Last Tuesday, New Yorkers held their breaths as FDNY workers spent four hours rescuing a 2nd Avenue subway construction worker stuck in the mud up to his chest under 2nd Avenue and 95th Street. The good news is, the worker, Joseph Barone, a 27-year construction veteran from the Local 731 union, survived with only a few bruises and a night in the hospital to recover from a bout of hypothermia. Since then, MTA has shut down the work area, pending an investigation into the incident.

But just how safe is it to dig in the dark, cavernous tunnels under the city? According to the MTA, since the construction of the 2nd Avenue subway began in 1929, there have been zero deaths.

“It’s a miracle that more workers don’t get hurt, because a lot of what we do is very dangerous,” said Richard Fitzsimmons, the business manager of Local 147 Union, the main union for the sandhogs, the nickname for underground construction workers. “Each individual removes so much earth. Just by knowing the work that’s been done, and the history, it’s astounding.”

The danger of the sandhog profession felt real that night, as around 8:30 p.m., Joseph Barone got his foot caught in a welding machine, and stepped off of the wooden platforms protecting workers from the quicksand-like mud. As soon as Barone got stuck, his fellow sandhogs worked to stop him from sinking. Authorities came shortly thereafter, and used a crane to lift Barone out of the mud.

Sometime after midnight, he was freed, and a crisis was averted.

Charles Cannon, who has been a sandhog for 42 years, and worked on the 2nd Avenue subway line a year and a half ago, said that he remembered a similar incident when he was working underground in Brooklyn some years ago, when his co-worker had gotten stuck in the mud.

“You’re talking to the man one second and the next he got buried, and you’re not sure where he might even be,” recalled Cannon of the terrifying situation. “When you have a situation like that, there’s a case of suffocation, there’s weight around your body alone everytime you breathe in and exhale it wont let you breathe in as much, your lungs can’t expand.”

Cannon explained that in a situation like Barone’s, you have to stand very still, because panicking and moving around will only make the body sink faster. During that accident years ago in Brooklyn, he and his fellow sandhogs were able to dig the victim out, but that doesn’t always happen.

“I’ve seen too many accidents occur. I don’t want to see anymore; I’ve even seen people pass away right in front of me,” said Cannon.

In fact, the underground construction work of sandhogs is considered to be the heaviest, and therefore the most dangerous of all the types of construction work, said Richard Fitzsimmons. Despite the inherent dangers of the profession, the 2nd Avenue Subway work has had a good record. In addition to the clean fatality record, only 2.1 accidents occur per 200,000 man hours, which is well below the Department of Labor standards, according to the MTA.

Fitzsimmons said that this is most likely due to better technology, better insurance incentives and tighter safety requirements. He said that, for instance, after several workers had their legs severed on the job, the union implemented the job of a brakee, who would stay with the machinery, to turn on the brakes in case something went wrong. Plus, he said, insurance companies give premium discounts to companies that work without accidents, so the union holds a lot of safety classes and medical training for their workers.

“In the long run, simply, it’s going to save lives, and save us a lot of money,” said Fitzsimmons.

Cannon said that he attributes the lack of fatalities to newer and better safety technology, like harnesses with bungee cords on the back. If you fall, he says, the harness will not only catch you, but will ease you down so that you don’t throw your back out.

Construction workers are decked out in protection gear: hard hats, ear plugs, work boots, barrier creams and harness belts.

“There’s danger everywhere,” said Cannon. “We all watch out for each other; you have to do that.”

But even with a slew of safety precautions and backups, Cannon said that going down into the darkness as a rookie can be terrifying. There’s always a danger of falling, being crushed, or even breathing in dangerous particles. Plus, Cannon said, the primal fear of claustrophobia is often present.

“It’s very tight quarters,” he said. “I’ve seen people take the elevator ride down 600-900 feet down when they get down they won’t get out of the elevator. They say ‘take me back up’; it’s overpowering.”

The invisible grueling work by sandhogs on the 2nd Avenue subway is expected to be completed by 2016. At which time, “the subway line that time forgot” will finally open to the public.

“When I go into those tunnels, it’s nothing short of majestic, and when it’s finally done, it’s really going to be something,” said Richard Fitzsimmons.

The structure of these meetings is new for the MTA. Small groups meet with MTA project representatives and facilitators to have detailed discussions about what’s happening at each of the future subway stops—East 63rd, 72nd, 86th and 96th streets—in the first phase of construction. Residents asked detailed, technical questions, about blasting techniques, environmental concerns and logistics of the future stations, as well as broader questions about how the contractors combat excessive dust at the sites.

