Business Editors

NEW YORK--(BUSINESS WIRE)--April 29, 2003

The New York Power Authority (NYPA) Trustees Tuesday authorized the expenditure of up to $700,000 for installation of a small generating unit that will harness the gas by-product from a wastewater treatment plant in Brooklyn to produce electricity while enhancing local air quality.

The up-to 250-kilowatt microturbine will be installed at the New York City Owl's Head Wastewater Treatment Plant, operated by the New York City Department of Environmental Protection (NYCDEP), in the Bay Ridge section of the borough.

"The project that we're planning for Owl's Head shows that current technologies are available for strengthening electricity capacity while improving the quality of the air that we breathe," said Louis P. Ciminelli, NYPA chairman. "Governor Pataki has made these goals top priorities, and the Power Authority has been one of the key organizations being relied upon to accomplish them."

Last January, the Governor directed the New York State Public Service Commission (PSC) to initiate a process that will ensure that one-quarter of the electricity purchased in the state be renewable power, such as wind and solar energy, and waste gas, by the end of the decade. This followed a 2001 executive order that established similarly ambitious goals on the use of renewable power by state agencies.

"The new microturbine that NYPA is planning to install at Owl's Head will allow us to significantly reduce the amount of waste gas that is currently being flared to the atmosphere by the wastewater treatment plant," said Alfonso Lopez, deputy commissioner of the NYCDEP. That will cut its emissions by thousands of pounds per year."

Also known as anaerobic digester gas, or ADG, the waste gas emitted from the sewage treatment process at facilities like Owl's Head is largely comprised of methane and carbon dioxide. Both are considered greenhouse gases that contribute to global warming. These gases are typically flared, or burned, for that reason and odor control.

In 2001, NYPA installed two microturbines at a wastewater treatment facility in the Town of Lewiston in Western New York.

Microturbines are small combustion-turbine generating devices that can be fueled in a number of ways, including ADG, natural gas and liquid fuels.

ADG will also be harnessed by eight fuel cells that NYPA is placing in service later this year at other DEP wastewater treatment facilities in New York City. They'll be identical to a 200-kw fuel cell that the Power Authority installed in 1997 at the Westchester County Wastewater Treatment Plant in Yonkers. It marked the first fuel cell in the Western Hemisphere to use ADG.

Whether it's ADG or some other source of energy, fuel cells are designed to extract hydrogen from whatever fuel they're using, and combine it with the oxygen in the air, to produce electricity.

NYPA meets the full electricity needs of thousands of public facilities in New York City, including those operated by the NYCDEP, saving them millions of dollars a year on their electric bills, compared to what they would have otherwise paid for their cost of power. In addition, they've benefited from energy-efficiency measures by NYPA that, to date, have cut their electric bills by more than $48 million a year, with a corresponding reduction of greenhouse gas emissions of nearly 400 thousand tons.

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Byline: Geoff Van Dyke

The days of the magazine cover as an honest-to-goodness art object may be gone, but they're certainly not forgotten. "Pulp Art," which opens at the Brooklyn Museum of Art on the 15th, presents more than 100 paintings, mostly from the 1930s and '40s, that graced the covers of the "pulp" magazines of that era. Many of the paintings will be shown with the magazine covers they illustrated, including titles such as Famous Fantastic Mysteries and Terror Tales.

Magazines generally commissioned the images - which often depicted sensational scenes in order to catch eyes at the newsstand (some things never change) - and then discarded the original paintings. "Almost all of these artists were trained in the best art schools in the country - they were incredible draftsmen," says Anne Pasternak, guest curator of the exhibition and the executive director of Creative Time. "They would have preferred to do their own paintings but if they were going to have to do commercial art, it was much more lucrative and much more respected to be able to work for the slicks like Esquire or Collier's. Working for the pulps was considered lowbrow." Of an estimated 50,000 to 60,000 of such paintings, only around 1,000 survive. "[The exhibition] is an opportunity to take a look at the importance of pulp art, because those artists told us a lot about the first half of the 20th century."

