham Road only to discharge but not pick up passengers? This outrage continues, the book-keeping and other excuses have not been addressed...

Two other 'Net notes: the Detroit "Campus Martius conservancy hired Egan Acres Farms in the Bronx, which specializes in jumbos. The tree is donated from a private home in New Paltz, N.Y. near Poughkeepsie." So what, a Bronx-business providing Poughkeepsie trees to Michigan?

An Ethnic Food Examiner says "Bronx: in all fairness, I don't think I've been to the Bronx more than 10 times. It's got a fabulous zoo. (is that considered ethnic?). According to my sources, you can hit a double in the Tremont area of the Bronx: Ecuadorian (and other Hispanics), and Ghanan." But the link to Ghanian is hardly limited to that country; the link to Ecuador is in fact about bachata, and says of
Claridad Restaurant, 373 E. 188th St.Bronx, NY, "Occasional local acts; call to find out; seedy atmosphere." Seedy is in the eye of the beholder...

The New York Times of November 18, aiming now at the commercial gentrification of Port Morris in the South Bronx, reported that "part of the area’s appeal is its access to transportation. Neil Pariser, a senior vice president of the South Bronx Overall Economic Development Corporation, a nonprofit group that has renovated factories and apartment buildings in the area, said, 'Port Morris has unusually excellent vehicular access for trucks and even good mass transit' — the No. 6 and No. 2 subways." But the Number 2, a West Side train, hardly serves Port Morris...

Every single Bronx Councilmember voted to roll back the twice publicly-enacted term limits...

It's not just that the New York Times promotes gentrification -- it's that they don't even mention that it exists. That is, they just don't care, even about basic journalistic balance. From last Sunday's Times:

Leila Abdoulaye sublets a friend's loft in an old piano factory in the South Bronx, and she need never worry about repairs. Her building, called the Clock Tower, has a 24-hour superintendent.

Ms. Abdoulaye, a 25-year-old student and model who also works as a restaurant office manager, pays $700 a month for her room. She shares the apartment with a rotating stream of models. Ms. Abdoulaye minds the store, as it were, between work and classes.

''It's the quality of the place, the price of the apartment, and the social life,'' Ms. Abdoulaye says. ''It's a nice place to live. A happy place to live.''

Daniel Lundby, 32, an out-of-work designer from Iowa, also lives in the Clock Tower, sharing a bright, open space with a roommate.

When he moved to New York City, he lived in a tiny sublet on the Upper East Side. ''Now,'' Mr. Lundby said, ''I have three times the space for the same price.'' His rent has risen about $100 a year since he moved in more than four years ago, but he says he is satisfied. ''I think I'm still getting a decent deal.

Not for long... And the November 9 Times mentions The Bronx, a county of over 1 million people in the Times' home city, only 11 times, and even these are oblique: mentions in Mount Vernon, from "Snarky Gulch" and Riverdale. For shame...

As New York City set up for the Marathon on November 2, cars along First Avenue in East Harlem were getting towed, and the Bx 15 bus to the Bronx was radically re-routed, turning north on Lenox and leaving Park, Lexington and Avenidas Tres, Dos y Uno unserviced. The runners barely touched The Bronx, despite all the hype about its fix-up.

Meanwhile in Belmont, we return against to Estrellita Poblana III on lower Arthur Ave, where the caldo de chivo, goat soup, is well-worth its six dollar price. The tortillas are hot and at noon on the day of the marathon, it was full of duos of Mexican men in their Sunday best, some drinking Tecate and others Mexican Coca-Cola, with the pure cane sugar, taking digital photos of each other to send back south of the border. Look, mama, I'm making it in New York. Even during the financial crisis...

Staying small bore but indicative, on Belmont above 189th a new store has opened, with baseball caps including multicolored camouflage, hip hop T-shirts and, as one Inner City Press source puts it, Ed Hardy hoodies for women and for men. The owners, who wear the caps they sell, built all contents of the storefront, but for the glass display. It's called E & J's, and just before a recent midnight, both E and J were there. We wish them well.

In the Bronx we traipse around, for example on October 18 and 19, from the 4 train at Yankee Stadium over to the D, and thereafter north under the Concourse.

Never say we don't follow-up: Angel's Ecuadorian Restaurant on Hughes Avenue and 184th has continued to improve, now with grilled tuna with platanos and avocado salad. Still no menu, and Angel hard of hearing -- but plaintains and tuna like this is not to be found elsewhere.

We return because we must to the New York Times' misrepresentation of The Bronx. The October 12 Sunday paper mentions the Bronx 18 times, but entirely from the perceived POV of Times readers: Riverdale real estate, sculpture and cider in the Botanical Garden, two obituaries, "Kosher Wars," and oh yeah, a reference to hip hop. That's keeping it real...

Click here for Inner City Press in Wash Post and Miami on CRA, here in Charlotte on the mergers, and here even praising the FDIC (on other grounds)

There were Wanted posters up along East Tremont and Bathgate Avenues on October 4, about an armed robbery in Harrison, New York, offering $15,000. Some of the posters were torn down, but other were there. By Webster Avenue, there were no more. Call it narrow-casting.

Also in terms of insular communities, now the "Bangladesh Plaza" neighborhood in Queens is echoed on a corner of The Bronx, 158 and Melrose, the Dkaka Discount, with the "Lotto" on the sign crossed out...

The closing of R&S Strauss, we now surmise is related to the loss of parking created by the mad "Bx 12 Select" bus plan.

Finally, new and second-time-around restaurant reviews: the new Arthur Avenue Pizza Co between 186 and 184 has high ceiling and free Internet but doesn't have beef patties...

Meanwhile, a second visit to Angel's Ecuadorian restaurant on Hughes Avenue and 184th Street found the food still excellent, if not better, juice goat and rice, ceviche, tamales Ecuadorian style in a banana leaf -- but still no menu, and major communications problems. There few things more striking in a restaurant than one that doesn't produce the food you order, or that refuses to take an order, both of which happened here. A co-reviewer is hoping it's just a communications problem. Time will tell. But better goat and rice cannot be found in the Bronx...