“We know you’re here because we’re making too much noise,” said Sam Schwartz, a traffic engineer with his own firm and the director of community outreach for the Second Avenue subway project. “We need you as the eyes and ears of this project.”

Participants listened intently to the representatives describing each segment of the project and dove right in with their own questions and suggestions. Some people looked longingly at the renderings of what their streets will look like by 2016, when the project is finished. Paul and Kathy Trupio pointed to a rendering that shows their building on East 69th Street, hopeful that the giant structures currently parked outside would eventually give way to the clean, bright subway entrance they saw pictured.

Claudia Wilson, an MTA community liaison, chatted with the couple about their experience and sympathized with their construction woes.

“I know it’s disconcerting; I know it’s upsetting to everybody, but when it’s done, you’re not only going to have a new subway,” Wilson said. “You’ll have new sidewalks, new trees, new streetlights. It’s going to be beautiful.”

The Trupios said that while learning more about the project doesn’t make the problems go away, it does comfort them to a certain extent.

“It’s an understanding of why the equipment is there, why so many people are there, what they’re doing that they need it all,” Kathy said. “Aesthetically, it’s still ugly. The air quality is still terrible. But it’s good to understand what they’re doing.”

Paul said that he thinks Second Avenue is in better shape than he expected it to be during the construction, and that he’s content to wait out the worst of times in order to enjoy the revitalized neighborhood when the new subway is running. The couple bought their apartment in 2003 and expect that it will see a big bump in value once the subway entrance is open right below them.

“With the aging baby boomer population, there’s a premium on convenience,” he said. All of the new entrances will be accessible to the disabled.

Michael Horodniceanu, the president of MTA Capital Construction, was on hand to deliver opening remarks and stayed to mingle with residents and answer their questions. One woman stopped him to ask if she would be able to hear the subway from her apartment once it was completed and operational, and he launched into a technical explanation for her.

Horodniceanu said that people often come to him with very detailed questions, and that he feels that these workshops are helping put people at ease and understand the project at a granular level.

“It’s very helpful, because it’s a forum for people to actually not only describe what they would like to see and what their questions are, but also to potentially suggest solutions,” he said.

At the end of the evening, each group’s top concerns were announced, and they ran the gamut from truck noise to parking restrictions to the acrid smell lingering in the air after controlled blasts. Horodniceanu said they would look at each one and open the next meeting in three months, at the suggestion of one participant, by listing progress made on each of the concerns raised in this session.

“The construction managers—the guys that were here today—will summarize all the issues, then we’ll see what we can actually address, and that will be addressed,” he said.

TRIBUTE TO TEDDY
Teddy Roosevelt eyes his next prey from the newly restored murals in the Theodore Roosevelt Rotunda at the American Museum of Natural History. After two years of conservation treatment, the huge canvases were re-introduced to the public this week.

MTA TO RESUME BLASTING AT EXPLOSION SITE
After a routine detonation became out of control and erupted to the surface of Second Avenue on Aug. 21, the MTA stopped blasting at the site on East 72nd Street until an investigation could be completed. The agency announced last Thursday that it had concluded that investigation and would resume blasting at the site, with a number of safety measures in place.

“We have completed our review of the incident and have implemented a number of corrective actions. From this moment forward, blasting operations will be subject to additional management scrutiny and enhanced safety procedures to ensure that the community and workers are kept safe,” said Michael Horodniceanu, president of MTA Capital Construction, in a statement.

Some of the improvements include a superintendent sign-off on a pre-blast checklist and an additional layer of protective rubber blast mats over the explosives. The MTA has also hired an independent safety consultant, Thacher Associates/Total Safety Consulting, to provide outside monitoring of the contractor at the site.

NEW MEDICAL FACILITIES TO BRING HUNDREDS OF JOBS
Last week, Mayor Bloomberg announced plans for a collaboration between City University of New York and Memorial Sloan-Kettering Cancer Center to construct two new state-of-the-art outpatient cancer care facilities on the Upper East Side.

The city will sell a 66,000-square-foot site at 525 E. 73rd St. for $215 million to the partnership, and MSK will construct a 750,000-square-foot facility designed for innovative outpatient treatment programs. The hospital plans to use the facility to treat lung, head, neck and hematological cancers.

CUNY Hunter College will build an up to 336,000-square-foot Science and Health Professions building on the site as well.

