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By Bill Parry

TimesLedger Newspapers

A gasp from the crowd assembled on the steps at Most Precious Blood Catholic Church in Astoria could be heard over the pealing bells as the tiny white casket was removed from the hearse and placed on a wooden platform.

Nearly 100 officers from the 114th Precinct in Astoria and the 108th Precinct in Long Island City joined emergency responders, Nassau County Police and community leaders Saturday to help give a proper funeral for the newborn boy who was discovered dead and wrapped in plastic in a garbage can at Dutch Kills Playground March 17.

As four pallbearers from the 114th carried the casket up the church steps, the police officers saluted stoically, their eyes fixated on the miniature white coffin

“Whenever it’s a baby it tugs at anyone’s heartstrings, especially police officers,” Deputy Inspector Osvaldo Nunez, the commander of the 114th Precinct, said. “When it’s a child even the most hardened officers take it to heart.”

No one ever came forward to claim the child, so The Children of Hope Foundation, a non-profit started by paramedics working for the Nassau County Police Department, took custody, named him Baby Dutch James Hope, and paid for the funeral expenses.

Once the funeral mass got underway, Father Vedran Kirincic, gazed from the altar toward the rows filled with police and said, “We see that this funeral is different, not only because of the age of this child, but something that goes beyond age and that is innocence. The child is innocent in the eyes of God and there is nothing more beautiful than Baby Dutch James Hope.”

Bishop Raymond Chappetto, who was born and raised in Astoria, looked over the crowd and smiled.

“This is his family, right here in this church,” he said during the mass. “His family has surrounded him with love, with prayer, and with the promise that the community will treasure his memory.”

Baby Dutch James Hope became the 139th abandoned child to be laid to rest at the Holy Road Cemetery in Westbury since The Children of Hope Foundation began operating in 1999, according to its founder, Capt. Timothy Jaccard, who spoke during the funeral mass.

“For every child that we’ve buried, and we’ve had to do that 139 times which is painful, others have been rescued,” Jaccard said. “Because of the media attention, other desperate women out there may call a crisis hotline instead. More than 3,669 babies have been rescued since we started.”

That message resonated with Al Perna, the founder and president of the Corona Community Ambulance Corps, who attended with a half dozen members of his team.

“It’s all very sad When I first heard about the baby discovered at Dutch Kills, I was heartbroken,” Perna said. “But that baby has a family today and we hope that this funeral raises the awareness of the next person who feels lost, afraid, hurt or has the feeling that she can’t have that child. There are people who can help in these situations.”

Jaccard helped draft New York’s Safe Haven Law, which allows a parent to leave a child 30 days or younger with an appropriate person or a suitable location, such as a hospital, police station, firehouse or church where the parent promptly notifies an appropriate person of the child’s location. A parent who wishes to leave a child can call the Safe Haven Hotline in New York at 1-877-796-HOPE and the child will be picked up by child care workers. All calls to the crisis line are kept strictly confidential. The foundation members are not counselors, they are crisis intervention professionals who are trained to assist in finding callers the help they need.

Once the funeral mass came to a close, Baby Dutch James Hope was given an escort by members of The Blue Knights motorcycle club and vehicles from the NYPD and the Nassau County Police Department for the funeral procession to Holy Road Cemetery.

“I’m not surprised, but the beauty, the dignity, the love that the NYPD offered this child is so very moving,” City Councilman Jimmy Van Bramer (D-Sunnyside) said. “It’s an unspeakable tragedy what this baby endured, but the fact that they went to such lengths to give this child what he didn’t have in life is something that I will never forget. It’s just so decent to send him off in this way, which is so different than how he died. The NYPD just gave him a state funeral which was so incredibly decent.”

There have been no arrests and the investigation is ongoing by the 114th Precinct’s Detective Squad and the Queens North Homicide Detective Squad. There is a $2,500 reward for anyone who provides information on who left Baby Dutch James Hope in the trash can at Dutch Kills Playground.

Anyone with information is asked to call the NYPD’s Crime Stoppers Hotline at 1-800-577-TIPS.

Reach reporter Bill Parry by e-mail at bparry@cnglocal.com or by phone at (718) 260–4538.

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Source: Times Ledger

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By Tammy Scileppi

TimesLedger Newspapers

Big Bird encounters a delivery man with many boxes for 456 Sesame Street. He said someone is moving to Sesame Street. Excitedly, Big Bird runs to tell Maria in the Mail It Shop, where he meets Mrs. Rosen and her daughter Emily. Emily talks briefly about her condition and leaves with Big Bird for a tour.

