J-SCHOOL BANS JOURNALIST The supposed journalism-themed school housed in the John Jay High School building is teaching a very questionable lesson by blacklisting the journalist who conceived it. When his ethics were questioned, the journalist-Jonathan Mandell-fired back by divulging the sorry episode to this column.

Before we get to it, some background: Mandell, a former Columbia Journalism School instructor who edits GothamGazette.com, broached the idea for the school in 1995 to District 15. It opened in 1998 in Carroll Gardens and has since moved to its current Park Slope location. Now called the Secondary School for Law, Journalism, and Research, serving grades 6 through 12, it has been an administrative nightmare for the district, as depicted in Mandell's article at gothamgazette.com/commentary/150.mandell.shtml.

The article, which infuriated school administrators, included one or two details Mandell observed on a tour of the school for parents of prospective students. The writer had been invited on the tour and introduced himself as a member of the press when he arrived.

But Principal Abby Reif later accused Mandell of coming to the school under false pretenses, as if he pretended to be a parent. So when Reif saw Mandell's name on a list of professional journalists who'd answered a call to visit students at the school, she banned him.

Repeat: The head of a supposed journalism school banned a journalist from volunteering at her school, falsely accusing him of an ethical breach. "She's impugning my integrity," Mandell said. "I'm not going to let that go."

It's obvious from speaking to Mandell that his interest in volunteering is to help students learn about journalism, not collect dirt for an exposé. For sure, his expertise is needed at the Park Slope school, whose principal has no background in journalism (or public relations, obviously). "I personally think I would be a very good volunteer," Mandell e-mailed us. "I am a third-generation New York journalist (my mother, my aunt, my uncle, my grand-uncle were all journalists in New York City), I taught journalism school for a dozen years, I have been on the staff of the New York Daily News and New York Newsday, and I now edit a web site about New York City on which I offered to give some space to showcase the best work of the students in the school." Mandell learned of his banishment two days before the visit.

One reporter who was not banned was Columbia Journalism School student Lauren Wolfe, who also interviewed District 15 Superintendent Carmen Farina for her radio feature about the school (available at http://real-server.jrn.columbia.edu:8080/ramgen/radio/news/2003). Afterward, the principal told Wolfe she must have misunderstood something.

The aspiring radio reporter later wrote in an e-mail, "I can only assume she's annoyed because I told the superintendent that the school appeared to be out of control. (Unfortunately, it did look that way.) I've just been trying to get some answers about the place, and it's a weird kind of excuse- and cover-up-laden kind of situation."

Chalk up another reporter on Reif's blacklist.

YASSKY STEPS UP Last year, when City Councilman David Yassky filled out his Campaign Finance Board form, he neglected to identify the office for which he planned to run. It's the kind of omission made by candidates undecided about their next move. Yassky's office told us someone simply forgot to check off the box for the 33rd Council District, but now we're wondering if it might have been a Freudian slip, because some folks are mentioning Yassky as a candidate for Brooklyn district attorney in 2005. He'd have to run against Joe Hynes, who has abandoned his dreams of higher office.

Our source also mentioned that some consider the front-runner to be Zachary Carter, the former U.S. Attorney for the Eastern District, which includes Brooklyn. Carter was an executive assistant district attorney in Brooklyn from 1982-87 and is now in private practice. But in an email message to us, Carter made his intentions clear: "I will not be a candidate for Kings County D.A.," he wrote.

Yassky didn't get back to us before our deadline. We'll forgive him, because he's been real busy lately, showing up in a host of newspaper stories on different subjects. He appeared at the protest outside the regular Democratic organization's fundraiser this year to protest its judicial selection process.

Yassky (along with Councilman Bill deBlasio) also brokered a deal for $6 million in city funds for affordable housing along 4th Avenue in Park Slope, in exchange for agreeing to the Bloomberg administration's rezoning plan. (Incidentally, Community Board 6's Pauline Blake had earlier denigrated as "political" the politicians' call for an affordable housing component in the rezoning plan. Yassky now has six million answers to that charge.)

Yassky also introduced a bill to require taxis be alternative-fuel vehicles, which someone should have done years ago. Another Yassky bill would require building owners and managers provide bicycle storage for all tenants and employees. And still another Yassky bill would allow off-duty police officers to wear their uniforms while moonlighting at security jobs.