“Thanks to our innovative approach to economic development, today’s announcement is yet another step towards making New York City home to the world’s most talented workforce,” Bloomberg said in a statement. “Not only will these two great institutions play a critical role in creating great jobs in one of the city’s growing industries, but they usher in the innovators and medical advancements of tomorrow.”

The projects are expected to create 3,200 construction jobs and 830 permanent jobs.

TURTLE BAY REJECTS MIDTOWN ANNEX IDEA
President of the Turtle Bay Association William B. Curtis released comments this week that will be presented at a City Planning Commission meeting on Sept. 27, rejecting a city proposal to annex an area of what is now considered Turtle Bay into East Midtown.

“What we cannot accept is any intrusion of Midtown beyond the current eastern boundary. City planning, however, is trying to annex an irregular area lying between Second and Third avenues, and East 43rd and East 45th streets and absorb it into the East Midtown study area. We strenuously object to this,” Curtis said in the statement.

Curtis cited the fact that that area has always been considered part of the East Side, not Midtown, and that the residential character of the area would make any type of Midtown upzoning inappropriate.

ANTIQUES AND ART AT THE ARMORY
Avenue magazine presents Antiques, Art & Design at the Park Avenue Armory this Friday, Sept. 21, through Monday, Sept. 24. The exhibit features over 60 dealers specializing in high quality art and antiques, including French, English, Italian, Swedish and Continental furniture from the 17th century through mid-century modern, fine silver, Russian antiquities and rugs, Tiffany lamps, French Art Nouveau and Art Deco furniture and objects, and many other types of art. Public show hours are 11 a.m. to 7:30 p.m. each day. Admission is $20. 643 Park Ave. Visit avenueshows.com for more information.

HOYLMAN WINS SENATE PRIMARY
In the 27th district Senate race, attorney and former chair of Community Board 2 Brad Hoylman beat out opponents Tom Greco, a Chelsea bar owner, and Tanika Inlaw, a public school teacher, to win the Democratic nomination. Hoylman, who received a reported 69 percent of the votes, will likely succeed Sen. Tom Duane, who surprised many when he announced he would retire at the end of his current term.

SODA BAN PASSES LAST HURDLE
Last Thursday, the New York City Board of Health approved Mayor Bloomberg’s “soda ban,” which prohibits the sale of soda and other sweetened drinks in any container over 16 ounces.

Bloomberg’s desire to curb the city’s obesity epidemic fueled the measure, which also applies to energy drinks like Gatorade and sweet iced teas. Over half of the city’s adults—and almost half of the city’s public school students—are overweight or obese, according to the Wall Street Journal.

Not surprisingly, vendors of sugary drinks have united to challenge the ban, arguing that it infringes on consumer freedom.

Many nutritionists support the measure, like the eminent Yale University epidemiologist Dr. Kelly Brownell, who told the New York Times, “It completely makes more sense to make the environment healthier rather than to just do pure education.”

While a Times poll found that most New Yorkers were against the law, the Board of Health vote was almost unanimous, with one abstention. Then again, Bloomberg appointed each board member himself.

The ban will take effect March 12, but vendors who break the law will not be fined until mid-June.

CENTRAL PARK RAPE VICTIM STANDS STRONG
The 74-year-old victim of a vicious assault and rape in Central Park last week told the New York Post that she isn’t going to let the horrible incident ruin her park experience.
“I’m not scared. I don’t want to lose that pleasure. I won’t let anything keep me from enjoying the park,” she told the newspaper.

The woman, identified only as an Upper West Side resident, was attacked in broad daylight as she was bird-watching in the park. The alleged rapist snuck up to the woman and assaulted her a few days after she had taken his photo when she caught him masturbating in the Rambles area of the park.

Police caught the suspect, 42-year-old homeless man David Albert Mitchell, as he was walking on the Upper West Side last Thursday. Mitchell reportedly has a long history of violent offenses.

ICONIC SECOND AVENUE BUSINESSES STRUGGLE FOR SURVIVAL WITH SUBWAY CONSTRUCTION

The polished floors, brand new tables, restored 90-year-old paintings and modern updates to the historic Heidelberg restaurant seem to indicate a run-of-the-mill renovation, something that happens in the normal course of operating a business. But if you look closely at the gleaming hardwood and peek around the corners of the restored bar, you can see that these measures are the elements of an eleventh-hour effort to save the embattled German institution. The Heidelberg is playing against the Second Avenue subway construction, and this is their Hail Mary pass.

