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CHARCOAL BEAUTY ◄ CITY ARTS, P.12
JAIL PLAN APPROVED JUSTICE
“The era of mass incarceration is over,“ Mayor de Blasio says, but critics doubt Rikers will close by 2026 BY EMILY HIGGINBOTHAM
Vanessa Ruta in her lab at Rockefeller University, where she is an associate professor. Photo: David Noonan
MANHATTAN GENIUS SCIENCE A product of New York’s top schools nabs a prestigious MacArthur Foundation grant BY DAVID NOONAN
Forging a world-class career in science takes focus, discipline, years of hard work and, in Vanessa Ruta’s case, a Metrocard. Ruta is an award-winning neuroscientist at Rockefeller University on the Upper East Side, where her colleagues hail from California, China, Brazil, Denmark and other places around the U.S. and the globe. But Ruta has found success in her hyper-competitive field right here on her home
The City Council voted to move forward with an ambitious $8.7 billion plan to build four borough-based jails and replace the Rikers Island complex, which is set to be closed by 2026 – a feat many wrote off as unrealistic just a few years ago. Of the 49 council members
who cast a ballot last week, 36 voted in favor of the land use plan, which has received criticism and skepticism from people across the political spectrum. Mayor Bill de Blasio, though, framed the bill’s passage as a major step forward for criminal justice reform in New York. “The era of mass incarceration is over,” de Blasio said during a press conference after the vote. “I want everyone to understand what this is about, it’s about valuing our people, no longer condemning people and sending them on a pathway that only made their lives worse
and worse, but believing that our people do not ever need to end up behind bars to begin with – never.” Supporters of this plan have led with the argument that it is the best path forward to close Rikers – an institution with a long record of abuse – and begin to breakdown the systemic racism upon which the prisonindustrial complex was built.
24-30 2019 INSIDE
WAIT (ALAS) ‘TIL NEXT YEAR Yankee Fans Mourn End of Team’s Season. p. 8
Fewer Beds, Reduced Height The new plan aims to tackle that in part by cutting
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island of Manhattan. A graduate of Stuyvesant High School, where she was introduced to “the elegant principles of the periodic table” by chemistry teacher Matthew Litwin, Ruta, now 45, earned a B.A. in chemistry at Hunter College, followed by a Ph.D. at Rockefeller. She capped off her education doing post-doctoral research at Columbia University. To confirm her Manhattan bona fides, Ruta boasts another achievement, or should we say, non-achievement. “I feel like a true New Yorker,” she says, “because I never learned to drive.” While she has spent most of her time between the Hudson and East rivers, Ruta’s re-
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WEEK OF OCTOBER
FALL FUN AT THE HARVEST FESTIVAL There was something for everyone at the annual event in the Meatpacking District. p. 20
MARCUS WELBY VS. DOOGIE HOWSER Is your doc’s age only a number? p. 2
A ‘DEEPLY RAW SPACE’ ON BROADWAY At a City Hall press conference held by Mayor Bill de Blasio after the jail vote. Photos: Michael Appleton/Mayoral Photography Office
Playwright Jeremy O. Harris on his groundbreaking “Slave Play.” p. 13
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WEEK OF APRIL
SPRING ARTS PREVIEW < CITYARTS, P.12
FOR HIM, SETTLING SMALL CLAIMS IS A BIG DEAL
presided over Arbitration Man has three decades. for informal hearings about it He’s now blogging BY RICHARD KHAVKINE
is the common Arbitration Man their jurist. least folks’ hero. Or at Man has For 30 years, Arbitration court office of the civil few sat in a satellite Centre St. every building at 111 New Yorkers’ weeks and absorbed dry cleaning, burned lost accountings of fender benders, lousy paint jobs, and the like. And security deposits then he’s decided. Arbitration Man, About a year ago, so to not afwho requested anonymity started docuhe fect future proceedings, two dozen of what menting about compelling cases considers his most blog. in an eponymous about it because “I decided to write the stories but in a I was interested about it not from wanted to write from view but rather lawyer’s point of said Arbitration a lay point of view,” lawyer since 1961. Man, a practicing what’s at issue He first writes about post, renders separate a in and then, how he arrived his decision, detailing Visitors to the blog at his conclusion. their opinions. often weigh in with get a rap going. I to “I really want unthey whether really want to know and why I did it,” I did derstood what don’t know how to he said. “Most people ... I’d like my cases the judge thinks. and also my trereflect my personalitythe law.” for mendous respect 80, went into indiArbitration Man, suc in 1985, settling vidual practice
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MANHATTAN'S APARTMENT BOOM, > PROPERTY, P.20
2015
In Brief MORE HELP FOR SMALL BUSINESS
The effort to help small seems to businesses in the city be gathering steam. Two city councilmembers, Robert Margaret Chin and Cornegy, have introduced create legislation that wouldSmall a new “Office of the within Business Advocate” of Small the city’s Department Business Services. Chin The new post, which have up told us she’d like to would and running this year, for serve as an ombudsman city small businesses within them clear government, helping to get through the bureaucracy things done. Perhaps even more also importantly, the ombudsman and number will tally the type small business of complaints by taken in actions the owners, policy response, and somefor ways to recommendations If done well, begin to fix things. report would the ombudsman’s quantitative give us the first with taste of what’s wrong the city, an small businesses in towards important first step problem. the xing fi of deformality for To really make a difference, process is a mere complete their will have to to are the work course, the advocaterising rents, precinct, but chances-- thanks to a velopers looking find a way to tackle business’ is being done legally of after-hours projects quickly. their own hours,” which remain many While Chin “They pick out boom in the number throughout lives on who problem. Angelo, vexing most said Mildred construction permits gauge what Buildings one of the Ruppert said it’s too early tocould have the 19th floor in The Department of the city. number three years, the Houses on 92nd Street between role the advocate She on the Over the past is handing out a record work perThird avenues. permits, there, more information of Second and an ongoing all-hours number of after-hours bad thing. of after-hours work the city’s Dept. problem can’t be a said there’s with the mits granted by nearby where according to new data jumped 30 percent, This step, combinedBorough construction project noise Buildings has data provided in workers constantly make efforts by Manhattan to mediate BY DANIEL FITZSIMMONS according to DOB of Informacement from trucks. President Gale Brewer offer response to a Freedom classifies transferring they want. They knows the the rent renewal process, request. The city They 6 “They do whatever Every New Yorker clang, tion Act tangible signs go as they please. work between early, and some come metal-on-metal can construction any small sound: the or on the weekend, have no respect.” the piercing of progress. For many can’t come p.m. and 7 a.m., the hollow boom, issuance of these business owners, that moving in reverse. as after-hours. The increased beeps of a truck has generto a correspond and you soon enough. variances has led at the alarm clock The surge in permits
SLEEPS, THANKS TO THE CITY THAT NEVER UCTION A BOOM IN LATE-NIGHT CONSTR NEWS
A glance it: it’s the middle can hardly believe yet construction of the night, and carries on full-tilt. your local police or You can call 311
Newscheck
for dollars in fees ated millions of and left some resithe city agency, that the application dents convinced
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