New York Shitty turns two today. Huge congratulations to NYS and our friend and major contributor Miss Heather, who’s tossed us hundreds of photos for hundreds of GL posts. What began as a blog largely covering the byproduct of man’s best friend has, over the last two years, turned into an eclectic collection of photos and information that ranges widely through Brooklyn and often turns its attention to important neighborhood quality of life issues that otherwise wouldn’t get any coverage. New York Shitty is raw and it is edgy, but most importantly, it’s relevant, sharp and funny. Here’s to many more years.

The other day we noted that Kellogg’s Diner, the spot at Metropolitan and Union Avenue in the Burg that will soon be surrounded by construction, is closed for renovations. A GL reader wrote to tell us that it was also nailed by the Department of Health on April 9 and closed with 77 points–which is fairly high. The violations don’t include some of the horror story rodent and vermin stuff that one sees elsewhere, but there’s improperly constructed areas, inadequate lighting, dirty cloths, workers not washing hands after using the toilet, workers using their (poopy?) hands to handle food rather than utensils and other forms of grossness. Ironically, it had been inspected in March and gotten 33 point, which required a reinspection. There’s a photo of the DOH sticker elsewhere.–GL Inbox

The Third Annual Brooklyn Blogfest is approaching quickly. It will take place on May 8 at 8PM at the Brooklyn Lyceum, which is located at 270 Fourth Avenue (at President Street) in Park Slope. Only the Blog Knows Brooklyn’s Louise Crawford, who founded the event and has worked hard on it every year, is putting together the best program yet, including a video by Blue Barn Pictures, a salute to Brooklyn’s photo bloggers, Top Ten Tips for New Bloggers and a special message from WNYC radio talk show host Brian Lehrer. Speakers will include OTBKB, Creative Times, Bed-Stuy Blog, New York Shitty, Flatbush Gardener, Luna Park Gazette and GL. OTBKB writes that it’s “an event for bloggers and non-bloggers alike, the Blogfest brings together citizen journalists, place bloggers, photo bloggers, special interest bloggers, and the creative, quirky, and personal bloggers that make the Brooklyn Blogosphere such a fascinating place to be.” More info to come.

• Park Slope Child Still Missing [OTBKB]
• Newark Echoes in Brooklyn After Sharpe James Conviction [AYR]
• 2 Council Aides Said to Embezzle Funds, Brooklyn Involved [NYT]
• Brooklyn Heights School Was Underused, Now Overcrowded [NYDN]
• Fire on Pierrepont Street [Brooklyn Heights Blog]
• Urban Gravestones, Part 5 [Bed-Stuy Banana]
• House of the Day: 1907 Ditmas Avenue [Brownstoner]
• First Escalator Was a Ride in Coney Island [Kinetic Carnival]
• Man Behind the Counter [Brooklynometry]
• Remains of the Sunview Luncheonette in Greenpoint [Lost City]
• Earth Day at Pearl Street Triangle [Dumbo NYC]
• The $4 Slice at Di Fara’s [Ditmas Park Blog]

In collaboration with fellow Brooklyn activists, Brooke Singer (www.superfund365.org) and Emily Gallagher, Habitatmap invites you to participate in our Virtual Toxic Tour and Community Mapping Workshop…The virtual tour will focus on groundwater contamination and hazardous vapor concerns in several areas of Greenpoint which are currently under evaluation by the New York State Department of Environmental Conservation. We will explore the neighborhood’s historic and contemporary industries, detail the contaminants of concern, and discuss potential remedies. This case will serve as a reference point for participants as we work with them to document toxic exposures in their own neighborhoods, brainstorm effective community organizing strategies, and help them recruit a network of activist peers to their cause.

Check out Habitatmap here.