“Business is so slow in the summertime, and with all the construction and the blasting, we decided it was time to give it a little bit of a facelift,” said Eva Matischak, the owner of the Heidelberg, on Second Avenue between East 85th and 86th streets. Her family bought the place in 1964, but it’s been a German restaurant since 1902, back when Yorkville was home to thousands of German immigrants.

Now, only a few of the Old World establishments remain, and the subway construction is threatening to shutter one of the last standing family-owned German eateries on the Upper East Side.

It’s not just a few jackhammers and some orange fencing that’s cut the Heidelberg’s business by roughly 30 percent. Since it’s near one of the future entrances of the Second Avenue line, the entire east side of the block lies in the shadow of massive storage containers. They obscure all of the businesses, creating an imposing barrier that only those with a specific destination in mind would be likely to traverse.

“It hurts because a lot of people driving or walking by might come in,” Matischak said, if they could see the place. “It’s been kind of hard to keep the expenses and the income at a level where we’re not losing money.”

A few months ago, Matischak was contemplating closing the restaurant and selling it, but her regular customers convinced her to give it another go. She took out a $100,000 loan from Chase bank, shut down for about a month, and is putting her last hope into a financial turnaround. They’ve installed new flooring and kitchen equipment, torn down an old dividing wall (a holdover from the cigarette-smoke-filled pre-Bloomberg days separating the dining area from the bar) to make the room more open, and given the place a modern polish while still retaining its charm and authenticity.

To keep above the red, Matischak will have to reduce her staff of 33 to about 15. She will probably close one day a week and stop serving lunch. She can’t continue the catering portion of the business because there is nowhere close by to park a van, and she won’t be offering delivery anymore because the construction makes it too slow. She switched to wooden tables so that she wouldn’t have to use linen tablecloths, saving about $3,000 a month on laundering costs. The restaurant will probably switch to all-cash, since accepting credit cards is more costly and time-consuming. They’ve also installed energy-efficient lighting in an attempt to cut the $4,000 monthly electric bill.

“We really almost closed. It’s making it too hard, to fight everybody all the time,” Matischak said. “Hopefully that will help us to survive, all those little changes.”

The “everybody” that Matischak is fighting includes the myriad city agencies that all small businesses must navigate, but it also includes a few conundrums courtesy of the MTA construction. For one thing, they normally bring in a lot of revenue during the summer months with their sidewalk café, for which they have a permit with the State Liquor Authority. They can’t operate the café now, but they’ve had to continue paying fees in order to ensure the permit doesn’t lapse. Matischak said that she’s had to pour $8,000 into keeping the permit active.

“Obviously [the Heidelberg], as well as a lot of businesses along Second Avenue, has been challenged by the construction, especially the restaurants have all been dealing with mainly café license issues because they have to be cut back,” said Nancy Ploeger, the president of the Manhattan Chamber of Commerce. She has worked with many of the affected businesses to alleviate some of the burdens that the construction has placed on them, acting as a liaison to the city’s agencies and pleading a case for leniency on some of the restrictions that could mean the difference between staying open and shutting the doors for many small businesses.

Ploeger and the Chamber have convinced the city to change a few small things that they hope will make a big difference. For example, restaurants normally have to resubmit an architectural plan for their outdoor café area if it changes in size. Restaurants on Second Avenue that are forced to shrink their sidewalk space due to construction have to abide by that rule, but the expense of hiring an architect to draw up new plans is a difficult one on top of the lost revenue from the outdoor tables that need to be cut.

“It’s not their fault that they’re being cut back,” Ploeger said. “They have to spend a lot of money to hire a an architect to make these drawings.” The city has agreed to allow those businesses to draw up and submit estimated plans themselves, without the seal of approval from an architect. Matischak also said that Ploeger is helping her negotiate with the State Liquor Authority to allow her to keep her sidewalk café license active without having to pay the fees.

Ploeger said that one of the biggest hurdles facing these businesses is the time associated with figuring out all the required steps to stay within the law when things change, and that the city should be more flexible in helping businesses navigate a problem that they didn’t create.

The Chamber instituted Second Avenue Restaurant Week, which ran in June this year, and tries to promote the businesses there and encourage them to offer special deals and promotions to get customers in the door. City Council Member Jessica Lappin conducted a survey recently of local residents, asking them what would persuade them to shop and dine along the areas of Second Avenue plagued by construction. While 86 percent of respondents said that specials and discount coupons would be the best way to get them in the door, business owners say that won’t make up for what they’re losing in foot traffic.

