The Red Hook Civic Association discusses Thor Equities, movie shoots and more, by Nathan Weiser

The Red Hook Civic Association held their monthly meeting on March 28 at the PS 15. A teacher from BASIS, Robert Barrios, NCO Jonathan Rueda and assistant police captain Ramos and Annette Amendola were some of the people at the meeting.

The Thor Equities site on Beard Street was brought up again. John McGettrick, president of the Civic Association, said that there will be a meeting organized by Councilman Carlos Menchaca’s office for April 19 to discuss the Thor Equities site.

At the meeting on April 19, there will be lawyers from Thor and environmental lawyers.

“The case that is currently before NY State Environmental Conservation is moving forward to force them into a consent decree,” McGettrick said. “They did provide to the state a copy of 173 pages of various items that were contained in the piles of dirt.”

Even though Thor claims that the toxic material is minimal the area is still subject to wind blowing dust throughout the area. McGettrick expects that sometime in the beginning of April that they will be given a deadline for safe removal of all debris.

There was also discussion of the underground stream that was underneath what is now Richards Street. The new steel bulkhead that surrounds much of the Thor property causes the water level to rise.

According to McGettrick, many people who live on Pioneer Street say that even when there isn’t a major rain storm they can get flooding in their basements. Visitation Church also often has a stream running in their basement.

“This is something where the outlets have to be reopened like they once were and that would involve action from IKEA and Thor,” McGettrick said.

New Development
Residential developments could be coming, which would have a real impact on the neighborhood.

It was announced that the plot surrounded by Columbia, Otsego and Lorraine Street is now on the market. The price of the plot isn’t known, but it is R6 zone with a commercial overlay. This could potentially be a massive facility.

“It could allow for a high-rise development at a substantial cost,” McGettrick said. “The potential development is almost half a million square feet.”

NYCHA
McGettrick understands that NYCHA will be considering putting in fill housing across from the Red Hook Library.

They are proposing to do this in the open area in public housing where they currently have the small community garden. In the past, NYCHA has attempted to do this at other NYCHA facilities because they are desperate for money.

“The idea is to allow substantially high structures to go up with a certain component of affordable housing and a certain component of market rate and above housing under a 99-year lease,” McGettrick said.

The money that is generated will try and close some of the deficit that NYCHA is currently experiencing.

Movies in Red Hook
Mary Kyle, who is an owner of Dry Dock, brought up the issue of movie and TV shoots in the neighborhood taking up more space than they need to.

She wanted to find out who decides how much space they get and how it can be reduced.

“Sometimes more than twice as much of the space as they really need,” Kyle said. “Then you find out they have basically had those spaces filled by the staff. They park in the spaces where they have kicked the residents out.”

Captain Ramos, who was at the meeting, said that any time movie units come to the neighborhood the approval comes from the mayor’s press office. Even the precincts don’t have oversight over that.

“Thee is a special unit, the movie and TV unit, and they are the ones that process those permits,” Ramos said.

McGettrick added that he thinks they can get the amount of space reduced, but he and others think the movie units shouldn’t be eliminated because they do good for the community.

“A lot of movies that are made both for TV and beyond are tied into the place at the end of Coffey Street,” McGettrick said. “That is the building that has been bought by UPS. The thing is that they do make contributions to the schools.”

A teacher at BASIS complained that a movie shoot had a negative impact on the school.

They took a lot of parking spaces close to the school and recently when the kids heard the explosion from the movie the teacher said the kids thought they were being bombed.

McGettrick thinks they can work on reducing operations of the film crews.

B71

Robert Berrios had a map of the proposed B71 bus route that they are trying to bring back. This bus line would operate between Brooklyn and Manhattan through the Battery Tunnel.

Berrios wanted everyone to go to the link on the front page of the bus map and sign the petition and get as many people to sign that petition as possible. He added the first two meetings with the MTA went well.

He is an advocate for not bringing the proposed trolley to Red Hook because it would lead to a two-fare zone, the neighborhood would lose parking and that the trolleys would not be able to stop all of a sudden in case of an emergency ahead.

Berrios said that this bus line would make it much easier for people getting to work in Lower Manhattan. McGettrick added that a few years ago it was 11 minutes to get from Baked to Bowling Green, and also said that if this bus doesn’t come they can bring something similar to a dollar van.

Neighborhood events
There will be an Easter Egg Hunt on Saturday for children at Coffey Park starting at noon. The Easter Egg Hunt is being organized by Redemption Church. Everybody is welcome to attend.

Neighborhood Coordination Officer (NCO) Rueda announced that the 76^th Precinct will be having their community council meeting on Wednesday, April 4. It will be at 7:30 pm at 191 Union Street.

Rueda will be hosting a meeting with NCO Clarke in the Red Hook Library for Sector D on April 5. Doors will open at 6:00 and the meeting will start at 6:30.

“It is a meeting about the community,” Rueda said. “Any concerns, any way you think we can do better, it’s about your guys. You guys are guiding me to see how we can better our community.”

Rueda has been working in the precinct for 10 years and this is his fourth month in sector D.

“Any situation, even if it is another precinct, I can still help you,” Rueda said. Rueda and Ramos described the role of the NCO.

“We basically stay in a section of Red Hook,” Rueda said. “There are four sectors in each precinct – A, B, C, D. There are two officers in each area. Any problem that arises, we give our cell phones and email addresses. We are basically on call 24/7 for you guys.”

“We have these build a block meetings since they are the experts in their sector,” Ramos said. “The idea behind this is to have the same cops in the same locations all the time and to improve communication between the cops and the people that actually live there so we can resolve the policing issues that are there. It’s a better way of gathering intel and information.”