FUN WITH TOXICS BONUS: The marker in the image above that is about three-fourths of the way down over the BQE in Williamsburg is a state superfund site at Meeker Avenue between Metropolitan and Union Avenues. If you have ever walked under the BQE on Metropolitan Avenue to go to the neighborhood on either side of the highway, you’ve passed this site. It’s the former Ansbacher Color & Dye Factory, which would appear to have been demolished to make way for the BQE without being cleaned up. For the record, it is directly to the west of the future site of the Gateway to Williamsburg development and to the east of several properties being developed or being sold as development sites. It is also a couple of hundred yards from a Karl Fischer-designed building at 525 Union Avenue.

“God. Oh my God. It’s 8:45 and I’m pacing around like a crazy person on the subway platform again. The G Train, man. The fucking G train. It’s gone from mild annoyance to genuine outrage to pure, paranoid obsession. Everything, I mean everything, wrong with my life can be traced back to this train.”–Gawker

| View | Upload your own

Come hear national expert and co-author of “The Cohousing Handbook: Building a Place for Community”, Chris Scott Hanson, give a free talk and slideshow about Cohousing communities on Friday May 9th at 6:30 pm at the Brooklyn Friends Meeting House, 110 Schermerhorn Street near Borough Hall. Sponsored by the Brooklyn Cohousing Group, which is building an urban Cohousing community in the Prospect Park area of Brooklyn. If you are interested in a more community-oriented way of living while still having privacy and owning your own home, then you may be interested in Cohousing. The idea of Cohousing is not new. It has been around since the 60’s and is more popular in Europe, but there are many Cohousing groups in the US.

For more info contact Alex at alex@alexmarshall.org. A lot of information, with links to more, is available here.

On Sunday, May 18, 2008 from 2 – 4pm pre-school and young school age children and their care-givers are invited to the Audubon Center in Prospect Park for a FREE event. Musicians and storytellers Hasan Bakr and Kevin Nathaniel will introduce the children to the sounds of Africa and the African diaspora through the story of a young musician, a magician, and how they save their village from the evil giant Abiyoyo. Instruments include the djembe, mbira, bongo, and shekere. After the performance children are invited to take part in a craft activity inspired by the Abiyoyo story. Free copies of the book “Pete Seeger’s Storysong ABIYOYO” will be distributed courtesy of Simon & Schuster, Children’s Publishing Division.

Sounds like a great event.

There is nothing like touring one of Brooklyn’s most well-known new buildings, like Richard Meier’s On Prospect Park. The views from the $6 million penthouse are killer and the units details are pretty nice. The building is 40 percent sold with move-ins coming in the fall.–Brownstoner

Here are some upcoming Brooklyn community board meetings with information courtesy of the compilations that appear in the Daily News:

Community Board 5. (East New York, Cypress Hills, Highland Park, New Lots, City Line and Starrett City) will hold its next regular board meeting at 6:30 PM April 23 at the board office, 127 Pennsylvania Ave.

Community Board 9. (South Crown Heights, Prospect-Lefferts Gardens, Wingate) will meet at 7 PM April 22 at Middle School 61 Auditorium, which is located at 400 Empire Blvd.

Community Board 10. (Bay Ridge, Dyker Heights, Fort Hamilton) will hold its monthly meeting at 7:15 PM April 21 at the Knights of Columbus at 1305 86th St.

Community Board 16. (Brownsville, Ocean Hill) will have its monthly meeting at 7 PM April 22 at the Brownsville Multi-Service Center, located at 444 Thomas S. Boyland St.