“There’s not too much that would help,” said Ralph Schaller, the owner of the Schaller & Weber butcher shop a few doors down from the Heidelberg. “Coupons? I don’t know. Either you come here or not. Tax breaks would help, that would be nice.”

Schaller, who works behind the counter at the German shop that he inherited from his father, said that he still gets a steady stream of regulars who buy the specialty meats and German import grocery items, but that his business is down significantly since the construction began.

“It’s bad. We’re 20 percent off [from normal business],” Schaller said. “We used to get a lot of people from out of town, but they don’t come anymore because there’s nowhere to park.” He said that the $115 tickets customers have gotten for double parking keep them away for good.

Schaller & Weber has been in business for 75 years, and Schaller said that the only reason he’s able to keep the shop open is that they own the building it sits in as well as a factory in Astoria that produces the meat products they sell in the store and elsewhere.

The furniture store next to the Heidelberg has also suffered. Ari Zaharopoulos, the owner of Gotham Cabinet Craft, said that their business is bolstered by their other locations (five total in Manhattan and 30 citywide) as well as repeat customers, but that their Second Avenue location has still taken a hit.

“It definitely has affected our sales because there is less visibility from the street,” Zaharopoulos said. “That location specifically caters to a lot of custom work. The potential buyers are not able to see our display. The traffic is diverted to the other side of the street.”

One of Zaharopoulos’ biggest concerns is what will happen when the city gets a major snowfall, a worry that Schaller echoed as well.

“If we have a hard winter, that’s going to be problem because if the snow piles up in that small space between the door and the equipment, no one will be walking by,” Zaharopoulos said.
He said that his biggest frustration is that the storage containers blocking the store seem to be there for the convenience of the MTA, rather than out of absolute necessity, and that they’re aren’t going anywhere anytime soon. The locals have been told that the containers will be in place for at least another two years.

Matischak is hoping that her cost-saving measures and general spruce-up will be enough to last that long. It was her regular customers who convinced her to stay in business, and she’s counting on them to keep coming back for plates of homemade schnitzel and glass boots (the restaurant’s signature) filled with frosty beer. The next few months will be telling, she said, as business gets back under way and she can determine whether her last-ditch efforts will pay off.

“There’s really no other places in Yorkville to give it character,” Matischak said. “People say we can’t leave the neighborhood, because if we go, there is no neighborhood.”

Inside the Second Ave. subway excavation. Via Wiki Commons

On the otherwise calm afternoon of Tuesday, Aug. 21, what was supposed to be a controlled underground blast blew rocks and debris into the streets at East 72nd Street and Second Avenue, terrifying residents and damaging a storefront. The explosion occurred as part of the Second Avenue Subway construction, and the next day, MTA officials said they were putting a moratorium on all work at that site until the contractor could provide a new standard operating procedure and a thorough safety review had been conducted.

This week, the MTA announced that construction at the site is resuming, but blasting will not continue at this time.

“What happened yesterday was completely unacceptable and should not have occurred,” Michael Horodniceanu, the president of MTA Capital Construction, the agency in charge of the project, said at the time. “I’m really upset and angry that whatever happened put the residents in the area in [this] situation. We are continuing our investigation into exactly what happened.”

Horodniceanu said that preliminary findings show that the blast, which was designed to create an elevator shaft, got out of control because the 1,800-pound, 6-foot-by-10-foot steel plate covering the tunnel above the explosives was not properly secured at its edges.
“The holes that were drilled in the rock outcrop that was blasted were diagonal. Normally we will do it in a vertical fashion,” he said, although the MTA has used this diagonal drilling at several other sites. “When you drill vertically, the energy that is created would go laterally. In this case, it went vertically and actually aimed directly to the deck, to the southeast corner of the 72nd Street deck. The decking lifted and allowed rock to actually spread into the street.”

Aside from a few broken windows at the Kolb Art Gallery, there was no structural damage to the street or nearby buildings, and no one was injured at the site, though the blast definitely rattled residents

The MTA plans to take a number of steps to ensure that this won’t happen again, Horodniceanu said. They will be adding protective rubber matting on top of underground blasts to further prevent the spread of debris, he said, and will also be expanding the areas from which they ban pedestrians surrounding a blast site. They are also hiring an independent safety consultant and will be employing a blasting consultant more frequently, he said.

None of these measures is expected to greatly increase the cost of the project or delay its December 2016 completion date, according to Horodniceanu.

“I truly would like to apologize to the residents of the area that have been exposed to numerous problems throughout the construction of this project, and I pledge to them that we’ll do our best for something like this not to occur again,” Horodniceanu said.