Fengwang Chen, 31, was ambushed as he tried to deliver a $22 order on E. 229th St. Saturday - what was supposed to have been his last day as a deliveryman for New China Garden, his wife said Sunday.

"He never picks a fight with anyone," Chen's wife, Yan Dong, said through an interpreter at Jacobi Medical Center, where he remains in critical condition.

The bullet that hit Chen, a father of two young children, entered behind his ear and lodged in his jaw. He is expected to survive.

More annals of Fordham Road -- while still awaiting local powers' spin on the closing of R & S Strauss, a reporter's recent pass-through the White Castle found, far from fast food, no one talking orders for foot traffic. Everything is directed at the drive-through customers. Some suburb...

For some years, Inner City Press has noted the lack of a Fed Ex / Kinko's in the Bronx. Now last week, it was explained, thusly: "The primary factor in choosing locations is customer demand," said FedEx Office spokeswoman Jenny Robertson. "We look at the density of small and medium-size businesses. And there's never been a 'ruling out' of the Bronx. We are just looking at those communities that have greater customer penetration." So, over 1 million people is not dense enough?

At deadline, we're told there is an explanation for, and even controversy around, the closing of the R & S Strauss auto parts on Fordham Road. If received, we will run it on this site.

This year's Ferragosto street fair on Arthur Avenue had, as before, peaches and red wine, plums and white wine, $1.50 Italian ices from Artusos, free samples of mozzerella -- and a cheesy and probably fraudulent presentation of "Florida Properties" complete with cartoon depictions of swampland. Like something out of the 1950s...

An Ecuadorian restaurant has opened on Crescent Avenue in The Bronx, with ceviche, goat and rice and that country's apple soda. The owner used to work for Arthur Avenue Catering and saved up cash. He's dubious about President Correa but attentive to the customers in his five-table storefront. To chicken soup he'll add white rice to thicken it. The hot sauce is made of radishes and there is not yet a menu. But we are wishing them well.

Meanwhile, gone from Fordham Road is the R & S Strauss auto parts store. What happened?

On the corner of Webster and 188th, there are flowers and prayers surrounding a street lamp, marking where a driver with crumbling brakes crashed and killed a pregnant woman and, days later, her child who had initially been saved. There is a music store and a playground. Another area resident was nearly beaten to death by the side of this playground, in the course of a robbery. One block up there is a Carvel's ice cream store, and then the under renovation and expansion Sears. Life, death and development continue in The Bronx.

Talk about nitty-gritty. The MTA has announced, regarding the 149th Street Hub, that

The Bx55 will have a new turnaround when changing from southbound to northbound: traveling south on 3rd Avenue, east on East 146th Street, north on Willis Avenue, and then north on 3rd Avenue. This will eliminate the bus stop on Willis Avenue at the far side of East 148th Street and replace it with a new stop on 3rd Avenue at the near side of East 149th Street. All other stops remain the same.

The Bx15 northbound will remain on the current route to Willis Avenue, then travel north on 3rd Avenue and return to the current route. Southbound, it will travel south on 3rd Avenue (passing 148th Street), then east on East 146th Street, south on Willis Avenue and onto the current route.

The Bx41 will leave its terminal on East 147th Street traveling west, head north on 3rd Avenue, west on East 152nd Street, north on Melrose Avenue, then resume the current route. Southbound, the bus will travel south on Melrose Avenue, east on East 154th Street, south on Elton Avenue, then south on 3rd Avenue and continue on its current route.

So what, no more Third-to-Melrose crosscutting by the Bx 41? How 'bout having the busses run on time?

So the NY Times has whipped up dissatisfaction with how Hunts Point is described in WikiPedia, quoting one non-profit head as unwilling to make edit to the entry, another calling WikiMedia and asking them to make changes. What happened to empowerment? And what of the use of the term Bronx for rough regions everywhere on else, for example in Jamaica?

The pizzeria that opened earlier this year on Fordham Road across from White Castle, in a space formerly occupied by a club that was closed for under-aged drink, has itself already been shuttered. We hardly knew ye...

Sadly we report that the oddly-placed Argentine coffee shop on Webster Avenue just north of the Cross Bronx Expressway has gone under, cut its name off the fabric awning, no more beef sandwiches...

Now the New York State Department of Environmental Conservation "is inviting public comments" on

The New York Organic Fertilizer Company's plant began operations in 1993. Over the years, repeated complaints have been made about odors emanating from the facility. It has been the subject of two major DEC enforcement actions during that period. In recent months, DEC has developed a new strategy to address the odor issues associated with the plant, and it is inviting public comments on its plans.

July 21, 2008 A Bronx Juror's Eye View: Gypsy Cab Whip Lash Crash 9 Years Ago Gets 1-Day Trial, by Matthew R. Lee of Inner City Press

The word now in the jurors' waiting room in The Bronx is that things are getting worse: the duty more frequent and each time for more days. There are at least two reasons, those who work there say. First, more and more cases are filed in The Bronx, because the county perceived as having poor and angry residents who award big damages. So for example when McDonald's was sued for making people obese -- and there are obese people all over -- The Bronx was chosen as the venue. Second, you have to be citizen and speak English to serve on a jury. These two characteristics have become less prevalent in The Bronx, as a clerk diplomatically puts it, even as the population has grown in the last decade.

Put these two together, and those eligible for it have jury duty more often, and for more days. Unless you luck out, and can get selected for the jury in one of the new one-day trials.

On a recent morning, this option was offered to early arrivals, and a long line quickly formed. Twenty two people were selected, and shuttled into a side room to fill out questionnaires. Have you ever sued anyone? Have you or a family member ever worked in a law office? Then the 22 took elevators upstairs to Justice Yvonne Gonzalez' courtroom on the fourth floor. They sat on one side of the courtroom, reading, lounging, complaining about the too-strong air conditioning even on this hot day. Ms. Gonzalez came in and smiled, went into the back. Five minutes later she re-emerged as a Justice, in black robe wearing glasses. "All rise!" the court officer said.

