HOLY WAR Slope Parents Protest Arabic School Plan
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Read your local stoop inside. Read them all at BrooklynPaper.com Brooklyn’s Real Newspaper BrooklynPaper.com • (718) 834–9350 • Brooklyn, NY • ©2007 BROOKLYN HEIGHTS–DOWNTOWN EDITION AWP/16 pages • Vol. 30, No. 11 • Saturday, March 17, 2007 • FREE INCLUDING DUMBO HOLY WAR Slope parents protest Arabic school plan By Dana Rubinstein action to combat the plan, and was The Brooklyn Paper set to rally on Friday. “[The Department of Educa- Park Slope parents exploded tion] couldn’t answer any ques- at Department of Education offi- tions at all, [like] who decided on cials who hope to squeeze a new this school, and where the securi- Arabic-language middle school ty will come from,” said Fraser. into the elementary-level PS 282 Her outrage was echoed by Do building on Sixth Avenue. lores Louison. The up-and-coming elemen- “This is totally unacceptable,” tary school already houses 600 said Louison. “We fought hard for students, from pre-K through fifth our science lab, our computer lab, our grade, and parents say it can’t music room, our art room. It doesn’t hold many more. take a rocket scientist to see that this “We’ll lose space, we’ll lose will change things for the worse.” services, and we’ll lose safety,” The PTA has found a champion / Julie Rosenberg said Parent Teacher Association in Councilman David Yassky (D- President Xiomara Fraser, whose Park Slope), who told The Brook- son is a fourth-grader at PS 282. lyn Paper that the plan was “a mis- “We would rather they give us take and would be very harmful to the option of putting our own sixth efforts to help that school grow.” The Brooklyn Paper The Brooklyn graders back here…if they think The Department of Education Patti Hagan with her beloved pooch, Lady Day. there’s enough space,” added Fras- Web site claims that the school is er. “That creates continuity.” only at 63 percent capacity. Fraser’s concerns were echoed “We wish every new school in by dozens of parents at the March the city could have its own build- 12 PTA meeting, where the city un- ing, but we rarely have the luxury veiled its plan amid widespread in- of sufficient space and money,” dignation that the Khalil Gibran In- said Melody Meyer, an Education ternational Academy hadn’t been Babak Ghahremanpour Department spokeswoman. drafted with any consultation from Parents at PS 282 in Park Slope are hoping to block a city plan to put an Arabic- The school is named for Gibran, the community. language middle school within their elementary school. a beloved Lebanese Christian poet. DOGGONIT! The day after that raucous meeting, parents Jennifer Bacon Fossati and Filippo Fossati sent Friends, foes cheer as Hagan’s dog Schools Chancellor Joel Klein a letter complaining that the Arab- turns up after odd disappearance language and culture school would “invade” PS 282 with a Honor program that “is an abdication of By Gersh Kuntzman munity-wide effort to find the pur- rals — “It’s run by a Bhutanese guy, the basic principle behind public The Brooklyn Paper loined pup that ended thanks to a by the way,” Hagan said — and education [by setting] up separate hunch by a receptionist at a Fort was told that a “strange” woman Residents of Prospect Heights schools to teach uncritically one Greene animal hospital. with gray hair and a dark coat had history and one culture.” at the — whether they support the At- The drama began on March 6, poked her head into the shop de- The letter cited a report pub- lantic Yards mega-project or not when Hagan tied up her dog out- manding to know whose dog was — were united in their joy at lished on MilitantIslamMonitor.org side New York Naturals on Flat- tied up outside. that referred to the Gribran Acad- hearing that Patti Hagan had got- bush Avenue near Bergen Street. “I went next door and talked to emy as a “Jihad school.” ten her dog back. court! Hagan was actually going into a Mike Hussein and he said the The academy, which would be That is, except Bruce Ratner. different store, but wanted Lady to same thing about this lady,” Hagan the city’s first dedicated to Arabic But more on that later. be in the sun, not in the cold (re- said. “And the optometrist said he language and culture studies, is be- Building to be Lady Day, the peripatetic At- member that, it becomes important saw a woman acting strange.” ing run by Debbie Almontaser, a named for Carey lantic Yards protester’s 12-year-old later). Convinced that Lady had been native of Yemen who is a 15-year black Lab, had been stolen last Ten minutes later, when Hagan dognapped, Hagan made the rounds veteran of the school system. week, setting into motion a