Bronx Weekend News Roundup, Feb. 7

From Green Bay to Beloit, from Milwaukee to Madison, frome Brandon to Kenosha, Cheeseheads rejoiced following the Packers 31-25 Super Bowl victory over the Pittsburgh Steelers last night. As a descendant of a long line of Pack fanatics, I can tell you with certainty that Wisconsinites will revel in this moment for months, if not years. Dairyland might not as productive for the next few days, but it will definitely be happier.

OK, back to the Bronx, where this relatively tropical weather (high of 42 degrees today!) will not last as temperatures will drop into the teens mid-week. We might see a small amount of rain/snow overnight.

Story of the Day:
Opponents of the city's plan to shut down John F. Kennedy High School say the Department of Education set the school up for failure. On Thursday evening (technically early Friday morning), the Panel for Education Policy voted eight to four (with one panel member absent) to phase the school out by 2014. Starting next fall, the school will eliminate a class each year.

This type of phase-out has been the fate of most large Bronx schools, as the city continues to push for smaller, themed schools and more charter schools. The teacher's union believes venerable northwest Bronx high school DeWitt Clinton could be next on the chopping block. They say the fact that Clinton's taking on more and more high needs students every year is crippling their chances for success.

Quick Hits:
Two Bronxites were killed overnight in separate fires.One occurred at 192nd Street and Valentine Avenue, the other at 15 North Street.

Cops busted 19 alleged gang members and drug dealers in Soundview last week. It was the culmination of a year-long operation that police say also netted suspects wanted in connection to a handful of murders.

A pothole epidemic compounded by this winter's historically bad weather is wreaking havoc on Bronx vehicles to the consternation of Bronx drivers.

The old PS 31 building near Hostos Community College, once dubbed the "Castle on the Concourse," remains vacant and continues to deteriorate despite past promises by the city to renovate it.

Bronx GOP Chairman Jay Savino spent $8,300 worth of campaign funds on dining, mostly outside of the borough, last year.

A West African immigrant was crushed to death in Hunts Point Saturday while trying to load a vehicle into a container truck.

A 76-year-old Bronx man is suing the NYPD after police, looking for his son, an alleged drug dealer, raided his apartment and accidentally shot him in the mid-section.

Ilia Lopez, a 58-year-old mother of three adult children who live in the Bronx, was killed in a hit-and-run incident in Harlem on Friday morning.

Rapid tax refund outfits are costing low-income taxpayers, including many in the Bronx, a significant amount in fees.

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Bronx News Roundup, Feb. 11

Larry Seabrook, the indicted Bronx councilman, has been asked to step down from his position as vice co-chair of the Black, Latino and Asian caucus. Meanwhile, the behind the scenes jostling to succeed him in the Council has already begun. Names being tossed around include Assemblyman Carl Heastie, the chair of the Bronx Democratic Party.

Still on Seabrook, the media has been lifting the lid on his messy love-life. In 1993 he divorced his wife but somehow neglected to tell her. She found out seven years later.

Bronx Republicans J.C. Polanco and Jay Savino have been served with subpoenas by federal prosecutors investigating a $50 million voting-machine contract the city's Board of Elections awarded a Nebraska company. Polanco is the Bronx Republican commissioner; Savino is the chairman of the Bronx Republican Party. More here.

The Bronx Democratic Party has endorsed Senator Kirsten Gillibrand.

A man is suing a Bronx co-op complex for discarding his deceased father's possessions.

The police are hunting five men suspected of robbing a parking garage in Morrisania last week. After tying up an attendant, the men stole cash and a BMW.

Yesterday's snow storm was welcomed by tire shop owners on Jerome Avenue.

An ice-skating rink has opened on East 161st Street.

BoogieDowner clears up some erroneous information floating around cyberspace about two local supermarkets.

Joshua Clottey, a world-class boxer, has quietly made the Bronx his home these past seven years. Next month, the Ghana-born welterweight is scheduled fight Filipino phenom Manny Pacquiao.

In Throgs Neck, near the Whitestone Bridge, a new golf course is being built. Ferry Point Golf Course is scheduled to open in 2011. Golf legend Jack Nicholas had a hand in the original design - previous plans to build here fell through - and continues to be involved.

A Riverdale couple recently celebrated their 75th wedding anniversary.

Bronx Republicans Featured on BronxTalk

This past Monday night BronxTalk featured an interview with Jay Savino Chairman of the Bronx Republican Party and Anthony Ribustello, former candidate for borough president. They discussed the failed campaign, the future of the party in the Bronx, their endorsement of Michael Bloomberg for mayor, and other topics.

You can see it here.

