16 APRIL 28 – MAY 4, 2017 BROOKLYN MEDIA GROUP EDITORIAL REMEMBERING THOSE WHO SERVED On April 22, the corner of 78th Street and Third Avenue was named in memory of a great lady, Maureen Stramka, who, over the decades preceding her 2014 death, made her mark on Bay Ridge. A former president of the Ragamu n Parade, the Bay Ridge Community Council and the Bay Ridge Lions, Stramka was omnipresent, also serving as a volunteer member of Community Board 10 and the 68th Precinct Community Council, among other organizations, on top of holding down the jobs that paid the bills. Stramka is just one of this neighborhood’s greats being honored in the coming weeks and months. Another is Police Oficer David Guttenberg, a member of the 68th Precinct, who was gunned down in 1978, just before Christmas, at the corner of Seventh Avenue and 86th Street. Thanks to the e orts of Auxiliary Police O cer Christian Durante, Guttenberg is well on his way to a similar honor, with CB 10 voting on Monday, April 24, to name the corner where he was killed in Guttenberg’s memory. A street naming in memory of another Bay Ridge icon is also right around the corner. On May 13, just across the street from the sign commemorating Stramka’s service, a street sign in honor of the late Howard Dunn, who died in 2015 at the age of 88. A naval veteran who served in World War II, Dunn was a fi xture in the neighborhood, working on behalf of veterans, the Boy Scouts and the American Legion. Other street corners have been named in memory of late State Senator Christopher Mega (80th Street and 10th Avenue in Dyker Heights); Police O cer Moira Smith (74th Street and Fi h Avenue), who was killed trying to save lives when the World Trade Center was attacked on September 11, 2001; Charles Ahl, the fi rst chair of CB 10 (Fi h Avenue and 80th Street); and Community A airs Commissioner Rosemarie O’Keefe (Fi h Avenue and Bay Ridge Parkway), among many others, including several victims of 9/11 who hailed from the neighborhood. We think it’s only fi tting that all of them should be permanently remembered, at street corners meaningful CHANGING THE FOX NEWS CULTURE 14 BROOKLYN MEDIA GROUP • MARCH 6 - MARCH 12, 2014 editorial A LOOK BACK compiled by GO BACK TO THE DRAWING BOARD to their families. We also think it would be wonderful if someone could compile an easily-accessible directory, perhaps online, to the memorials so, as the years go by, not only their names but their lives will never be forgotten. HOMEREPORTER AND SUNSET NEWS Change (Estab. 1953) to 2015 ▲ ▲ Gary Nilsen and Helen Klein (USPS 248.800) 9733 FOURTH AVE. • BROOKLYN, NY 11209 Co-Publisher ... Victoria Schneps-Yunis Co-Publisher ... Joshua A. Schneps Editor in Chief ... Helen Klein Telephone 718-238-6600 Fax 718-238-6630 E-mail [email protected] Periodical postage paid at Brooklyn, N.Y. Published weekly by Brooklyn Media Group, Inc. Single copies, 50 cents. $35 per year by mail, $40 outside Brooklyn. On June 8, 1962, the Bay Ridge Home Reporter (founded 1953) and the Brooklyn Sunset News, a continuation of the Bay Ridge News (founded 1943) were merged into the HOME REPORTER AND SUNSET NEWS. Postmaster: Send Address Changes To: Home Reporter and Sunset News 9733 Fourth Ave., Brooklyn, N.Y. 11209 Entire contents copyright 2014 by Home Reporter and Sunset News All letters sent to the HOME REPORTER AND SUNSET NEWS should be brief and are subject to condensing. Writers should include a full address and home and office telephone numbers, where available, as well as affiliation, indicating special interest. Anonymous letters are not printed. Name withheld on request. LETTERS TO THE EDITOR, AS WELL AS OP-ED PIECES IN NO WAY REFLECT THE PAPER’S POSITION. No such ad or any part thereof may be reproduced without prior permission of the HOME REPORTER AND SUNSET NEWS. The publishers will not be responsible for any error in advertising beyond the cost of the space occupied by the error. Errors must be reported to the HOME REPORTER AND SUNSET NEWS within five days of publication. Ad position cannot be guaranteed unless paid prior to publication. Brooklyn Media Group, Inc. assumes no liability for the content or reply to any ads. The advertiser assumes all liability for the content of and all replies. The advertiser agrees to hold the HOME REPORTER AND SUNSET NEWS and its employees harmless from all cost, expenses, liabilities, and damages resulting from or caused by the publication or recording placed by the advertiser or any reply to such advertisement. The very notion of creating a news network Photo by Gardiner Anderson And the award goes to… Bay Ridge, which has provided the backdrop for many movies and television shows over the years, from “Blue Bloods” and “Saturday Night Fever” to “Mad Men” and, in 2006, to “Then She Found Me,” starring Helen Hunt and Bette Midler, seen above in a