com- returned from photocopying pro- of the local animal hospitals to get The Gibran school would have By Gersh Kuntzman test flyers (what else?), Lady was the word out and posted flyers all only a sixth-grade class next year, The Brooklyn Paper nowhere to be found. over the neighborhood (“Lady Day but eventually house 81 students Finally, someone is making She popped her head is very sweet and loves to eat ap- in grades sixth through eight. a federal case out of honoring into New York Natu- See DOGGONE on page 13 The PS 282 PTA has sprung into Hugh Carey. On Tuesday, Rep. Ed Towns (D-Fort Greene) pushed through a bill that would rename (or, more accurately, name) the fed- Is Hepcat eral courthouse on Cadman driving off Plaza East and Tillary Street 7TH AVE EXPRESS “Hugh L. Carey United States Courthouse.” into the Dana Rubinstein SMART Report: One-way streets are speedways The House overwhelmingly California sun? passed Towns’s bill, which INSET: By Christie Rizk Armed with a radar gun, speeds as high as would honor the man who See p. 13 mom served seven terms in the Con- The Brooklyn Paper activists from Trans- 40 mph, while on portation Alter- two-way Seventh, gress, the governor who saved There is now conclusive natives stood cars maxed out at New York City from bankruptcy, proof that cars have turned on Seventh and ONE-WAY 7TH only 20 mph. the Democratic powerbroker / Julie Rosenberg; Park Slope’s one-way Eighth Eighth avenues The speed lim- who tightened the belt on the Avenue into a mini-speedway, and measured how it on both state’s profligate spending by City buys lending credibility to resi- fast cars were going ONE-WAY 6TH streets is 30 mph. saying “the days of wine and dents’ fears about a proposal on both streets. The gun-on-the- roses are over,” the liberal lion to turn Sixth and Seventh av- On one-way Eighth, street survey refutes the De- whose greatest regret is that he Paper The Brooklyn land for enues into one-way streets. cars were clocked at See ONE-WAY on page 15 See CAREY on page 15 The federal courthouse on Tillary Street could be named for Gov. Hugh Carey. Ratner By Ariella Cohen The Brooklyn Paper Love ’em or Lethem Why is Mayor Bloomberg buying land for developer Bruce Ratner? The City Council was left asking that Boerum Hill’s prodigal son’s new Brooklyn-free novel question when officials from the city’s Eco- nomic Development Corporation disclosed By Adam Rathe the new book, “You Don’t Love has built his reputation largely that almost half of the city’s previously an- The Brooklyn Paper Me Yet,” which was released on on books like “Motherless nounced $205-million contribution to At- March 13. Brooklyn” and “Fortress of Soli- lantic Yards would pay for acquiring land It could be seen as a betray- “There was something myste- tude,” both highly praised works within the mega-development’s 22-acre al. Jonathan Lethem, patron rious and really evocative to me that are now standard issue for F footprint. saint of South Brooklyn’s about that part of LA — Silver train riders. That’s quite a bur- And no one knows why. literati, has written a book Lake and Echo Park,” he said. “I den to bear. “I said, ‘Why are we are reimbursing based in, of all places, Los An- like places that are ill-defined “You Don’t Love Me Yet” fol- [Ratner] for property that he [could] pur- geles. bohemian frontiers, verging on lows Lucinda Hoekke, a young chase on the open market?’” said Council- Greenhood / Aaron “I wanted to shake off the re- gentrification — disputed ter- musician who’s breaking up with woman Letitia James (D-Prospect Heights). sponsibility of being the rains. There is a certain Brook- her boyfriend/bandmate and has “They … avoided the question.” ‘Faulkner of Boerum Hill,’ ” the lyn-ness to that.” taken a job at “The Complaint James, a strong opponent of Ratner’s $4- author told GO Brooklyn last And he can’t really be faulted Line,” an art project that finds billion arena-and-skyscraper Xanadu, was week. He was preparing to go for trying to get away. Lethem her listening to callers’ griev- See RATNER on page 5 Paper The Brooklyn away for the weekend, to rest a lives on the same Boerum Hill ances for hours on end. Author Jonathan Lethem (right) and his dog, Maisy, in Boerum Hill. bit before he began the tour for block that he grew up on, and See LETHEM on page 10 2 AWP THE BROOKLYN PAPER • WWW.BROOKLYNPAPER.COM • (718) 834-9350 March 17, 2007 WHERE TO EDITORS’ PICKS SATURDAY SUNDAY TUESDAY WEDNESDAY FRIDAY March 17 March 18 March 20 March 21 March 23 Brooklyn’s Go green Gardens’ new Work up a thirst for party one of Farrell’s styro- brew foam cups full of beer Sick of being overlooked for the Greenest Block in The Brooklyn with Park Slope’s St.