The Briefly for June 29, 2020 – The "Even Aliens and UFOs Have Left New York" Edition
Today - Low: 69˚ High: 85˚
Clear throughout the day.
Get ready, because tonight starts Macy's ill-conceived fireworks displays across the city for the next five nights. The city said they will send notifications a few minutes before they start(Ron Lee for NY1) The story of Charlie H. Cochrane, Jr., the NYPD's first openly gay cop, who joined the force in 1967. (Carey Reed Zamarriego for Untapped Cities) Photos: Pride Weekend's Drag March. (Scott Lynch for Gothamist) More Photos: The Drag March. (EV Grieve) The NYPD celebrated Pride in their traditional style by pepper-spraying and arresting participants of the Queer Liberation March during a dance party in Washington Square Park. (Duncan Osborne for Gothamist) Answering questions about the availability of the NYPD's disciplinary records, which will become available in July. (David Cruz for Gothamist) 17 members of the city’s Corrections Department will face departmental charges for their roles in the death of Rikers Island inmate Layleen Polanco last June. Bronx District Attorney Darcel D. Clark and the city’s Department of Investigation have refused to pursue criminal charges. (Jan Ransom and Ed Shanahan for NY Times) How Occupy City Hall's 24-hour protests came to be. (Juliana Kim, photos by Amr Alfiky for NY Times)
"Yet on day one of his mayoralty, de Blasio betrayed his word—and even more, the Black and Hispanic communities of New York City—by bringing back an even more blatantly discriminatory policing strategy: the practice of aggressive misdemeanor arrests known as “broken windows policing.”"
-Bernard E. Harcourt, professor of law and political science at Columbia University, for Gothamist, Mayor De Blasio's Police Strategy Has Always Been Racist
The number of UFOs reported across America in the first three months of the year shot up by 112%, but New York's UFO sightings are among the country's lowest. Even the aliens know it's not a good time to see the city. (Adam Nichols for Patch) The headline says it best: The Garbage-Scented, Siren-Laden, and Yet Still Pleasant Reality of Dining Outside Right Now (Robert Sietsema for Eater) There are over 5,650 restaurants open for outdoor dining in the city, the Department of Transportation has an interactive map. (Devin Gannon for 6sqft) Maybe some of these locations need to be double-checked since they're in the middle of bike lanes, which is forbidden by the new guidelines. (Gersh Kuntzman for Streetsblog) The experience of a day of phase two inside Veselka. (Ryan Sutton, photos by Gary He for Eater) Six ways restaurants have been innovating to enforce social distancing. (Bao Ong for Time Out) The state has extended its to-go cocktail laws for an additional 30 days. (Erika Adams for Eater) Five years of lessons learned from writing about food and dining. (Serena Dai for Eater, good luck on your new gig)
"For years, the NYPD has used the city’s public drinking laws as a simple pretext for the harassment of communities of color. Of the 15 city police precincts that wrote the most summonses for open-containers in 2010, 12 were located in communities of color. A separate Brooklyn study found that 85 percent of open container citations in that borough were given to Black and brown residents, and only 4 percent to whites."
-Shabazz Stuart, CEO of Oonee, for Streetsblog, It’s Time to Legalize Public Drinking for All New Yorkers
Dog runs, basketball courts, tennis courts, volleyball courts, handball courts, and bocce courts are returning to the city's parks with phase three. (Shaye Weaver for Time Out) Everything known about indoor dining, which starts on July 6 in phase three of the city's reopening. (Hannah Albertine for The Infatuation) For the second time in two decades, the MTA is facing a "doomsday budget." (Robert Pozarycki for amNewYork Metro) James Dolan owns Madison Square Garden and the Knicks and might be one of the biggest idiots in the entire city. The CDC's website with information on Covid-19 antibodies clearly states "Having antibodies to the virus that causes COVID-19 might provide protection from getting infected with the virus again. If it does, we do not know how much protection the antibodies might provide or how long this protection might last." Has that stopped James Dolan from saying he wants to fill Madison Square Garden with people who have tested positive for antibodies for a benefit show? No it has not. (Amanda Hatfield for BrooklynVegan) A deeper dive into the Summer Youth Employment Program, how its elimination by the de Blasio administration disproportionally affects people of color, and why kids are fighting to bring it back. (Rainer Harris for Curbed) Red Hook's Fairway will close by July 17. The landlord will look for a grocery store to take its place. (Liena Zagare for BKLYNER) Mayor de Blasio is calling for a full eviction moratorium through August 20 and for the state place tenants who miss rent on a year-long payment plan to make up for back rent once they are able to work. (Alejandra O'Connell-Domenech for amNewYork Metro) New York Hall of Science won't be reopening in 2020, opting for a 2021 date. (Bill Parry for QNS) Getting students into classrooms in the fall, if that is an option at all, will be a difficult task. The CDC calling for children to be six feet apart, which would be impossible in the city's 150 schools that are already operating at a capacity of 150% or more. For instance, Francis Lewis High School in Queens is built for 2,188, has 4,492 students and capacity will have to be cut to around 1,000. Whatever happens, school will not be returning to normal in the fall. (Ashleigh Garrison for Chalkbeat) RIP Milton Glaser, who created the I ♥ NY logo. (William Grimes for NY Times) It's a great apartment that will be plagued with construction noise through 2035, but you'll be close to the trains! (Norman Oder for Atlantic Yards/Pacific Park Report) Spring training hasn't begun yet and Vegas is already predicting a better season for the Yankees than the Mets. (Joe Pantorno for amNewYork Metro) St. Patrick’s Cathedral welcomed people for Sunday Mass for the first time since March. (Robert Pozarycki for amNewYork Metro) The city's affordable housing lottery is anything but fair to the people who can afford the least. For each apartment available for "extremely low-income" families there are 650 applicants. That is nearly 5x as many applicants for apartments for families making between $122k and $168k/year. (Rachel Holliday Smith for The City) Sunday's double rainbow. What does it mean? (EV Grieve) Do you know what this city doesn't need? A sinkhole problem. A sinkhole nearly ate an SUV on the Lower East Side over the weekend. (EV Grieve) There are nine NYC beaches opening for swimming on July 1st. (Noah Sheidlower for Untapped New York) Thanks to reader Jenny for today's featured photo!