A gate grows in Bay Terrace

Patch 

  Baysiders should sleep better now that a local parking lot is locked up at night, one politician promised.

Over the past several months neighbors have been complaining about noisy car meetups at the Little Bay Park parking lot at the entrance of Fort Totten, said Assembly Member Edward Braunstein, who represents most of Bayside.

Bay Terrace locals have filed seven drag racing reports with 311 in the past six months (more than triple the number of complaints in Bayside during that same time, data shows), and shown up at the local police precinct to complain about the noise, said NYPD Deputy Inspector John O'Connell.

To curb car noise (and complaints) Braunstein, alongside the NYPD and Parks Department, has helped set up a gate and lock at the entrance of the parking lot, which is shut by police officers at park closing, 10 p.m., and reopened by the Parks Department in the morning.

"The new locking system.... will hopefully put a stop to this quality of life concern for the long term," said Braunstein in a news statement.

Queens is about to get their own Potters Field

NY Daily News

As the number of coronavirus deaths overwhelms New York’s morgues, funeral homes and crematoriums, city officials are scrambling to find locations to temporarily store the dead.

Fort Totten, a former cemetery that’s now a park in Queens, is the likely place where the glut of bodies will be kept during the pandemic.

“If the current outbreak escalates, burials will occur at Fort Totten and Hart Island," said a March 29 email shared among high-ranking city officials. The email lays out the work required to turn Fort Totten into a burial site.

Temporary burials at Hart Island, the city’s public cemetery on the Long Island Sound where unclaimed bodies have been buried for decades, come with a slew of logistical challenges due to regular flooding and the island’s remote location.

With at least 6,182 city residents dead from COVID-19 as of Sunday night, Fort Totten will soon be tapped for temporary burials, according to sources with knowledge of the operation.

Mayor de Blasio has for more than a week declined to discuss the city’s plans for the bodies of coronavirus victims during public briefings. And his office has denied Fort Totten will be used as a site for public burials.

On Sunday, mayoral spokeswoman Avery Cohen declared, “We are not considering temporary burials at this time.” Later, Blasio’s press secretary Freddi Goldstein added: “We’ve increased capacity enough that we do not believe we’ll have to move to temporary burials.”

Pols oppose jail at Fort Totten

From the Queens Tribune:

State Assemblyman Edward Braunstein (D-Bayside) and Councilman Paul Vallone (D-Bayside) said that they are opposed to a proposal to create a new city Department of Correction training facility at Fort Totten.

Braunstein said that, according to a document his office received that was dated Sept. 26, the city has moved to re-use a portion of Fort Totten to create permanent home for a city Department of Correction training academy. In 2015, the city’s Fire Department—in collaboration with the city’s Office of Management and Budget and Design and Construction Department—initiated the first of two consultant studies on the proposal. An analysis of requirements for the site is expected to be completed this month, according to the document.

“I strongly oppose the creation of a new DOC training facility at Fort Totten and find it outrageous that the city is secretly considering this proposal, which could have a detrimental impact on our parkland,” Braunstein said. “Recently, Community Board 7 notified my office that DOC was considering a facility at Fort Totten. Upon receiving this information, my requests to various city agencies have failed to result in any substantive information. It is absolutely unacceptable that a proposal of this magnitude was not shared with elected officials and the community board for over two years.”

Braunstein called on Mayor Bill de Blasio to abandon plans for the facility at Fort Totten, while Vallone added that Bayside was the wrong community in which to locate such a facility.

From QNS:

In a letter addressed to Mayor Bill de Blasio on Jan. 11, state Senator Tony Avella raised concerns with the city’s “serious lack of information” in reference to certain project propositions by the Fire Department and Department of Corrections (DOC). The FDNY has proposed building a wind turbine at the Bay Terrace location, while DOC considers using it as the site of its new training academy.

After an alleged runaround from city agencies, Avella has filed a Freedom of Information (FOIL) request for documents pertaining to both proposals.

“What are you hiding?” Avella writes. “I would appreciate a full briefing on your plans by all those involved.”

Fort Totten — formally an active U.S. Army installation in the Bay Terrace section of the neighborhood — is currently used by the U.S. Army Reserve, NYPD and FDNY. Certain portions are designated public park areas.

