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CB6'S GOWANUS CONDITIONS - PAGE 3
STAR REVUE
JULY 2021
INDEPENDENT JOURNALISM
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A RED HOOK WARRIOR
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by Brian Abate
here will be six massive last-mile warehouses open in Red Hook by 2022, totaling more than 3 million square feet. These warehouses include Amazon, UPS and Fedex facilities and right now the plan is for them to bring a lot of trucks in and out of Red Hook every day. Jim Tampakis of Tamco Mechanical, located on Richards Street in Red Hook, has been pushing for last mile warehouses to take advantage of Red Hook's waterfront to help transport materials. This would decrease both pollution and traffic. Right now, our designated truck route runs down Van Brunt Street and over to Bay Street, passing by three Amazon warehouses now under construction, as well as our parks and Rec center. The new truck traffic would lead to numerous issues, including pollution and congestion and would make the street more dangerous for children as well as motorcycle and bicycle riders. Health issues have to be prioritized and doctors have called the neighborhoods surrounding distribution centers “diesel death zones.” On aver-
age, 10 percent of New Yorkers have asthma but 25 percent of children in Red Hook have asthma. Tampakis has made a little progress in his mission on behalf of the neighborhood. Two weeks ago a Cross Harbor Trailer on Barge RoRo Service made a successful test run. “This would use barges to bring in freight to the Red Hook Marine Terminal and down to the Hughes site on Columbia Street,” according to Tampakis. Tampakis went on a walk with local leaders a few weeks ago to discuss suggestions and ideas for how to best deal with the warehouse issue. The walk was joined by members of Community Board 6 and Community Board 7, representatives from the DOT (Department of Transportation) and EDC (Economic Development Corporation.) “I thought it was a positive experience because it brought more awareness to the issues,” Tampakis said. “I think everyone was open to the idea of utilizing the waterfront.” Another possibility brought up during the walk is opening Halleck Street. The street ends because
Jim Tampakis has run a family-owned machine shop on Richards Street since the 1970's.
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Gowanus Canal cleanup on schedule, City behind
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o sooner had Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) regional counsel, Brian Carr, finished giving his update of the Gowanus Canal Superfund cleanup—works are advancing on schedule with no major hiccups—than members of the neighborhood’s Community Advisory Group began venting their grievances. Among other things, members who attended the June 22 virtual meeting expressed to Carr their disappointment in what they described as a failure by the EPA to make New York City comply with its Superfund obligations—particularly the construction of two large retention tanks along the Gowanus Canal that will capture combined sewer overflow into the waterway—and their distrust of the city’s environmental impact statement for the proposed rezoning of Gowanus.
When in France Years of foot dragging by the city, consistently decried by the advisory group, prompted the EPA to issue a unilateral administrative order in March that compelled the city to begin construction on the tanks. At the June meeting, members wanted to know what the hold up was nearly four months later. Some members argued that there seemed to be a lack of commitment by EPA leadership in ensuring that the remedy of the Gowanus Canal was protected from recontami-
by Jorge Bello
nation from the increase in density— and toilet flushes—the neighborhood can expect from the proposed rezoning, which was backed by Community Board 6 after a vote on June 23. “We’re talking about putting more people next to a canal that still has raw sewage flowing into it. What the hell is going on? Maybe it’s because I’m in France, but I feel like coming out with a pitchfork,” said an exasperated Katia Kelly, a member of the advisory group and Gowanus resident. The city asked the EPA in May to clarify some of the language contained in the administrative order, which the agency did on July 2. This will not delay the 2029 completion date set forth in the federal directive, Carr said. “I have every confidence that the tanks will be built.” He also assured the group that the administrative order was issued with the full backing of the EPA at all levels of the command chain, including the agency’s headquarters in Washington. However, Carr advised Gowanus residents to remain vigilant about future instances of noncompliance by the city in the context of the proposed rezoning—especially as related to potential violations of the Clean Water Act—and to voice their demands through avenues outside the community advisory group, such as by writing their local congressman or electing more responsive local leaders into office.
Julia, dear The EPA is currently reviewing the draft environmental impact statement the city released in April, Carr said, adding that the agency expects to use its authority under Superfund to seek clarifications from the DEP on how the rezoning might impact the canal’s remediation. Members of the advisory group repeatedly voiced their dissatisfaction with the accuracy of the impact statement, saying it contained “faulty data” and calling for DEP Commissioner Vincent Sapienza to appear before the group in the near future. “We can’t respond to a comment that the [environmental impact statement] is ‘faulty’ because there’s nothing for us to respond to in that context,” Julia Ehrman, who attended the virtual meeting on behalf of Council Member Brad Lander, explained to the group. Ehrman urged members of the advisory group to be specific in naming their qualms with the impact statement; she explained that some errors were to be expected in a document of its breadth and scope, but that the city had thus far been quick to rectify mistakes pointed out by Lander’s office. An emphatic response came from Linda LaViolette, a group member: “I spent a lot of time reading through the full 1,000 pages. There weren’t a few mistakes, dear, there were many, many mistakes. This level of inconsistency and faulty data is not acceptable.” Over the past weeks, some CAG mem-
bers have specifically taken issue with the DEP’s choice to use rainfall data from 2008 in its assessment of flood risks in the area. Carr acknowledged this concern and suggested residents ask the city to rework the impact statement with data from different rainfall years during the upcoming rezoning meetings. It’s important to speak up, Carr told the group, because the city is only legally bound to produce an environmental impact statement that merely considers the consequences of the proposed rezoning, but it is not obliged to produce an accurate assessment of its impact. “If you guys raise an issue and the city thinks about it but gets it wrong, the city still gets to say that they considered the issue even if they got it wrong.” Calls from residents for the EPA to take an active role in drafting a new version of the environmental impact statement also intensified during the meeting. Carr reiterated the role of the federal government would be to continue to ensure the integrity of the Superfund remedy by making sure the city builds the right infrastructure to contend with increased density in the area, but that it did not have the jurisdiction to further opine on the proposed rezoning. Plus, environmental impact statements of any kind, Carr explained, are typically carried out by a single level of government, in this case the city. That’s why no one thought to involve the EPA from the outset in the crafting of a local government document, he said.
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Red Hook's Stop the Violence Fair by Nathan Weiser
On the last Saturday of June, Red Hook Houses hosted an anti-violence fair in Coffey Park. The Mayor’s Action Plan for Neighborhood Safety (MAP) network engages residents impacted by violence with support services and resources. Many neighborhood and city organizations set up information tables at the fair. There was the Red Hook Community Justice Center, representatives from Brooklyn District Attorney Eric Gonzalez’s office, New York Housing Authority Health Initiatives, NYCHA Resident Economic Empowerment and Sustainability, NYC Sanitation, FDNY, NYC Health, Red Hook Community Resilience Corps, Redemption Church in Red Hook and the NYC Mayor’s Office to end domestic and gender-based violence. On the right is Derick Latif Scott. He is the director/founder of Operation HOOD (Helping The Police Athletic League had an in- Our Own Develop). The other two are in his organization. (photo by Weiser) flatable area where kids could throw a the surrounding neighborhoods. thing is wrong with these people, football. Saturday’s fair was the first one in something has happened to them and Resident leaders in the Red Hook Brooklyn, but they have previously it is on our shoulders to find out what public housing development provid- had one in upper Manhattan and one happened, so that we can start the ed support services to increase safety in the Bronx so far, according to the cure.” awareness, promote healthy relation- Red Hook Justice Center. “When it comes out, the first question ships and food access. Derick Scott, who is the founder of we ask is what is wrong with this kid. The resource fair is part of the Safe Helping Our Own Develop (HOOD), Something has happened to this kid Summer series where communities brought his organization to the fair. and he needs everybody’s help. She across NYC rally in an effort to mitineeds everybody’s help. It is not lon“The message is love,” Scott said. “We gate ongoing local gun violence and ger what we say out of our mouth, it is have to change the narrative. Somepreserve the health and wellness of what we prove in our actions. The founder of the organization said a little thing people can do to improve the community is to clean up in the area and on the street. This is an example to show to the children. He added that ones neighbors in the building and down the block are ones extended families.
