The local paper for the Upper er East Side BIGBUCKS AUCTION AT P.S. 6 <SCHOOLS, P. 4
WEEK OF APRIL
3 2014
NYPRESS.COM
OurTownEastSide @OurTownNYC
Our Town Honors Ho the Eastside Eastsider of the Year
In Brief
2014
OTTY AWARDS Congratulations to Sen. Liz Krueger, who was named Eastsider of the Year this week as part of our annual Our Town Thanks You (OTTY) Awards. Krueger was one of 16 New Yorkers recognized in a ceremony on April 2 for their service to the Upper East Side. For profiles of all of the winners, see our special section, which begins on page 13.
THE POLITICS OF EVERYWHERE CITY HALL On the circuit with Gale Brewer, the busiest politician in New York BY MEGAN BUNGEROTH
The Borough President is famished. Gale Brewer has been working since 7:30 a.m., and by 5:15 p.m., as she’s leaving her office, she realizes that all she’s had to eat so far is a banana. She’s not headed to dinner, though, or home. Tonight, Wednesday, March 26, Brewer will be attending seven events throughout Manhattan, a typical night for the woman who may be New York’s most omnipresent politician. “I try to go to as many events as humanly possible,” Brewer says in the elevator. Her staff sifts through hundreds of re-
quests each week to put together her schedule. She has a committee that helps decide which events she’ll attend. The only reason for turning down an invitation is that it conflicts with another scheduled event. Nothing is too minor, no one too marginal. She leaves the Municipal Building at 1 Centre Street about 15 minutes behind schedule, but still confident she can get to everything for the evening. Stop number one is at a bar around the corner from City Hall, Manhattan Proper, where a surprise going-away party for Chuck Meara, former staffer to both Speakers Christine Quinn and Gifford Miller, is underway by the time Brewer arrives at 5:18 p.m. Council members and veteran staffers clutch glasses of wine and whiskey, reminiscing with Meara, while
The start of a grueling evening for Brewer, who will make seven stops before ending her workday. Photo by Megan Bungeroth
the younger staffers cluster together around iPhones. Brewer pushes through the narrow room, stopping every two feet to shake hands and say hello to former council colleagues. She finds Meara and chats with him. There is no time to grab a drink, and no food to be found. She winds her way back out the door by 5:28 p.m. and climbs into the
big black SUV with city plates that will shepherd her around the island this evening. As her driver Michael navigates the potholes of 10th Avenue, Brewer concedes that tonight, with its seven stops, is slightly above average in terms of number of events; normally she’s got four or five on weeknights. That restriction, though, is simply one of
logistics, not of her willingness to show up. “Between 6 and 8 p.m. you can’t do more than four events,” she says. That’s when most groups schedule their meetings. When she was in the city council, representing the Upper West Side, she also appeared everywhere,
CONTINUED ON PAGE 8
NEW YORK’S SEGREGATED SCHOOLS A new study from UCLA shows that New York’s public schools are the most racially segregated in the country. The study tracked enrollment numbers from 1989 to 2010, and said that many black and Latino students go to class with “virtually no” white classmates. At New York City’s charter schools, the numbers are even more dramatic; 73 percent of charters have “less than 1 percent” white enrollment, the study states, making them the least diverse of all of the schools it studied. One of the report’s authors, Gary Orfield, said that while the segregation problem is closely tied to housing patterns, “in the 30 years I have been researching schools, New York state has consistently been one of the most segregated states in the nation — no Southern state comes close to New York,” he told the AP.
REFORMING THE COMMUNITY BOARDS Councilmember Ben Kallos proposed revamping the city’s community boards. Kallos’ recommendations include instituting term limits for board members, requiring applicants to disclose conflicts of interest, and creating standardized online applications for those who wish to join boards. As we reported last week, Kallos also supports opening the community boards to teenagers. Between April 1 and May 30, four new borough presidents and 21 new city council members, along with their previously elected colleagues, will be making 1,475 appointments to 59 community boards spanning all five boroughs. “New York City community boards must truly represent the community,” Kallos said. “Yhey can be a vital space for New Yorkers who want to express concerns.”