For FY 2018, DOC allocated $1.1 billion to fund a “New Jail Facilities” project, prompted by Mayor de Blasio’s push to close Rikers Island and create neighborhood-based and decentralized jail sites. Avella questioned whether DOC’s interest in Fort Totten pertained to this move.

“I hope this is not a hidden plan to place a jail on the Fort,” Avella writes. “Such an attempt would be fought vigorously by the whole community.”

Fort Totten floor fall-through

From CBS 2:

A city worker fell through the floor of a crumbling old building in Queens.

The parks employee and his crew were sent in to clean after someone else decided the structure was safe.

The inside of the old building on the grounds of Fort Totten — a former U.S. Army site — has seen better days.

It’s now dilapidated and deserted.

New York City Department of Parks and Recreation employee Cory Credell said on Monday, he was asked to go inside and clean it up after the department’s health and safety team deemed the site safe for the job, CBS2’s Valerie Castro reported exclusively Tuesday night.

Once inside — wearing a paper mask he was given to protect his face — Credell said he knew it was trouble.

Animals had made the structure their home long ago.

Credell began to sweep the floors, but the weak structure gave way and he fell through.

Does Fort Totten need better security?

From WPIX:

There is a call for increased security at New York’s military reserve bases.

For example, Fort Totten in Queens can have hundreds of army reservists training there on any given day but there are no armed guards at a checkpoint.

Fort Totten’s director of operations, Mac Harris, is worried. “To me, it’s just a matter of time,” he said.​ “We are just like sitting ducks here. Just waiting for something to happen.”

According to Congressman Steve Israel, armed guards were cut at Fort Totten in 2009. It was a budget cut.

Now it’s FDNY officers on light duty checking motorists’ identification. Pedestrians and bikers can walk right in.

Army Corps to clean up Fort Totten spot

From the Queens Chronicle:

The U.S. Coast Guard doesn’t use its 9.6 acres at Fort Totten anymore, but the government will be cleaning it up.

Gregory Goepfert, project manager for the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers, announced plans for removing lead-contaminated soil during a meeting Tuesday in Bayside.

The area is near the northern part of the fort between the ballfields and the old fortifications.

“We would like to go ahead and clean up the soil that has been impacted and replace it with clean material,” Goepfert said.

The 20,000-square-foot site would be refilled with clean soil from elsewhere. The endeavor will cost about $200,000.

Goepfert said the plan was preferable to alternatives like doing nothing, just fencing it off to the public or covering it with a landfill cap, but that would require additional maintenance in the future.

The Army Corps determined that it is the only one of five areas they tested at the fort that requires remediation.

Fort Totten falling apart!

From the Queens Courier:

Fort Totten’s history is slowly fading away.

The historic Bayside park is home to several dilapidated and historic buildings that have been sitting vacant and in need of repair, according to the Bayside Historical Society. The oldest among these is the Willets Farmhouse, built in 1829, making it the oldest building in the area.

Despite the deteriorating conditions none of the buildings will be repaired anytime soon, according to city records.

A Parks Department spokeswoman said that the farmhouse was worked on in 2013 to stabilize it but the area is completely fenced off and no one is allowed inside to check the building’s condition. Abandoned NYC, a website devoted to decaying sites, published a photo tour of some of the buildings in 2012.

The Parks Department is in the planning phase of a $2.1 million restoration project, of the roofs of two historic buildings: the Chapel and the Commander’s House, both of which were built in the early 1900s, a parks spokeswoman said. But construction won’t begin until next year, leaving the two historic buildings exposed to rain and other natural elements that will eat away at the building.

The groundskeeper for the park said that if something isn’t done soon, the buildings would be damaged beyond repair. And as winter approaches, groundskeeper Mac Harris knows that the buildings will suffer.

“The roofs are not being repaired,” Mac Harris said. “The buildings are slowly being decayed.”

Fixing Fort Totten

From the Queens Courier:

Upgrades are coming for buildings at the historic Fort Totten Park.

The Commanding Officer’s House and the chapel at Fort Totten are set to be revitalized, according to the Parks Department, which oversees both structures and announced Aug. 8 that it is accepting bids for a contractor to do the work.