"You don't have too," Justice Gonzalez said. "We're going to pick 12 of you and ask you some questions. The rest of you can wait."

The first 12 were selected. Your witness was not, and cursed his luck. The questions got personal. What do you do, for work? What does your wife do? What exactly is a nutritional consultant? You choose patients' menus? Have the patients filed lawsuits? Do they talk to you about them?

Two of the twelve admit they want to go to law school. They will not be chosen. An Asian woman tells a long story about a customer in the nail salon where she works, who hurt her shoulder in a car accident and constantly complains about it. She too will be asked to leave, as this case is about a car crash, which injured a Ms. Filartiga -- not her real name.

Now the two lawyers are getting to ask the questions. Really, they are trying to put ideas in potential jurors' minds, things they couldn't say once the trial begins. If a person doesn't look injured, can you accept that they are still in a lot of pain? I guess so. Good, because that's Ms. Filartiga over there, and she's in pain. It's a sad looking old woman on the far side of the courtroom. "She's doesn't speak English," we're told. They why do we have to? Even if you speak Spanish, you have to focus on what the interpreter says. And in this one-day trial, to save money no court recorder is present. There will only be your memory, and that should be focused on the interpreter.

As jurors are stricken, your witness is called into the jury box. Questions are asked, to catch up with the others. Potential grounds for being stricken are disclosed. But the witness makes it, as Juror Number Seven, the alternate. The others are thanked for their service, and return to the jurors' waiting room for four more days of limbo. Those lucky seven of the 22 who remain are told to order lunch, to be paid for by the court system. The alternate may or may not get fed, therefore the dollar tip does not have to be paid at this time.

Triple decked roast beef and a diet Coke. Pickles? Why not. But how was the diner that gets all these court house orders selected? Was this to low bidder? The case begins, with opening statements. A taxi has been hit from behind, at University Avenue and McCombs Dam Road. The plaintiff was wearing a seat belt, but still be whipped back and forth. She has lost work since then, she has gone to many doctors. She will never be the same. She needs money.

That's the plaintiff's lawyer's story. The defense lawyer, for two New Jerseyites who are not here, tells a counter tale. The plaintiff knew the cab driver, that's why he hasn't been sued. The cabby stopped short and with no notice, causing the crash. The plaintiff's own doctors reports, which will be distributed at the end, will show that her injuries are not serious. Okay, let's get it on.

There is only one witness, Ms. Filartiga the plaintiff. It looks like she hasn't been prepared. She keeps interrupting her lawyer, staring off into space. Unprompted, she says she wasn't in fact wearing seat belt. Does that make her negligent? Let's at least quantify and get some damages, her lawyers seems to decide. When did she work, after the accident? There was the perfume factory... But only in the summers... She's not sure. But after March 1999, when did she work?

That's how it emerges, that this terrible important fender-bender took place more than nine years ago, and is only getting its one-day trial now. Why? How can it take nine years to hear this meager evidence? Did the defendants delay things hope Filartiga would die or move back to Santo Domingo? Did the plaintiffs' lawyer put the case to the back of the line as a small damages dog? The jury is never told. But no wonder no one can remember what happened that day, or afterwards.

The lunch has arrived, and the case is still not over. Juror Seven will have roast beef after all. The seven are led up a staircase to a room with peeling paint. "Don't talk about the case," they're told. "Sports or fashion is okay." Out the window is Yankee Stadium, where the All-Star Game's Home Run Derby is to be held that night. The youngest juror, now wildly thumbing his Sidekick, says even the tickets to Home Run Derby are expensive. The sandwich, though free, is not good. Perhaps they really were the low bidders. A Hispanic woman, maybe in her 50s, calls her boss and says she'll be back at work tomorrow, she lucked into the one-day trial. After that the silence is deafening. The one African-American on the jury, a large woman, gets up to go to the bathroom.

Juror Seven, to pass the time and drown out the sound of flushing, says Major League Baseball is screwing The Bronx by having the parade in Manhattan, and the memorabilia show too. There's no response. Oh really. He tries again, saying how in his jury pool, everyone one wanted to get on the jury. In most cases, people are trying to get off, saying, "I can't be fair" or "I hate the police." There are a few nods. Okay then, read the newspaper. In the corner of the room there's a stack of police accident reports, with drawings of automobiles and arrows for direction of impact. Could Filartiga's be in there?

Okay it must be time to go back down. No, says a large woman who used to be a school principal. "They come up and get us, I know this, I've done it before." She is white, and almost everyone else is Hispanic. She is ignored. Six of the seven creep down the stairs, where have metal mesh because criminal defendants are led this way too. They peer into the empty courtroom. Hey, the security officer says. "Go back upstairs." The principal was right, looks vindicated. Are they settling the case? Ten more minutes pass.

Finally they are led back into the courtroom, Juror Seven told to pick a spot in the second row. This is easy, this is fun. It will end today, they've said. The jury is told the Ms. Filartiga was 53 when the crash happened. She's 62 now and it is estimated that she will live to 84. "That's an average, of course," the plaintiff's lawyer said, adding the word "actuarial." She says, "You can decided how much each of her years will be worth." But can we? How?

The plaintiff's lawyer has forgotten to make photocopies of her exhibits. There will be only one copy in the deliberations room. The defense has copies, which are passed out to each juror including Number Seven. The exhibits are pretty damning. A doctor says the pain is fake. The police report on the accident says the taxi stopped too fast. Then again, that was only what the Jerseyites said. But only they spoke with the police. Why hasn't the cabby come to the trial to testify? Why didn't the plaintiff's lawyer try to address this hole in her case? Is the hope simply that six Bronx jurors, told a tale of a possible-hurt factory worker, will award millions of dollars?

