MAYOR ADAMS COMMISSIONS DOROTHY DAY STATEN ISLAND FERRY

 

Ferry Named for Renowned Catholic Activist Who Lived and Worked on Staten Island

 

$85 Million State-of-the-Art Ferry to Set Sail Later This Year

New York City Mayor Eric Adams and New York City Department of Transportation (DOT) Commissioner Ydanis Rodriguez today officially commissioned the Dorothy Day, the third and final new, 4,500-passenger Ollis-class Staten Island Ferry vessel joining the fleet this year. The $85 million, state-of-the-art ferry is named for Day, the legendary 20^th-century Catholic peace activist. The Dorothy Day has completed harbor trials and passed U.S. Coast Guard inspections — and will serve passengers for the first time later this year.

 

“Dorothy Day represents so much of what is great about New Yorkers and our city, and we are proud to honor her by commissioning this Staten Island Ferry,” said Mayor Adams. “Having her name on this boat will remind New Yorkers and visitors alike of her fight for peace and against hunger, fights that we are continuing every day. Thank you to all of those carrying on her legacy.”

 

“The Staten Island Ferry is a staple of life in New York — shepherding almost 10 million people to and from Staten Island every year. It’s only right that we modernize our fleet to ensure the country’s busiest ferry route operates effectively,” said Deputy Mayor for Operations Meera Joshi. “Dorothy Day was an incredible activist and a stalwart New Yorker. I’m glad that we are honoring her memory with our newest ferry. I am grateful to the crews at DOT that tirelessly keep this gateway to our great borough open, and I can’t wait to take a ride on the Dorothy Day.”

 

“We at DOT and the incredible Staten Island Ferry staff are proud to celebrate Dorothy Day today, and we are excited to bring the ferry with her name into service later this year,” said DOT Commissioner Rodriguez. “During her life, Day loved riding this ferry — as she knew how a short ferry ride can serve as a peaceful, even meaningful, escape from the hustle and bustle of the life in our city. Best of all, given her lifetime commitment to equity, Day would be thrilled at how DOT is committed to keeping admission to this ferry free for all.”

 

The newest Staten Island Ferry, the Dorothy Day, is preceded by two new ferries this past year, all constructed by Eastern Shipbuilding in Panama City, FL. The Staff Sergeant Michael H. Ollis — named for a war hero from New Dorp killed saving the life of a fellow soldier in Afghanistan — began passenger service in February. The Sandy Ground — the second Ollis-class boat, which honors one of the nation’s first Black settlements that was located on Staten Island’s South Shore and served as a stop on the Underground Railroad — was commissioned by Mayor Adams in February and began regular passenger service in June.

 

The three new Ollis-class ferries commissioned this year come with support from funds provided by a range of federal agencies and elected officials, including U.S. Senator Charles E. Schumer and U.S. Senator Kirsten Gillibrand. The new ferries are larger, more modern, and safer in extreme weather than earlier fleets. They feature popular design elements of past Staten Island Ferries, including phone-charging outlets and more comfortable seating, as well as an oval upper-deck promenade that serves, for the first time, as an outdoor “walking track” for riders. 

 

“My grandmother loved the Staten Island Ferry, so what an honor to have one named after her,” said Martha Hennessy, social justice activist and granddaughter of Dorothy Day. “In these days of global instability, let us use this moment to remember her efforts to make peace.”

 

“Dorothy Day is one of the most significant figures in the history of the church in the United States, and we pray she will one day be a saint,” said Cardinal Timothy Dolan, Archbishop of New York. “She was also a devoted resident of Staten Island and Manhattan. It is fitting that this ferry will keep her name alive, and, please God, help introduce new generations to her radical love of God and neighbor.”