The deteriorating roof on the Commanding Officer’s House, which is used as administrative offices for the Parks Department, will be replaced with new slate shingles, and the building’s columns and cornices will be restored to their former glory.

Also, the capitals atop the columns will be replaced with ones from the building’s original design, and the metal balcony on the second floor will be repaired.

Council members propose ferry to NE Queens

From the Times Ledger:

City Councilman Paul Vallone (D-Bayside) is one of three representatives in Queens asking the city to consider expanding ferry service to two locations in the northeast part of the borough.

Vallone wrote a joint letter with his Council colleagues Julissa Ferreras (D-East Elmhurst) and Peter Koo (D-Flushing) addressed to Hannah Henn, director of ferry service for the city, asking the city Economic Development Corp. to conduct a pilot program that would test out the long-term viability of offering permanent ferry service from Manhattan to Citi Field in Flushing and to Fort Totten in Bayside.

The letter cites a variety of factors the Council members say support the idea of instituting a new route from Manhattan to both locations.

“We believe a combination of factors will lead to an overwhelming success of the proposed sites: the demand from local communities, economic viability, lack of transportation alternatives provided to northeast Queens and the availability of existing docks at the proposed sites,” the letter said.

The letter, officially sent from Vallone’s office, refers to a 2013 Citywide Ferry Study completed by the EDC, which mentioned Citi Field as a potential stop along a ferry route because of its vicinity to Flushing Meadows Corona Park and the World’s Fair Marina.

Divorce Fast
The letter also states that ferry service to Citi Field and Fort Totten would help alleviate some of the overcrowding on the No. 7 train, the only line to run from Manhattan to the northeastern part of the borough.

Leg found near Fort Totten

From the Queens Courier:

A body part believed to be a human leg was discovered in the water near Fort Totten Park Monday afternoon.

Police responded to a call of a possible body part found in the vicinity of Duane and Underhill roads around 4:30 p.m. yesterday, said cops.

After determining that the body part was likely a human leg, police searched the shoreline area, but found no additional body parts.

The Medical Examiner’s Office will determine if the leg is human and its origins. The investigation is ongoing.

More path problems at Little Bay Park

"It seems Parks Dept is flip-flopping on leaving a temporary Bike/Pedestrian path by Fort Totten's Little Bay Park "Comfort station construction project. Last weekend they opened up the fence on both sides so the path was completely usable. But I went today and its all closed up again. Can we talk to Parks; I was told Mike Agnella was in charge there of that park. Or give me the keys to the truck, I'll lay down some asphalt over the grass, as temp path.

At least they put up a sign on the fence by the 212 street side of the parking lot explaining what will be built AND, "Scheduled Completion: Fall 2014".

That's 2 complete seasons! If they leave it with no access from one side to the other, without risking one's life tangling with cars on the CIP entrance ramp!" - Upset in Bayside

Bathroom project cuts off bike access

"I went to check out the post Sandy damage I was told about at the bike path by Fort Totten. And I was surprised by a HUGE fenced off section, including the parking lot and the whole width of the bike path. I tried walking to other side of the lot by walking along the outside edge of the fence along the waters edge but, I think as you can see in photo, there's a point it goes right to the cliff's edge and I couldn't go any further. I had to turn around, cross the entrance ramp roadway onto grass on other side then to the other section past 212 street.

Can't they leave the path, or at least part of it so people can get from the one section to the other section on the marina section area. Its totally useless now. I'm guessing its going to take most of, if not all of, the summer to complete this construction of bathrooms." - Frustrated in Bayside

Where the hell is the tram we paid for?

From the Queens Chronicle:

The $262,400 tram taxpayers funded through Borough President Helen Marshall’s office has seen little usage since it was acquired in 2008 for Fort Totten and has been out of commission this summer at the Bayside park.

The open-air vehicle, which seats 40, was purchased to make it easier for visitors to get around the 50-acre park. But there were problems from the start.

Mechanical issues first sidelined the vehicle and then the fuel tank had to be enlarged because it’s powered by compressed natural gas. If the tank had remained its original size, the tram would have had to have been transported frequently to a fueling station off-site at Flushing Meadows Park.