Assembly Member Kellner’s office said that they have received a few concerned phone calls about the incident and that he is working with the MTA to make sure that communication is better going forward.

“The MTA must be accountable to the community for the actions of their contractors. To date they have failed to do so,” Kellner said. “The MTA must explain in detail what new safety measures they will put in place during blasting to assure East Siders are never put in danger.”

The MTA has assured the community that blasting won’t resume at the site before additional safety measures are implemented.

Dr. Horodniceanu answers reporters' questions about Upper East Side explosion

“What happened yesterday was completely unacceptable and should not have occurred,” said Dr. Michael Horodniceanu, the president of MTA Capital Construction, the subsidiary agency in charge of the Second Avenue Subway construction project. “I’m really upset and angry that whatever happened put the residents in the area in [this] situation. We are continuing our investigation into exactly what happened.”

Horodniceanu said that preliminary findings show that the blast, which was designed to create an elevator shaft, got out of control because the 1,800 pound, 6-foot by 10-foot steel plate covering the tunnel above the explosives was not properly secured at its edges.

“The holes that were drilled in the rock outcrop that was blasted were diagonal. Normally we will do it in a vertical fashion,” he said, although the MTA has used this diagonal drilling at several other sites. “When you drill vertically, the energy that is created would go laterally. In this case it went vertically and actually aimed directly to the deck, to the southeast corner of the 72nd Street deck. The decking lifted and allowed rock to actually spread into the street.”

Aside from a few broken windows at an art gallery, there was no structural damage to the street or nearby buildings, and no one was injured at the site.

The MTA plans to take a number of steps to insure that this won’t happen again, Horodniceanu said. They will be adding protective rubber matting on top of underground blasts to further prevent the spread of debris, he said, and will also be expanding the areas from they ban pedestrians surrounding a blast site. They are also hiring an independent safety consultant and will be employing a blasting consultant more frequently, he said. None of these measures are expected to greatly increase the cost of the project or delay its December 2016 completion date, according to Horodniceanu.

“I truly would like to apologize to the residents of the area that have been exposed to numerous problems throughout the construction of this project, and I pledge to them that we’ll do our best for something like this not to occur again,” Horodniceanu said.

Even though it means a lifelong worry like no other, most parents say being a parent is the best thing that ever happened to them. No regrets, even if one day they become bit players in the lives of their beloved offspring, “But that shouldn’t happen,” I tell new daddy, editor Allen Houston, recalling my own profound regret for “not being there” for my widowed dad.

I loved him dearly, but preoccupation with my children—his grandchildren—didn’t leave real time for this father and grandfather who lived 1,000 miles away.

I shall never forget seeing my dad begin to weep as my cab pulled away from his house on our annual reunion. I cried a lot on my trip back to New York, but vows to make my dad an integral part of our lives came about too late. Five months later, my 77-year-old father‘s funeral was held on my 33rd birthday.

I often write about these primal connections that, after a certain age, our society finds quite forgettable.

While it’s extremely painful for parents to learn from Facebook that an estranged son is married or an out-of-touch daughter has given birth, their poignant loss is sparking overdue social concern, as in the book When Parents Hurt and support groups for healing estranged relationships. But there’s a long way to go and, yes, opposition from family generation segregationists like radio guru Dr. Joy Bernet hadn’t been invented, the New York Times front-page story “In the Facebook Era, Reminders of Loss After Families Fracture” (June 15) shows it can bring family neglect and estrangement out of the closet.

While my behavior wasn’t heartless, it was heedless, and I needed to be told how my dad suffered from this unintended neglect. Neglect is never benign.

What if he’d not had a sudden fatal heart attack and was instead sent to a nursing home, where stories of abject abuse get minimal media coverage? I only learned of two elder men repeatedly beaten in a New Jersey nursing home from a brief WINS radio report. The story can be found by searching “N.J. nursing home abuse of two elder men.” Attention must be paid!

And surely attention must be paid to government’s relative indifference to the Second Avenue Subway construction’s deadly affect on small business, and why City Hall mamas and papas (and civic ones too) haven’t gone all-out to patronize these besieged small shops and restaurants, let alone pushed for significant tax breaks and other credits.

Now, a June 13 Times story says wannabe mayors will push for more women- and minority-run businesses, but where’s the support for, say, Eva Mahschek, the hands-on owner of the Heidelberg Restaurant on Second Avenue between 85th and 86th streets?

