Bronx News Roundup, August 11

The Daily News examines a number of questionable issues in the race for the 14th district City Council.

This Saturday and Sunday, Dexter Gardiner and the Gardiner Family Foundation will host the fourth annual Gardiner Memorial Basketball Classic Tournament at St. James Park.

The Bronx Parks Department has come under fire from the Outsiders, a Bronx youth baseball team, for not providing regular maintenance for baseball fields.

Teddy Ferrer, an employee of Tuff City, a store in the Bronx that combines graffiti, tattooing and a music studio, was recently interviewed by the New York Times about his graffiti and tattooing skills.

Police are investigating a possible series of hate crimes against West African Muslims in the Claremont neighborhood of the Bronx.

As if obtaining the position of Senate majority leader was not enough of a reward to end Pedro Espada Jr.'s June coup of the Senate, now Espada Jr.'s son will fill the newly created position as "deputy director of intergovernmental relations." Pedro G. Espada, a former city councilman, will earn $120,000 a year working for the Senate.

Yesterday, the MTA released a new $28 billion, five year plan to improve the New York City bus and subway systems. Included in the plan is the renovation of four subway stations along the 6 line in the Bronx.

BoogieDowner blogger, Erin Cicalese, contacted Community Board 7 about removing unsightly graffiti on a WWI monument on Mosholu Parkway and succeeded in getting help to clean up the monument. The New York Daily News covers Cicalese's story here.

The New York Dormitory Authority plans to spend $637 million on the construction of buildings for public and private universities and nonprofit health care facilities in the Bronx.