This weekly feature spotlights a wide variety of people who live and work on the Lower East Side. If you know someone you would like to suggest be featured in “My LES,” please email us here.
What do you do?
I'm the Executive Director at the Lower East Side Harm Reduction Center. I oversee all operations, government contracts and foundation supporters. I started working here as a volunteer in the early 90’s when it was still illegal to distribute sterile syringes to active drug users. While working for the NYC Department of Health, I provided HIV/AIDS education to others who volunteered and participants (clients). Eventually, I was offered a position as Peer Education Program Coordinator in 1994. This was when we were located at Avenue C between 3rd & 4th Sts.
From Cuomo's State of the State presentation; paradying the state's bizarre budgeting process.
Post political editor Frederic Dicker, Governor Cuomo’s BFF, turns up the heat on Sheldon Silver, as a budget deadline looms in Albany. Here’s how the press release column begins:
With less than two weeks to go be fore a budget is due, aides to Gov. Cuomo fear a state shutdown could occur because of large spending demands by Assembly Speaker Sheldon Silver, The Post has learned. Administration insiders said they’ve been stunned to find that Silver (D-Manhattan), despite a $10 billion projected deficit, is “more concerned with satisfying the spending demands of this or that bloc in his conference than he is in doing what’s best for the state.” Continue reading Cuomo Takes Aim at Silver, as Budget Deadline Nears
Spring has sprung in the M’Finda Kalunga Community Garden, but we won’t be seeing much sunshine today. The rain will continue this morning, giving way to cloudy skies this afternoon. A high of 55 today. Mostly sunny tomorrow before the showers return mid-week. Continue reading Good Morning!
Near Essex & Canal, Saturday afternoon. Photo by Brifget Bosworth.
New York City police and federal transportation agents spent most of the day on Canal Street, pulling over interstate bus drivers for spot inspections. They stopped dozens of buses at various locations throughout the city last week, in the aftermath of the deadly bus accident in the Bronx.
The photo above was taken by Lo-Down contributor Bridget Bosworth, shortly before 3pm. This morning, we noticed more buses pulled to the side of the street, on both Canal and Division. Employees of the Federal Motor Carrier Safety Administration and the Department of Transportation were both on the scene.
Happy pre-Purim! There are quite a few activities planned throughout the neighborhood in the next couple of days, including this evening’s Purim Talent Showcase at the Stanton Street Shul. It begins at 9:30pm, following Maariv services and the megillah reading. In addition to the entertainment, there will be refreshments, hamentashen and klezmer music throughout the evening. There’s a $10 suggested donation at the door. The historic Stanton Street Shul is located at 180 Stanton Street (between Clinton and Attorney streets).
The victim, LES resident Sabrina Scott, was punched and then fell onto the tracks as a Good Samaritan wrestled with her attacker. Fortunately, Derrick Oakes (the Good Samaritan) was able to pull Scott up before a train came along.
Police say Acevedo has no known address and is apparently homeless.
A fire broke out this afternoon on the top floor of 253 East Broadway (near Montgomery), a tenement building along historic Shtiebel Row. No one was hurt in the blaze and damage to the building didn’t appear too be too bad. The building’s owner suggested someone was doing unauthorized work inside an apartment. Continue reading Fire Quickly Extinguished at 253 East Broadway
A special free concert (one that feels especially poignant right now with the current crisis in Japan) comes to Abrons Arts Center next weekend. The Carnegie Hall Neighborhood Concert Series will present two of Japan’s best known Tsugaru shamisen performers, Yutaka Oyama and Masahiro Nitta as part of their ongoing citywide JapanNYC festival. Abrons notes: The Tsugaru shamisen is a banjo-like instrument from the Tsugaru region in Aomori Prefecture in the northernmost part of Japan’s central island of Honshu. Both Oyama and Nitta are known for using the instrument to bring a modern sensibility to an ancient, highly percussive folk music, which is sometimes referred to as “Japanese bluegrass.” Watch a fantastic video of them performing after the jump.
Sheldon Silver, Oakland Mayor Jean Quan, Dr. Floyd Hyen (Quan's husband), City Councilmember Margaret Chin, AAFE Executive Director Chris Kui.
Lower East Side Assemblyman Sheldon Silver has a lot on his plate these days. This week, Speaker Silver is in the middle of intensive budget negotiations with Governor Andrew Cuomo and legislative colleagues. But nevertheless, he managed to make it down from Albany last night for a big event in Chinatown.
Silver presented awards to several honorees, including Oakland Mayor Jean Quan, at Asian Americans for Equality’s Lunar New Year celebration, at the Jing Fong restaurant on Elizabeth Street (more on the event later).
Silver did not talk much about the budget negotiations. But, in the presence of many of the neighborhood’s affordable housing activists, he repeated the Assembly’s commitment to renewing and extending rent protection laws.
Don’t miss a special production of Peter and the Wolf tonight and tomorrow at University Settlement’s Performance Project. The piece was created by the young performance artist Marc Arthur. Program notes state: Arthur’s Peter and the Wolf draws from more than 80 sources of text to tell this story about the loss of childhood innocence. A children’s chorus and a troupe of child ballerinas elevate the most dramatic moments of the production and viscerally remind audiences that children are not always so innocent or kind. Appropriate for young audiences; deals with mature themes. $5-$15 //tonight at 7:30, tomorrow at 2pm and 7:30pm // 184 Eldridge St
The governor is apparently now supporting Sheldon Silver’s proposal for linking property tax relief and the extension of rent control laws (WSJ, Capital Tonight).
Driver’s license of bus driver in Bronx crash is suspended (NYT).
Cops come out in force to run down Angel & Kings tagger (EV Grieve).
There’s been lots of speculation about the so-called “Allen Street Hotel,” going up at 139 Orchard/138 Allen Street. Now an interesting item has popped up on LoopNet.
According to a listing updated March 16th, Misrahi Realty is offering the 16-story, 98 room hotel to prospective buyers. Price: undisclosed.
This weekly feature spotlights a wide variety of people who live and work on the Lower East Side. If you know someone you would like to suggest be featured in “My LES,” please email us here.