There was also talk about installing gas tanks at the park, but that was vehemently opposed by the community due to safety concerns and dropped.

The tram was supposed to operate from 9 a.m. to 5:30 p.m. on weekends until the end of June and daily from 11 a.m. to 7 p.m. after that through Labor Day.

Asked what had happened to the tram this year, the Parks Department sent the following comment: “A 16-seat electric cart currently provides transportation for senior swim classes and during special events. Operating the cart is more efficient than the tram as it uses fewer staff and does not require special fuel to be brought in.”

Will this building ever be restored?

From the Times Ledger:

The Center for the Women of New York President Ann Jawin has not let up in ongoing efforts to move her group into a building in Fort Totten in Bayside and said she hoped to see bids chosen to renovate part of the facility by the end of the year.

Jawin said she had cleared another hurdle in the long journey back to Fort Totten after the city Landmarks Preservation Commission approved the installation of a barrier-free access ramp at the center’s soon-to-be new home.

Equipped with the nearly $1.5 million necessary to fund the first stage of renovations, including sanitizing and removing asbestos from the first floor of the building, at 207 Fort Totten Ave., Jawin said she hoped to see more progress after nearly a decade of negotiating with the city.

The Kew Gardens-based center has been working to move back into Fort Totten after it was forced out of the area in 2002 to make room for a city Fire Department facility. The city Parks Department has listed the entire renovation cost at $3.5 million for the center to pay.

Jawin said she hoped to move into the first floor of the 117-year-old, city-owned building first before making renovations to its basement and second and third floors.

The result of not enough cops?

"On Wednesday 07/25/12 I took my grandson to the Fort Totten playground and before getting there in the Parks Department parking lot next to the playground and near the sidewalk there were beer cans in one of the spots as you can see. I can't say if the Park cleaning staff or rangers did this or some other unrelated people, but close watch should be present since it can get very lonely in that area which makes it suitable for people looking for peace and quiet for a nice stroll or reading under a tree but also for other to practice certain things that they can enjoy in the privacy of their home without disrupting others or the environment. Is ironic that these things happen where the police has a huge amount of personnel stationed.

On another note, the handball area and a small seating place in the park next to the tennis court, basketball court and children playground and in front of the Edward Bleecker's middle school which is next to the elementary school bearing the same name on 149th Street between 26th Avenue and 25th Dr. in North Flushing has become a place for drinking alcoholic beverages and doing drugs at all times of the day specially on summer days. Most of the drugs are consumed behind the handball court wall and the alcohol and some drug in the seating spot in between the handball court and the tennis court.

I don't think this is alien to the police and still nothing is done. The park is a recreation area to exercise and get fit physically and mentally and not a place to consume drugs and alcohol especially in front of two public schools." - anonymous

Claire's been at this for years

Letter to the Times Ledger:

In an article in the July 8 New York Post Queens Weekly section, headlined “Shulman gets slap for illegal Willets lobby,” Claire Shulman, the former borough president, once again got away with illegal shenanigans.

Shulman started the Fort Totten Redevelopment Authority when President Bill Clinton sold the 168 waterfront acres to the city for $1. One of the honest members of the authority sent a list to me of the people Shulman appointed to represent the community. Many were developers while others were receiving monies for their nonprofit organizations from Shulman.

She named her group an authority in order to keep the community it was representing out of the meetings. This is also done by the Metropolitan Transportation Authority. There are no open meetings and authorities are not under the Sunshine Law.

We the people living around the fort had to protest to just listen to what was being discussed for our community. When we arrived to go into the meeting, Shulman called in eight policemen in riot gear to stop us from walking down the hallway. We paid taxes to listen to what the group was planning for us.

Eventually, we won. We did not give up and she had to eventually allow the community in. Why was there such a strong protest by Shulman to keep the community out of the meetings?

Can it be the same reason she received a slap on the wrist for illegally lobbying city officials to “win approval for their favored projects”? Shulman has received too many slaps on the wrist. As a taxpayer, why? Other taxpayers should ask why she gets away with her backroom deals.

In fact, we should demand she resign from the $3 billion project and an investigation ensue, including her bank statements. Enough is enough! A slap on the wrist will allow her to continue her underhanded activities, for she appears to think she is above the law and morality.

