Brooklyn Today May 1: Dry Those Tears

May 1, 2017 Brooklyn Daily Eagle

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THE LEDE: Good morning on this first Monday in May, Brooklyn! It’s a big day for openings in NYC: citywide ferry service begins today, Governors Island is up and running for summertime fun and Cobble Hill’s long-awaited Books Are Magic opens its doors…meanwhile, the doors of the controversial Crown Heights homeless shelter remain tightly shut. Plus, a local columnist weighs in on the deadlock between the Brooklyn Heights Association and Brooklyn Bridge Park over the Pier 6 development, and there’s no time like the present to learn how to pronounce “Kosciuszko.”

IMPRINT: Ace cover art on New Philosopher reminds us that we are what we eat.

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The Rundown

~DRY THOSE TEARS: It’s time for Brooklynites to turn the page on the recent closings of BookCourt and the Community Bookstore. Following both closures, Brooklyn resident and best-selling novelist Emma Straub vowed to right a wrong and revive a dying breed. Five months later, Straub made good on her word as her bookstore “Books Are Magic” will open its doors today.(via the Brooklyn Daily Eagle)

~STILL NO SHELTER IN CROWN HEIGHTS (FOR NOW): The controversial homeless shelter in Crown Heights won’t open its doors for at least another two weeks, in order to allow for more time to resolve a lawsuit against the facility. Two block associations are waging the lawsuit to fight the shelter.(via DNAinfo)

~FRIDAY NIGHT FLAMES: A three-alarm fire thought to be fed by 150 cases of “Spare Fuel” for autos broke out in a garage in the Mapleton section of Borough Park on Friday afternoon and quickly spread to two adjacent residential buildings. (via the Brooklyn Daily Eagle)

~DON’T DRINK THE WATER: Remember that Crown Heights elementary school with water fountains that spewed higher levels of lead content than the water in Flint, Michigan? The issue wasn’t isolated…the Department of Education reveals that about 83 percent of NYC school buildings have had elevated levels of lead in the past six months. (via the NYT)

~NOT JUST A VIEW FOR PRECIOUS FEW: A lawsuit over the controversialPier 6 development between the Brooklyn Heights Association andBrooklyn Bridge Park is revived after court-mandated efforts to settle failed…..meanwhile, curmudgeon columnist Sam Howe explains why oldBrooklyn Heights is so protective of its perch on the historic bluff. (via the Brooklyn Daily Eagle and Howe’s Brooklyn)

~“‘CONTEMPORARY THINKING,’ NOT CONTEMPORARY EXHIBITIONS”:The Brooklyn Museum grapples with preserving its identity as an “encyclopedic” museum in a time when contemporary art is hot, hot, hot.(via the NYT)

~THE HILLS, HAMMOCK GROVE AND HOLI HAI, OH MY!: Governors Island opens for the season today! From food to festivals to special events, Gothamist presents a guide for how to make the most of the island in the summertime, when the livin’ is easy. (via Gothamist)

~PRONUNCIATION LESSON OF THE DAY: Ever noticed how NYC pols refer to the Kosciuszko Bridge as simply the “K Bridge”? It could be because the “right” pronunciation depends on where you’re from. Here’s a primer, and a brief history of Polish immigrant and Revolutionary War hero Tadeusz Kosciuszko. (via the NYT)

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Staff Picks

READ: From an elevated airport spanning 144 blocks to a Brooklyn Museumquadrupled in size, “The Greatest New York Projects Never Built.” (via The Bridge)

PROFILE: The New Yorker accompanies Bed-Stuy-based poet Morgan Parker to get a tattoo. (via the New Yorker)

LOOK: Photos of NYC waitresses during those oh-so-rare lulls at work. (via the NYT)

LISTEN: Less than a month after tying the knot, a bike accident left one woman’s husband paralyzed from the waist down. Hear their story of“survival and loss mixed into one.” (via WNYC/Death, Sex & Money)

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NATIONAL BULLETIN: A government shutdown appears to be averted (for now)…a gunman opens fire at a birthday party in San Diego…as hate crimes surge across the U.S., lawmakers seek harsher penalties…andTrump wants to put some national monuments on the chopping block, while protesters in New Orleans don’t want to let go of their Confederate statues. (via the NYT, the AP, the WSJ and WaPo)

FOREIGN FLASH: Nelson Mandela’s granddaughter has renounced the ANC…Trump gets chummy with President Rodrigo Duterte of the Philippines, who is leading a deadly drug crackdown in his home country…China contributes an outsized impact on the world’s fisheries, 90 percent of which are fully tapped or facing collapse…and Star Wars megafans can buy a $1.4 million gold Darth Vader mask from a Tokyo-based jeweler.(via WaPo, the NYT and the AP)

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ROYAL WATCH: Queen Elizabeth’s crown weighs a whopping three pounds. (via People)

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BROOKLYN TONIGHT

6:30pm – Community Dance Class at Bric House Ballroom. Details.

6:30pm – Bike Month: A Conversation with Paul Steely White and Mark Gorton. Details.

6:30pm – ChinaFile Presents: Documentary Films from China at the Asia Society and Museum. Details.

6:30pm – Confessions of a Wall Street Insider: A Cautionary Tale of Rats, Feds, and Banksters at NYPL Mid-Manhattan Library. Details.

7:00pm – PEN World Voices Festival: Forbidden: Too Punk, Too Queer with Carrie Brownstein and Thomas Meinecke at The Greene Space. Details.

7:00pm – Keeping Alive the Memories of Lost Loved Ones for Healing and Resilience with Henry Louis Gates, Jr. and Soledad O’Brien at New York Open Center. Details.

7:30pm – The Moth StorySLAM at The Bell House. Details.

7:30pm – George Takai at BAM. Details.

8:00pm – The Legacy: JFK at 100 with Stephen Kennedy Smith, Douglas Brinkley, Robert MacNeil and Jonathan Alter at 92nd Street Y. Details.

10:30pm – Reverend Vince Anderson and the Love Choir at Union Pool.Details.

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ON THE PITCH: Monday mornings be like…http://bit.ly/2qfMdrk.