COPYRIGHT 2003 Copyright by Media Central Inc., A PRIMEDIA Company. All rights reserved.
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It's not yet 30 years since Judy Chicago started working--alone--on The Dinner Party, a monumental labor that came to involve 400 people producing a symbolic representation of the history of significant women in Western civilization. (1) How times have changed! The Dinner Party, which initially met with an unenthusiastic artworld reception and hostility from Congress, has become an icon of feminist art. The work was recently on view at the Brooklyn Museum of Art (BMA), where it has at last found a home through trustee Elizabeth Sackler's purchase and donation. Beginning in 2004, it will be permanently housed in the Sackler Center for Feminist Art at the BMA. (2)

How does it look now? Both dated and relevant. Both disappointing and engrossing. It's still impossible to see the piece without looking through sociopolitical glasses. The Dinner Party (1974-79) centers on a triangular table measuring 48 feet on each side with place settings for 39 identified mythical and historical individuals, 13 to a side. Each setting consists of a decorated ceramic plate and an elaborate textile runner, accompanied by a bland iridescent goblet, a doughy fork, knife and spoon set, and a gold-edged napkin. The names of another 999 women are written on a white-tile "Heritage Floor" supporting the table. To create the whole, Chicago orchestrated a variety of volunteers--researchers, needleworkers, ceramists and other specialists, including several men, over a period of years.

As a process of creation, the work remains an exemplar of artistic ambition. However, as an art work, The Dinner Party is not altogether satisfying. Although it occupies a large room, the installation is undeveloped sculpturally, and as a didactic program, meant to communicate information and to provoke viewers to seek further information, it remains dependent upon written information to fill out its visual expression. Chicago herself seems to have come to this conclusion, writing in a 1996 commemorative volume published by Penguin Books that, "By the time The Dinner Party was completed, it was probably better described as a project than a work of art." (3)

It is best appreciated as a tightly related chronological sequence of "pictures," starting with mythical fertility goddesses of prehistory and ending in the mid-20th century with Virginia Woolf and Georgia O'Keeffe. The individual place settings proceed like a group of illustrations in a book.

Taken individually, Chicago's symbolic compositions are often compelling. The abstracted vaginal imagery china-painted onto the plates is pictorially powerful in its central organization and symmetry; the butterfly and flower motifs work the same way but somewhat diffuse the effect with the attractions of the noncentral wings or petals. The plates with other motifs, such as Sojourner Truth's masks and Ethyl Smyth's piano, are letdowns. This work surely must be acknowledged as a major precedent for the many sexual images and themes offered by women artists in recent years. Chicago had a leading role not just in the push to acknowledge the achievements of women but also to actively express female sexuality. In the plates, she exploited the exquisite colors and luscious surfaces available in the ceramic medium. The purple-red going to grays of the Kali plate is one of the outstanding examples; the central slit pours open with the heat of magma. The Saint Bridget motif, which blends flame and flower, also burns with radiance.

The majority of the plates are graphic and two-dimensional. As forms, most of them are merely circular blanks made to serve as "canvases." The classic goblets offer vertical punctuation only, while the standardized flatware is historically incorrect early on and culturally skewed. The settings would be stronger as plates and runners alone. Near the present in the chronological sequence, plates are built up in relief meant to symbolize modern women breaking out of convention. These more sculptural forms recall works by leading ceramists of the '70s.

In making the runners for the place settings, Chicago capitalized on many capacities of textiles--the intense colors of dyes, the linear and pointillist optical effects attainable through stitching, a wide variety of textures. The textiles are effective as both picture and form. The Dinner Party makes use of an astonishing variety of techniques, including crewel and many other types of embroidery, weaving, couching, applique and reverse applique, braiding, knotting, lacing, beading, felting, knitting, drawn thread work, trapunto and other types of quilting, laidwork, bargello, blackwork, whitework, crossstitch, ribbon work, petit point, cutwork and crochet. The extraordinary expressive qualities are best appreciated up close.