 

Dorothy Day (1897-1980) was a convert to Catholicism who led the Catholic Worker movement, founded during the Great Depression. As editor of The Catholic Worker newspaper, she maintained the movement’s pacifism even during World War II, while operating soup kitchens, including one on the Lower East Side of Manhattan that remains in operation today. Day was repeatedly arrested for her postwar protests during New York City’s air raid drills, which criticized nuclear war preparation. Hailed by Pope Francis in his speech to the U.S. Congress in 2015, Day has been submitted to the Vatican as a candidate for canonization by the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops. Day regularly rode the Staten Island Ferry to reach her cottage on Staten Island’s South Shore and is buried in Pleasant Plains.

 

BRAC November 2022 Newsletter

BRONX RIVER ART CENTER  Celebrating 35 Years of Bringing Arts & Cultural Programs to the Bronx

NOVEMBER 2022 at BRAC

Education

Image: Kayla Weisdorf instructing teen participants from the local community. Photo: Ukari Bakosi, 2022.

Teen Project Studio, TPS Bio Art & Community Through December 17th

Since mid-October, Teen Project Studio +2.0 has been exploring creatively nature-based solutions to climate change, biodiversity crisis, pollution, environmental shifts. The weekly, hands-on, makers sessions are leading to the production of a collaborative art & science project that addresses and foresees a livable future.  Each week, participants research a range of different solutions, their promises, benefits, and how they have been implemented, developed, and advanced by artists and designers. TPS participants have also been surveying the neighborhood of West Farms and identifying areas that could potentially benefit from a nature-based intervention with the goal of collectively designing and making a bio-artwork piece to contribute to the space. More information, visit TPS Home Page

Exhibitions

Image: Molly Goldfarb, "Santa Hey", 2019. Courtesy of the artist.

KEEP IT IN FICTION A Study of Fictional Narratives and Visual Arts On view from November 3rd to December 10th

Bronx River Art Center is pleased to announce KEEP IT IN FICTION, an exhibition that explores how artists disguise truth with fiction in order to arrive at a number of different conclusions. Through visual explorations artists seek out unlimited possibilities to distort reality in order to cope, reinvent, or escape their daily realities. Through visual arts, featured artists explore to engage in a fictional form of truth. The eleven artists chosen for the exhibition will present narrative inspired work that range in media from paper and book arts, sculpture, prints, paintings and digital media. To expand the exhibition's intent each artist created a narrative excerpt, poem or video to accompany the pieces. Participating artists: Marcy Brafman, Jason Bryant, Jennifer Deppe Parker, Molly Goldfarb, Sally Jerome, Kerry Lessard, Marianne Petit, Zoia Skorodapenko, Mark Torres, Chao Wang, and Natalie Collette Wood. Curated by Stephany Young

BRAC Exhibition Page

Public Programs

Image: Jeanai La Vita, performance of The Séance. Screen Capture. Courtesy of the artist.

THE SÉANCE A Night of Multimedia Theater Performance Friday, November 11th, 2022 at 7pm

Local artist, Jeanai La Vita, brings to BRAC her theatrical concert event The Séance incorporating a hybrid of semi-improvised contemporary classical singing with live music and a film with soundscape created by the artist and Giacomo La Vita. The theatrical concert invites audience members to commune with the performers as they channel stories and messages from beyond. The ensemble of instrumentalists accompanying the performance will create a special live score in reaction to BRAC’s space.

RSVP on Eventbrite

Image: Marianne Petit, "The Story Of Pauline and the Matches", 2011. Photo: Ukari Bakosi, 2022.

IN CONVERSATION Artists featured in KEEP IT IN FICTION Saturday, November 19th, 2022 at 5:30pm

Bronx River Art Center continues with the presentation of the monthly Artist Talk series IN CONVERSATION. For November, Hector Canonge moderates the artist dialogue with the participation of artists featured in the current exhibition, curated by Stephanie Young. The conversation will outline each artist's creative process and their production process in relation the works exploring language and visual aesthetics. IN CONVERSATION is an artist talk program that fosters dialogue, exchange and reflection about Contemporary Art issues by featuring local, national, and international guest artists working in various disciplines and creative practices. The monthly program consists of the presentation of selected works followed by an open forum with attending audience members.

