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Bank Robbery Epidemic in Prospect Heights


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A bank robbed on Washington Avenue is at least the 4th such robbery for the year, according to Prospect Heights Patch.

The robber, who was wearing sunglasses, a black hat and a grey overcoat, entered the Capital One Bank on Washington Avenue (between Eastern Parkway and Lincoln Place) around 4:30 pm Friday and left with cash, and yet, never actually a weapon or even pretended to have one; instead, he passed a note to the teller and got what he was looking for. According to witnesses, the suspect was black, about 6 feet, 1 inches and 210 pounds.

Patch listed three other bank robberies near Eastern Parkway in the past year:

June 23: Apple Bank (corner of Eastern Parkway and Albany Avenue); cash amount: unspecified.
June 7: Banco Popular (Eastern Parkway at Nostrand avenue); man apprehended after “quick cash grab”.
February: Chase Bank (Eastern Parkway and Bedford Avenue); a 30-year old man was arrested.

Get Your Rat-Proof Garbage Can, For Free

Source: Atlantic Yards Watch

If you live or own a business in Prospect Heights, you are eligible for a free rat-proof trash can, as long as you are willing to pick it up from the office of Council Member Letitia James, 67 Hanson Place (9:30 am – 5:30 pm – call first at 718-260-9191 to make sure they still have one for you).

These Department of Health approved cans are brought to you by James and Forest City Ratner. The first time they were offered was back in June, in response to complaints of a “rat tsunami” around Atlantic Yards construction zone, and one resident contending that they could look out their window and see trash cans overflowing with rats (a la that Indiana Jones flick).

Olde Brooklyn Bagel Shoppe Can’t Seem to Get Orders Right


Source: Business Insider

In a neighborhood dominated by Bergen Bagel, there were high hopes for Olde Brooklyn Bagel Shoppe, which was opened across the street from Zaytoons by Zaytoons partners Ahmad Samhan and Faried Assad.

While most agree that the bagels and gourmet deli items, organic salads, and pastries and sandwiches are tasty, the Shoppe seems to have a bit of a customer service problem, including complaints about long lines, inefficient staff, and, in a number of cases, it seems that they just can’t get the orders correct.

“I was so happy when Olde Brooklyn opened because I figured I would no longer have to walk to Bergen Bagels,” Jack Krohn wrote on Brooklynian. “After several months of giving Olde Brooklyn a try, I’ve returned to Bergen, despite the walk from my home.”

Why? Olde Brooklyn just can’t seem to do anything efficiently, according to Jack. Despite a simple order–bagel and cream cheese–it takes as long as 15 minutes to wait for the staff to complete the order. Compare and contrast that to the hyper-efficient Bergen Bagel, where staff dart about like parts in a well oiled machine. What’s more, Bergen rarely makes mistakes. In another post, user Smokin’ Joe says he’s a regular, but deals with an “annoying” wait and on a mildly complicated order (like, egg sandwich instead of just a bagel and cream cheese) “they’ve gotten it wrong a couple of times … i’m not sure where the flaw in their system is, but they should study terrace or bergen.”

Sure enough, multiple reviews on Yelp criticize the Bagel Shoppe for botched orders: “One-third of the time they will get your order wrong,” says one reviewer. “That is not really an exaggeration … However I am confident that these guys will pull it together and their food is good enough.”

Bottom line, by Champika F.: Walk a couple of blocks and go to Bergen Bagels instead: “I think this place is way overhyped … the service i’ve experienced is insanely bad. They’re nice but my orders have always been wrong. On one visit I asked for a whole wheat bagel toasted with scallion cream cheese. I even confirmed with him while he was preparing it – ‘scallion right?’ ..’Yes, scallion’. What I got – whole wheat, un toasted with vegetable spread.”

546 Grand Ave. Restaurant to Reopen


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Reports on Brownstoner suggest that the space formerly occupied by the unpretentiously named 564 Grand Ave. Restaurant in Crown Heights (pictured here in its hole-in-the-wall heyday) will be reoccupied by a potentially snazzier, more upscale restaurant that’s still focused on Spanish-American Food. So goes the neighborhood. Folks say the old 564 was dumpy but nevertheless a great place to grab a tasty meal and a refreshing Corona or two.

Starlite Lounge May Reopen; Gets its Own Documentary


Willie Rowe, Former Starlite Lounge employee (Source, NY Daily News)

The legendary Starlite Lounge, which opened in 1959 on Nostrand Ave. in Crown Heights, was the first black-owned gay bar in Brooklyn. It has been closed since July 2010. But now, it may be revived with the help of two documentary filmmakers.

The filmmakers, Sasha Wortzel and Kate Kunath, set out to make a short film about the fight between the bar’s owner and the building’s new owner, who threatened to kick out the bar. However, it quickly grew into months’ worth of footage and plans for a full-length feature film that should be done sometime in 2012.

Instead, they got so wrapped up that they ended up shooting months of footage they’re now working on turning into a feature-length film, expected to be completed some time next year.

