Bird's-Eye Views of Downtown Brooklyn

Photos by MK Metz

From a high perch, we saw Downtown Brooklyn from a perspective we don't usually get. Above, Cadman Plaza Park.

The Post Office and Courthouse, all the way across Downtown Brooklyn to Barclays Center.

The top of the tall building across the street from the St. George Tower.

The weird glass atrium atop the Post Office.

Fulton Street, with the Williamsburg Bank and Barclays on the left.

Flying around the towers of Downtown Brooklyn.


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Three Days of Rallying for LICH in Brooklyn

Photos by MK Metz

We've been trying to get to as many rallies for Long Island College Hospital (LICH) in Cobble Hill as we can. Guess you've heard that SUNY Downstate is pulling every illegal trick in the book to close LICH down, including ignoring court restraining orders.

In their rush to dump patients, SUNY administrators put an 81-year-old senile LICH patient on a bus to Florida; police had to issue a Silver Alert to find him. They tried to kick an 11-month-old baby having breathing problems out of the hospital. Public Advocate Bill de Blasio and Assemblywoman Joan Millman had to step in and enforce the law.

On Friday, de Blasio rallied with community activists and staff from Interfaith Medical Center and LICH  at Brooklyn Borough Hall (photo above).

De Blasio and the other leaders called for the state Dept. of Health to get off its friggin butt and try to keep a Brooklyn hospital open for a change. He didn't put it exactly that way.

On Sunday another emergency rally was held at LICH, on Hicks Street across from the hospital. Cars honked in support of the protesters the entire time.

Speaking were Congresswoman Nydia Valezquez (wearing black), Jo Anne Simon, President of the Boerum Hill Association (blue); Borough president Marty Markowitz (not visible), patients and nurse leaders.

On Monday, de Blasio released a plan that calls for the creation of the Brooklyn Health Authority, with power "to transform hospitals and provide healthcare to the entire borough." You can read more about the plan here.

We have to commend Brooklyn's representatives who have been on fire lately trying to rescue the boroughs' hospitals. We especially applaud de Blasio, who is filing lawsuits, getting arrested, walking the walk, rallying the troops, and leading the charge for healthcare in Brooklyn.

Looking a lot like a Mayor, come to think of it.

LICH looks like Afghanistan, by the way. There are maybe 100 armed police and security guards stationed around the entire block, blocking the doors, on the streets and inside the hospital, terrorizing the patients. SUNY Downstate will get this real estate if they have to kill every citizen in western Brooklyn.

Previous:
- Emergency Rally at LICH in Brooklyn on Sunday at Noon
- Scenes From Brooklyn Healthcare Funeral March
- Judge: SUNY Must Offer Same Services at LICH As It Did This Past Friday 
- SUNY Tries to Sneak Patients Out of LICH; LICH Calls Cops

More on LICH


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What We Saw Walking to LICH the Other Day

Photo: MK Metz

We walked to a rally for Long Island College Hospital (LICH) in Cobble Hill, Brooklyn on Sunday.

On the way, we passed by this hand-made gargoyle, sitting all by itself on Hicks Street.

We thought it rather attractive, especially the bulging knuckles.

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Bevacco's New Chef; Pool Violence; and More Brooklyn Briefs

- Homer Fink was not swept of his feet by Bevacco's new celebrity chef Friday night. [BHB]

- NYPD arrest 13 as pool violence explodes. [A Walk in the Park]

- Paul Auster to headline Brooklyn’s newest comics festival. [Brokelyn]

- Now there's a musical inspired by the Brooklyn Superhero Supply Company. [Broadway World]

- Five pedestrians struck by cars in NYC over the weekend, three in Brooklyn. [Gothamist] 

- Photos from Saturday's 100 Man March in Crown Heights against gun violence. [Brooklynian]

- More secret Brooklyn rooftop camping planned for August. [Gothamist]

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If You Were in Brooklyn Heights or DUMBO During 9/11 You Will Want to Read This

Map: CDC

We just learned that people who lived, worked or attended school in most of Brooklyn Heights or DUMBO during the September 11, 2001 terror attacks are eligible for a government program that will monitor their health and provide benefits if they get sick from the attack.

No one we asked who lived in this area knew about this program. (UPDATE: Actually there are two programs -- the Victim's Compensation Fund, which has a deadline to apply, and The World Trade Center Health Program, with no deadline yet.)