Boadaceia's runner employs felt in muscular curves that recall Viking motifs. Trotula's is active, with quilted diamond shapes, a tree of life motif, flowers and birds; concentric mounds pile up at the bottom edge like a landscape. Eleanor of Aquitaine's cloth includes tapestry depicting irises and roses, as well as a fence that contains her plate and its breast-and-clit-like fleur-de-lis. Petronilla de Meath's runner suggests eroticism and strength with coursing curves inspired by Celtic interlace. On Artemisia Gentileschi's setting, a representation of gathered cloth makes a three-dimensional drapery around a dramatically black "stage."

During the late 90's -- in the midst of the country's economic boom -- New York City watched helplessly as companies seeking lower-priced office space fled to the New Jersery waterfront, taking thousands of jobs with them.

With a vow to end the exodus, city officials announced a plan to develop Downtown Brooklyn. The plan calls for building as much as 5.4 million SF of new office space that presumably would rent for less than $40 a SF and compete with office space in places like Jersey City which many firms considered an attractive place to locate back office and other operation.

The city expects to spend about $100 million over a 7- to 10-year period to execute the plan. That figure does not include the cost of transportation improvements, officials said.

"During the last boom, this city did not have space for companies that wanted to come here," said Deputy Mayor for Economic Development and Rebuilding Daniel Doctoroff. "We are still paying the price for that."

In the 1990's, New Jersey created over 12 million SF of space, enough for 50,000 workers. The opportunity cost to the city of 50,000 jobs is equivalent to $150 million in 2003 dollars. In 2000, 32 New York City companies relocated to New Jersey, resulting in the loss of 9,000 jobs, according to statistics compiled by the city from the U.S. Department of Labor, Cushman & Wakefield, and the NJ Department of Economic Development.

Doctoroff announced the Bloomberg administration's Plan for Downtown Brooklyn at a press conference last week at the Metro Tech Center in Downtown Brooklyn. He was joined by Amanda Burden, director of City Planning, Joshua Sirefman, chief operating officer of the city's Economic Development Corporation, and a host of Brooklyn officials including Borough President Marty Markowitz.

Under the plan, four sites near the Metro Tech Center have been identified as potential locations for new office development. Three new office towers -- with as much as 3 million SF of space -- could be built abutting a newly created 1.5-acre park on Willoughby Street just west of Flatbush Avenue Extension. Another office development anchoring the west end of downtown at Boerum Place was identified with a total development potential of nearly 850,000 SF.

The sites are owned by several different entities and some assemblage of sites would be required before highrise office towers could be built, officials said.

"The city sees Downtown Brooklyn as a key to its economic development," Burden said. "Though the expansion of commercial and residential opportunities as well as significant investment in public open space and streetscape improvements, we hope to transform Downtown Brooklyn into one of the greatest office districts in the city."

The city views Downtown Brooklyn -- which currently has a Class A office space vacancy rate of .2% as a place where companies may locate back office operations or shift some of its workers under plans to disperse operations. Doctoff said the city has not had discussions with potential tenants or discussed public incentives that may be necessary to bring new office development to life. But the city must take proactive steps to ensure that the tools are in place so that development can move forward when economic conditions are right.

"No one can predict when the market will turn around but it is vitally important that, as the city's economy recovers, we are prepared to offer companies viable and affordable locations to meet their expansion needs," Doctoroff said.

One obstacle to new development in Downtown Brooklyn is that the area is "underzoned." Officials plan to issue a draft scope for the Environmental Impact Statement this month and hold the first public meeting on the proposed zoning changes in May. The project is expected to be certified into the Uniform Land Use Review Process this fall and will take seven months to complete. Public meetings will be held throughout the process and progress reports will be given, officials said.

