From personalized math and
English, to learning a new language,
we provide your child with a wellrounded
academic experience that
will set them on a path to success.
Apply for K–6 at
HebrewPublic.org/Apply
Apply by: 4/1 | Lottery date: 4/9
COURIER L 12 IFE, FEB. 8–14, 2019 G
MERCHANTS
Continued from cover
ties along Mermaid Avenue, others on
parts of Surf, Stillwell, and Neptune avenues,
and those along the Reigelmann
Boardwalk between W. Fifth and W.
23rd streets.
The city-sanctioned district would
fund supplemental services — including
sidewalk and street cleaning, new
signage, holiday lights, and citywide
promotion of local shops — through
annual taxes levied on business and
property owners within it.
The median cost of the taxes, which
the city calls “assessments,” for Mermaid
Avenue business and property
owners would be just more than $500
per year , according to Alliance executive
director Alexandra Silversmith.
And owners of the avenue’s larger
storefronts would pay more, because
the tax is partly determined by square
footage, according to Silversmith.
But many Mermaid merchants
don’t want to pay a penny, with several
signing a petition against the bid’s formation
that Cosme and his fellow local
property owner Daniel Ioannou circulated
last year.
The critics now plan to present that
opposition in the coming weeks, by delivering
an offi cial letter to the Alliance
asking it to remove Mermaid Avenue
from the proposed bid boundaries
on behalf of the avenue’s business and
property owners, they said.
“Mermaid Avenue is saying they’re
not interested, and their autonomy
should be respected,” Ioannou said.
One Mermaid business owner said
that even though he could afford a potential
annual tax of $1,000 more, he
would not be willing to put money towards
the bid’s services, which he considers
frivolous expenses for his storefront
— but not for operations located
in other parts of the proposed district.
“Christmas lights are pretty, but
they don’t help my business,” said
Steven Feinstein, who owns Wilensky
Hardware on Mermaid Avenue near
W. 22nd Street. “Mermaid and Surf
avenues have totally disparate needs,
I don’t see why we should be bundled
together. If Mermaid Avenue was removed,
I’d be all for it.”
Another entrepreneur, who owns
a drug store on Mermaid Avenue,
agreed, saying he doesn’t want to pay
for supplemental sanitation services
as part of the bid, because he already
sweeps the sidewalk in front of his
shop on a daily basis.
“I’m doing it everyday — there’s not
much garbage outside,” said Roger Li,
the owner of J & R Pharmacy at Mermaid
Avenue and W. 23rd Street.
But owners who say street maintenance
is unnecessary may soon be
singing a different tune, according to
Silversmith, who said Mermaid Avenue
has largely remained clean for
most of the past two years thanks to
a private sanitation team funded by a
state grant, which drained the last of
its dollars in 2018.
And not all Mermaid property owners
are against the bid — one entrepreneur
who owns three properties on
the stretch, all of which are within the
current proposed boundaries, said the
avenue would benefi t from the regular
upkeep the district would fund.
“Mermaid Avenue has been so depressed
for so many years. That whole
corridor is unmaintained — it needs
help,” said Nino Russo, who also owns
Gargiulo’s restaurant on W. 15th Street
between Mermaid and Surf avenues,
which is within the proposed district.
Silversmith and her fellow bid organizers
do not want to put local smallbusinesses
in the red, she said.
And they will continue to seek feedback
from neighborhood business
owners before holding the fi nal vote on
whether or not to form the district —
which will require majority approval
from all merchants within it in order
to pass, according to the local leader.
“We’re trying to get the correct information
out and then let people make
the right decision based on facts,” she
said. “Our goal here is not to put anyone
out of business.”
HATE CRIME
brutally bludgeoning the three Asian
victims in the head with the tool, according
to Gonzalez. An eyewitness
told this newspaper the scene was a
“ bloodbath. ”
Paramedics rushed the victims —
the restaurant’s 34-year-old chef, Fufai
Pun, his uncle and a co-owner of
the eatery, 50-year-old Tsz Mat Pun,
and its 60-year-old manager, Thang Ng
— to NYU Langone Hospital-Brooklyn,
where doctors immediately pronounced
the younger Pun dead, and
the elder Pun and Ng later died from
their blunt-force injuries on Jan. 18
and 24 respectively, according to prosecutors.
Following his arrest, Martunovich
allegedly told cops that he targeted the
three men because of their race, according
to the district attorney.
Gonzalez’s announcement of the
charges comes a week after pols, activists,
and locals rallied on Jan. 25 outside
the buffet to demand he prosecute
the alleged triple homicide as a hate
crime.
A co-host of the rally claimed Martunovich
watched a fi lm depicting
Asian men abusing women before his
alleged killing spree, which convinced
the suspect that he was a savior.
“He entered the restaurant motivated
by a racial stereotype of gender
relations in my community, with
a goal to massacre, believing himself
to be sort of a savior, the attacker bludgeoned
these restaurant workers while
they were doing their job,” Chinese-
American Councilwoman Margaret
Chin (D–Manhattan) said at the rally.
Peterson, however, could not confi
rm Chin’s claim that the fi lm motivated
the attack.
LEARN AND GROW WITH
HEBREW LANGUAGE
ACADEMY!
HLA - 2186 Mill Avenue, Brooklyn, NY 11234
HLA2 - 1870 Stillwell Avenue, Brooklyn, NY 11223
admissions@hebrewpublic.org | 646-916-0055
Continued from cover
link
/Apply
link