Mahschek desperately wants to preserve this last of Yorkville’s German restaurants, but business is down over 30 percent. She laments, “People avoid walking here, with the high construction wall blocking the street view as well as taxi and car access. Delivery service problems are tremendous, with some vendors dropping their service altogether. Our sidewalk café, for which we pay extra, is unusable.”

When these small businesses go, the community loses its neighborly character and overall quality of life. “Where there is no vision, the people perish…” Not to mention where there is no justice.

dewingbetter@aol.com

Elected officials, including Council Member Jessica Lappin, Council Speaker Christine Quinn, Council Member Dan Garodnick, State Sen. Liz Krueger and Manhattan Borough President Scott Stringer, spoke at the annual ESNA meeting.

Last Sunday, dozens of Upper East Siders braved the icy rain to attend the annual East Sixties Neighborhood Association (ESNA) meeting, coming together to hear from a slew of elected officials and talk about the big issues facing their neighborhood in the coming year.

City Council Members Jessica Lappin (who reps the eastern portion of the district) and Dan Garodnick (who reps the western part) both came out to support the work of ESNA, as did State Sen. Liz Krueger, Assembly Member Micah Kellner, Council Speaker Christine Quinn and Manhattan Borough President Scott Stringer, who was the event’s keynote speaker. At the last minute, Rep. Carolyn Maloney swung by to congratulate the organization and the board.

“This is really such an important organization that works so hard for the neighborhoods of the East 60s, and this is certainly an exciting time for the Upper East Side,” Maloney said. “The East 60s is certainly a gateway to the East Side from Queens, Long Island and Roosevelt Island.”

She mentioned the upcoming construction of the Cornell/Technion campus on Roosevelt Island and the fact that the East Side is home to an increasing number of tech companies. Maloney also touted the East Side’s abundance of hospitals and said she’s trying to get New York state to create a high-tech zone in the city for those hospitals to develop new technology and use it right there.

Stringer, who is an Upper West Side resident but lived for a brief time on East 85th Street near Second Avenue, focused his speech on transportation, explaining his recently announced ambitious plan to reorganize the MTA’s funding structures. Using the Second Avenue Subway as a jumping-off point, Stringer launched into an explanation of his vision that would bring back the defunct commuter tax and use that money to help permanently fund a five-borough transit system, theoretically without constant fare hikes.

“We need to expand the system, but it cannot be on the backs of working people,” Stringer said.

He also praised ESNA members for looking at the big picture in terms of what’s good for the city.

“One of the great parts of what ESNA is all about is you think locally and act globally,” he said.

Barry Schneider, president of ESNA, spoke about some of the group’s ongoing projects and what they have their eyes on. ESNA has a group of 13 certified tree pruners who attend to local tree pits, and is hoping to get more volunteers to expand their territory.

Schneider also petitioned the crowd for anyone with a spare $12 million to fund the rehabilitation of the pier at Andrew Haswell Green Park.

“If you have $12 million, we’ll name that park after you. We’ll even put in neon, which is against the city code, but we’ll get around it,” he joked.

He also encouraged ESNA members to get involved in Community Board 8 and pointed out the major projects residents should be aware of, like the Roosevelt Island tram station’s upcoming repairs and what major local buildings have changed hands. Schneider said that the group will have a full plate in the coming year and will probably focus a lot of energy on transportation and construction issues.

Each of the event’s speakers agreed on one thing: that ESNA is a model community group. Schneider said it just takes a little commitment from everyone to make an outstanding contribution.

“We’re a volunteer organization. We get together because we think we can make a difference in the community,” he said.

Maloney on the roof of the Azure building. Photo by Andrew Schwartz.

Some politicians get themselves noticed for the things they say. Others work quietly, hoping to gain attention for the things they do. The rare breed of national legislator is able to land in the spotlight both for their pithy turns of phrase and for their hard-won accomplishments. Rep. Carolyn Maloney is that kind of lawmaker.

The Upper East Side congresswoman has been enjoying national attention lately for her mantra “Where are the women?” a non-rhetorical question posed first to fellow Rep. Darrell Issa when a panel he chaired on religious freedom and birth control was devoid of female speakers and subsequently to every media outlet that would listen as a general indictment of Republican-led policy that seeks to legislate women’s rights.

It’s a catchy and of-the-moment question, but it’s one that Maloney has been asking for decades, as a chief sponsor and continual champion of the Equal Rights Amendment, as the author of the Debbie Smith Act, which allocates $151 million in federal funding a year to process DNA evidence in sexual assault cases and as a reliably unyielding proponent of women’s rights on the national stage.