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“Freedom is a state of mind, not a place of being,” Scott said. “We all learn from on another. Each one, reach one, to teach one. We have to do this together. It is peace up, guns down.”
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The Mayor's Action Plan sponsored the anti-violence event in Coffey Park
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July 2021
Opinion: Words by George A look at the CB 6 conditions attached to their approval of the Gowanus Rezoning
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he long-planned, top-driven Gowanus rezoning plan is reaching climax this year, as a large group of local, term limited politicians are set to walk out the door.
The first meeting was a well attended affair, where somewhat bewildered locals were fed a pre-packaged plan that was supposedly crafted by local stakeholders a few months before.
pefund Advisory Group, and the lack of NYC cooperation with the EPA is a constant complaint, including accurate information about overflows.
As Gowanus historian Joseph Alexiou once proclaimed a bit ironically at the Brooklyn Historical Society, the story of New York is the story of real estate.
Pratt Institute presented a slideshow presentation of the plan in front of the crowd, but questions and comments were not allowed.
The Board requests EPA’s written review of the City’s CSO projections,
Comment: What the hell are additional assurances?
9 - Review of Public Place.
Probably inevitable after the communities of Park Slope and Carroll Gardens moved from squalor into luxury as the bankrupt 1970s became the luxurious 1990's and 2000s, Gowanus, smack between those monied communities, has become treasured land for builders of luxury residential towers.
Instead, the residents were shepherded to various and separate tables where minders pushed the residents into outcomes desired by the process.
Commment: Nice request. What will CB 6 do with the information. Their main power is simply advisory.
Three years later, we here at the StarRevue received the following press release, which began:
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE – November 20, 2013 Contact: Alex Moore Office: (718) 499-1090 amoore@council.nyc.gov Community Planning Process for Gowanus Area to Begin December 9th “Bridging Gowanus” will give residents a say on the future of their neighborhood. End result will be a community supported blueprint for an environmentally safe, vibrant, and sustainable Gowanus to inform de Blasio Administration Bridging Gowanus was a top down process that was thrust upon the neighborhood.
Community Board 6 began the final process with an approval of the rezoning with conditions. What follows is my take of the conditions, as space permits.
1 - Accountability To hold the City and all parties accountable for the commitments they make as a part of the Rezoning, the Board demands that the City support and fund the Gowanus Zoning Commitment Task Force. Comment: The Brooklyn Bridge Park Corporation was forced by State Senator Daniel Squadron to create a local advisory group to form to oversee their operations. I went to a couple of meetings. They got absolutely no cooperation from the Corporation and nothing they said was ever listened to.
2 - Combined Sewer Overflows CSOs are a significant and ongoing source of pollution in the Gowanus Canal, and the Rezoning must result in a net decrease in CSOs.The Board cannot support the Rezoning without independent review of the City’s projections and City compliance with its legal obligation to control outfalls. Comment: I am a member of the Su-
4 - Compliance with EPA The Board demands that the City fully comply with the EPA’s order to complete the retention tanks on the EPAmandated timeline. Comment: Meaningless. The EPA has already said they would take the city to court if there is no compliance.
5 - Unified Stormwater Rule To ensure that the Rezoning does not result in a net increase in CSOs, the City must require the Unified Stormwater Rule to be in effect prior to the first site sewer connection in the Rezoning area. Comment: According to the DEP website, this rule will be in effect this year. New buildings won't happen for at lesat a couple years, so yet another meaningless condition.
6 - Implementation. Irrespective of its initial projections, the City must ensure that CSO impacts are continually modeled, monitored, and timely reported, and that each sewer connection is modelled for its individual impact on sewer capacity. Comment: The EPA, which reigns sovereign over NY City and State, is already going to be demanding this. So again, big whoop-de-do.
7 - Sewer system capacity The DEIS identifies two water treatment sites that serve Gowanus and asserts that they have capacity to cover an anticipated increase in sewage. However, the DEIS does not study the capacity for regular dry day sewage flow from Gowanus to the Red Hook Treatment Plant through existing underground viaducts. The Board demands that the final EIS correct this oversight. Comment: OK, so study. Big deal.
8 - Environmental Remediation
HOTD0G AND MUSTARD BY MARC JACKS0N ¡DÁMEL , O MUSTARD! ¡OH N0, HAS L0 VOY A WHY ARE Y0U PUeST0 EL CÓM i C MeSSiNG ARReGLAR! EN eSPAÑ0L! WITH THE TV ¡O0PS! REMOTe?
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Comment: The Superfund's chief engineer made some comments about this last year and the city and state tried to censure him. Once the rezoning is approved there will be nothing the EPA can do about this since they are tasked with mostly just the Canal's remediation.
10 - EPA Review of Brownfield Development Projects. The Board demands that EPA review individual development applications in advance of permitting to ensure that proposals are consistent with the Superfund cleanup and public health. Comment: Who is going to pay for these reviews? It is not part of the Superfund duties.
More This is only about a third of the conditions. Much of the rest have to do with housing and culture - all things that are written into the actual EIS (which is the text of the rezoning, actually). To me, the worst of it is what I consider a bribe given to the local public housing projects, paid by the City. If what it takes to fix up my building is a giveaway of nearby public goods to private developers, then every public housing resident will clamor for a neighborhood-busting rezoning in their neighborhood. The correct answer is to treat all public housing equally, and get them all up to snuff, as Nydia Velazquez recently demanded on her recent tour of the Red Hook Houses, demanding $40 billion federal dollars for NYCHA.
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The Board’s conditional support for the proposed development at Public Place is contingent on the EPA’s continued review of remediation at the site and its ultimate conclusion that the remediation is compatible with the proposed residential, educational, and recreational uses.
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Toll Brothers, one of the country's largest developers planned a huge development adjacent to the Canal in 2008. But a couple years later, partly due to the work of Congresswoman Nydia Velazquez, the Canal was named a Superfund site, a designation fought by the Bloomberg administration, and Toll abandoned Gowanus for the then new Brooklyn Bridge Park, where they built condos and the hotel.
Now we are in the stretch run of the rezoning process. Governnment's desired outcome has become 30 story residential buildings, the majority of the units overpriced luxury units, no doubt a large number will be bought by investors looking for safe places to park their money. Back in 2016, they were only talking about 12 story buildings, but inflation has taken root as the cost of land speculation has boosted land costs.
3 - EPA review
The Board understands that the Rezoning is an opportunity to repair decades of pollution, but additional assurances are needed to ensure that remediated sites are fit for residential use.
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the long-term waterways would save money for last-mile warehouses by avoiding bridge and tunnel tolls.