CORRECTIONS We should have specified in last week's column that the $40,000 that Flatbush district leader Lori Knipel withdrew from her savings to help her, co-leader Jake Gold and Assemblyman Jim Brennan defeat Joni Yoswein's slate in 1992 did not go to Brennan's campaign fund. While Knipel and Gold were running on a slate with Brennan, Knipel's loan went to the separate campaign fund of Knipel and Gold, which Gold later closed despite Knipel not having been repaid. The debt led to a schism that persists to this day.

Brennan had a separate campaign fund and had no obligation to raise money to repay Knipel's loan. Knipel, who later worked her way through law school and is now an attorney, told us last year she's no longer expecting to see the $40,000 back, and is willing to bridge her divide with Gold.

Meanwhile, another reader informed us that contrary to what sources had told us, Housing Court Judge Dawn Jimenez, a candidate for Civil Court in Brooklyn, does indeed live in the borough. The caller, who identified himself as "a master of Brooklyn politics" and fan of this column, allowed that Jimenez did live in Manhattan for a while after growing up in Gravesend, but has since moved back to her native 'hood. "She and her family live right near Coney Island Hospital," the master reported, "and are legitimate Brooklyn residents."

SERENA SLIPS AWAY Parkview Tennis Club's failure to provide the free youth lessons it promised in its concession agreement with the city reportedly drew the ire of Flatbush Councilwoman Yvette Clarke at a recent council committee hearing. Clarke wondered aloud if the next Serena Williams might have slipped through Brooklyn's fingers without ever having picked up a racquet, thanks to the lack of tennis opportunities for underprivileged youngsters.

An exaggeration? Consider that the previous concessionaire's youth tennis program produced Levar Harper-Griffith, who became one of the top three junior players in the country, according to Park Slope's Mark Naison, whose own children benefited as well and went on to stellar athletic careers. "Without the free court time and the subsidy, that never would have happened," Naison said. "That's what this concessionaire didn't do."

Opponents of Parkview's operation are counting on political pressure from Clarke, David Yassky, Bill deBlasio, and other members of the City Council to prod the Parks Department into terminating the tennis club's agreement. The club, on Parkside Avenue at Coney Island Avenue, has been seeking a contract extension, without which it claims it can't build the first-class clubhouse it pledged six years ago.

The club doesn't want to invest hundreds of thousands of dollars in a clubhouse only to see another operator win the concession in five years. That's understandable-and as good a reason as any to put the concession up for bid anew. It seems logical that multiple bidders would jump at the chance to run Brooklyn's only major indoor tennis concession in a five-mile radius.

MARTY MAKES AMENDS Borough President Marty Markowitz took a step to patch up his image with Brooklyn's cycling community, kicking off Bike Week NYC in Brooklyn by pedaling from Grand Army Plaza to the Brooklyn Bridge, then distributing breakfast goodies to passing cyclists. Markowitz's relationship with bikers has been flat since his refusal to support banning cars from Prospect Park, the borough's top cycling spot.

INSIDER TRADING Crain's Insider reported that if term limits force City Councilwoman Tracy Boyland from her seat at year's end, her father, former Assemblyman Frank Boyland, would likely run to succeed her. She could then "take" the seat back from him in 2005. Frank Boyland won reelection in 2002 but quit a few days before his new term was to begin, forcing a special election that he knew his son William Boyland would win. The elder Boyland was criticized for the move, but it was not particularly damaging to the family as no other potential candidates in the district have been able to build a viable political base.

GOP BATTLE LOOMS IN BAY RIDGE Last winter, it was the Democrats who couldn't unite behind a City Council candidate, eventually fielding four against the lone Republican in the race, Rosemarie O'Keefe. The Dems' division nearly cost Vinny Gentile the race. He won by 31 votes.

But now it's the Republicans who may be divided. Some GOP leaders want O'Keefe to run again, but one source claimed that Brooklyn Republican Chairman Hy Singer thinks former School Board 20 President Charles Capetanakis would have a better chance to beat Gentile. "Capetanakis, I know, is being heavily recruited," the source said. Though one local paper ran a story pointing to O'Keefe as the anointed candidate, the source said, "Nothing could be further from the truth." Of course, that source was a Capetanakis supporter, so take that with a grain of salt. Maybe a pound. Another source told us no effort is being made to persuade Capetanakis.

Capetanakis, for his part, has expressed no interest in running. His position seems to be that if Republican leaders unite behind him, help him raise money, and promise him no opponent in the primary, he could be talked into running. But he won't actively seek the nomination. That gives O'Keefe the edge. Though she hasn't decided to run, she's been trying to stay in the public eye, just in case.