Just like Telly, Emily is a member of the Triangle Lovers Club. Next, she plays with her pet goldfish Arnold, who makes fast friends with Dorothy and Elmo. Mrs. Rosen drops by again and helps Emily into her wheelchair.

The sun is setting and it’s getting dusk, the relaxing theme of “Sesame Street” plays while Emily plays the theme on her clarinet.

Those were scenes in which 10-year-old Emily Landau was featured on the children’s television show, to educate kids about her life with a physical disability. In 2002, she appeared in several episodes of “Sesame Street,” which were filmed at Astoria Kaufman Studios.

Now 27, Ladau said she is proud of her many accomplishments as an empowered disabled woman, who has become a prolific writer, speaker, and passionate disability rights activist.

The Long Island native maintains meaningful ties with her friends from Queens, where she has connected with other disabled people through her work. She does a podcast with a local resident.

As an advocate, Ladau has fought tirelessly for those in her community who have no voice, hoping to achieve inclusivity for people with disabilities, and tells her readers and followers.

“I live life on wheels and write about it. Disability rights are my passion,” she said.

As a speaker, Ladau often spreads her message about a variety of topics relevant to “really cool people who happen to be disabled.” She also uses her blog, Words I Wheel By, as a platform to address discrimination and to encourage others to understand the experience of having a disability in more positive, accepting, and supportive ways.

Her work has been featured in numerous online publications, including The New York Times, Salon, The Daily Beast, The Establishment, The Huffington Post, and SELF.

In Vice – Motherboard, she writes: “I am not broken. There is nothing that needs to be changed about my state of being. There is nothing I want to change. I am a whole human being whose body moves forward through life in turns of the wheel, and my reality is not for anyone else to decide.”

And she feels deeply about and shares in the experiences of her sisters with disabilities. For a while, Ladau was disappointed with what she saw as a lack of inclusivity by the Women’s March movement and wrote, “What every one of us needs to do right now is dig deeper into these issues, to recognize that disability rights must always have a seat at the social justice table. I feel like my work as an activist has turned me into a broken record, because my urging for people to dig deeper than surface-level mentions of disability is constant. I only wish a major effort like the Women’s March, which is a critical part of the overarching movement for women’s rights, had already gotten this message from the disability activists who have been advocating tirelessly.”

Recently, thanks to Ladau’s strong words and persistent protests, the Women’s March has recognized and embraced women with disabilities as one of their own, and she has decided to join them.

The activist has maintained that social justice warriors and some political candidates seem to forget that there are 56 million Americans with disabilities, according to the U.S. Census Bureau, and that this forgotten voting block faces numerous, often unresolved issues in their daily lives, which need to be addressed through vigorous policies. For instance, only one in three people who are working-age with a disability has a job. Of those, around 400,000, work in sheltered workshops where it is legal to pay people less than minimum wage.

“It’s mind-blowing,” said Ladau, who takes on a host of other crucial issues, including the high rate of domestic violence and sexual abuse suffered by disabled women. She also fights for smooth sidewalks.

At times, the media portrays disability in less than acceptable ways, according to Ladau. And it seems that even in these progressive, enlightened times, many people view disabilities in a negative light, perhaps as a burden to caregivers and even to those using wheelchairs, who are dealing with limitations daily.

These are some of the issues that the activist, who like her mother is living with Larsen Syndrome — a disorder that affects the development of bones throughout the body — has been speaking out about and hoping to change. She said storytelling is at the heart of her work in disability activism, and she addresses everything from practical presentations on using social media for effective advocacy to deeply personal conversations about her experiences as a disabled woman.

Ladau often reminds folks that the rights afforded to all humans by the Constitution do not prevent the stigmatization and injustices experienced by disabled people and points out that it’s why legislation such as the Americans with Disabilities Act came to exist due to the hard work of activists. Yet, she explains, such legal protections still do not prevent prejudice or exclusion of disability — a major social justice issue.

And considering that one in five Americans has disabilities, she said, “it’s time to learn that disability can intersect with every identity. Every. Single. One.”

In educating people about what it’s like to live with a disability like hers, Laudau said she works with the idea that “if you want the world to be accessible to the disability community, you need to make the disability community and all the ideas and concepts surrounding disability accessible to the world. So, I believe that advocacy is definitely a two-way street. And I work to make my experiences something that people can understand.”

The creative activist said she is very proud of the fact that she has taken her personal passion for disability advocacy and turned it into a professional career. She was recently recognized by the American Association of People with Disabilities with the Paul G. Hearne Emerging Leader Award.

“With that award comes some funding that I’m going to use to begin a disabled writers fellowship program,” she said. “So I’ll be working with writers with disabilities through an organization I work for called Rooted in Rights, where I currently serve as editor-in-chief of the blog, and I’m going to be mentoring young writers with disabilities and helping them find a pathway as they start their careers.”