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it leads into Red Hook Park, however that part of the park hasn’t been tended to in years. It’s overgrown with plants and is closed to the public. Opening up Halleck Street would give trucks another route to use which would decrease congestion and reduce the number of main trucks going down main streets like Van Brunt Street and Court Street. However, as of now the Parks Department has no intention of doing that. In addition to the walk there was a community meeting held on June 16th called “Community Conversation: Last Mile Delivery Warehouses.” Some of the key issues mentioned about the warehouses were destruction of historic neighborhoods, few and low-paying jobs at the warehouses, noise and air pollution and decreased quality of life. The meeting once again helped bring awareness to the issues Red Hook will face as more and more warehouses move into the neighborhood. Just over 100 people viewed the online the meeting and 80 stayed till it ended over two hours later, according to Tampakis. A study done by five Columbia University students echoed the issues that were brought up in the meeting. “There is no clear definition of a lastmile warehouse for the city,” the study said. “The result is numerous loopholes that allow many companies to build these facilities ‘as-right’ without the consent of community boards, zoning boards, or the city, leaving communities without a say in what happens in their own neighborhood.” This means that last-mile warehouses aren’t closely regulated which allows them to do what’s best for them rather than what’s best for the community. After conducting their study the Columbia University students recommended “a more rigorous consideration of the currently optional night-time and electric vehicle programs within the city. We also encourage considerations into the potential use of rail and especially maritime transportation as the majority of these facilities have access to a waterfront.” These suggestions are logical since the last mile warehouses in Red Hook are all close to the waterfront. In the short-term it may seem more expensive since they would have to install cranes to move materials. However, in
“Tolls for a tractor trailer coming in from Elizabeth NJ to Brooklyn are above $150 per round trip and there would be lots of trucks making thattrip every day,” Tampakis says. “Amazon has signed 20 year leases and over that time the cost would be amortized.” Perhaps an environmentally concerned city could chip in as well. “One of the toughest things is a lot of the time, people just aren’t open to doing things differently,” Tampakis said. “They may not have used waterways in other locations and so it's not in their toolbox.” In addition to pushing for maritime alternatives, Tampakis also wants them to use electric vehicles. Another possibility is using bikes whenever possible. Either option would be much greener than relying solely on trucks. While Hank Gutman, the current DOT commissioner, stresses the importance of trucks adhering to laws and sticking to their designated routes I saw multiple trucks driving on streets they weren’t supposed to be on, while driving in Red Hook with Tampakis. Right now there is not strict enforcement of truck routes and the problem will only get worse. Tampakis stressed the importance of enforcing these laws. He also spoke about what he believes is one of the root causes of all the last-mile warehouses moving into Red Hook. “I think that people here are fed up with rising prices,” Tampakis said. “The people who sold the land that’s going to be used for the warehouses had to spend $15,000 per year on flood insurance. Small businesses have been hurt financially so it makes sense that they would sell. It would be nice if the DDC [Department of Design and Construction] can install or design a FEMA [Federal Emergency Management Agency] approved system that reduces the cost of flood insurance.” The current flood protection plan in Red Hook uses temporary Tiger Dams as well as pre-deployed Hesco flood barriers. There are brand new Hesco barriers on Imlay Street, Summit Street and on Clinton Wharf. Even in the aftermath of Hurricane Sandy, flood protection is an issue that still needs to be addressed in Red Hook. In the end, only new laws will force Amazon and others to make changes.
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Parks Dept. reminds us that Red Hook has ballfields
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The Brooklyn Parks Department Office along with the Environmental Protection Agency held a zoom meeting on June 15 to give an update on the construction of the Red Hook Ballfields. The first community update meeting about the Red Hook Ballfields was held in 2015. The EPA deemed that the fields needed to be remediated due to led contamination. As of now, they have updates for when the first three phases will be completed but not the fourth phase of the complex. There were 54 people who listened into this virtual update meeting. Community members, representatives from teams and area organizations as well as Maisha Morales from Jabari Brisport’s office and Dan Wiley from Nydia Velazquez’s office were among the viewers. The timeline of the various phases were pushed back due to budget cuts. Parks claims to have hired extra workers over the summer to at least meet a delayed schedule. “I just want to remind everyone that our parks workers have been working throughout the whole pandemic, and that they are essential workers, so I just want to give respect to our operations staff,” Chief of Staff to Brooklyn Parks Commissioner Davey Ives said. Daniel Gaughan, who is the on scene coordinator from the EPA, went through some of the history of the site and why EPA got involved. The whole complex except for Field 9 and the track has been closed due to lead contamination and there are four phases that will modernize and fix the fields. “In 2014, New York State Department of Environmental Conservation referred the site to the EPA,” Gaughan said. They found that the top six inches of ballfields 5-8 were highly contaminated. That was why they could not stay open. Field nine was able to stay open since the contamination is is further down. “It is under formal EPA oversight,” Gaughan said. “We have an order signed with parks to do this work. Specifically 5-8 we have built up high levels in the surface. We have built signs around the facility to let people know why it is being closed.” There will also be at least a 12 inch cover of clean material with soil, fill and turf to cover the site. If anything goes wrong, DEC will provide oversight in the future. Terry Naranjo, who is a design director on the Brooklyn team of the parks capital division, went over some of the public safety measures that have been part of the construction process due to the contamination. One public safety measure has included dust monitoring. There has been continuous perimeter dust monitoring during activities where soil id disturbed. To control the dust there are soil pile tarps, frequent spraying of ex-
Red Hook Star-Revue
by Nathan Weiser
posed areas with water and a perimeter fencing dust curtain. They have been monitoring the air quality daily since the construction started. Over the last year, they have covered up the piles of soil to try to contain the dust and have watered it down to make sure the dust does not rise up.
Update on the phases According to Ives, when they last updated the public they said that phase one would be finished over the summer, but now that is not the case. Another complication is more paper work with EPA involved. Phase one includes ball fields 5-8 along Bay Street and soccer field 9. They are expected to reopen this fall. There will be synthetic turf with new backstops on all fields, perimeter fencing, which is already up, accessible dugouts and new trees, which will provide shade around the seating areas. A lot of curbs in the dugouts were completed and some of the drinking fountains and spray fixtures have been completed as well. The ramps, staircases and electrical work is also finished. From now until completion in the fall, they will be back filling the clean soil, which is an important safety measure to prevent access from underground contaminants. They will also be installing the turf, backstops, more fencing, benches, bike racks, bleachers, exterior pavements and plantings. They were originally targeting phase two to be finished the end of this year but it is now pushed back to the spring of 2022. Phase two includes ball field nine and soccer field two. The Red Hook Recreation Area Track 1, Soccer Fields 3-5, and Ballfields 1-4 Reconstruction project (PHASE 3) is set to begin construction on July 6th, 2021. This project will reconstruct the track & field and convert three soccer fields and four ballfields from natural turf to synthetic turf at the Red Hook Recreation Area. Starting July 6th, 2021, the site will be closed to the public for the duration of construction (through spring 2023estimated). Signs have been installed in the park alerting the public to impending construction on July 6th. Phase three, which includes the track that surrounds the soccer field as well as the four baseball fields near IKEA, is now slated to begin construction this summer and be finished in spring of 2023. According to Naranjo, in their site plan for phase two along Bay Street they will have an improved accessible entrance leading to a seating plaza and their will be a retaining wall. There were also be a preserved grove of existing trees. So far in phase two, there has been tree pruning and protection of the trees. Much of the utility work has
The slow march to opening day, five years on (photo by George Fiala)
been completed. Many curbs are finished, there is a new entrance from Bay Street, there are new LED light fixtures on Field Nine and there has been installation of storm water lines. What still has to be done in phase two includes site grading of soccer field two, constructing the pedestrian paths and installing path lighting and drinking fountains. “Phase three is the largest component and we are excited about it being able to go into construction,” Naranjo said. “It is now in the pre-construction phase. We are hoping to begin construction in July. The anticipated completion is spring 2023.”
2021 version of the fitness area in Bush Clinton Park. They can customize it for different ages so people can utilize various workout stations. In phase three, there will be new turf fields for ball fields 1-4, plenty of seating, game tables on the perimeter, bleachers near the fields, “shade trees” around the perimeter to help cool off and a misting station, which can be found in all four phases. Phase four is the final phase and includes soccer fields one and six, which will both have new synthetic turf. There will also be adult fitness stations near soccer field six off of Court Street.
The design process takes about one year and procurement takes nine months to a year. Procurement is the process of getting a contractor that is capable and certified of doing the work and that meets all of the standards. Once procurement is complete, construction will begin.
There will be new accessible entrances, lots of new seating for the public including a revamped seating area along Bay Street, which will have an area for food trucks to line up. There will be tables in this area for people who are either watching or playing to fuel and enjoy food from the trucks.