September, 2006, Home Reporter photo taken on location on Shore Road at 77th Street. Midler performed at the most recent Oscars, singing “Wind Beneath My Wings” during the awards show’s In Memoriam segment. “Then She Found Me,” which also starred Matthew Broderick, was also shot inside a historic home on 88th Street. Each day, thousands of people depend on SUNY Downstate Medical Center for emergency medical care and vital health care services. But this state-operated public hospital has been in danger of being closed or privatized for more than two years. Hundreds of jobs have been lost, and numerous health care services have been cut or curtailed due to the hospital’s ill-prepared “Sustainability Plan.” Now, there is language in the 2014-15 proposed state budget that would open the door to as many as five corporations to operate SUNY’s public hospitals. United University Professions, the union that represents nearly 3,000 employees at SUNY Downstate, has been fighting to keep SUNY Downstate a fully operational staterun facility. However, UUP isn’t fighting the battle alone. The SUNY Downstate Coalition of Faith, Labor and Community Leaders has become an important ally. The coalition has staged a number of rallies and protests over the past 18 months to save health care services and jobs at SUNY Downstate and keep it a public facility. The latest such effort is a 48-hour interfaith fast. It will begin Sunday, March 9, at 3 p.m., in front of Downstate’s 470 Clarkson Avenue entrance. Interfaith leaders and members of the community will participate to show their strong support for this beacon in Brooklyn and call attention to the threats it faces. You can take part in the fast or find out more about it by calling 718-270-1519, or sending an email to [email protected]. We strongly urge you to join our campaign. Take part in the fast, or come out and show your support. Together, we can deliver strong message that SUNY Downstate must remain a full-service, state-operated public hospital. The threats facing SUNY Downstate are real. The SUNY Board of Trustees has openly discussed the possibility of closing SUNY Downstate. There is also language in the Executive Budget, which would allow corporations to control SUNY’s public hospitals; one corporation must affiliate with an academic medical institution or teaching hospital. SUNY Downstate has Brooklyn’s only teaching hospital. Privatizing or closing SUNY Downstate as a way for the state to save dollars is shortsighted and unnecessary. We believe the answer to Brooklyn’s health care shortcomings lies in the “Brooklyn Hospitals Safety Net Plan,” a UUP-backed initiative to stabilize and deliver health care throughout Brooklyn. This plan would preserve SUNY Downstate and save several financially unstable hospitals in Brooklyn, including Interfaith Medical Center, Brookdale, Long Island College Hospital and Kingsbrook Jewish Medical Center. You can see the proposal online at http://www.brooklynhospitalplan.org. It calls for the creation of a network of satellite ambulatory care centers, and would be controlled by and affiliated with 14 other Brooklyn hospitals. Downstate would be the network’s hub, educating and supplying physicians and medical staff to the care centers and working with doctors at the other hospitals. It’s a simple, effective plan and, if given a chance, it will work. New York has a responsibility to provide for the health care needs of its citizens. The Brooklyn Hospitals Safety Net Plan—our plan and the community’s plan—is a viable, workable option for long-term health care in Brooklyn. That’s something that Brooklyn residents desperately need. Frederick E. Kowal is president of United University Professions, the union representing 35,000 faculty and professional staff at SUNY’s 29 state-operated campuses, including SUNY’s public teaching hospitals and health science centers in Brooklyn, Buffalo, Long Island and Syracuse. With the city deciding to move forward on most of the school co-locations approved late last year, as Mayor Bloomberg prepared to vacate City Hall, parents in southwest Brooklyn are not only disappointed but angry. While the Department of Education under Mayor de Blasio wisely opted to back out of a planned co-location of a new high school inside Gravesend’s John Dewey High School, the DOE decided to move ahead with two others: the co-location of a charter school inside Seth Low Intermediate School in Bensonhurst and another inside Joseph B. Cavallaro Intermediate School in Bath Beach. These – like others in the borough and the city – are both fiercely opposed by parents, educators, students and the local Community Education Councils, all of whom contend that the co-locations would steal necessary space from students already attending the schools, and those who will be going to them in the near future. While