RSVP on Eventbrite

Upcoming

Image: Summer 2022 Student Art Show, held on August 12th. Photo: Ukari Bakosi, 2022.

Fall 2022 Student Art Show Saturday, December 17th, 2022

BRAC will close out the Fall 2022 semester of art classes with an art show exhibiting the work of our students working in different media over the past three months. Join our teaching artists, staff members, students and parents in celebrating the creativity and growth of our students.

Opportunities

Image: Off-site mixed-media art workshop at CREO College Prep taught by Jonathan Berry. Photo: Ukari Bakosi, 2022.

For Artists / Curators / Educators

As part of our commitment to further nurture, support, and encourage the development of artists from the Bronx and New York City at large, BRAC will compile a list of opportunities in the arts and related fields. Artists and organizations are welcome to send us and share their listings and future opportunities.

NYC METRO AREA En Foco Open call to BIPOC photographers The 8th Annual En Foco Photography Fellowship is designed to support New York-based photographers of color who demonstrate the highest quality of work as determined by a photography panel of peers and industry professionals. The deadline for applications is November 11, 2022. Apply  NYC ArtWalk Open call to all visual artists NYC ArtWalk seeks to implement a sustainable model of opportunities that can support the work of artists from all corners of the world. Through art shows that support diversity, inclusion and equity. Apply to have your artwork shown on digital screens in the streets of SoHo (as part of a collaboration with the Climate Museum of New York City) or Times Square (as part of the International Street Art Show). The deadline for SoHo applications is October 10, 2022; the deadline for Times Square applications is November 20, 2022. Apply  Smack Mellon Artist Studio Program The Artist Studio Program was launched in 2000 in response to the crisis of available affordable space for artists living and working in New York City. The program provides six eligible artists working in all visual arts media a free private studio space accessible 24/7 and a fellowship (dependent on funding). The 2032-2024 program begins September 1, 2023 and ends August 15, 2024. The studios are located on the lower level of our building at 92 Plymouth Street in Dumbo, Brooklyn and range in size from 250 to 300 square feet. The program does not provide living space. The deadline to apply is November 23, 2022 11:59pm Apply Site:Brooklyn Gallery Open call to artists Landscape makes the strange familiar and the familiar strange. It asks the viewer to think about the fundamental question: what is the world we inhabit like? Often, artist’s answers have drawn attention to not only the space of the earth, but the passage of time, the rhythm of the seasons, nature’s death and birth, the environments both made and lost by humanity’s interventions, both great and small. Site:Brooklyn’s new show, Landscape: Constructed and Wild is looking for artworks focused on the environment in which we live. The deadline for applications is December 5, 2022. Apply

BRAC COVID-19 Protocols

Proof of vaccination will be required upon entering building for all persons over age 6. Use of masks during classes is required. For general questions about classes, please email education@bronxriverart.org.

STATE INSPECTOR GENERAL ANNOUNCES LAUNCH OF COMPLAINT DASHBOARD AS PART OF TRANSPARENCY COMMITMENT

 

 

New York State Inspector General Lucy Lang announced today the launch of a publicly accessible dashboard containing data about all complaints received by the Offices of the New York State Inspector (OIG) as part of her commitment to improve transparency in state government. Hosted on the state’s Open Data portal, the Inspector General will make available anonymized monthly data about the number, nature and source of all complaints received by the agency, which is comprised of the Offices of the New York State Inspector General (NYSIG), Welfare Inspector General (OWIG), Workers’ Compensation Inspector General (WCIFG), and Gaming Inspector General (OGIG).

 

The first set of data made public today provides information on complaints received by the agency in September 2022. The data will be updated in the middle of each month to include totals from the month prior. Open Data’s interface will empower the public to interpret data on complaints through maneuverable charts and graphs.

