Cries of Amazement As Judge Orders SUNY to Give LICH Back to Continuum
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w Facebook.com/ Twitter.com Volume 59, No. 93 WEDNESDAY, AUGUST 21, 2013 BrooklynEagle.com BrooklynEagle @BklynEagle 50¢ BROOKLYN B’klyn Att’y Guilty TODAY Cries of Amazement as UG Of Condo Fraud A . 21 From Associated Press Good morning. Today is A real estate lawyer the 233rd day of the year. has pleaded guilty to secu- Judge Orders SUNY to Give On this day in 1897, the rities fraud, admitting he Brooklyn Daily Eagle car- forged condominium plan ried an article with the acceptance letters from headline “Officers Move state authorities to enable LICH Back to Continuum Against Pool Rooms.” By developers to sell apart- “pool rooms” they meant ments without proper reg- SHOCK, AMAZEMENT, RELIEF AND CONFUSION not billiard parlors, but ulatory oversight. greeted the blockbuster announcement on Tuesday that places where people made The attorney general’s Brooklyn Supreme Court Justice Carolyn Demarest has bets on horse races. While office said Tuesday that ruled that SUNY Downstate must give back Long Island waiting for the results from 36-year-old Eduard Frid- College Hospital (LICH) to Continuum Health Partners, or the track to come in by tele- man of Brooklyn forged to another trustee if Continuum isn’t able or willing to graph or telephone, they six letters from 2010 to take it back. played billiards, and even- 2012 and filed three with tually the original meaning the New York City De- SUNY Downstate, which took over LICH two years ago of the word was lost. The partment of Finance. under an arrangement approved by Justice Demarest, particular pool rooms in Under a plea agree- has been trying to shut it down since February. Residents, question were not in Brook- ment, Fridman will pay hospital staff and unions, Public Advocate Bill de Blasio lyn, but in Maspeth and $100,000, be on probation and a number of civic groups have battled in the courts Ridgewood, Queens. Some for five years and won’t and in countless rallies and marches to block what they of them were in well-known work in New York’s secu- athletic clubs, restaurants rities or condominium called SUNY’s plan to sell off LICH’s valuable assets. It is and political clubs, creating businesses. said to be worth a half a billion dollars. See stories by Mary an embarrassing situation Sentencing is sched- Frost, page 3, and Charisma L. Miller, page 12. for police. uled for Oct 7. LEFT: Brooklyn State Supreme Court Justice Carolyn Demarest. File photo Tech Startup In DUMBO BLDG BLOK IS ONE OF THE high-tech startup firms at NYU Poly’s DUMBO incluba- tor at 20 Jay St. Here are Bldg Blok’s Liz McEnaney (co-founder), Jennifer Ramos (intern) and Dana Karwas (co-founder). See story on page 3. Photo courtesy of NYC Department of Small Business Services BROOKLYN'S DANNY JACOBS battled through a bloody eye to knock out Giovanni Loren- zo Monday night in Manhat- tan. “I knew I had the skills over Lorenzo, but I knew he had the experience,” Jacobs admitted after the fight. See Sports, page 5. New Comedy To Open in Williamsburg ANNA KENDRICK AND RON Livingston are seen in a scene from “Drinking Bud- dies,” a new film by director Joe Swanberg opening Fri- day at Nitehawk Cinema in THE BROOKLYN ACADEMY OF MUSIC WILL UNVEIL A NEW Williamsburg. See story, BAM outdoor art installation and bike park on Sept. 4 at 31 page 9. Lafayette Ave., directly across the street from the famed Photo courtesy of Magnolia Pictures venue. The 20-by-24-foot wall will feature murals by local artists, with Brooklyn-based artist KAWS to be the first to be featured. Photo courtesy of NYC Department of Small Business Services Wednesday, August 21, 2013 • Brooklyn Daily Eagle • 1 EVIEW AND COMMENT RWill Hakeem Jeffries Respect His Constituents On the Minimum Wage? If the 1968 federal minimum wage grew with inflation, it would be $10.67 today. If it grew with worker productivity, it would be $22 today. If it grew with the incomes of the wealthiest one percent of Americans, it would be $33 today. But where does it stand 45 years later? A miserly $7.25. While Forbes’ top 100 CEOs rake in more in an hour of work than the av- erage low-wage worker does in a year, it is unacceptable for Congress to al- low 30 million Americans to make less today than low-wage workers did 45 years ago in 1968. Fortunately, there