the city has said it only considers under-utilized schools for co-locations, area education advocates say that both Cavallaro and Seth Low are well utilized, and likely to become more crowded as students now in elementary school in both District 20 and District 21 move up to middle school. Indeed, District 20 is one of the most crowded school districts in the city, so much so that the city built a host of new schools for it in the past decade, with more being planned, meaning that public school students in both District 20 and District 21 are likely to feel the squeeze should they have to share space with students from a charter school. That strikes us as patently unfair. While some of the charter schools poised to open in September, 2014 may be worthy additions to the city’s educational offerings, their needs should not trump the needs of existing schools with existing students. And, indeed, when a charter school is put inside a public school, the process must involve the school communities at both educational institutions, and parents must also be involved. The city must go back to the drawing board and come up with alternative arrangements for the charter schools planned for Seth Low and Cavallaro as well as other schools where they are opposed.. The students who attend those schools deserve no less. guest op-ed Keep SUNY Downstate open and public BY FREDERICK E. KOWAL Entire contents copyright 2016 by Home Reporter and Sunset News A LOOK BACK The late Bay Ridge activist par excellence Maureen Stramka, second from right, is the subject of this week’s Look Back. In a photo from the les of this newspaper, Stramka -- who succumbed to cancer just short of three years ago -- is seen with former First Lady Hillary Clinton, to her left. Also in the photo -- former Assemblymember Adele Cohen and Democratic District Leader Dilia Schack, both Democrats, and Republican Bob Capano. On Saturday, April 22, the corner of 78th Street and Third Avenue was named in memory of Stramka who, over the years, served as president of the Bay Ridge Community Council, the Bay Ridge Lions and the Ragamu n Parade. Compiled by Helen Klein GUEST OPED BY JULIAN PHILLIPS that gave voice to a conservative viewpoint was a novel idea—and very much needed at a time where liberal opinions dominated the airwaves. Television maverick Roger Ailes was certainly the right person to catapult such a concept onto the scene, and it quickly found a willing audience and ultimately skyrocketed the network to the top of the cable news ratings. The rise and dominance of Fox News may have surprised many in the business, perhaps because they underestimated Ailes’ ability to promote and “sell” his product with cra y slogans like “Fair & Balanced” and “We Report, You Decide.” It all sounded great—and more importantly, looked even better. For its targeted audience, Ailes hired young, mostly white blonde women with short skirts and pumps, accentuated by glass desks to ‘see all,’ and dashing white men in sharp suits delivering hard-hitting headlines geared towards presenting news with a conservative agenda that had tremendous appeal to those willing to tune in. Like it or not, Fox ruled cable news—and every other network was scrambling to catch up. For a time, Fox did deliver news and a message that gave voice to a conservative think tank that was sorely needed. However, conservative news started to shi toward a right wing agenda. Hannity & Colmes became just Hannity. With the 2008 presidential election approaching, there was a clear shi to hammer the Republican agenda home without balancing that viewpoint with credible le leaning analysts. It was a direct departure from 2002, when Ailes hired me as the network’s fi rst African American male anchor and host of “Fox & Friends Weekend.” Eleven years later, outside of Juan Williams hosting “The Five,” there is no African American male presence hosting a prime-time show on that network. I guess that did not matter to executives at Fox, because they still command sizable ratings over their competition. But what about fairness and balance? Can a network which claims to be just that, achieve those goals with very little minority presence in front of — or behind — the cameras in production or editorial decision making? Equally as important, can Fox maintain any sense of credibility settling sexual harassment suits now in the millions of dollars against its talent and executives? It boils down to how Fox intends to move forward. It can die a slow death in the ratings with its current base—or it can change how it presents news and treats its employees. I’m not suggesting Fox change its political focus—rather the culture in which it operates. In the end, that has everything to do with its character. Julian Phillips is a journalist and author.
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