For phase three, they were going to meet with the contractor on site a few weeks after the meeting. They didn’t know an exact date when the construction would begin.
The design of phase four was finished in the spring of this year. As of now, they are in the procurement phase, and they are not sure when construction will begin since it depends how long procurement takes.
The soccer field will be improved and enlarged with new synthetic turf and there will be a brand new track surrounding the soccer field as well. The field will be able to be used for football and rugby in addition to soccer. The track, which has been open so far to runners, will have to be closed once the construction begins over the summer for phase three. “The track will be closed from this summer until spring 2023,” Ives said. “It’s a necessary evil of the construction. The field that is surrounded by the running track will get brand new lighting so that the area can be utilized at night for recreation and many different sports. Near the track there will also be an adult fitness area and improved areas for picnicking. Adult fitness can include pull up bars, dip bars and it will be essentially a
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“We are very excited,” Naranjo said. “This is going to be one of the premier recreation destinations in the city and with your patience it will eventually get there. We all hoped it would be sooner, but it is coming.” Besides the Red Hook Ball Fields, another issue that was addressed was the Coffey Park bathroom and sprinklers not being operational. Parks has been working with Carlos Menchaca’s office to get it working again, but they do not know exactly what is causing the electricity to go down. During the mayoral campaign, former City Commissioner Kathryn Garcia was asked about the slowness of agencies completing projects. The entire mishigoss that you have just read has taken years longer than the three Amazon warehouses rapidly being completed right around the parks.
July 2021, Page 5
Motorcycle Activism in Red Hook by Brian Abate
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heryl Stewart is a Red Hook resident and motorcycle activist. She is the founding member of multiple organizations including Sirens Women’s Motorcycle Club, New York Motorcycle & Scooter Task Force and Riders Against Congestion. Sirens began in 1986 with Stewart as founding member and currently has more than 60 members. In addition to advocating for motorcycles they advocate for equality and have ridden in the Pride March since 1986. They also do charitable work like transporting milk to milk banks and volunteering at Camp Simcha, which was created to help children battling serious illnesses have fun and make friends. New York Motorcycle & Scooter Task Force’s goal is to work with leaders and lawmakers to promote policies that improve safety for motorcycle and scooter riders, which is how Stewart came in contact with Cesar Zuniga, the Executive Director of Community Board 7 and a recent City Council candidate. He supports motorcycles as a fuel efficient transportation option, believes they are congestion-reducing and thinks they can free up more parking spaces. He also supports motorcycleonly parking. “I think one of the issues is certain riders give us a bad reputation and that’s what people think of when they think
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of motorcyclists,” Zuniga said. “They don’t think of a teacher or an artist and certainly not a politician.” Stewart brought up the possibility of “creating a New York City stunt park to get kids riding illegal dirt bikes and ATVs off of public streets.” Zuniga voiced his agreement and said it could be similar to skate parks which are now common throughout New York City. One has been planned for the park across from Tesla but as with other Parks projects in the neighborhood, has been extremely slow in happening. “Motorcycles are much more fuelefficient than cars, they can help with congestion and they can free up parking spaces,” Stewart said. It would be especially beneficial to open up more parking spaces at this time as New York City’s Open Streets program is now permanent, which has made it even more difficult to find parking. These changes would also improve safety conditions for riders. “I think we need to have motorcycleonly parking at select corners,” Stewart said. “So many times when motorcycles are sandwiched between cars they get knocked down which can damage them as well as helmets. A lot of time riders aren’t aware of that damage until they’re riding again, which can be very dangerous. This would also keep pedestrians and oth-
Cheryl Stewart introduces Cesar Zuniga to talk motorcycles (photo by Brian Abate)
er vehicles safe because it’s easy to see around a motorcycle that’s parked on a street corner. A car or truck would block visibility.” In addition to protecting the safety of riders, motorcycles are much more environmentally friendly than cars and Stewart has fought for motorcycles to have 100 percent tax exemption from congestion pricing, given how much smaller they are than cars. The tax exemption also encourages people to use motorcycles instead of cars, which in turn would be environmentally friendly. “I feel very confident that we’ll make these changes because these are all very logical ideas,” Zuniga said. “I know there’s a lot of B.S. from the DOT [Department of Transportation]
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but we’re going to have a brand new government in 2022 and I’m confident we’ll get this done.” Zuniga also encouraged those in attendance to go out and make their voices heard in order to get the attention of other politicians as well as the general public. He thinks these issues haven’t gotten enough attention yet but that can change quickly ahead of the upcoming elections and Stewart agreed. “I think we need changes,” Stewart said. “If politicians are serious about the Green New Deal [which calls for the government to significantly reduce greenhouse gas emissions,] we should be treated as the solution and stop being treated as part of the problem.”
July 2021
Brooklyn Artists Put On live Show
T
he coronavirus pandemic devastated New York City’s arts and entertainment sector. It is finally coming back to life thanks to COVID-19 vaccinations. Eighteen artists from Red Hook's TI Art Studios presented their first art show – “20202021” – in more than a year. The June exhibition featured various media from artists Julia Whitney Barnes, Jon Bunge, Marsha Clark-Lind, Katherine Forst, Spring Hofeldt, Katherine Keltner, Brian Kenny, Katerina Lanfranco, Janice McDonnell, Elizabeth Meggs, Spencer Merolla, Elise Putnam, Mike Sorgatz, Syma, Traci Talasco, Linda Tharp, Vincent Tsao, and Ward Yoshimoto. Holding a show stemmed from their weekly Zoom calls that began at the beginning of the lockdown.
“The show is an acknowledgment of all that time together,” said McDonnell, who organized the exhibit. “It is a testament and tribute to resilience, fueled by the warm kindness of community.”
The oil on canvas painting McDonnell submitted for the show was called “JoJo and Friends” from her series, “JoJo Stays Home.” In the witty still-life painting, JoJo the felt owl sits among pieces of butternut squash that are similar in size to her. “Food was a matter of concern,” McDonnell recalled about the early months of the pandemic. “The grocery stores were scary. There were long lines once you got there and empty shelves oftentimes when you got inside. And deliveries were hard to come by.” During the pandemic, McDonnell received copious amounts of squash, apples, and onions in her weekly food delivery. “So, I did what any painter would do – I started painting them,” she said of how the produce soon became props. “The relationship between this playful little creature and the sustenance and safety that the vegetables represented became an important
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by Erin DeGregorio part of the painting.”
Human figures emerge in the gestural landscape of color of Sorgatz’s expressionistic gouache paintings. Their identities, according to the Carroll Gardens artists, are a mysterious, universal, and timeless image of humanity. “The concept that kept coming back to me was the idea of voices and how we’ve been on the call,” he continued, “just listening to each other for so long and how nice it was to hear other people’s voices outside of our house.”
Sculptor and installation artist Talasco’s work uses architecture as a social political space to deal with matters such as female identity and power imbalances. The work she created for the Sweet Lorraine Gallery – “99.44% Pure and Other White Lies” – used bars of Ivory soap to form cinder blocks. “Language and titles are really important in my work, so I started investigating the color white specifically. I was interested in how it has historically become synonymous with things that are good and pure … such as ‘lily white,’ ‘white as snow,’ or even ‘white lies,’” Talasco said. “The title uses Ivory soap’s advertising slogan, and the cinder blocks represent how these harmful ideas have become systemic structures really ingrained within our society.”
with the sculpture, itself, the shadows and the movement, I hope to engage the viewer on several levels.” Bed-Stuy artist Meggs created a diptych with two interrelated pieces titled “Make Haste Slowly” and “Voice of the People,” which were based loosely on themes of connections and community.
“The impulse to be playful was a reaction to all the sadness and trauma of the past year,” Meggs said. “I love working non-representationally because different interpretations are highly possible.”