Pointing out that language and labels are important in describing people with disabilities, Ladau said she prefers to be called ‘a disabled woman’ vs. ‘a woman with a disability.’

“I would say my disability doesn’t define me as a whole person. It’s one aspect of my multi-faceted ID,” she said. “And I do consider disability to be an identity and something that I’m proud of, so in the same way that I say, ‘I am a Jewish woman,’ I put the identity before the word ‘woman.’ It’s something I consider to be a part of me.”

With her mom being disabled, young Ladau grew up in an environment where that was all she knew.

“Since my mom and I share the same disability. I have always had a built-in role model in my life who really showed me how to advocate for myself and how to fight for the things that I need and someone to show me that having a disability doesn’t mean that you cannot live a full life,” she said.

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Source: Times Ledger

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By Naeisha Rose

TimesLedger Newspapers

City Councilman Donovan Richards (D-Far Rockaway), chairman of the Public Safety Committee, and Councilwoman Helen Rosenthal (D-Manhattan), the chair of the Committee on Women, held a joint hearing last week where they blasted the NYPD for failing to help victims of sexual violence, especially those abused by acquaintances.

“A recent report from the [Department of Investigations] saidthe Police Department has been knowingly neglecting victims of sexual assault since 2010 and undoubtedly before that,” Richards said April 9. “Stranger rapes have been prioritized over acquaintance rapes, but nearly 90 percent of sexual assaults in New York City are committed by an acquaintance.”

A DOI report released in March found there were only 67 detectives in the Adult Sex Crimes Division of the NYPD tasked with tackling 5,661 cases in 2017, according to Rosenthal.

To even come close to truly undertaking the amount of cases in the city, the report said the department would have to hire at least 73 additional officers, said Rosenthal.

“Investigators are not being properly trained, facilities are not suitable, and wait times are extensive,” said Richards. “It is no wonder that victims don’t report more often.”

To address the problems with the Special Victims Division in the NYPD four bills were proposed. One was for sensitivity training, another for a modern case management system, a third for evidence-based staffing and a final one for training and investigating sexual crime.

“We respectfully oppose the legislation being proposed,” said Oleg Chernyavsky, the NYPD’s legislative director, about the dramatic changes suggested, because they did not want “to dilute the [police] commissioner’s authority.”

Richards also criticized the existence of more “white badged,” or younger officers, in the squad vs. “gold badged” officers, but Chernyavsky was not having it, and said a memo about the qualifications of the officers wasn’t entirely accurate.

“To call these investigators very inexperienced is misleading,” Chernyavsky said. “The average experience of an investigator coming to SVD is 6.6 years, and of the applicants only 20 percent are accepted. The supervisors have 8.1 years.”

Richards hopes that the bills go forward, because they would include 10 weeks of specialized training for officers before they are allowed to question victims of sexual misconduct or violence.

City Councilwoman Adrienne Adams (D-Jamaica) also weighed in on the report.

“With just 67 detectives in the NYPD’s Special Victims Division, it is clear that sexual assault is not a priority in New York City,” said Adams. “It is troubling that many sexual assault cases are not properly investigated due to a lack of staffing. Victims of sexual assault deserve better as all sexual assaults should be treated as high priority crimes. We need an immediate solution to correct these systemic problems by increasing the staffing levels within the sex crimes units.”

Reach reporter Naeisha Rose by e-mail at nrose@cnglocal.com or by phone at (718) 260–4573.

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Source: Times Ledger

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By Bill Parry

TimesLedger Newspapers

When Mayor Bill de Blasio signed legislation last August to provide low-income New Yorkers with universal access to legal representation for wrongful evictions, the city became the first in the nation to establish this type of law.

The Right to Counsel NYC Coalition and Catholic Migration Services hosted a town hall meeting in Elmhurst last week to explain the details of the new law, such as why the Right to Counsel is so important, the eligibility requirements, how to find an attorney, which Queens zip codes will begin implementing RTC, and how to build tenant power.

After learning that 11433, 11434, and 11373 are the first Queens zip codes to have the law phased in, more than 150 tenants at the meeting in St. Bartholomew Catholic Academy in Elmhurst broke into small discussion groups to discuss the issues with attorneys and organizers.

“I’m so excited that Right to Counsel became a reality. This new right gives tenants access to free legal representation but also gives them a new tool to build power,” Catholic Migration Services Tenant Organizer Lorena Lopez said. “As tenants learn about this right and use it to defend themselves against evictions, I believe they’ll feel empowered to take more action and build stronger tenant associations. These communities will stand up, protect each other and when that happens, tenants win.”