Specific zone changes were not discussed, but officials said the height of new buildings may not adhere to the unofficial ceiling of 34 stories and 512 feet -- long the norm in the neighborhood -- set by the Willamsburgh Savings Bank building at the edge of Fort Greene.

The plan also calls for creating 1,000 new residential units on the eastern side of Flatbush Avenue Extension, from Tillary to Willoughby Streets, and along the south side of Myrtle Avenue, east of Flatbush Avenue Extension. Other development sites have been identified along Livingston Street between Smith Street and Flatbush Avenue. The city is hoping the new residential development will help connect the downtown area with existing residential areas in Fort Greene and Boerum Hill.

"We want to knit the communities with one another," Burden said.

The plan also calls for drawing upon and expanding the neighborhood's rich cultural and intellectual resources, such as those found at Polytechnic University, Brooklyn Law School and St. Joseph's College. Planned parking facilities could bring an additional 2,000 parking spots, city officials said.

Business Editors

STATEN ISLAND, N.Y.--(BUSINESS WIRE)--May 9, 2003

Staten Island Bancorp, Inc. (NYSE: SIB), announced today, that it's wholly owned subsidiary, SI Bank & Trust has opened its third branch office in Brooklyn, New York.

The branch will be located at the corner of Kings Highway and Coney Island Avenue and will serve the neighborhoods of Homecrest, Ocean Parkway and Midwood.

"We are extremely excited about this new location," stated James R. Coyle, President & COO of SI Bank & Trust, "we have been very successful in building new business in our first two Brooklyn locations and look forward to similar success at this new branch." Prior to the opening of this branch, the bank served the Brooklyn neighborhoods of Bay Ridge, Bensonhurst and Boro Park. Coyle continued, "we have been able to grow our deposits in Brooklyn from $100 million to over $200 million in just two years, with approximately 18% of deposits in non-interest checking accounts. This demonstrates our ability to serve the core account needs of individuals, families and businesses."

In addition, the bank has entered into lease agreements for two additional Brooklyn locations and a new branch in Edison, NJ. "We expect to open two of these three branches by year-end and we will continue to seek de novo branching opportunities in the New York Metro area," added Coyle.

SI Bank & Trust is a wholly owned subsidiary of Staten Island Bancorp, Inc. SI Bank & Trust was chartered in 1864 and currently operates 17 full service branches and three limited service branches on Staten Island, New York, three full service branches in Brooklyn, New York and 15 full service branches in New Jersey. SI Bank & Trust also operates SIB Mortgage Corp., a wholly owned subsidiary of SI Bank & Trust, which conducts business under the name of Ivy Mortgage in 42 states. On March 31, 2003, Staten Island Bancorp had $6.9 billion in total assets and $625.0 million of total stockholders' equity.

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A judge has dismissed a sexual abuse lawsuit against the Catholic Diocese of Brooklyn, a decision that could affect similar legal action aiming to overcome expired statutes of limitation on old abuse cases. Judge Janice A. Taylor of the New York State Supreme Court in Queens on April 11 threw out the suit filed by 42 plaintiffs who had claimed they were abused by Catholic priests, some as many as 50 years ago.

The plaintiffs' lawyer, Michael Dowd, had argued that church officials who had covered up the alleged abuse had hindered the victims from filing suit. Taylor said the victims had "timely knowledge" of the abuse and could have taken action before their legal window expired. Calling it "a disastrous decision," Dowd said he would file an appeal. The ruling may be significant because lawyers have used the same fraud and concealment argument in other cases to get around the expired statutes of limitation. Dowd also filed a similar suit against 14 priests in the neighboring Diocese of Rockville Centre. Several states, most notably California, have passed laws to lift the statutes of limitation on old cases to let alleged victims seek legal action.

COPYRIGHT 2003 The Christian Century Foundation
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