After months of physical isolation and remote conversations, a physical book – with the same title as the exhibition – was also created to document the unique moment in time experienced by all of the participating artists. Yoshimoto photographed much of the artwork for the book and Meggs wrote the book’s introduction. “I never would have imagined this show or the book happening back in March – or anything that has happened, actually,” said Sorgatz, who designed the 48-page book. “It’s been an amazing experience in the middle of a horrible time.” The book can be purchased online via Blurb (https://www. blurb.com/b/10751142-twenty-twenty-twenty-one).
Bunge celebrated nature by creating a hanging sculpture made of different curly willow branches that “honor the energy and spiritual harmony of natural forms.” When the lights were on at the gallery, shadows were naturally projected onto the nearby walls. “I find the contrast between the artwork and the shadows to be very striking, and the shadows themselves to be very mysterious. With the flick of a light switch, they are gone,” Bunge explained. “The sculpture pauses, speeds up and slows down and even reverses direction,” he continued. “In working
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Janice McDonell with her squash (photo by DeGregorio)
July 2021, Page 7
Hip Hop Has Found its Princess on Planet Her
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by Roderick Thomas (rtroderickthomas@gmail.com)
ust 3 years ago Amala Dlamini, famously known as Doja Cat could have been described as a humorous and talented niche musician. In some ways Doja Cat is an unlikely music star, however considering all her talents, ‘marketability’ and how well she mixes her various genre influences, it’s surprising she wasn’t famous sooner. On June 25, 2021 the “Streets” musician released her 3rd album Planet Her, a follow up to the commercial success of her second LP Hot Pink. With Planet Her, Doja Cat proves her previous successes weren’t flukes and that she isn’t simply riding the current wave of female rap popularity. On Planet Her, Doja Cat solidifies her musical signature, as a distinct sound that reaches the masses. Her 3rd album sonically catapults her into a category of her own, she plays masterfully in spaces few other mainstream rappers have been able to skillfully occupy. Let’s take a moment to understand the significance of Planet Her to hip hop and beyond, and why it may be one of the best commercial albums of 2021.
For some artists, their involvement in the creation of music often begins at one level, vocal performance (with varying degrees of skill). Yes, Doja’s glossy pop star ready image could have some mistake her for a pop music figurehead, detached from the roots of music making. However, Doja’s background in instrumental production gives her an added skillset which sets her apart from many of her contemporaries. In addition to her knowledge of production, Doja Cat doesn’t shy away from blending genres, and she does it quite well. The music industry and hip hop specifically, has not always had a great relationship with genre blending women. Only in more recent times have more female rappers been able to find mainstream success by mixing genres. The sorting of music into distinct categories has served as a categorization tool, but also
“Woman Walks Ahead”, by Gene Bray I saw a great movie on Showtime on demand. “Woman Walks Ahead” It’s a true story about a woman painter who goes to the Sioux Reservation to do a portrait of Chief Sitting Bull. A few years after he led his warriors at Custer’s last stand. But it’s not really about “that.” It’s really about showing what a Chief like Sitting Bull was really like. This movie is “Big Medicine.” It is also about showing the different natures of the natives and the whites. And of course; it is a love story. The painter Catherine Weldon [ played by Jessica Chaistain ] knows noth-
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as a barrier for Black artists especially. Essentially, Pop music is deemed white music, while hip hop and r&b is Black music. This rule has been applied on a race basis first, regardless of the actual music genre an artist produces. The exceptions to this happen only when there’s a blatant push to market said Black artist to ‘whiter’ audiences (Doja Cat for example), or if the Black musician’s genre is too divergent from hip hop and r&b, like rock music for example. With Planet Her, despite its consistent hip hop elements, the album is currently classified on many platforms as Pop.
In the past, genre blending hip hop artists were mostly appreciated on the outer edges of mainstream commercial success. 15 to 20 years ago Doja Cat could have been seen as hard to market. Is she a singer or a rapper? Is she pop or hip hop?. Today, thanks to artists like Lauryn Hill, Andre 3000, Drake and Nicki Minaj, artists like Doja Cat have a much easier time navigating the music business as genre blending, hip hop musicians. Currently, hip hop is more focused on mood setting vs genre purity and exclusivity. Planet Her is quite frankly the most cohesive amalgamation of popular genres I’ve heard in the past decade. While Doja Cat’s consistent ingredient is hip hop, she stirs in punk, pop, r&b, and pop-rock vocals with beautiful synchronicity, all while spitting lightning fast raps. And for those who are partial to clever wordplay, her rap lyrics are decorated with witty, bold metaphors that may require a second or third listen to understand –– “you just wanna pop up on these clowns, you the batman.”
Doja’s singing voice is light and clean, ethereal sounding. The quality of her soprano is reminiscent of many of the sounds of the late 90’s and very early 2000’s pop-rock/pop-folk records, “Kiss Me” by Sixpence None the Richer as an example. Her influences are quite audible, however she doesnt
ing about natives. She just assumes they are, well, not as smart as her. She meets Sitting Bull [ played by Michael Greyeyes ] digging potatoes, in white man’s clothes. She tries to sweet talk him into getting his portrait done And the Chief puts her in her place immediately. Gently. Sweetly With a few short sentences..
A Chief is always a Chief.
The big difference between natives and whites is….Natives listen when talking. And not just with their ears. They listen with their eyes. And they give you plenty of time to finish. Then they think before speaking. Talking with them is “Big Medicine.” They all have a quiet dignity. Their handshakes are sincere. To get a hand-
run away or lose herself in them.
Influences accounted for, she still delivers a distinct Doja Cat sound. Perhaps this is most noticeable on her song “Get Into It (yuh).” On the record Doja raps in a very recognizable pattern made popular by rap queen Nicki Minaj. She raps with a similar playful aggression that escalates, then ends with a loud inhale (see Bottoms Up ft. Nicki Minaj). Another noticeable rap influence is perhaps her Kendrick Lamar influence. I would argue Kendrick Lamar is probably her most audible, though less obvious hip hop influence. Currently, Doja Cat is the most versatile rapper to impact mainstream female rap in the last decade. The comparisons to Nicki Minaj are inescapable for any female rapper, and while this comparison may cast a shadow on other rappers, for Doja, she actually shines in the face of the comparison. I’d say, where Nicki Minaj is more Jay Z/ Foxy Brown (hip hop), with Britney Spears/ Cyndi Lauper (pop), Doja Cat is more Nicki Minaj/Kendrick Lamar (hip hop) with Little Dragon/ Avril Lavigne (pop).
What sets Doja apart is how well she synthesizes distinct sounds into genre balance. Planet Her is most definitely a let it play, skip no tracks album. However, I do have some current favorites. On the album opener “Woman,” we hear Doja Cat effortlessly flex her musicality and give us an afrobeat record. On “Been Like This,” her soft soprano floats above ambient sounds and percussion, as she sings about a change in the behavior of a lover. And lastly, “Get Into It (Yuh)” showcases Doja at her most punky and playful.
Doja Cat is a fulfillment of decades long influence and work of rap predecessors who helped create more space for dynamic talent to be commercially viable and mainstream. Planet Her is everything we loved and appreciated about mainstream hip hop, pop-rock, pop-r&b and indie-pop over the last 15 years. Enjoy
shake like that would be “Big Medicine’’ for you. Especially nowadays. One group lives in harmony with nature. They talk to their horses like they talk to people. They listen to the eagle and understand what it has to tell them. [ The Eagle really does speak to them.] They listen and learn from the thunder. People who worshiped the buffalo. And showed gratitude to it.
And the other group? Well they don’t shake hands like that. And talking with them, well it sure aint medicine. In fact it leaves you feeling sick. One group saw nothing wrong with shooting 1000 buffalo a day and skinning the hide. Leaving the carcass to rot. One thousand a day, every day, for ten years. Until there were only a hand-
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ful left. Shooting them while knowing this was the food of the natives. They actually thought they were doing “God’s Work.” Exercising dominion over all the animals of the earth. Because the natives were considered animals too.