Why didn't someone -- say for example, the Jerseyites' insurance company -- simply give Ms. Filartiga 40 or 50 thousand dollars, back nine years ago, and leave it at that? Did Filartiga ask for more? Did the insurers refuse to pay, then made her wait nine years? This is the background we need, to weight the equities. But none of the jurors get that information, much less the Alternate, your witness, who is now told to go. There is no closure, as in real life. Good luck Ms. Filartiga, hope you make it to 84 or more.

We devote our Bronx Watch footnote this week to an anti-Strategic Lawsuit Against Public Participation win, NWBCCC vindicated against landlords which claimed that tenant organizers interfered with their relationships with Washington Mutual bank. On July 7, Justice Sallie Manzanet denied the landlords' claim, triggering 11 days later a press release by the victorious lawyers. Hats off. But the press release doesn't saying anything about legal fees and costs...

With the hype starting to swirl around the July 15 All-Star game at Yankee Stadium, Major League Baseball did not respond to repeated inquiries from South Bronx media about covering the game. Of course, the parade, concert and other events are all in Manhattan...

In front of Mount Carmel Church on July 13, the John Duke / Newark Symphonic Band played tuba music as a priest led a march down 187th Street past frying sausages and bubble tea.

In Belmont, now it's the Dolce Amaro restaurant, next to Modern's supermarket, that's been closed by inspectors, health and mental hygiene. The previously but only briefly closed Arthur Avenue Bakery is back open, this time seemingly legal, with a new inspection report in the window.

Of the new BX 12 "Select" service, these negative reviews: the moving of the Local stops in fact makes trips longer for many riders, as they can no longer take local or Select, whichever one comes first. Some local stops have muddy sidewalks, and no disabled access. Lawsuit, anyone?

And then there is the case of the hijacked banana trucks, stolen from Delaware and dumped, fruitless, in The Bronx...

The Empowerment Zone last week announced 11 awards, eight in Manhattan and three in The Bronx:

* $200,000 loan and a $50,000 grant to help Project Enterprise Inc. establish a micro-loan program in the Bronx Empowerment Zone. Since its creation in 1996 as a US Tressury-certified Community Development Financial Institution, Project Enterprise has served more than 1,300 entrepreneurs, disbursing more than 350 loans totaling over $1.2 million.
* $250,000 grant to help Rocking The Boat Inc.'s $960,000 project to consolidate and renovate its educational facilities. The project will help the company establish its first permanent home at 812 Edgewater Road in the Bronx. Rocking the Boat used traditional wooden boatbuilding and on-water education to help middle- and high school-age youth develop into empowered and responsible adults. Its programs serve nearly 2,000 students and community members, mostly from the south Bronx.
* $150,200 grant to help the New York Gauchos and Teamwork Foundation renovate its main gymnasium and entranceway at 478 Gerard Avenue in the Bronx. The Teamwork Foundation, founded 40 years ago, serves as the general business administrator of the New York Gauchos basketball program that has served approximately 11,000 young people ranging in age from 5 through 18. Fifteen Gaucho alumni have played in the National Basketball Association (including Stephon Marbury of the New York Knicks).

Nomination for worst bus line in the city: the Bx 41 along Webster Avenue. A recent evening at 149th Street, people waited for an hour. Later, up the line, the schedule was ignored, all busses stopped at Fordham Road, leaving those heading further north stranded again.

The week of the City's announcement of plans for "Third Avenue / Melrose Commons" on the real Third Avenue and 157th Street, Flynn Playground was entirely ripped up, while overpriced "luxury condos" were advertised between 156th and 157ths. Is this serving actual Bronx residents? Further south on Willis, at 145th, Peter Goodwine founded Fort Motte Baptist, and on 142nd there is Abraham House. More gentrification on Lincoln Avenue, beyond the Clocktower at 112, a whole new crowd. Again, is this helping those who've long lived in The Bronx?

It's street fair time again in The Bronx. On a rainy Saturday night on 187th Street, an old grinding machine sounding like African drumming chewed through sugar cane fed in by a man in a skull cap, in his pickup truck, sign calling it Bahar Fruit Juices. On Arthur Avenue in a Parks Department trailer, the band Streets of the Bronx played on, for only those under Palumbo's Caffe's awning.

The blues they played could be for the Hunts Point Market, which is threatening to move to New Jersey, just after the City moved the Fulton Street Fish Market up near it. Great planning...

Trolling the Federal Register, we learn that DOJ has sued and settled about illegal underground storage tanks, for gas, at 1303 Webster Avenue and 4090 Boston Road in the Bronx...

Leave it to the New York Times to gush about gentrification of the South Bronx without once mentioning its impact on affordability for the people who live here. While some of "Sobro's" new residents mean well, they should start thinking harder how to not only raise the rents. Here's hoping...

This week, media-watch at home and abroad. Now we know who the New York Times writes for -- in a piece about a factory fire in Mott Haven in the Bronx, the Times of May 28 wrote " People walking around East Harlem and the Upper East Side this afternoon may have noticed black smoke billowing in the air, visible from quite a distance." Apparently, no one in The Bronx saw the smoke, or is reading the Times....

Now is The Independent of London of May 27 snarking about the South Bronx: "Belgravia and the Upper East Side would be looking like swathes of Croxteth and the South Bronx already do with people; vegetation sprouting through the tarmac, litter blowing down the streets like tumbleweed, derelict dwellings with broken windows, dogs running wild, and not a policeman in sight." Wild dogs on the tarmac!

Now it's become clear that the parkland promised in exchange for that taken for the new Yankee Stadium will open, if ever, long after at the stadium does. So who's to blame? The Parks Commissioner won't talk, and the local pols who supported the deal continue to claim, against all evidence, that it is on track. And now it looks like the news stadium won't get an outdoor hockey game, either.

Meanwhile, MLB.com has placed the East Harlem restaurant Rao's north in... the Bronx. Click here.