Prior to Right to Counsel, nearly no tenants had legal representation in Housing Court — estimated as just 1 percent in 2013 by state court officials — which resulted in high incidences of evictions and unchecked tenant harassment. To help close the gap, the de Blasio administration dramatically increased the availability of city-funded legal services for low-income tenants, increasing funding for legal assistance for tenants facing eviction or harassment from $6 million in 2013 to $62 million in 2016, a tenfold increase.

The program successfully increased tenant representation in Housing Court from 1 percent in 2013 to 27 percent in 2016. At the same time, residential evictions by marshals declined by 24 percent, allowing 40,000 people to remain in their homes during 2016 and 2017, according to City Hall.

“It’s been five years since the on-and-off fight to keep my home started,” Elmhurst resident Martin Hernandez said. “Getting the help of Catholic Migration Services and its attorneys has been instrumental in being able to stay in our homes and defend ourselves. That’s why I’m thankful not only for the help I have been able to get, but now with the Right to Counsel, all low-income families in New York will be able to access the legal assistance we have always needed. The Right to Counsel will empower us to continue with our struggle to have decent housing and equal rights.”

Reach reporter Bill Parry by e-mail at bparry@cnglocal.com or by phone at (718) 260–4538.

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Source: Times Ledger

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By Mark Hallum

TimesLedger Newspapers

When L train service is suspended next April for repairs to the Canarsie Subway Tunnel, the founding members of the transit group Access Queens worry that the MTA is not seriously considering the impact the displaced Brooklyn straphangers will have on the already packed No. 7 Train.

A joint open house in Ridgewood between the MTA and the city Department of Transportation April 12 outlined an ambitious plan to move people from Brooklyn and Queens into Manhattan during the 15-month period in which a portion of the L train will be shut down for tunnel repairs.

The plan will temporarily shift road layouts and bus lanes to accommodate increased bus and road traffic, while ferries, an up-and-coming city favorite, will also be part of the effort of moving the estimated 200,000 daily L train riders to their jobs and back home.

“If you do the math and then you add in the population growth, obviously a good chunk of those people are going to funnel onto the 7 train, which is already having signal problems despite CBTC having been installed,” said Brandon Mosley, one of the Access Queens founders. “There’s just a lot of questions. This is the first event the MTA has held in Queens [regarding the tunnel closure], but they’re not really looking at Queens as a whole – the 7 train specifically – to say we have a major issue here.”

But the MTA said its effort factored in capacity on the No. 7 and the line should be able to support an overflow of people from Brooklyn.

“We’ve been aggressively preparing robust service plans for the Canarsie Tunnel reconstruction project and expect the 7 train to have enough capacity for additional riders boarding at Court Square while the project is underway,” MTA spokesman Shams Tarek said. “We’ll also vigilantly monitor conditions and deploy personnel to help customers as they navigate unfamiliar routes.”

The Canarsie Tunnel was one of nine underwater right of ways flooded during Superstorm Sandy in 2012 and sustained the most amount of damage to tracks, signals, signal lines, power cables, communication lines, lighting and ducts along the over 7,000-foot stretch.

Walls must be rehabilitated to ensure the structural integrity of the tunnel.

“They don’t really have a precise way to know who is gong to use which lines, so they’re making assumptions and no one thinks the 7 line is as bad as it is,” said Melissa Orlando, another founding member of Access Queens. “People who don’t ride the train don’t understand how bad it is… There’s kind of like a disconnect from what’s actually happening and I think they’re really not anticipating, not able to anticipate, what’s actually going to happen.”

During peak hours, DOT will turn curbside parking on 14th Street in Manhattan into a bus lane with an HOV lane to provide bus service across the Williamsburg Bridge starting at the Bushwick Avenue stop of the L and will include redesigns of Grand Avenue

“The 15-month closure of the L train is an unprecedented challenge. DOT and MTA have been doing extensive analysis and planning, and we expect to release more information shortly,” a DOT spokesman said. “We think that a substantial group of people will choose to bike, and encourage it as a safe, comfortable, and environmentally efficient mode of transportation. DOT is working hard to provide an expansion to safe cycling infrastructure in both Brooklyn and Manhattan as part of the L train tunnel shutdown work to ensure that any additional cyclists are well accommodated. DOT and MTA will continue our ongoing work in engaging, reviewing, and evaluating the mitigation plans prior to, during, and after the partial L train shutdown.”

The representatives from Access Queens were grateful, however, that the MTA took into account their suggestion to provide free walking transfers between the G and the No. 7 at Hunters Point Avenue.

Reach reporter Mark Hallum by e-mail at mhallum@cnglocal.com or by phone at (718) 260–4564.

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Source: Times Ledger