BronxTalk is seen live each Monday night at 9 p.m. on Cablevision channel 67 in the Bronx and is repeated each day at 9:30am, 3:30pm, and 9:00pm. It is produced by Jane Folloro.

Bronx pols head (another) worst offenders list

In today's NY Post there's a list of state lawmakers who owe the city fines for campaign-finance violations. Five of the top seven worst offenders are from the Bronx. Assemblywoman Carmen Arroyo heads the list with $33,648 in unpaid fines (going back over 15 years). Also up there are State Senators Pedro Espada Jr. and Ruth Hassell-Thompson, and Assemblymen Jose Rivera and Michael Benjamin.

"I guess these guys view these fines as kind of like parking tickets," one government reform advocate told the Post. " People feel they can violate the law with impunity."

More here.

In other political news, the Bronx GOP chairman Jay Savino has decided to endorse Mayor Michael Bloomberg for relection, after weeks of playing hard to get. Savino's support means three of the city's five GOP county chairman are backing Bloomberg, which will allow him to run as a Republican.

Word of Savino's about face doesn't seemed to have reached the Bronx County Young Republican Club, however. As of this morning, the group (who call themselves "a small herd of pachyderms amongst a mass of jackasses") is still hawking Term-Limit Mike Bloomberg buttons on their Web site.

Bronx News Roundup, Feb. 26

Two Bronx men are accused of a hate-crime murder for beating an Ecuadorean immigrant to death in Brooklyn in December while shouting anti-gay and anti-Hispanic slurs.

WNYC's Main Street NY project visited 161st street to ask local businesses about the changes coming in the wake of the new Yankee Stadium, including the proposed rezoning. You can listen in or read the transcript here.

Perhaps you caught Anderson Cooper singling out Bronx Congressman Eliot Engel for arriving a tad early at Obama's speech on Tuesday (if not, the transcript is here; scroll down a bit). Engel, who is known for staking out choice seats at big speeches, fired back today.

Bloomberg is courting recalcitrant Bronx GOP chief Jay Savino along with the other Republican borough chairs as he prepares to run for his third term - but no luck so far.

Australian paper The Age has an article highlighting one of the many Bronx classrooms with a Teach for America recruit behind the desk.

Sustainable South Bronx founder Majora Carter is featured in the second installment of HBO's show "The Black List," airing tonight.

Bronx State Sen. Ruben Diaz, Sr. is balking at proposed tolls for the Harlem and East River bridges; the tolls are part of a plan to close the MTA budget gap and avert drastic fare increases and service cuts.

Bronx News Roundup Feb. 10

Mayor Bloomberg wants to use federal stimulus funds to finish building a $55 million parking garage at the Botanical Garden. BoogieDowner has more on the 6-story project which has run into difficulties in recent months.

Jay Savino, the Bronx Republican party chairman, is unlikely to support Mayor Bloomberg for reelection, says Bob Kappstatter in his weekly column. According to Kappstatter, Bloomberg has to win over three of the city's five GOP county leaders if he wants to run on the Republican ticket.

The Daily News' Bill Egbert has more on the continued resurrection of the Grand Concourse, which is 100 years old this year. He touches on whether or not the northern section of the Concourse will also see improvements. Xavier Rodriguez, district manager of Community Board 5, hopes so. He thinks it would benefit the Fordham Road shopping area. (For the sake of clarification, the Mount Eden-Highbridge neighborhood is in CB 4, not 5, as written in the article.)

The trial of two tenants and a landlord charged with the deaths of two firefighters on Jan. 23, 2005, is coming to a close. The day became know as Black Sunday after a third firefighter died in Brooklyn that day. See here and here.

We missed this at the time, but the Gotham Gazette recently took a detailed look at some of the bills introduced by the City Council in past few months. Among them is a bill by Council member Maria Baez calling for public schools teachers to be issued with parking permits. A Streetblog blogger thinks it would be a disaster.

The owners of Mainland Media have started a social networking Web site for Bronx residents.

Bronx News Roundup for Sept. 8

The Times highlights an exhbit at the Bronx Museum of the Arts: Street Art, Street Life: From the 1950s until now. (Photo above is in the exhibit.)

The race between Efrain Gonzalez and Pedro Espada is considered one of the hottest in the city.
The primary election is tomorrow.

The Norwood News has been inundated with letters complaining about the Select Bus Service along the Bx12 route, but the The Times and now the Daily News have run articles saying passengers are happy with the new system. The Norwood News letter writers, however, focus not on the new system for boarding the bus (getting a receipt from a curbside machine before boarding the bus) but on the fact that residents on the western part of Fordham road heading to Manhattan now have to walk a few blocks to get on the Select Bus.

The chairman of the Bronx Republican Party, Jay Savino, has a big fat crush on Sarah Palin.