A look at the early morning situation from the Brooklyn Weather Observatory confirms what the forecast says: it is shaping up to be a glorious spring day. The official forecast is: “Warm with plenty of sun” and a high of 72. Tonight will be 56 with clear to partly cloudy skies. Tomorrow is shaping up to be an Acute Spring Fever Day.–Accuweather

We’re not sure what’s more compelling about this tale of an attack on Sixth Street in Park Slope by a group of teens: the attempted mugging and attack or the resident who got upset the victim fell on her flowers. We’re leaning toward the latter as it seems to be one of those utterly classic tales of that Special Park Slope Something. It comes from the Park Slope Forum on Brooklynian:

Saturday night at about 11pm I was walking with some friends on 6th street. When we got to 6th and 6th Avenue we ran into a group of about 10 kids ranging in age from 14 to 18 years old. They told us to give them money and when I refused one of them pushed me over a fence into someone’s flowerbed. The owner of the house came out and started screaming at me (?!) for destroying her flowers. The kids all thought it was a big joke and just egged her on. Luckily, we saw a cab and jumped into it but not before one of the kids took a swing at me and punched me in the face. If that lady hadn’t come out to yell at me or if we hadn’t been able to grab that cab I don’t know what would have happened. I called 311 the next day but they were less than impressed.

To complete the picture, the original poster admits to having been drunk at the time of the attack, but notes he was with some sober companions. So, let’s recap: A Park Slope resident–either a recent buyer or an old timer–comes out to find someone sprawled on her flowers surrounded by nearly a dozen teenagers and her first reaction is to be worried about the flowers? As in, “Honey, that bastard is dying on my pansies?” Ah, to be attacked in the Slope, stumble dying onto someone’s flowers and hear someone screaming at you for killing their flowers. What a way to go.

More Brooklyn hawks! These two–a mother and chick–are residents of Carroll Gardens. While their positions on 360 Smith Street, 340 Court Street, the Oyster Bar on Hoyt Street, Public Place and the Toll Brothers Gowanus development are unknown, we can say with 100 percent certainty that they are pro-pigeon and rodent, at least in the sense of enjoying them for dinner. The photos come from our Carroll Gardens Correspondent, who writes:

I have been watching these hawks swoop inside pigeon nests and steal babies over the years. The pigeons have nests in the cornices of the row houses across the street. Recently, I have been seeing one in the tree top in front of my window. Still not sure it was a hawk or a dove until I saw another hawk swoop in with a live mouse, its tail flipping around: a molting chick and the chick’s mother. You can see the fluffy down on the chick.

More photos below.

We’re not certain there is any organized opposition to the zoning text amendment that will redefine a number of narrow Carroll Gardens streets as being, in fact, narrow rather than “wide,” but residents aren’t taking any chances. They’ve started a letter-writing campaign to show their support to Planning Chair Amanda Burden, Brooklyn Planning Director Purnima Kapur, Borough President Marty Markowitz, City Council Member Bill de Blasio, Members of Commmunity Board 6 and others. A letter is now circulating in advance of a Community Board 6 Land Use Committee meeting on the change on April 24 at 6PM (at 250 Baltic Street). The letters will be presented by the CORD group, which has campaigned hard for this change and overall downzoning of Carroll Gardens. There is a “property owner” and “resident” version of the letter. Here’s the resident version:

I am a Carroll Gardens resident. I may or may not be able to attend all of the public hearings and meetings in regard to the proposed zoning text amendment referenced in the land use application above, so I wish to go on record by voicing my opinion now.

I am in favor of this zoning text amendment change. I believe that this is a long overdue, much welcomed relief to some of the problems Carroll Gardens has been facing due to the increase in new residential development. It pleases me that these streets, First through Fourth Places, between Smith and Henry Streets, Second, Carroll and President Streets between Smith and Hoyt, may no longer be subject to a regulation which allows boulevard sized, out of character structures to be built upon them. It is my wish that the members of our Community Board and Borough President Markowitz, heartily recommend Carroll Gardens Zoning Text Amendment N080345ZRK.

I want to thank the Department of City Planning for introducing this wonderfully creative solution and Councilman DeBlasio for his continued support. Further, I fervently hope that once the public hearings are over, both the City Planning Commission, and the City Council will make every possible effort to proceed as swiftly as possible to get this changed enacted.

One activist we spoke with called the letter and its widespread distribution in the neighborhood “a true sign of grassroots solidarity.”