Many respiratory illnesses, GI problems, and cancers have come about as a result of exposure to the witch's brew of toxins that spewed out over Brooklyn for months after the World Trade Center attacks. Lots of people have developed anxiety as well.

The CDC says that illnesses like cancer are still developing and may continue to appear into the future.

Full details in the Brooklyn Eagle.

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Where Is Celso Heredia? LICH Staff Fear the Worse for Elderly Man that SUNY Dumped

Celso Heredia. Photo: NYPD

A helpless 81-year-old man with dementia "disappeared" from Long Island College Hospital (LICH) in Cobble Hill, Brooklyn last Wednesday after LICH nurses had spent days trying to prevent his eviction by SUNY Downstate, which is trying to clear the Cobble Hill hospital of patients so it can be sold.

____________________

UPDATE: Heredia has been found. See Brooklyn Eagle story.
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Nurses are frantic that Celso Heredia, with no known family and who does not speak English, is wandering the streets -- or worse.

Several news sources have documented the story so far, including Pix 11, the NY Times and the Brooklyn Eagle.

Here is what is known:

- SUNY Downstate administrators discharged the helpless man from LICH at roughly 11 p.m. Thursday night, and bought him a bus ticket to Florida, where he has no known friends or relatives, scheduled to leave at Friday morning at 7:45 a.m.

- Nurses objected to evicting him with no one to care for him, and caused him to miss his bus.

- Suny Downstate bought him a plane ticket and arranged for a SUNY van to bring him to the airport, still with no one to pick him up at the destination.

- PIX 11 discovered the plan and asked SUNY what the hell were they doing with Heredia.

- SUNY canceled the plane ticket.

- Heredia stayed safely at LICH over the weekend.

- On Wednesday afternoon, as LICH was thrown into chaos by SUNY administrators handing out pink slips (technically administrative leave) to 650 employees, Heredia "disappeared."

- SUNY originally said that, despite scores of new surveillance cameras installed all over the hospital, no video existed of Heredia leaving the hospital.

- PIX 11 discovered the existence of video footage.

- It was discovered that Heredia left through a first floor door that required a security code or card possessed only by SUNY administrators and armed guards, and not by nurses.

- Someone opened this door for Heredia.

- Heredia has not been seen since.
Was he pushed out onto Hicks Street, or smuggled past more than ten police cars that were parked directly outside the door?

- Nurses, who cared for Heredia for more than a month after he was found wandering the BQE in June, are frantic that he will wind up dead.

- SUNY placed from 5 - 7 nurses on unpaid leave for "losing" Heredia, though the nurses are followed around the hospital from room to room by the more than 100 armed guards working for SUNY.

- Police issued a Silver Alert.

- Suspicion grows that SUNY administrators had Heredia dumped somewhere.

- The NYS Attorney General is investigating elder abuse.

If you see Celso Heredia, please don't let him out of your sight, and call 1-800-577-TIPS(8477).


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Emergency Rally at LICH in Brooklyn on Sunday at Noon

Public Advocate Bill de Blasio and Se. Daniel Squadron at a rally last week. Photo: MK Metz

An emergency rally to save Long Island College Hospital (LICH) will be held at noon on Sunday, July 28.

SUNY Downstate had planned to close LICH on Sunday but a restraining order remains in affect.

In spite of this, SUNY has accelerated its illegal actions against LICH - closing down units, putting 650 employees on leave, having armed SUNY Security guards patrolling the hospital and trying to illegally prevent patients from entering.

This is the work of thugs.

Since SUNY started diverting ambulances and ejecting patients, losses at LICH have grown from roughly a million dollars a month, if that much, to $15 million a month -- according to SUNY, which won't allow anyone to inspect their books. SUNY now says they want to close the hospital because it's losing money.

SUNY plans to sell LICH's valuable real estate to bail its own poorly-managed hospital out. SUNY's diversion of ambulances from LICH has already thrown emergency departments across Brooklyn into chaos, with ambulances filled with patients lined up outside Methodist Hospital in Park Slope, for example, from 1 - 9 hours.

That's up to 14 ambulances unavailable to save lives off the street for hours.

Come to LICH at the southeast corner of Hicks Street and Atlantic Avenue in Cobble Hill on Sunday.