From the department of "It Don't Mean a Think If It Ain't Got that Swing" -- We agree it's ridiculous that the renovated playground of Public School 138 in Soundview has no swings. According to the Daily News, the explanation is that NYC recently paid $3.5 million to settle a case brought by a woman named Daisey Vega who was injured in a swing accident in 1999 at Noble Park in the Bronx." Mayor Bloomberg is quoted that "you have one accident, everybody screams, 'More safety, another level of backup,' and then somebody sues. A lot of the old things that we did because there are some risks involved and people have sued . . . are no longer things that we do. Sad, I mean . . . you know . . . anyways." This in the same month he told a reporter asking about Sean Bell, "some nerve.. talk to my press secretary." And so it goes.

Meanwhile, Bloomberg has announced that the Yankees and Major League Baseball will donate $7 million to city institutions such as the Grand Concourse branch of the public library, Kips Bay Boys & Girls Club, and Bronx Lebanon Hospital's pediatric diabetes program. "There's no way to put a value on the free advertising that we get out of something like this," he said. The July 15 game will be preceded by a five-day fan-fest at the Javits Center with autograph sessions, memorabilia displays and batting cages. But the Javits Center is in Manhattan... Derek Jeter said, "with the addition of the new stadium, they're really building up the area around it." We'll see.

We are back on the Bronx-watch including watching how the term is used. No less than the BCC (okay, its Welsh service) used "South Bronx" as a generic insult in an article, here, about biking. Also in the UK, the Andover Advertiser of May 16 quotes a local pol that "We are in danger of scoring an own goal because the way we talk Tidworth is like living in the Bronx." And what's wrong with living in the Bronx?

While the Bloomberg Administration loudly claims concern for the lack of supermarkets and fruits and vegetables in lower income neighborhoods, the gentrification it has fueled is part of the problem. In an example of commercial gentrification, Vornado Realty Trust is jacking up Key Foods' rent 500% on Bruckner Boulevard and White Plains Road, driving out the store in order to demolish it and leave residents of high-rises with a ten block walk to the store. Only in New York...

Cinco de Mayo was celebrated on 187th Street and Crescent Avenue on May 3, with no even as much fanfare as last year. The sponsor was Health Plus, which ran nearly every booth. Even by five o'clock, there were no tacos, no Mexican sodas, nothing. Que pasa?

The next day, May 4, six police cars, a fire department 4 by 4 and two ambulance converged on the same corner. Police engaged in a manhunt, while people stood in front of the mostly-Albanian social clubs gawking. A social club on 186th Street has a sign, Welcome Home, Ramush. But were the police working for the International Criminal Tribunal for the Former Yugoslavia?

Finally the scandal of the 700 teachers in NY Board of Education "rubber rooms" has hit the tabloids, with the Daily News following-up on filmmakers' work, and saying it costs the City $65 million a year. But what of the scandal of "District 75," to which a mix of violent and learning disabled kids are sent, without notice or due process?

Spring has sprung in The Bronx, and the buildings are coming down. On 163rd Street and Third Avenue, the Powerhouse Church is down. The second courthouse has disappeared; there is a sign by Procida Construction advertising the chance to "join Dunkin Donuts and Popeyes" in a strip mall on the site. Whole streets are closed off to traffic. But we're back looking into it -- watch this site, and, on international issues, this streaming video http://www.bloggingheads.tv/diavlogs/10560#

On the sidelines of Inner City Press' first-hand coverage of the Pope's visit to the United Nations on April 18 -- click here for that -- the venture to Yonkers involved telling residents of the Dunwoody neighborhood that they could not go out of their houses for hours on end. There was no reporting about hot sheet motels in the area...

Arthur Avenue Bakery update: even with two governmental "Closed" signs on the window, the bakery is still stocked, and a handwritten sign promises wholesale bread as special prices. Neighbors often wondered what took place in the half-finished cinderblock building above the bakery...

And now, a new restaurant review in the form of a cautionary tale. On Fordham Road across from White Castle, in the storefront formerly occupied by a bar that got closed for serving under-aged drinkers, the "Il Ponte Vecchio Pizza Restaurant" has opened. The space is long and narrow, like a railroad flat. On a recent visit, two reviewers walked through to sit in the back, next to an open door. The back yard has green Astro-turf, making it seem like a place to sit. But in fact there is a large refrigerator in the yard, into which restaurant staff disappeared several times during the 20 minute wait for fried calamari. One, the manager, reappeared carrying a head of lettuce in ungloved hands. "Sorry for the wait," he said. "It's that we make everything fresh." The next, a cook, came out with vegetables. On the menu, one can design a salad: walnuts 50 cents, cheddar cheeses 75 cents and the like. It is confusing and could, it appears, result in a $22 dollar salad.

There are pipes across the ceiling. One is for sprinklers -- safety is always a plus -- but the other pipe made noise during the visit. The decor includes vaguely Roman tiles, an incongruous chicken, and witch hats. There is a hole in the ceiling next to the light fixture, and another in the brick wall.

On the positive side, the Cuban panini came with fresh-made potato chips. "Those only come with the panini," the manager said. Oh well. He said they own nine other restaurants. These, we gotta see...

To be constructive, this restaurant can make money from Fordham students. But it will need to stay open later than 9 p.m., and otherwise raise its game, and/or lower its prices. The catering has promise, the hot chips should remain. And maybe the fridge should come in from the back yard...

Belmont journal: what do you say about a public library -- say, one on the corner of 186th Street and Hughes Avenue -- that doesn't have tax forms in the week that taxes are due? Why is yet another small grocery store opening up on 187th Street, between Beaumont and Cambrelleng, making it a total of eight in a three-block strip? Three of these are open 24-hours a day; whether the new one will be is not yet known. If you combined these eight, you could have a good-sized supermarket... This are back to morning, post unilateral declaration of independence in Kosovo, at the Albanian social clubs in the area. A strangely flashy place named Planet Wings has opened up in the same stretch, already offering franchise opportunities along with slightly overpriced wings. Cheapest item is a taco, at $2.16, but it is cold, cannot hold a candle to the little stands that have cropped up in Belmont. The sign says, best wings in the Hudson Valley. But this is The Bronx.. The area was filled with police this week, searching for suspects, throwing people up against the pharmacy's rolling metal gate. But the only "raid" that got publicized was of the Arthur Avenue Bakery, click here for that. Welcome to Belmont...