Now soldier Silas Groves [ played by Sam Rockwell ] tells us of the atrocities committed by the natives.True enough. But the difference is, the natives see a white person and are willing to be friends. But the whites [ well 99% of them ] hate all ‘indians’. Another starring role is the Land. And the Sky. And the rivers.. We see how we were meant to live. Gazing at the thunderstorm far off.
(continued on next page) July 2021
Intikana, Taino from the Bronx, by Michael Fiorito
I met the rapper Intikana through a series of mutual connections; some from a New York based Taíno community and some from musicians we both know. Born and raised in the Bronx, Intikana went to P.S. 76, M.S. 135, then to Dewitt Clinton High School. As a professional recording artist, Intikana has collaborated with legends such as Dead Prez, Keith Murray, Murda Mook, Chris Rivers, Abiodun Oyewole (The Last Poets), Vaughn Benjamin aka Akae Beka (Midnite), Dinco D (Leaders of The New School), and Vordul Mega (Cannibal Ox). His EP “Native Eyez” was nominated for three Native American Music Awards (“Best Music Video”, “Best Rap Recording” & “Best Historical / Linguistic Recording”). I spoke with Intikana on a Saturday in mid-June. “Are you a New Yorker?” “My grandparents moved from Puerto Rico to The Bronx in the 1950s. My Mom was born and raised in The Bronx. My dad was born in Queens but raised in The Bronx.” “Have you ever been to Puerto Rico?” “When I was a kid, I spent summers in Puerto Rico. Borikén is actually the original Taíno name of Puerto Rico. The Taíno were the first Indigenous people to encounter Columbus. The Europeans have had a long history of committing atrocities on the island. Intikana often writes about the island’s history of social injustice. “What was it like growing up in the Bronx?” “It made me who I am. I will always love my city. Someone once told me where you’re from feeds you. Growing up in the Bronx fed me. It taught me survival. Taught me about life.” “When you say, the neighborhood taught you how to survive, what do you mean?” “It taught me how to be strong in challenging situations. I experienced a lot
(continued from page 3) Black clouds on the move; dropping rain. Flashes of lightning followed by rumbles of thunder. . Being with Sitting Bull out here, Catherine begins to fall in love. How could she not. The Chief is so down to earth. Wise. Heroic. He’s even kept his sense of humor. Oh, and he is really easy to look at too. Even though she’s in her early 30s I’d guess; it’s her first time being
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in The Bronx. When I was a kid, my father was in prison. I was thirteen when he came home. On the weekends, I used to stay with him in the Mill Brook Projects in the South Bronx. One day, we went to the park with my family. While there, a little boy had hit my sister in the face and made her cry. My dad was upset and confronted the boy’s father. The guy said something threatening to take things to another level. In response, my father punched him. The guy dropped to the floor and we walked away. When leaving the park, the guy got up and pulled out a gun. Then he started running at us claiming to be a cop. He pointed the gun at my dad, my uncle, and then aimed it at my face. Suddenly, the officer emptied the entire gun, shooting multiple bullets. Luckily, I was only grazed on my arm. It wasn’t a direct shot. However, the man shot my dad. One bullet struck my father in the leg which thankfully went in and out. The guy with the gun turned out to be an off-duty corrections officer. He was sentenced to a year in jail for reckless endangerment. Not a year for shooting my dad but rather a year for endangering the lives of everyone else in the park.” “Did these experiences inspire your interest in rap?” “Definitely. But let me take a step back. I was close to my grandfather. He was a deep-thinking man. He taught me how to play chess and reflect on my approach to everything. He got extremely sick from diabetes when I was twelve. When I went to see him in the hospital, he didn’t recognize me at first. Slowly, he began to remember who I was, but the nurses forced me to leave the room. This was an immensely powerful experience for me. My reaction to the emotion was to start writing about it. Also, when I was going to high school, rapping was a way for me to verbally defend myself. At first rapping was a way for me to find my voice, but then it grew into something that helped me to discover myself. Music also kept me focused. Eventually, I
in love. And a woman in love is a wonderful sight. It’s so sweet watching her fall deeper and.deeper. The deeper she falls; the more beautiful she becomes. It’s sweet. And it’s sad.. And the Chief is also.falling in love.The electricity between them slowly grows and grows until it’s like lighting. This is a movie with 2 heroes. Two beautiful heroes.. . Look and listen to the Chief give a speech at the end. One hundred and three.words Every…. one worthy to be
started to get more into poetry. I also learned more about theater and film. I wrote a play called Penumbra, which included music, poetry, and monologues. Penumbra also had dancers and live musicians. I toured the play around the country in places such as Alaska, California, Chicago, New York, Utah, Colorado, and as far as Ecuador. My friend Bamboo MC helped me find the title Penumbra. Penumbra means a shadow of a shadow.” “Who were your inspirations? What kind of music do you listen to?” “When I was younger, I was engrossed in Hip Hop: Nas, Tupac, Biggie, Jay-Z, Busta Rhymes and many others. I did my homework. I studied all the artists. Then I checked out older albums. At seventeen, I interned at BMG, the record label. There I helped with promotions for “The Neptunes present... Clones” album by Pharrell and Chad Hugo. I spent a whole day with both managing the line for autographs at their in-store event. For a young kid, these moments were life-changing. This would all prove to have a positive impact on my networking and collaborations. “I also spent time at the Apollo Theater. That’s where I got to meet Sway. I broadened my interests, studying jazz, blues, soul, roots reggae, and bomba, which is a form of Afro-Borikén music. I was so hungry and kept growing and learning. There was an artist named Vaughn Benjamin who founded a group called Midnite and later changed his name to Akae Beka. He was a significant inspiration for me. His intelligence, style, and overall mission was powerful to me. We collaborated on a song called “Meditation” which features Stic of the legendary Hip-Hop group Dead Prez as well as Aza Lineage from Kingston, Jamaica. Only months after releasing the song, he sadly transitioned (died) in 2019. “Through music, I’ve been able to travel and see the world. Which is such a huge blessing. In South America, for example, I participated in important
engraved in gold. Dressed in a beautiful, ceremonial, brilliantly colored; crafted by an artist, coat made from Buffalo Hide And a Feathered Headdress. Bigger than Life. Every inch a Chief. And compare that with our political leaders. Dressed by fashion consultants. Down to the tie clasp. And who babble nonstop.. Meaningless words written by speechwriters.. Towards the end when everything is ready to blow, Sitting Bull drapes a large Crimson blanket around his bare chest
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Indigenous ceremonies. It was during this time that I received my spiritual name, Intikana.” “Can you tell me about your songs that involve your Taíno origins?” “I wrote a song called ‘Native Eyez’ which is also the title track for a project I did in 2013. It was created to raise awareness of native culture and its connection to the street. How the arriving conquerors replaced the nature world, the jungle, and the forest, with the concrete jungle. I then did music videos for this project. The mission was to showcase and highlight our global interconnectedness as Indigenous peoples. Not just for Taínos but for Indigenous people everywhere. I also did a music video with an artist from Australia named Provocalz. The song is called ‘ Survivors’ and is part of a native music project called ‘Only Built for Koori Linx.’ The song speaks about how much Indigenous people had to endure simply to survive. My interests in social justice have inspired me to keep learning, to remain a student.” “What has your Taíno culture taught you about your perspective of the world?” “My culture motivates me when there’s no motivation. I remember why I’m doing the work. It’s not for some artificial purpose. I have a bigger mission. My work inspires me to learn about history. For instance, when I read Columbus’s journal, it made me want to cry. Columbus wrote in his letters that the Indigenous people were gullible and naive. In his letters to Spain, he wrote that the Taíno were easily able to memorize prayers and could easily be conquered. And, because of the Taínos’ generous nature, the Spaniards were able to colonize the island fast. It hurt me to read this. The impact of colonization still affects Borikén today. Since the time of the Spaniards, foreign anthropologists have selectively filtered what we know about our own history. We are conditioned to see ourselves through the eyes of people who hate us.”
and rides off into the stormy night.. Drapes it like only a Brave Chief could. Crimson was the only color for this moment. No fashion consultant would dare try to dress a Chief. And against his skin tone and long black hair at this pivotal moment.; the effect is breathtaking. Let’s end this movie review remembering a favorite word of Chief Sitting Bull’s. “Cantognake.” [ To hold in one’s heart ] .