O'Keefe also invited her supporters from the last race to her house in late April, ostensibly to thank them, but more importantly to broach the subject of her running again. Several in attendance encouraged her to do so, including Brooklyn Conservative Party Chairman Jerry Kassar. Kassar doesn't buy the argument that if O'Keefe couldn't win February's special election with four candidates splitting the Democratic vote, she'd certainly lose one-on-one against an incumbent Democrat. Kassar noted that the special election ballot didn't identify the candidates as Democrats or Republicans. In recent partisan elections, Republicans have done well in Bay Ridge (notably Assemblyman Matthew Mirones, State Senator Marty Golden, and Rep. Vito Fossella).

Secondly, Kassar said, Gentile is vulnerable because he just voted to increase income and sales taxes after basing his last campaign on opposition to a property tax increase. The only votes against the measure were cast by the Council's three Republicans. Democrat Mike Nelson said in The New York Times that voting for the measure was "as pleasant as telling your wife that she doesn't look good in a dress that she just bought, and you have 10 minutes to get to a wedding in another borough."

It's a displeasure Gentile's opponent-be it O'Keefe, Capetanakis, Bob Capano, or someone else-will undoubtedly remind him of in the fall.

SOMETHING SMELLS News that many neighborhoods will lose one weekly garbage pickup drew an immediate outcry from politicians. For once, we have to agree with them-if not their logic. City Councilman Vinny Gentile, prone (as many elected officials are) to being overdramatic, declared in a press release, "I can just see people walking in the streets rather than on the sidewalks as they try to avoid sprawling trash."

There is a better argument to be made: The Department of Sanitation says it's reducing collection in places where the trucks don't fill up, thereby increasing efficiency and saving money. It seems to us that longer routes is the better answer. Any truck that regularly comes back half-full should have its route lengthened. With longer routes, fewer trucks would be needed, so money could be saved without allowing garbage to pile up.

Borough Politics Archive

2003
May 12 column.
May 5 column.
April 28 column.
April 21 column.
April 14 column.
April 7 column.
March 31 column.
March 24 column.
March 10 column.
March 3 column.
February 24 column.
February 17 column.
February 10 column.
February 3 column.
January 27 column.
January 20 column.
January 13 column.
January 6 column.

2002
December 30 column.
December 23 column.
December 16 column.
December 9 column.
December 2 column.
Novemer 25 column.
Novemer 18 column.
November 11 column.
November 4 column.
October 28 column.
October 21 column.
October 14 column.
October 7 column.
September 30 column.
September 23 column.
September 16 column.
September 9 column.
September 2 column.
August 26 column.
August 19 column.
August 12 column.
August 5 column.
July 29 column.
July 22 column.
July 8 column.
July 1 column.
June 17 column.
June 10 column.
June 3 column.
May 27 column.
May 20 column.
May 13 column.
May 6 column.
April 29 column.
April 22 column.
April 15 column.
April 8 column.
April 1 column.
March 25 column.
March 18 column.
March 11 column.
March 4 column.
February 25 column.
February 18 column.
February 11 column.
February 4 column.
January 28 column.
January 21 column.
January 7 column.

2001
December 10 column.
December 3 column.
November 19 column.
November 12 column.
November 5 column.
October 22 column.
October 1 column.
September 6 column.
September 4 column.
August 30 column.
July 23 column.
July 2 column.
June 25 column.
June 11 column.
May 28 column.
May 21 column.
May 14 column.
May 7 column.
April 30 column.
April 23 column.
April 9 column.
April 2 column.
March 26 column.
March 19 column.
March 12 column.
March 5 column.
February 26 column.
February 19 column.
February 12 column.
February 5 column.
January 29 column.
January 22 column.
January 15 column.
January 8 column.
January 1 column.

2000
December 25 column.
December 18 column.
December 11 column.
December 4 column.
November 27 column.
November 20 column.
November 13 column.
November 6 column.
October 30 column.
October 23 column.
October 16 column.
October 9 column.
October 2 column.
September 25 column.
September 18 column.
September 11 column.
September 4 column.
August 28 column.
August 21 column.
August 7 column.
July 31 column.
July 24 column.
July 17 column.
July 10 column.
June 26 column.
June 19 column.
June 12 column.
May 15 column.
May 8 column.
April 24 column.
April 10 column.
March 13 column.
March 7 column.
February 21 column.
February 14 column.
February 7 column.
January 31 column.
January 24 column.
January 17 column.

1999
December 16 column.
December 9 column.
December 2 column.
November 25 column.
November 18 column.
November 11 column.
November 4 column.