Friday, June 13, 2008

Ratner Rally And Opposition

In the face of the nation’s economic downturn and rumor of the Nets basketball team sell off, Atlantic Yards backers chose Brooklyn Day, June 5, 2008, for a show of strength. Brooklyn Borough President Marty Markowitz, union leaders, the elected and others carpeted Brooklyn Borough Hall steps that face the Supreme Court Building. Community Benefits Agreement Chair Dee Hunley-Adossa warmly invited speakers to the podium.

Speech content ranged from glowing memories of the Brooklyn Dodgers to jubilant prospects of jobs to searing threats to critics of Forest City Ratner’s Atlantic Yards Project. Curtis Sliwa described Brooklyn as “the emerald in the crown” and said, “Brooklyn needs the Atlantic Yards Project.” IronWorker Union Local 34 president pointed to “15,000 union jobs and 3,000 sustainable jobs as reasons to convince all opposition to step aside and let this project happen.” Sal Zarzana of the Carpenters Union Local 926 informed the crowd “all union members present lost three hours of pay to attend the rally.”

The crowd was predominantly Black adults and children with a sprinkling of Whites. Black senior citizens covered the benches. School children flanked the speakers at the podium. As large as the crowd was only one small food pushcart gave away free hot dogs. NYS Assemblyman Karim Camara asked, “Are you ready to bring basketball to Brooklyn?” He followed with, “We have a project that has significant provisions for housing for people like you and me.”

NYC Councilmen Lewis Fidler and Dominic Recchio spoke in favor of basketball, jobs and housing. They urged dissenting council members to join the bandwagon. Councilwoman Darlene mealy proclaimed herself “a union baby.” She named David Yassky, Hakeem Jeffries and Tish James as project blockers. Mealy declared, “If Tish James won’t build it, then we’ll knock her out of office…we have to think about who we vote for. If they’re not doing things in our favor, we have to get rid of them.” Upon hearing this statement, St. Senator Eric Adams who was absent from the rally responded, “This is the same idea we have for those elected that agree with using eminent domain for Atlantic Yards.”

Across town and hours later, Community Board 8’s Housing/ULURP committee met at the Center for Nursing and Rehabilitation to deliberate on the same matter. Committee Chairwoman Nizjoni Granville read eleven points for inclusion in a letter of inquiry to FCR and the Empire State Development Corp. from CB 8. Claims of “no business when the arena is dark” were heard. Peter Krashes who lives within the projects footprint explained “the project is being done in two phases where the arena and commercial space are in Phase I. Housing construction is in the second phase and its estimated completion is in 2018. City and state government have no measures to hold FCR accountable to completing Phase II.”

Eminent domain was used to shorten the project from a 20-year timetable to a 10 – 12 year process. The community is concerned that a great portion of the project area is cleared, though it will be ten years before constructions occurs. Present at the meeting was ESDC Ombudsman Forest Taylor who affirmed that the state reimbursed FCR $105 million for assembling the site. Though invited, FCR didn’t send a representative to the meeting.

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Sunday, June 1, 2008

Total Black TV Fills Void Left By BET


Does cable, DirecTV and regular TV leave you feeling as if you’re missing something? Could “what’s missing” be programming that relates to the core values and interests of the black community? If so, visit TotalBlackTV.com. Total Black TV is the cyber spot to view, download and upload black video content. Knowing the diversity of interests, the videos are organized into 27 categories that include action, sitcom, drama, animation, science fiction, shorts and religion.

The site serves the seasoned and emerging content producer by offering the choice of mailing DVDs AVIs or film cassettes to a post office box or uploading to the site. Video viewing is limited to a particular PC during free streaming or purchased downloads secured from file sharing, using Microsoft DRM technology. Thus, producers have another avenue to get their story to the public.

Total Black TV is also a social networking site where members can share photos, videos and messages among themselves or a select group. This part of the site is called totalblacktv.com/myview and requires a separate account registration from the main site. Registration has a page where members may invite eight family members and eight friends/coworkers.

New York attorney Kevin Golding owns Total Black TV and initially launched it in 2005 to serve Ausar Auset Society, an international cultural organization. The site went from distributing Ra Un Nefer Amen’s Kamitic lifestyle videos to branching out to other content producers. Golding says, “The idea of people watching such historians and health practioners as Dr. Sebi, Dr. John H. Clarke, and Dr. ben-Jochannan on an iPod was an exciting proposition.”

Rather than seek angel investors or venture capitalists, Golding and Promotions and Marketing Coordinator Amar Divine opted to make alliances with colleges, film festivals and individual video producers. The corporation co-sponsored the 2007 African Film Festival in Edinborough, Scotland. Angie LeMar, a popular radio host on England’s Choice FM interviewed Golding on location. These international links result in site visitors from Kenya, Belgium, Hawaii, Japan, India, the Netherlands, Canada and South Africa. The latest promotion is the TBTV Dance Competition where dancers submit videos of their dance routines to totalblacktv.com/myview rather than travel to a geographic location. The submission deadline is Saturday, June 7, 2008.

Amar Divine is driven to present positive images and ideas produced by people of color. Divine compares TotalBlackTV.com to a cable station that promotes black media but “isn’t representative of positive black culture [nor] produced by black people.” Rather, Divine aspires to experience similar success to that of cinemanow.com.

The corporate team is planning a launch party slated for September 2008. Academicians, performers and emerging producers have been extended invitations. While the team is keeping the details of the event under wraps, it is sure to be extraordinary to introduce such a well-conceived Web site.

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