July 2021, Page 9
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The structure of the whole event sees 24 national teams competing matchby-match in stadiums spread through 11 European cities, rather than in only one country as it happened for all the previous editions. Begun in Rome on June 11th and finished one month later on July 11th in London, EURO2020, won by Italy, succeeding 2016 winner Portugal, motherland to the great champion Cristiano Ronaldo. As we said, all this stuff appears to restore a normality perceptible in the people crowded in the stadiums’ stands, even if distanced and swabbed: people who have travelled from many countries only to see a match, a thing that would have sounded weird and irresponsible just a little more than one year ago.
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hat’s nowadays mostly marking the return to the so-called normality in Europe after the outbreak is the UEFA European Football Championship, a tournament played every four years. The tournament was scheduled for last year, but.... That is why the championship is still called EURO2020 despite happening this year.
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And the crowds do not stay in the stands, as town squares and clubs are full of fans festing their beloved teams while watching the matches on a maxi-screen or listening the commentary via radio, without causing any surge in the epidemiological curve. This has been made possible only thanks to the vaccination efforts, whose efficacy allowed 55% of European people to receive at least one dose of the vaccine and even prompted many governments to abolish the mask’s obligation. Therefore it should not surprise how, when on June 20th a
correspondent of Italian news station TG1 was hugged and surrounded by fans during a live reportage on Italy’s win on Wales, the anchorman in the studio did not blame the crowd but he rather enjoyed the whole scene. The old continent has eventually returned to fest and this championship arrives at the end of a series of experiments on the epidemiological impact of mass events like gigs or sportive games. Swabbed or vaccinated, people on the stands or in parties do not cause any increase of Covid cases, that’s the evidence which gigs and gatherings monitored by virologists has offered us, making us breathing more quietly today. With the fear of the virus (but not the awareness of its presence) passed away, there’s again (and finally!) space for entertainment and jocular rivalries, whose main expression in Europe is football indeed. Russia Vs Poland, England Vs Scotland, Spain Vs Portugal, Italy Vs France, Germany Vs France, England Vs France, Portugal Vs France - France is not so loved through Europe - these are only few of the old-fashioned rivalries that cyclically entertain millions of fans from the football field. Each “contrast” between two nations lies on a past of mutual defeats and provocations that every true fan could enumerate by heart, remembering for example the time when French footballer Zidane headbutted the Italian Materazzi during the 2006 World Cup Finals. All these “clashings” smell of a past once we believed would have never returned. Hence it is a pleasure to have eventually come back to these little things, instead of being always concerned to hear bad news every time watching TV. Now the latter is turned on only for sport and that’s, overall, the real happiness.
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July 2021
Jazz by Grella Twin Peaks
P
retty much since the start, there’s been a debate over just what jazz is. The etymology of the term is itself unclear. Jazz was first called “jas” and “jass,” and those look to be connected to the mid-19th century slang “jasm,” (yes, you know what that is) transmuted in a 1916 article in the Daily Californian to “jaz-m.” Close by is the Razzy Dazzy Spasm Band, which played Storyville during the 1890s. They didn’t play jazz as we know it, nor is it likely they played what we might hear today as Dixieland or “trad” style, but they were one of the roots of what became “jass” and jazz. What are the elements of the music, what makes it what it is? Louis Armstrong famously answered the question by saying “If you have to ask what jazz is, you’ll never know,” which is great but also glib, and Armstrong also didn’t hear bebop as jazz, he hated it. The music is still, in the scheme of things, young, only about 100 years old. But coming into a dynamic, media-based cultural scene, and based on improvisation, jazz has gone through growth and a series of innovations that set it apart from every other musical art form. In its 100 years, it has gone through at last four major revolutions and incorporated elements of every other music it touches on in American culture. There’s nothing like it. There’s nothing in music as hard to define. Rather than a sound or a style, I try and hear jazz as a language and a practice. The language is one of the sounds of jazz, the way musicians articulate phrases and rhythms. One of those articulations is swing, and for too long that was seen as essential to jazz—the Armstrong bias. But we’ve had 50 years of postBitches Brew music making, and the swing era itself was far shorter, proof that swing isn’t necessarily the
thing. But like with the playing of Steve Lehman and Rudresh Mahanthappa, you can have rhythmically driving articulation that’s still jazz, straight eighthnotes that are attacked with a drive that pushes the time forward, swing the way a bass player handles it.
Free jazz has often eschewed clear jazz language, but it’s a jazz practice, a way for musicians to approach and develop the music. Not all free improvisation is jazz; I think improvisation that seeks a certain form is jazz, so that Cecil Taylor is jazz, while Keith Jarrett often is, but not always, even inside the context of one of his improvised concerts where one minute he’s creating a chord sequence that sounds like standard song form, while another he’s playing spiky, dissonant lines that are like Bartók. This is why I dont think of Gershwin as a jazz composer. A wonderful classical composer who used the coloration of jazz language in a convincing way in the classical context—not an easy thing to do—but not jazz per se. Thats okay, because the word “jazz” doesn’t automatically make something better, or even good. Like the man said, there’s two kinds of music, the good kind, and the other kind.
Thats a long introduction to two monumental recordings out this year that mark extant points of where jazz is and can be, even while challenging the definition of the music: Anthony Braxton’s Quartet (Standards) 2020, a 13-CD box put out by the Tri-Centric Foundation, and New World Record’s compilation of archival recordings of the playing and composing of Julius Hemphill, The Boyé Multi-National Crusade for Harmony. The close timing of these releases is coincidental to the contrasts between two important and deeply influential musicians, and how they approached jazz language and traditions. Marty Ehrlich’s devoted and insightful notes to the Hemphill box begin with just that premise. He quotes Hemphill’s response, in a BOMB magazine interview, to the rise of neo-conservatism in jazz in the 1990s: “Well, you often hear people nowadays talking about the tradition, tradition, tradition. But they have tunnel vision in this tradition. Because tradition in AfricanAmerican music is wide as all outdoors.” Simply put but profound, the concept encompasses everything from Hemphill’s role in the great World Saxophone Quartet, his fantastic big band, his own chamber music composing, Sun Ra, and even bands like Cameo that put together sophistication, funk, intelligence, and weird-assed goofiness into a seamless package that is dazzling and disorienting— music that almost makes one’s hearing agoraphobic.
The Boyé 7-CD box is built around a substantial core of group improvisations, in the studio and live. Some of this music is completely free, built spontaneously in every moment in real time, while other examples are guided by themes, or sectional forms, but propelled and filled in by improvisation. This stuff is historic in two ways: none of it has been heard by the general public until now, and it captures the ferment of the late loft scene in New York City, musicians coming together in semi-private spaces to figure out how to rebuild and rewrite a language that
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had, for a time in the late ‘60s to mid ‘70s, fractured into rock, free, funk, and more traditional styles.
Playing with extraordinary peers like cellist Abdul Wadud, trumpeter Olu Dara, fellow saxophonist Ehrlich, and solo, one can hear Hemphill put together a language that has deep folk feeling, even deeper than the blues which always runs through it. Hemphill always sounded of the earth, of a place, an external landscape filled with the details of daily life. Even in freest flight, his playing always communicates, one primarily hears ideas, statements, questions. The word “free” obscures that Hemphill is always connecting one note to the next in a meaningful way, there’s no existential angst, he’s not trying to shout at the universe through squawks and smears. Although his saxophone playing is very different, this marvelous box shows him as following a similar path as that of Albert Ayler, going back in his mind to a time before “jazz” and “jass” and “jaz-m” and finding a new dialect, outside of swing and bop and the rest, with which to explain his meanings to the listener. That he expanded the jazz tradition, that he made a new space in which other musicians reside, is exactly the point.