Maloney has proven she can walk the walk (often in heels) and talk the talk (often with wry jabs at right-wingers and the few political opponents who have challenged her). In her almost 20 years as a congresswoman, she has also been able to strike an impressive balance between advocating for national issues and supporting local ones.

One of her signature measures has been fighting to get federal transit dollars pumped into the overcrowded East Side public transportation system.

“I am very proud of finally finishing the Second Avenue Subway,” Maloney said in reference to funding the first phase. “For those of us who ride the good old Lexington Avenue line, one of the most overcrowded in the nation, there really is a limit to how many people you can stuff into that subway car.”

Over the years, she’s helped secure $4 billion in federal funds for the project, which has generated approximately 38,000 jobs, and she said that when she first began pushing for it, she faced an uphill battle.

“I got $5 million to do a study and then another $5 million for an engineer’s report, and then I just kept pushing it,” Maloney said. “Then we finally broke through, and every day I worked on it.”

She said one of the efforts of which she is most proud is her work on the Anti-Terrorism Intelligence Reform Act, the law that changed the structure of the intelligence system in the wake of the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks, and on the 9/11 Health and Compensation Act.

“I think it’s an example of how this government can really get things done when we’re determined to get things done. We completely reorganized our government and made homeland security our No. 1 top priority,” Maloney said. She also isn’t shy about insisting that New York deserves the lion’s share of anti-terrorism funding.

Maloney, originally from North Carolina, got her first taste of community leadership when she became president of the 92nd Street Block Association, representing the street she has lived on since 1976. In 1982, she was elected to the City Council and in 1992, she ran for Congress, shocking many by ousting incumbent Republican Bill Green and becoming the first woman to represent the 14th District.

She’s been re-elected nine times and recently kicked off her 10th re-election campaign, this time for the renamed and redrawn 12th District, encompassing parts of north Brooklyn (which she used to represent) as well as the Upper East Side and eastern Queens. Maloney doesn’t bat an eyelash at the potential challenges inherent in representing both Williamsburg and Park Avenue.

“I have to study the area and work with the other elected officials, and my work is really a result of what the needs are,” Maloney said of her 100,000 potential new constituents. “When I represented that area, they had an incinerator and I called for the first federal hearing on the incinerator and literally closed it down, so that was a major environmental victory.”

Recently named Public Official of the Year by Earth Day New York and the New York office of the Natural Resources Defense Council, Maloney doesn’t back away from issues she sees as vital for the environment. She’s currently embroiled in battling against the Marine Transfer Station planned for East 91st Street, citing concerns for the East River as well as about public health conditions in the surrounding neighborhood.

“Sometimes it’s not what you do, it’s what you stop. When they tried to close the veteran’s hospital on 23rd Street, that became a goal and a passion of mine to keep it open,” Maloney said—and she succeeded. She also successfully lobbied against the closure of several post offices in her district.

She’s been heavily involved in creating new schools for the Upper East Side, working to form the East Side Task Force on education that led to the formation of several local schools.

“I can remember meetings where I said, if you can’t give us a school, I’m going to have to open up my home and move the kids in, because we really need it,” Maloney said.

Maloney lives near her office on East 92nd Street, a fact she said she relishes because she loves that part of the Upper East Side. She spends as much time in the neighborhood as she can.

She has two daughters, Virginia and Christine, with her late husband Clifton Maloney, a wealthy investment banker who died in 2009 pursuing one of his passions, mountain climbing, in Tibet. Now that her children are out of the house, she focuses even more on her career—though she admits she takes time for gardening and is even planning to get back on a bicycle this spring to promote new bike lanes—and seems undaunted by the premise of a three-borough campaign in a contentious election year. She credits her staff for helping her maintain a local focus.

“One of the reasons I ran for office was that after 12 years of Bush and Reagan, federal aid to the city was cut by 74 percent,” she said. “It got so that we could hardly do anything. You could see the importance of the federal government for doing anything local, particularly big projects such as housing, transportation, major investments…

“To this day, we do send more in tax revenue than what comes back, and it’s my job to try to get every penny of it,” she said.

The hundreds of commendations lining the walls of her office and her obvious pride in her work clearly speak to the seriousness with which she takes her job in Congress, but Maloney admits that she relishes creating legislation and finds it, well, fun.

“It’s sort of like a game to me,” she said, explaining how she can introduce so many bills (70 in the last full session, tying her for the most from any representative). “There’s a problem and I just sit in front of a fire or a pretty view and I think of a legislative fix.”