is a bill in Congress to rectify this injustice. Con- gressman Alan Grayson (FL) has introduced H.R. 1346, the “Catching Up to 1968 Act of 2013,” which would raise the minimum wage to $10.50 per hour and index it to inflation. Neither President Obama’s nor Rep. George Mill- er’s and Senator Harkin’s minimum wage proposals come close to catching up with 1968 by 2016; only Rep. Alan Grayson’s bill H.R. 1346 requires $10.50 per hour, 60 days after passage. This necessary increase would be a major, immediate economic stimulus and expand employment. Recently, over 300 citizens who live in the 8th district of New York signed a petition that I submitted, summoning Rep. Hakeem Jeffries to hold a town hall meeting to discuss H.R. 1346. Currently 34% of residents in East New York live under the poverty level. Rep. Jeffries is paid to meet with con- cerned citizens during the August recess, and he did not initially respond. On Aug. 17, I went to his “outdoor office hours” in Coney Island to dis- cuss in person. Mr. Jeffries has not yet responded to a specific meeting about the minimum wage. 70% of Americans and 50% of Republicans sup- port a raise. Without a higher minimum wage and indexing it to inflation, it becomes more likely that low-wage workers will fall further into pover- ty and be more reliant on government services like food stamps, Medicaid, welfare and the earned income tax credit. Despite pegging their own wages to inflation, Congress has failed to index the minimum wage to cost of living increases. As a result, low-wage workers have lost $15.3 billion in wages since the minimum wage’s peak in 1968. For every day that Congress fails to raise the minimum wage back to 1968 levels and index it to inflation, each minimum wage worker loses an- other $26 in potential earnings. In the time between when his constitu- ents first contacted him and now, minimum wage workers in Rep. Jeffries’ district lost over $1.3 million in potential wages. He currently supports a higher minimum wage, but has not yet co-sponsored H.R. 1346. Even if Rep. Jeffries does not support this bill, we hope he can at least respect his constituents by holding the town meeting to which his constit- uents summoned him. —Erica Lee Erica Lee is a social worker and concerned constituent of the 8th district. For more information about this letter and the Catching up to 1968 Act of 2013, visit www.timeforaraise.org Is published daily except Saturdays, Sundays and Federal Holidays by Everything Brooklyn Media, LLC (USPS 971380), located at 16 Court Street, Suite 1208, Brooklyn, NY 11241. Subscription price Publisher - J.D. Hasty: [email protected] is $130 per year, $65 for six months. Periodicals Postage paid Features Editor -Samantha Samel: [email protected] at Brooklyn, NY. POSTMASTER: Send address changes to Community Editor - Mary Frost: [email protected] Brooklyn Daily Eagle, Circulation Office, 16 Court Street, Suite 1208, Religion Editor - Francesca N. Tate: [email protected] Brooklyn, NY 11241. 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Email: [email protected] Consulting Editor - Sam Howe: [email protected] 2 • Brooklyn Daily Eagle • Wednesday, August 21, 2013 Judge Orders SUNY: Give LICH Back to Continuum Nurse Cites Support From Eagle, Others By Mary Frost to treat people in need of medical Brooklyn Eagle care, Justice Demarest determined Shock, amazement, relief and “that I have a legal and moral respon- confusion greeted the blockbust- sibility to correct my earlier error.” er announcement on Tuesday that “This win belongs to LICH RNs, Brooklyn Supreme Court Justice staff, doctors, neighbors and com- Carolyn Demarest has ruled that munity associates, Councilmen SUNY Downstate must give back Levin and Lander, Senator Sqaud- Long Island College Hospital (LICH) ron, Assemblywoman Millman, the to Continuum Health Partners, or Red Hook Star and the Brooklyn Ea- to another trustee if Continuum gle,” said Julie Semente, critical-care isn’t able or willing to take it back. nurse at LICH and a member of (See additional story, page 12.) the New York State Nurses Associ- SUNY Downstate, which took ation. “Our relentless actions from over LICH two years ago under an January to June fighting the injus- arrangement signed off on by Jus- tice that SUNY was perpetrating on tice Demarest, has been trying to LICH, and the superb, accurate re- shut it down since February.