The title of Braxton’s new collection defines the content, and one of the multi-instrumentalist’s and composer’s long-standing concerns—digging into and taking apart the jazz tradition in its modern incarnation, from the outside in. Braxton has been a controversial figure, and his body of work is so vast that it’s hard even for devotees to outline clearly. He’s also developed a cultish following among some musicians, who treat everything as revelatory even through the quality of Braxton’s playing and composing is wildly uneven. I think Braxton is best heard as a true experimentalist, he tries stuff out in no small part to see what will happen. This is invaluable, and also means that not all experiments will pay off, which further means that failures can be just as important as successes. He’s led some tremendous small groups, composed some expressive, exciting, and meaningful music, and he’s also made some insultingly simplistic pieces and, recently, operas that are dull, obscurantist, and childish in their conception. He presents everything with the same coy seriousness, and that can be maddening.
This enormous set of interpretations of standards—67 extensive tracks—is maddening in a good way. There is so much music, and so much of it is so fascinating, it’s easy to get sucked in. In fact, it’s better to get sucked in. Braxton’s language is so particular that it can feel peculiar in small doses, even down to his tone, which takes the quiver of Warne Marsh to an extreme. His playing can sound free, but it’s not, he’s on record as saying, “The last thing I’m interested in is existential freedom.” Instead, he’s working (with pianist Alexander Hawkins, bassist Neil Charles, and drummer Stephen Davis) from inside the tradition, questioning every facet, pushing tunes like “Why Shouldn’t I?” as far as they can go while still being identifiable, with blurry hyperarticulations over the placid beat of the rhythm section. Quartet (Standards) 2020 asks in every moment, is this jazz? The answer, always, is “yes.”
July 2021, Page 11
New York remembers an icon of journalism by Joe Enright
“E
nright, I need you to cover the Hamill unveiling!”
It was George again. I could almost smell his cheap cigar seeping through my cell phone as I helped a friend scale a striped bass on Canarsie Pier. “Huh?” I replied in my usual sophisticated way. “Pete Hamill, you twit! You wrote a memorial to him back in August!” “Right, I remember, but what, did he die again?” “Joe, you’re an idiot! They’re dedicating a block to him today. Get on it!” So there I was at the intersection of 12th Street and 7th Avenue in Park Slope at 2 pm on a glorious cloud-free Thursday in June. It would have been Pete’s 86th birthday. I asked around to see if I needed press credentials to take photos, but people edged away from me as if I smelled like fish guts. Suddenly some guy in a suit blasted out from a microphone that he was a politician. Somebody near me said, “That’s Brad Lander. He’s smiling ‘cause he just won the first round of the primary for Comptroller. I bet he’s thinking about laying his hands on those billions.” Lander observed that Hamill was one of seven Irish mutts born down the block and introduced Pete’s Japanese widow, Fukiko, an esteemed writer herself, who read a sad passage from her husband’s unfinished manuscript about coming home to Brooklyn, Back to the Old Country. She noted that they frequently moved during their 33 years together, which meant packing up 20,000 books over and over again. She recalled how, in their Prospect Heights apartment last August, Pete
reached out for her and, as if in slow motion, he toppled away, softly calling, “Fukiko, I’m falling.” Days later he passed away at Methodist Hospital, five blocks from where we all now stood. Guys behind me started arguing about Pete getting into a fistfight with John Lennon over Fukiko while another politician read from Pete’s A Drinking Life then introduced another politician who read from another Pete essay and, well, pretty soon everybody was reading some of Pete’s great quotes. The top Mayoral primary vote-getter, Brooklyn’s own Eric Adams, talked about Robert F. Kennedy and what a loss the country suffered when he was assassinated, only feet away from his pal, Pete Hamill. Two of Jimmy Breslin’s kids were there and mention of the 2019 HBO documentary, Breslin and Hamill: Deadline Artists drew warm applause (I loved it, but Pete hated its emphasis on his womanizing 50 years ago). By the way, any mention of the Hamill family’s boundless love for the presently cash-strapped Brooklyn Public Library also got people clapping – politicians, please take note during budget negotiations. Then Denis Hamill took the mic, thanked everybody for coming and delivered a wonderful heartfelt reminiscence about Pete: the Brooklyn Eagle and Roulston’s delivery boy, high school dropout, Brooklyn Navy Yard machinist, US Navy vet, Mexico art student on the GI Bill, graphic designer, cartoon enthusiast, cub reporter, father, war correspondent, RFK confidant, blue collar journalist, essayist, shortstory writer, screenwriter, novelist, editor-in-chief, heavy drinker who throttled back so as not to become an ethnic stereotype…But Denis focused on Pete, as the oldest sibling, turning Brian away from drug-fueled delinquency to become a top-notch photographer and helping Denis, sister Kathleen and brothers John and Joe (both deceased) to become successful writers (brother Tom, apparently the black sheep of the family, became a scientist). Pete did it using heartfelt gentle persuasion, giving generously of his time and wisdom. Denis called it The Pete Hamill Way. Now Pete is buried in Green-Wood Cemetery, a place he loved, which he always called “the GreenWood,” as if it were a Bay Ridge bar. As a kid, in the twilight, Pete and his pals would climb the GreenWood fence at the end of 7th Avenue, eight blocks away from his railroad flat on Pete Hamill Way. Inevitably they would cower in the darkness wondering what spectres might emerge beyond the next tombstone. Pete always claimed those imaginings set him on the course to becoming a writer. 70 years later he and Fukiko bought a family plot there after a tour revealed a vacancy near the gaudy gravestone for Boss Tweed. Hamill thought the famously corrupt politician would make for a terrific after-life companion. And good copy. For Pete, it was always
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about the stories he could tell. Take this one, for example, which he filed with the Daily News on September 11, 2001… Above us, at 9:55, the first of the towers began to collapse. We heard snapping sounds, pops, little explosions, and then the walls bulged out, and we heard a sound like an avalanche, and here it came. Everything then happened in fragments. I yell to my wife, “Run!” And we start together, and this immense cloud, perhaps 25 stories high, is rolling at us. But bodies come smashing together in the doorway of 25 Vesey St. and I can’t see my wife, and when I push to get out, I’m driven into the lobby. I keep calling her name, and saying, “I’ve got to get out of here, please, my wife.”…[P]olice are caked with white powder, coughing, hacking, spitting, like figures from a horror movie. Then there’s a sound of splintering glass. One of the emergency workers has smashed open the glass doors. I feel as if I’ve been there for an hour; only 14 minutes have passed. “Get going!” a cop yells. “But don’t run!” The street before us is now a pale gray wilderness. There is powdery white dust on gutter and sidewalk, and dust on the roofs of cars, and dust on the tombstones of St. Paul’s. Dust coats all the walking human beings, the police and the civilians, white people and black, men and women. It’s like an assembly of ghosts...To the right, the dust cloud is still rising and falling, undulating in a sinister way, billowing out and then falling in upon itself. The tower is gone. I start running toward Broadway, through dust 2 inches deep. Park Row is white. City Hall Park is white. Sheets of paper are scattered everywhere, orders for stocks, waybills, purchase orders, the pulverized confetti of capitalism. Sirens blare, klaxons wail. I see a black woman with dazed eyes, her hair coated with dust, and an Asian woman masked with powder. I don’t see my wife anywhere. I look into store windows. I peer into an ambulance. I ask a cop if there’s an emergency center.
"Hamill thought the famously corrupt politician would make for a terrific after-life companion. And good copy." July 2021