“Because there are so few places for this community to go, when Starlite was open, they came from all over,” Kunath told the NY Daily News. “It went from being a neighborhood bar in the 50s and early 60s into being really an institution in the gay black community … There’s a whole culture and community that has been displaced.”

While it’s unclear if and when the Starlite may reopen, there was a very successful reunion party earlier in December that had a turnout in the hundreds. You can also support the owners by pledging money to support the reopening of Starlite via IndieGoGo. In the meantime, the former Starlite just houses another cell phone store, sadly.

Read more on NY Daily News.

Man Who (Allegedly) Torched Prospect Heights Woman in Custody

Jerome Isaac

This is Jerome Isaac, 47, the guy who allegedly set ablaze an elderly Prospect Heights woman in an elevator earlier this week, and later presented himself at the police station, reeking of gasoline. He is being charged with the first-degree murder of Delores Gillespie, 73. She hired him to do handyman work but let him go because he was stealing, according to her nephew.

Apparently, Isaac cornered Gillespie in the elevator at 203 Underhill Avenue yesterday, sprayed her with some flammable substance, and set her on fire with a bottle gas-bomb, which killed her, as reported in the New York Post, Daily News, and elsewhere. The police said he also left a note on the elderly woman’s door with a list of jobs he had done that he needed to be paid for.

This is a sad loss for Prospect Heights, as neighbors universally described her as kind, generous, and wonderful, looking out for neighbors and the community. She had just returned home from shopping

Read more in the New York Post.

Here’s a ghastly pic of the deadly sequence of events, courtesy of NYPD and posted on metro.us:

Jerome Isaac allegedly murdering Delores Gillespie

“When I left Saturday afternoon, 203 Underhill Ave. was my home,” wrote Lauren Johnston in the NY Daily News. “Now it is a murder scene. My neighbor Delores was horrifically burned alive in an elevator just a few feet from my apartment door. My hallway was beige. Now it is a charred black shell covered in thick, soppy soot, and shattered glass.”

Brooklyn Rental Prices Increase in 2011

It’s no secret that the housing market is in the dumps and many Americans have been forced out of their homes and into rentals. Just like anything else in a free market, when demand increases so does price. Brooklyn New York has been no exception. Below is a series of graphs illustrating the price increase of studio, one and two bedroom rentals over the last 13 months.

With the price of living increasing for everyone renting an apartment, home or condo, it’s more important than ever to protect your valuables from a catastrophe. Rental insurance will reimburse you for the cost of your possessions up to your coverage limit. That means if you purchase a $20,000 policy your possessions will be covered up to that amount. The first step is to take an inventory of the contents of your home to determine how much coverage you will need.

Depending on your policy type and the area you live in, rental insurance will cover you in the event of fire, theft, water damage and natural disasters. Imagine your neighbor next door left their stove on overnight and the apartment building caught on fire. Would you be able to replace all of your possessions out of pocket? For most of us, the answer is no. Protecting yourself from the unknown can be incredibly inexpensive. The average cost of rental insurance is $15 a month. Sleep easy at night knowing everything you own can easily be replaced with a rental insurance policy. Get free rental insurance quotes from agents in your area.

*Image by MNS Impact Real Estate

Crown Heights Real Estate: How'd You Like This Fixer-Upper for $500,000?

Get ready to bid on this Crown Heights landmark, located at 838 Prospect Place (photo: Daily News):

It’s scheduled to be up for auction on Oct. 20, starting st $500,000. But before you get too excited, consider that the building has been empty and rotting since about 2008, so you’ll likely need to do a full gut renovation while you fend off the raccoons infesting the back yard. Apparently the city purchased it and planned to make it an assisted-living facility group home, but they had trouble reconciling some design requirements (such as new fire escapes) with historic preservation codes covering the property.

Read more:

Sopranos Writer Buys St. Marks Condo for $2 Million

What recession? Via Curbed: “… screenwriter Todd A. Kessler, a former Sopranos scribe … appears to be the buyer of a 4BR, 3BA condo at 162 St. Marks Avenue in Prospect Heights.”

“… The apartment, in a 22′-wide brownstone that turned condo in 2007, was asking only $1.679 million when it hit the market at the end of September. Kessler just paid for the apartment: $2,005,000, or 19.4 percent over the asking price.

Read more: http://ny.curbed.com/archives/2011/02/01/screenwriter_pays_2_million_for_prospect_heights_condo.php

Apple Store coming to Prospect Heights?

Apple, originally uploaded by Ronaldo F Cabuhat.

More Ratner Retail updates! According to the New York Observer:

“…the tech behemoth is now setting its sights on a location near the proposed Atlantic Yards arena in Brooklyn, future home to the Nets basketball team …. (the) company has been informally chatting with potential landlords, including Atlantic Yards developer Forest City Ratner, about leasing options in the area …”

” ‘They’ve been very gun shy, the Apple people,’ said the source … it’s the only place in Brooklyn that’s super visible, close to trains and about as close as you can get to a 24-hour community in the borough.”

Read more: iRatner! Apple Digging Atlantic Yards

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