Verdi Square

The survey evaluated parks based on the percentage of residents living within a 10-minute or ½ mile walk of a park; total park acreage including the city’s median park size, and services and investment, which combines the number of playgrounds per 10,000 residents and number of dollars spent per person.
“New York spends a lot per person,” said Adrian Benepe, senior vice president and director of city park development for The Trust for Public Land. Benepe was New York City Parks Commissioner for 10 years, until joining the The Trust for Public Land last year. This year’s ranking showed New York spending $160 per person compared to $152 in the previous ranking.
The good news is New York moved up from third place, passing Sacramento, since last year. At that time, the Trust looked at just the 40 largest U.S. cities. By including the 50 largest U.S. cities this year, Minneapolis got into the mix, and secured the first place ranking. In 2012, San Francisco ranked number one, with Sacramento in second place. New York and Boston had tied for third.
If the same 40 cities had been considered this year, would New York have been Number One?
“It’s possible,” said Benepe. How does the future look for New York? Because other cities have “big, empty areas” and New York doesn’t, he said it will be hard for New York to add more medium-sized parks to increase overall park acreage in the future.
How do particular New York neighborhoods fare?
Park acreage includes federal, city, and state land yet, the Upper East Side still falls short. “The Upper East Side is one of the areas that doesn’t have a lot of parks,” said Benepe.

At 2 p.m. on Saturday, June 1, a 37-year-old man from Queens was working in a commercial building on West 63rd Street when he had a dispute with another worker. The second man struck the first man in the face with a painting broomstick, injuring him and causing pain and bruising. The broomstick wielder fled the scene, while the victim went to the 115th precinct and received treatment by Emergency Medical Services there. No flying monkeys were witnessed in the vicinity.

At 5:30 in the morning of Saturday, June 1, a 55-year-old handy man from the Bronx parked his vehicle across the street from the building on Riverside Drive where he was working. At the end of his shift at 4 p.m., he found his car had been stolen. It was not at the towing pound or the marshal’s office. The vehicle was a green 2003 Dodge Caravan with New York plates, valued at $3,000.

An 81-year-old man living on West 81st Street reported that sometime between 8:15 and 8:30 a.m. on Wednesday, May 29, an unknown person had used his home computer to withdraw $20,000 from his bank checking account. It is unknown if he had a wife and whether she was computer-literate.

Early in the afternoon of Thursday, May 30, a 61-year-old woman was taking a yoga class on West 77th Street when she discovered that her wallet had been taken from her purse. She did not see anyone do the dire deed. Other people in the class said that this sort of theft is very common at this yoga studio. The woman canceled her credit cards, and fortunately, there were no unauthorized charges. Items stolen included $250 in cash, her New York State driver’s license, a package of stamps worth $25, plus her credit and debit cards.

In the morning of Thursday, May 30, a 33-year-old man from Redondo Beach, CA placed some items next to him as he sat on a park bench opposite Riverside Drive. When he looked back at his belongings ten minutes later, the items were missing. Video cameras may have captured footage of the incident, but there were no witnesses. The items stolen included an Apple MacBook Pro valued at $2,500, an All Saints briefcase worth $600, an iPhone charger valued at $30, iPhone ear buds worth $30, and a computer case valued at $50. The total haul amounted to $3,210.

In the morning of Wednesday, May 29, a 17-year-old female student tried to enter her school on Amsterdam Avenue with an E-cigarette. As she passed through the scanners at the entrance, she was told to stop by to see the school safety agent, a 52-year-old woman. The girl refused and grabbed the safety agent by the collar. The agent tried to place the girl under arrest, but the girl resisted and the agent broke her pinkie finger in the scuffle. The agent was taken to the hospital, and the girl was arrested on May 29 and charged with felonious assault on a peace officer.