Metro-North follow-up: a week after defending his railroad's exclusion of riders at Fordham Station in The Bronx, and saying inaccurately that a center platform could be built for more express trains to stop at Fordham, Metro-North president Peter A. Cannito was quoted in a press release about a center platform -- for Yankee Stadium. It's a $91 million project, and according to Cannito, "Everyone is pushing to get it open as close to opening day 2009 as is safely possible." The press release continued, "The four tracks of Metro-North's Hudson Line pass just west of the stadium. The tracks are being relocated about 50 feet west to allow for construction of two center-island platforms." It's all where your priorities are...

In 2007 in its headquarters Metropolitan Statistical Area of New York City, Citigroup confined Americans to higher-cost loans above the rate spread 2.61 times more frequently than whites. Citigroup's disparity to Latinos was 1.90.

JPMorgan Chase, in what is also its headquarters MSA of New York City, was even more disparate, confining African Americans to higher-cost loans above the rate spread 2.92 times more frequently than whites. Chase's disparity to Latinos was 2.50. More here.

And now predatory lending has slowed the market: home sales volume in Queens dropped by 25 percent from February 2007 to February 2008, 31 percent in Brooklyn, 36 percent on Staten Island -- but fully 50 percent in the Bronx...

BRONX, N.Y., March 30 -- As New York government officials consider imposing a tax for driving into lower Manhattan, many of the Metro-North Railroad trains which stop to let off suburban riders in the Bronx refuse to take Bronx passengers on board for the last leg of the trip into Grand Central Station. When these trains stop at the Fordham Road station in the Bronx, the public address system announces that they are "discharge only" and that anyone who insists on getting on will be charged the highest possible fare. Among those excluded or over-charged are Bronxites who have paid over $140 for a monthly pass from Fordham to Grand Central.

This longstanding policy was questioned on March 26 at a public hearing of the Metro-North Railroad president Peter Cannito. Along with questions about allowing more bicycles on the MNRR trains and better policing late-night drunken riders, Inner City Press asked Mr. Cannito to explain why the company he runs, at least until later this year, denies its services to pre-paid customers in the Bronx. While several of the other MNRR board members present seem surprised that this takes place, Cannito said it is a product of an operating agreement between the states of Connecticut and New York. He said that since Connecticut pays 65% of the New Haven line's costs, they have requested that no passengers be allowed on the New Haven lines trains which stop to discharge passengers in the Bronx.

When Inner City Press questioned the social, racial and environmental justice logic of keeping paying customers from The Bronx from riding the suburban commuter trains even when they have paid, Cannito said, even if "you don't accept it," he had explained it. Another board member interjected that what Inner City Press had raised showed the "regionality of service" which is "something we are keenly aware of and working toward."

Further inquiry by Inner City Press has revealed as an explanation of the exclusion of Bronxites that the Connecticut and New York lines of the Metro-North system don't have in place a system to invoice each other for riders like Bronxites riding New Haven line trains south into Manhattan. The bureaucratic fix appears simple, unless an implicit selling-point of the New Haven line is the exclusion of more "urban" riders. While some intrepid Bronxites have found a way around the MNRR's policy of exclusion -- by buying a holding a ticket from Westchester to Grand Central, as if they had gotten on further north -- these games are not accessible to everyone, cost more and should not be necessary, particularly with congestion pricing looming.

Cannito offered a single, illusory concession. He said that MNRR is considering whether having a middle platform at the Fordham station would allow additional express trains from White Plains to stop at Fordham. But a cursory visit to the station shows that there is no room for a middle platform, and little chance of expanding the station outward, either into Fordham University where a dorm is being constructed, or out onto Webster Avenue.

Also at the hearing, a bicycle enthusiast derided late night drunken riders who, he said, often vomit in the cars. Just as a designated quiet car had been proposed, he suggested what he called a "designated pukers car."

Bronx news watch medley -- note to News 12: the Latin music legend who just died was named Cha-chow, not Cock-Hayo... And to report at length about the fight-back of a Bronx high school football coach without even mentioning why the principal banned him from the campus is not respectful, it's mystifying...

Last week in honor or search of La Francophonie, Inner City Press had to venture beyond the Bronx, first to DC then Manhattan then finally the Borough of Kings. Monday in DC, the Press' travails with the UN and Google were discussed. Monday night at the CUNY Graduate Center on Fifth Ave, an eclectic band played, saxophonist from Quebec, bass from Mali, keyboards from Japan. The M de C Paul Holdergraber from the NY Public Library is, despite his name, French. Who knew? The week was capped, however, by the surreal performance of a quintet called La Laque at the Luna Lounge west of Bedford, east of Lorimer in Brooklyn. Energetic drums, ethereal singing in French, vaguely Germanic keyboards. One of the few song-explanation said that Tuesday is French for weekend. "C'mon, that's funny," the singer deadpanned. Mardi, get it?

And while not French at all, we're compelled to note, across the street from Luna Lounge, the upscale-downscale meat emporium Fette Sau, faux Southern pork shoulder $15 a pound, we recommend the broccoli salad and sweet black chili sauce...

The day after news of the Federal Reserve's murky bailout of Bear Stearns through JPMorgan Chase, Inner City Press / Fair Finance Watch filed with the Federal Reserve Board in Washington, and the Federal Reserve Bank of New York, a petition, complaint and series of requests, portions of which are available by clicking here. ICP has now made a similar filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission. Meanwhile, it's reported that Bear Stearns' CEO recently paid cash to buy two apartment in the former Plaza Hotel in New York, without a mortgage...

So how did Eliot Spitzer get caught? North Fork Bank, recently re-branded Capital One, filed a Suspicious Activity Report last July. Like most SARs, it went nowhere. Until HSBC filed its own, about transactions with shell companies QAT International and QAT Consulting Group, connected to Emperor's Club VIP. Now investigators took an interest, tracing back to Spitzer. Why was he banking with North Fork, of all places?