It is time state Attorney General Eric Schneiderman stop playing politics and dig deeper into Shulman and the city Economic Development Corp. and local development corporation run by her.

Joyce Shepard
Bayside

Fort Totten ecodock on hold

From the Times Ledger:

Plans to build an eco-friendly dock at Fort Totten Park will have to wait another year due to a lack of funding in the city’s capital budget, according to the Metropolitan Waterfront Alliance.

While the MWA continues working to build community eco docks in every borough, appropriate for different vessels, community events and educational opportunities, President and CEO Roland Lewis said the Bayside project will not move forward until at least next year due to budget constraints.

Eco docks are wooden barges that rise and fall with the tides and can accommodate different kinds of vessels, Lewis said. The multi-purpose docks, which cost around $700,000, will also have a human-powered boating platform so kayakers and rowers can visit, Lewis said.

What makes them eco-friendly, Lewis said, is the small footprint left behind in the water.

Man searches for Fort Totten graveyard

From the NY Times:

The fort, Mr. Wilkins insisted to no avail, had once been his family’s rolling farmland and the cemetery on it was still his. It had been retained, he said, by a special provision set out when his father sold the property, which was eventually bought by the military before the Civil War.

More than a century later, Tom Loggia, Mr. Wilkins’s great-grandnephew, is continuing the family quest to seek out and memorialize a cemetery that he steadfastly insists lies unmarked on the land.

His goal, which he has been pursuing for years, is to erect a monument or marker to replace the vanished headstones of what he says are up to 30 members of an extended family and their neighbors.

But history repeats itself, sometimes with eerie symmetry: About a decade ago, on Mr. Loggia’s first try, he was turned away by a guard at the fort’s gates, he said.

Fort Totten was decommissioned; parts of it were turned into a city park, while the Army, the Coast Guard and the New York Fire Department control the rest. Officials there remain skeptical that the graveyard exists.

Lots of ponds

Click photo for story - it's a 2 pager!

Tweeders have been at this a long time

From the Times Ledger:

Kudos to Dr. Richard Lipsky, representing Willets Point United, on the letter he wrote about Community Board 7’s behind-closed-door antics (“CB 7 has much to answer for in it approval of Willets Point project,” Feb. 3).

Lipsky’s letter regarding the Willets Point debacle was déjà vu to me. The same tactics were used against the community and myself by CB 7’s chairman when we insisted CB 7 take a vote to keep Ft. Totten parkland and they refused.

The borough president at the time, ironically, was Claire Shulman. President Bill Clinton sold Ft. Totten to the city for $1. It was Shulman’s role to develop the 169 waterfront acres. She appointed developers, people who receive monies from her for their nonprofit agencies and hacks. Shulman also appointed Adrian Joyce to sit on the committee, represent the community and head the Ft. Totten Redevelopment Committee.

The people who were protesting the closed door meetings were told people appointed by Shulman were “representing the community.” Yet when we, the people who live near Ft. Totten, asked to sit in on the meetings, we were told by her counsel that a “vote was taken” and it was unanimous “not” to allow the community into the meetings.

We organized, protested and eventually went to CB 7 to testify. When I submitted my testimony to Gene Kelty, he immediately tore it up. There is usually one community officer at the CB 7 meetings, but I made the mistake of informing the office that I would testify that night. There were six uniformed officers from the local precinct, and as I was reading my testimony two officers came up and attempted to pull me away from the microphone.

This did not deter me at all, and in fact it made people join our plight and eventually the meetings were open and Ft. Totten became parkland. If we had not continued the pressure, St. John’s University would have built 300 dorms there, affecting our community with more traffic and less parking spots.

The letter written by Lipsky was a reminder of the tactics used by Shulman and her cohorts. These secret meetings and using underhanded tactics to prevent the community on speaking out against an issue is politics as usual. It is time for term limits on community boards or the eradication of all community boards. From my experience, many do not represent the community but developers and borough presidents or their members are aspiring politicians and use community boards for their résumés.

It is time for the FBI, city Department of Investigation and any other investigative organization to step in and take a good look at these done deals and anointed hacks.

Joyce Shepard
Bayside