By Colleen Long and Jennifer Peltz

Police Commissioner Raymond Kelly is the most popular public figure in New York City not running for mayor. And when asked, his answer is always the same: He has no plans to enter the race and is focusing solely on running the police department.
But that hasn’t stopped political insiders from urging the 71-year-old Kelly to get in, suggesting his tough-on-crime record would make him the front-runner from Day One.
“Ray Kelly great public servant. Only hope of averting disaster for NY,” media mogul Rupert Murdoch tweeted last week.
Such chatter has reached a fever pitch ahead of an upcoming deadline for candidates to file petitions to get on the ballot. But experts say the odds of Kelly entering are slim, and it’s not clear whether the commissioner who has served for more than a decade would even stay on after the election.
“I think that the conservatives, plus some business elites, are concerned about the Democrats being too liberal for them,” so they want someone like Kelly who can replicate the policies of Mayor Michael Bloomberg and his Republican predecessor, Rudy Giuliani, said City University of New York Graduate Center political scientist John Mollenkopf.
Kelly is an independent who has served under both Democrats and Republicans, including former President Bill Clinton as the head of customs. He’s seen as someone comfortable being a public figure, with the managerial experience of leading the nation’s largest police department.
Kelly also has presided over a precipitous drop in crime – last year there were a record low 419 murders in a city of 8 million people – and has remade the NYPD’s counterterrorism and crime-fighting efforts. His reputation remains untarnished despite department scandal and criticism.
“He’s a phenomenal police commissioner,” said Bloomberg. “He’s done an enormous job for this city. As far as I know, he doesn’t have any interest in running for mayor. But this is a very good manager who cares very much about people and has done a great job.”
Kelly regularly gets a higher approval rating than the mayor and other public figures; in a Quinnipiac University poll late last month, more than two-thirds of voters said they liked how he’s doing his job. The same poll also found nearly half thought he should run for mayor.
“There’s no question that he’s admired in what he’s doing in his job,” but it’s not clear that would translate into support for him as a political candidate, said the poll’s director, Maurice “Mickey” Carroll.
Late last week, when asked about the election, Kelly gave the standard response: “I have no plans to run for elective office.”
But he acknowledged he was flattered by the poll numbers, citing them as a reflection of how well police officers do their jobs.
“They are doing a superb job and I’m the beneficiary of that,” he said.
Talk of Kelly’s political prospects picked up after some voters started getting survey calls last month about their views of him and the mayor’s race. Conducted by longtime Republican pollster Kellyanne Conway, the $17,000 survey was commissioned by a businessman who’s not well known in political circles, she said, declining to identify him. She said he had seen media reports about interest in a potential Kelly candidacy and was curious about how he might fare.
“I believe that there is room for a new entrant, especially someone as well-known as Ray Kelly,” Conway said.
But with a July 11 deadline to submit petitions to enter the race for the Sept. 10 primary, it could be tough to put together a campaign and fundraising apparatus. Many experienced political strategists are already committed to other candidates, as are many endorsers.
Plus, as an independent, Kelly would need party leaders’ permission to run in a primary.
“I admire the commissioner greatly, but in terms of being a candidate for mayor, I don’t believe it’s going to happen,” said Manhattan Republican Party Chairman Daniel Isaacs. “I don’t believe he, personally, is inclined to run, and I think, quite frankly, at this juncture it’s quite late to run.”
Kelly’s popularity has remained high even as his department’s tactics have come under fire.
An ongoing federal civil rights lawsuit claims thousands of street stops made under the department’s “stop, question and frisk” policy were based solely on race. During the 10-week trial, city lawmakers reached agreement on a proposal to create an inspector general to oversee the police department, based largely on the outcry over stop-and-frisk and a series of stories by The Associated Press about the department’s monitoring of Muslims. A 2011 investigation found instances of ticket-fixing by dozens of officers who are now being charged criminally. And the 50-shot police barrage that killed unarmed Sean Bell on his wedding day prompted protests and debate about excessive force.
Some current mayoral candidates have said they would keep Kelly as commissioner, but he hasn’t said whether he’d stay if asked.
Others would look for new leadership in the police department if elected.

Left to right, Ken Biberaj and Gov. David Paterson

“Over the course of this campaign, I have regularly sought the advice and counsel of Governor Paterson about the issues that face the Upper West Side as well as our City. It is an honor to have his support in my race for the City Council,” said Biberaj.
Governor Paterson stated, “I am pleased to see that there are a number of excellent candidates in this City Council race for the 6th District, which will guarantee good service to the area I used to represent. I am endorsing my close friend Ken Biberaj because he believes in a better path for his family, friends and neighbors and represents a fresh, new voice eager to engage in the civic process. In our many discussions about the issues impacting the District, Ken has displayed a pragmatic, realistic view of our economy and the times we live in, which is unique and rare, and has proven to be a forward thinker with a tremendous vision for the future of his community and their quality of life.”