So why is the courthouse at 161st and 3rd being given to Imagine Schools, which in 2005 lost its charter for a Syracuse elementary school for having low test scores and high turnover among students and staff members?

Foreclosure tale from New York, by a charter-bus driver in the East Bronx who has a mortgage payment that went from $2,482 to $3,500 a month. I had a two-year teaser rate, now going up every six months to a maximum of 13.2 percent, "I spoke to Wells Fargo. I tried to get them to keep the rate at the teaser rate, 6.8 percent... I'm in a home that cost us $35,000 in the sixties. We refinanced three times, and we owe $400,000."

It appears that the UN is considering relocating some of its trees, including gifts from the Japanese mission, to keep them safe during construction. Inner City Press asked Capital Master Plan spokesman Werner Schmidt if he could confirm that the Bronx-based NY Botanical Garden, where the CMP's Michael Adlerstein used to work, is coming to check out and even price relocation of the trees. "There are tree issues," Schmidt replied. "We are talking to a number" of entities, "including the Botanical Garden." Watch this site. And see, on Inner City Press and free speech, www.bloggingheads.tv/diavlogs/9329#

As you cruise past Cardinal Hayes High School, let's say on MetroNorth watching a new building rising where once the Police Academy was to have been, who would have guessed what the principal had on his hard drive -- or would that be his zip(per) drive? Also on the porn front, Inner City Press last week ran a three-story series that CUlMinated in the quiet removal of Smooth and King, replaced by Elle and Vogue. Click here. And now, to the Bronx...

A snowy Saturday night in Tremont, club-goers line up in front of the Jet Set Cafe on Webster, across from the deadly White Castle outlet, just south of where Popeye's Fried Chicken has moved in. If you need a selection of hundreds of hubcaps and rims, this is your area.

Across the world but related, In Kazakhstan, Ministry of Emergencies head Vladimir Bozhko last week warned ArcelorMittal, the world's biggest steel company, that it could be forced to close one of its coal mines it if does not improve safety conditions after an explosion last month killed 30 people. The company was given one month to draw up a plan to introduce 41 safety reforms at the Abaiskaya mine in central Kazakhstan. ArcelorMittal is making steel for New York's Freedom Tower...

Also high in the New York City sky is the multi-million dollar penthouse owned by Lichtenstein, on 40th Street and 2nd Avenue. It was put into a different light by the story this week of Germany's payment for a CD-ROM of its citizens with money in Lichtenstein. Enabling tax evasions as an act of war? Also about the UN, see this sample editorial.

Meanwhile, the NY Attorney General's office last week sent Inner City Press a letter about a years-old Freedom of Information Law request about predatory lending, responsive documents to which have still not been provided...

In the streets of the Belmont neighborhood in the Bronx, lined with Kososar social clubs selling burek, cars honked their horns, flying red flags emblazoned with the Albanian black eagle. "Times Square one o'clock," a men in front of one of the social clubs told cars that slowed as they passed. Meanwhile, the UN Security Council convened an emergency meeting for 1 p.m. as well, announced to the press not by the UN but by the French mission. What could the Security Council accomplish? Click here for Inner City Press' story from the UN on Kosovo, and also on " Death on UN Lawn Leaves Questions Unanswered, Photos Unexplained."

By Fordham Plaza, where every morning now a long time snakes down the sidewalk, patrolled by guards who cause a break in the line for certain overpriced storefronts, the environmental outrage recently occurred. The tall trees fronting the Metro North railroad tracks were unceremonious cut down. In any other borough, this would have triggered protest, probably before, and saving the trees. But this is the Bronx, where institutions do whatever they want and the people are made to wait endlessly in line...

Last week, Hudson Valley Bank's CEO said in a press release that Bronx landlord Barry Levites has been named to the board of New York National Bank, which sold out to Hudson Valley Bank. The press release mentions, only once, Hudson Valley Bank's Business Development Board, and that Levites was already serving on it. So Hudson Valley Bank's impact on NYNB has been to name a controversial Bronx landlord to its board. The missed j.a. lobbia wrote in the Voice during the 2001 mayoral campaign of donations from "Levites Realty, which has made headlines for its decrepit Bronx buildings, including one that had to be vacated in 1994 after the walls began to shake and crack." Welcome to the new New York National Bank...

Now this was innovative-- Luis Fernandez, 30, was arraigned last week on charges that he sold illegal drugs while making deliveries for Schmuger's Hardware Store on Third Avenue, including a sale last month to an undercover cop near E. 178th St and Third Ave...

Bloomberg's state of the city speech last week, delivered while still toying with a presidential run, took credit for rezoning the South Bronx, but not for closing schools and daycare centers, and presiding over the increasing unaffordability of housing to people who have long lived in The Bronx. Then in his canned radio address, Bloomberg equated fighting poverty with monitoring those getting out of prison, while saying that "another key priority of my second term [is] fighting poverty." We'll see.

From an Inner City Press correspondent in the North Bronx we have this -- Saturday January 19 near 241st Street, on an elevated train stopped between stations, police lay in wait to issue tickets to riders who walked between cars. Feeling it was a set-up, our intrepid correspondent got off at the next stop and stood telling entrants what the police were up to. And soon enough, the police left...

As protests continue of Bloomberg's closing of the day care center on 140th Street between Willis and Alexander Avenues, now the state Office of Children and Family Services is moving to shutter the Pyramid Reception Center in the Bronx.

Now slated for the Bathgate Industrial Park, which has had a weedy lot just below the Cross Bronx Expressway for more than a decade, is a warehouse for Pearlgreen Hardware, which claims it will add about 60 new jobs in addition to the 60 workers Pearlgreen currently employs. We'll see..

Dion DiMucci, formerly of the Belmonts, is moving back to New York, to... Wall Street.