Previous articles:

- Scenes From Brooklyn Healthcare Funeral March
- Judge: SUNY Must Offer Same Services at LICH As It Did This Past Friday 
- SUNY Tries to Sneak Patients Out of LICH; LICH Calls Cops

More on LICH

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Rescue at Overturned Sailboat Under Brooklyn Bridge

From the scanner:

Mobile units rushed to the Brooklyn Bridge on Saturday afternoon at roughly 2:50 p.m. as a sailboat was reported overturned and sinking under the Brooklyn Bridge.

According to 911 dispatch, a pleasure boat came to the rescue of the boaters.

Two people were recovered from the sinking boat.

More details when available.

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Scenes From Brooklyn Healthcare Funeral March

Photos by MK Metz

We joined many hundreds of protesters in a funeral march over the Brooklyn Bridge on Wednesday to mourn the death of Brooklyn healthcare.

This is why:
People who live or work in Brooklyn Heights, Cobble Hill, Carroll Gardens, Boerum Hill, Gowanus, Red Hook, DUMBO, Vinegar Hill, Fulton Ferry, Downtown Brooklyn, Fort Greene, and the surrounding areas are now without a hospital because SUNY Downstate has closed almost all of Long Island College Hospital (LICH) and prohibited ambulances from bringing sick patients there.

This is illegal, especially since Public Advocate Bill de Blasio obtained an temporary restraining order (multiple times) keeping the hospital open.  SUNY actually hired almost 100 armed guards to keep patients and staff out of LICH. In their rush to empty out the hospital this week, they lost a senile, 81-year-old man.

SUNY is going to sell LICH's valuable real estate -- one of the most modern hospitals in Brooklyn and rated number two -- and make a big developer and his political patron mighty happy!

People who live in Bedford-Stuyvesant and Crown Heights are also about to lose their hospital, Interfaith Medical Center. Interfaith was about to merge with Brooklyn Hospital Center but the state wouldn't give them the roughly $1.2 million they needed for the study. (That's less money than SUNY is spending to barricade LICH.) Wow, losing a recently-renovated medical center worth billions because of a lousy $1.2 million study.

As we marched, a New Orleans funeral brass band played and mourners with red handkerchiefs cried. Cars slowed down and honked and a hearse drove very slowly, blocking traffic.

This was one of the biggest marches we've ever seen on  the Brooklyn Bridge. Every rally for LICH and Downstate is bigger than the previous one.

Public Advocate Bill de Blasio (who was recently arrested at a LICH protest) and Council member Letitia James. People in western Brooklyn are starting to cheer whenever they see de Blasio, who is running for Mayor. He's starting to look like the man New York City needs.

On the Manhattan side, heading into Foley Square.

The crowd kept pouring into Foley Square as speaker after speaker asked "Where's Governor Cuome?"

NYC's very excellent Comptroller John Liu. Assemblywoman Joan Millman and Councilmembers Steve Levin, who have also been arrested for LICH, were also marching.

Head of 1199, members of the NYS Nurses Association and other activists.

About a dozen people including nurses and staff, residents and City Councilman Brad Lander (center) volunteered to commit civil disobedience and get arrested.

Lander said, “When I break the law, I’m arrested. When SUNY breaks the law, there needs to be consequences. The State University of New York, which manages LICH, has violated court orders and broken the law as it seeks to close this much needed, much used community hospital, all without serious legal consequences."

The volunteers sat in the roadway of the entrance of the Brooklyn Bridge. When they refused to move, the police picked them up and cuffed them.

City Councilman Brad Lander and others, being led to the police van.

Those who were arrested deserve all of our thanks.

There are protests very frequently now. If you or anyone you know might ever get sick or hurt, join the next one! Also, call Gov. Cuomo and tell him if he's not part of the solution, he's part of the problem.

More at: The Brooklyn Eagle; saveLICH Twitter feed; Public Advocate Bill de Blasio, Concerned Physicians of LICH,  Brooklyn Heights Association

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Judge: SUNY Must Offer Same Services at LICH As It Did This Past Friday

Photo: MK Metz

Appellate Judge Robert Miller on Monday ordered SUNY Downstate to maintain the level of service at Long Island College Hospital (LICH) that was provided at the hospital as of 4 p.m. this past Friday.

Public Advocate Bill de Blasio (pictured above with legal hotshot Jim Walden) and SUNY Downstate are both claiming victory.

Meanwhile, court orders seem to be multiplying like jackrabbits.

See the full story at the Brooklyn Eagle.


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