 

“We take seriously our responsibility to thoroughly investigate every allegation under our jurisdiction, and to share any substantiated findings with the public,” said Inspector General Lang. “Transparency has been my priority since taking office. It is vital that government clearly communicate about how we are fulfilling our mandate to serve the people of the state. We invite researchers, journalists, and the public to review and analyze our data and help us work towards a more transparent New York.”

 

This effort is the latest in a series of initiatives designed to increase OIG transparency, which has also included the ongoing publication of a decade’s worth of historical letters, daily social media updates and engagement, and a commitment to publish every report and letter detailing the agency’s work addressing complaints of corruption, fraud, criminal activity, conflicts of interest or abuse in state government.

 

View the OIG data portal here: https://data.ny.gov/Transparency/Offices-of-the-Inspector-General-Investigative-Com/m4ux-3xxj

Doctor Convicted At Trial Of Illegally Distributing Oxycodone From Midtown Manhattan Practice

 

 Damian Williams, the United States Attorney for the Southern District of New York, announced that a federal jury found HOWARD ADELGLASS guilty for his participation in a conspiracy to illegally prescribe oxycodone.  The defendant was found guilty following a two-week trial before U.S. District Judge Jed S. Rakoff.  Sentencing is scheduled for March 8, 2023, before Judge Rakoff.

U.S. Attorney Damian Williams said: “Doctor Howard Adelglass was a drug dealer, but instead of peddling drugs on the street corner, he distributed drugs with a prescription pad from his Central Park South ‘pain-management clinic.’  For years, the defendant prescribed enormous quantities of highly addictive and deadly opioids to people he knew were suffering from substance abuse disorders or were dealers.  By distributing mammoth quantities of oxycodone pills to people without a legitimate medical purpose, the defendant destroyed lives and families.  Along with our law enforcement partners, we will continue to hold accountable those responsible for fueling the opioid crisis that is ravaging our community and nation.”

According to the allegations contained in the Indictment, the evidence offered at trial, and matters included in public filings:

HOWARD ADELGLASS was a licensed physician.  Together with Marcello Sansone, the defendant operated a pain-management clinic located in Midtown Manhattan (the “Clinic”).  The Clinic serviced purported patients seeking oxycodone and other pain-relief medications commonly diverted for illicit purposes.  In exchange for cash payments, and in some instances for cocaine, ADELGLASS wrote thousands of prescriptions for large quantities of oxycodone, and many he wrote to individuals whom ADELGLASS knew did not need the pills for a legitimate medical purpose.  When they occurred, ADELGLASS’s examinations were perfunctory.  The defendant’s purported patients included individuals addicted to opioids and, in some cases, who sold oxycodone on the street.  Even when faced with clear evidence of his purported patients’ drug abuse and diversion, ADELGLASS continued to prescribe large quantities of oxycodone to them.

Initially, ADELGLASS staffed the Clinic with inexperienced young women, some of whom he addicted to oxycodone.  In approximately October 2018, after serving as a primary source of patient referrals, Sansone took over as the Clinic’s office manager.  In that role, Sansone helped to control access to ADELGLASS and the lucrative prescriptions he wrote for medically unnecessary oxycodone.  With particularly vulnerable patients, the defendants solicited and, in some instances, received sex acts in exchange for oxycodone prescriptions.

Between in or about November 2017 and in or about September 2020, ADELGLASS prescribed more than 1.3 million oxycodone pills. 

On October 13, 2022, Sansone pled guilty to conspiracy to illegally distribute oxycodone.  Sansone is scheduled to be sentenced on February 13, 2023, before Judge Rakoff.

ADELGLASS, 67, of New York, New York, was convicted of conspiracy to illegally distribute oxycodone, which carries a maximum sentence of 20 years in prison. 

The maximum potential sentence in this case is prescribed by Congress and is provided here for informational purposes only, as any sentencing of the defendants will be determined by the judge.

Mr. Williams praised the outstanding investigative work of the Federal Bureau of Investigation, the New York City Police Department, and the Department of Health and Human Services, Office of the Inspector General.