The U.S. Department of Agriculture has filed an administrative action against Rosenthal & Klein Inc., Bronx, N.Y. The action alleges that the company committed willful, repeated, and flagrant violations of the Perishable Agricultural Commodities Act (PACA). In the action, it is alleged that the company failed to make full payment promptly to 16 sellers of the agreed purchase prices, in the total amount of $927,459.76 for 208 lots of perishable agricultural commodities. Food wars...

While trying to create buzz for a presidential run, Mayor Bloomberg is moving to close the Lucille Murray Child Development Center in the South Bronx by January 11. Not only is the Center being de-funded -- the building will no longer offer daycare of any kind. Great...

On the fight against the proposed take-over of Commerce Bank, including its drive-thru branch on Fordham Road, see, e.g., "Activist fights TD-Commerce Bancorp deal, citing racial gap," by Richard Newman, Bergen Record, Jan. 1, 2008, Pg. L7

In the Daily News' December 28 Pollyanna piece about crime drops in The Bronx, there's a quote from Augie Aloia, a professor of criminal justice at Monroe College in the Bronx, the "the new numbers as a sign that the Bronx is 'turning the corner...Because of the demographics, the Bronx is a tough borough and it always has been.'" But what demographics does he mean? If the reference is to income, that should be spelled out. By the way, grand larceny is up, and shootings and injuries have not declined as much as homicides: meaning that the decrease may largely be attributable to advances in emergency medicine...

Click here for Inner City Press / Fair Finance Watch's challenge to the proposed take-over of Commerce Bank by Toronto Dominion. In the New York City MSA, TD Banknorth strikingly excluded African Americans from its marketing, outreach and lending. For home improvement loans, of which TD Banknorth made 126 loans to whites based on 266 applications of which it denied 115 (43.2%), TD Banknorth processed only 46 applications from African Americans, denied 35 of them (76.1%). For refinance loans, of which TD Banknorth made 10 loans to whites, TD Banknorth received nine applications from African Americans, and denied ALL of them. While strikingly excluding people of color from its offers of normally-priced, prime credit, TD's Banknorth has continued funding and enabling predatory / fringe financiers such as high-cost pawnshops... And see, "Advocacy group in challenge of TDBank-Commerce Bancorp deal," by Carrie Tait, National Post (Canada), December 29, 2007; "Advocates for poor protest bid to buy Commerce," by Harold Brubaker, Philadelphia Inquirer, December 29, 2007

Christmas in Belmont is not the same this year. What's missing? Well, the farm animals and horse-drawn carriage ride, from in front of Mount Carmel Pharmacy. There's said to a sickness in the family, so this year there's only a Santa in front, $5 a picture, small candy bars handed out free. To the side of Santa on Sunday, the neighborhood's ghost-like bootleg DVD seller greeted an African-American teen with an off-color salutation. "What'd you say, man?"

As Carrion Downshifts to Race for NYC Comptroller, Human Rights Disinvestment Balanced by Returns

BRONX, NY, December 13 -- As Bronx borough president Adolfo Carrion spoke at the Grand Hyatt Thursday morning, quoting from James Joyce and Emma Lazarus' poems on the base of the Statue of Liberty, he seemed inexorably to be moving to declaring himself a candidate for Mayor. In the audience were generations of Bronx elected officials, Jose and Joel Rivera, the Yankees' Randy Levine and a table bought by the Bronx Zoo, Herman Badillo at a table of lobbying firm Tonio Burgos and Associates. The real estate industry was making introductions, and filling the ballroom. There was no talk of rising rents, only of rising hopes. And then Carrion declared for... Comptroller.

In the media scrum that immediately followed, he was asked "why not run for Mayor?" His answer was "I've got kids," and that there are other young talents running for Mayor, two on whom he said he would call with the news: Christine (Quinn) and Anthony (Weiner). He shifted to say that New York's economy is doing well, even with the subprime lending crisis. He said there are "ten to twelve thousand families with subprime mortgages," an estimate that readily-available Home Mortgage Disclosure Act data calls into question. But he's not yet Comptroller.

Looking ahead, Inner City Press asked Carrion for his views on using the city's pension fund and investment to advance human rights. "It's one of the strongest instruments municipalities have," Carrion said, "to go to enterprises, to multinational corporations or funds, and say we are uncomfortable with practices in parts of the company, in countries, the treatment of workers."

Inner City Press asked if he would divest from specific countries, and from companies doing business in them, using as examples what other government subdivisions have targets, Sudan and Syria. "Anywhere human or workers rights are violated, we need to rethink strategy," Carrion said. He went on to say he would "also take into consideration the return for pensioners." So if human rights violators are profitable? We'll see.

Footnotes: A study cited last week found that in Jamaica, Queens, a mainly black suburb of New York with a median income of $45,000, 46 per cent of mortgages were sold by sub-prime lenders; while in Bay Ridge, Brooklyn, a mostly white area with a median income of $50,000, 4 per cent of mortgages originated from sub-prime lenders... With Citigroup giving its CEO and chairman jobs to investment banker, now pundits speculate that the branch bank may be sold, saying Citi's "share in New York is way down from five years ago, when it had nearly 21% market share and 375 branches, because it moved a large amount of deposits from New York City to Nevada." Is that why Citi has felt comfortable doing less and less under the Community Reinvestment Act?

So Mayor Bloomberg, preparing to fly to Beijing and to Bali, announces without consultations that P.S. 220 in the Bronx will be closed. His canned quote was "We just can't sit here and let a school that does not do what it's supposed to do continue on its merry way" -- he said as he headed on his merry way to cut ribbons in China with Hank Paulson, and to resorts in Indonesia...

A Bronx tale, from last week's New York Sun, about Gloria Davis' successor Michael Benjamin: "He first saw her when he stopped by the William Hodson Senior Center on Webster Avenue... by his third visit to the center, he won a date with Ms. Benjamin, who accepted a lunch invitation at a nearby Albanian-run Italian restaurant." Okay, that'd be on Arthur Avenue. But which one? Noticed on Cambrelleng: a 4 by 4 with diplomatic plates, "Consul." Albania, anyone? In the run-up to the December 10th