Inwoodite

The Future of Inwoodite ...

... is on Twitter. At least for a while.

Apologies for the unannounced summer break extension. Other hobbies and projects, not to mention the paying job, are eating up more and more time these days. I've found Twitter to be pretty efficient for passing along neighborhood news, so I'm going to see how the micro-blogging thing works out.

I will still be posting here on the old blog from time to time, when 150 characters won't cut it, and Inwoodite posts will continue to show up on the Twitter feed.

Follow it here.

Linares Could Be Bumped Off Ballot

Liz Benjamin of The Daily Politics reports on an interesting development in the race to succeed Miguel Martinez in council District 10:

The Manhattan Board of Elections has recommended that Guillermo Linares, who is trying to win back his old Council seat after it was vacated by scandal-scarred Democrat Miguel Martinez, be bounced from the ballot.

A report issued by the Manhattan board found that two of Martinez's three-person committee on vacancies, which tapped Linares to take over Martinez's petitions, are not registered voters - a requirement under the Election Law.

Jerry Goldfeder, who, along with Leo Glickman, is representing Linares' opponent, Ydanis Rodriguez, said the board could not locate either Placido Rodriguez or Augusto Diaz on its voter rolls. The third member of the committee, Eve Marie Santana, is a registered Democrat.

The issue of Martinez's committee on vacancies membership was just one of multiple challenges lodged against the petitions filed by the former councilman in advance of his abrupt resignation and subsequent guilty plea to charges in connection with the Council slush fund scandal.

The 10 city Board of Elections commissioners are scheduled to vote on Linares' ballot status at a hearing tomorrow at 10 a.m.

Benjamin goes on to report that Ydanis Rodriguez plans to move forward with a State Supreme Court challenge of the Linares petition if Wednesday's decision goes Linares' way.

Fatal Hit-and-Run on Sherman [Updated]

The Times reports that an Inwood pedestrian was killed early Sunday:

In Inwood at 5 a.m. the police found a 65-year-old man with head injuries on Sherman Avenue at Arden Street. He was pronounced dead at the scene, according to the police. Witnesses said a black sedan fled north on Sherman after hitting the man, who was not immediately identified.

According to Transportation Alternatives' CrashStat, two other pedestrians have been killed on Sherman since 2001 -- one at the Thayer intersection; the other, in 2002, between Academy and W. 204. The latest death sees Sherman emerge as one of Inwood's most dangerous streets for pedestrians.

As of Sunday when the Times story went to press, no arrests had been made.

Update: The Daily News also covered, but nothing new aside from the pic.

Hate Is No Answer to Hate Mail

Never a dull moment around here, is there?

Just when the race to replace Miguel Martinez was shaping up as the issue of the day, Inwoodites learned that the FBI is investigating hate mail sent to local Hispanic business owners. According to reports from NY1 and WCBS, the letters, which restaurateurs in Inwood and Washington Heights have been receiving for about a year now, express such idiotic sentiments as "Stop wrecking my USA," "Speak English" and "We don't want you in our community."

Unfortunately, the reaction from Fernando Mateo of Hispanics Across America, who is quoted in both stories, probably won't help matters. While conjuring images of the racist letter writer(s) murdering local business owners and their patrons with machine guns, Mateo blamed the incidents on "people from downtown who can't afford their rents [and] now want to come to our community and tell us what we need to do and send hate letters like this."

Inwood is the first and only New York neighborhood I've lived in, and my s.o. and I fell for the place before we knew from cheap(er) rents, so technically Mateo isn't referring to me. But his message is pretty clear, and it threatens to drive a wedge between Upper Manhattan's Hispanic communities and the thousands of "people from downtown" (and down South, among other places) who were drawn here, at least in part, by the work of those entrepreneurs currently targeted by a small number of loons -- who, for all anyone knows as of now, might not be "newbies" at all.

I can't say it any better than Inwoodite Rose Fox, who issued this call to action early Thursday:

Summer Break

I hate to drop out at such an exciting time -- all right, so that's not altogether true -- but I have a long-awaited appointment at the far end of this walk.

Back in a few weeks.

Rodriguez Wastes No Time [Updated]

Hot off the presses. Spotted this morning on Broadway at 207.

Update: For those who haven't seen, here are the jaw-dropping details of the Martinez scandal, and news of another non-profit imbroglio involving the Martinez camp's chosen successor, former City Council Member Guillermo Linares.

Daily News: Martinez to Plead Guilty [Updated]

It turns out UCAN wasn't the only non-profit linked to a Martinez relative to receive city funds. Click through for the full article.

Manhattan City Councilman Miguel Martinez will plead guilty as early as Thursday to federal charges involving the misuse of taxpayer dollars through Council slush funds.

He will be the first Council member charged criminally in a year-old pork-barrel probe.

Sources familiar with the case said Martinez agreed to plead guilty to criminal charges related to the misuse of public funds by several nonprofit groups, including one where his sister was a board member.

Acting Manhattan U.S. Attorney Lev Dassin quietly filed a notice Tuesday indicating Martinez will plead guilty to unspecified charges. One of the groups involved in the case is a group Martinez has long favored with public funds - the Upper Manhattan Council Assisting Neighbors (U-CAN).

In the last two fiscal years, Martinez earmarked $786,000 in taxpayer dollars for U-CAN while his sister Maria served on its board.

The Daily News first reported the funding conflict in April 2008.

The pork included $380,000 he earmarked this budget year, but it was shelved after the city's Department of Investigation raided U-CAN in March. U-CAN hasn't filed tax forms in years. Its most up-do-date filing, for 2006, shows it receives 100% of its funding from government sources.

This year, Martinez also sponsored $53,000 in public funds for another nonprofit, ARC XVI Fort Washington Inc., which has employed his sister as a program aide.

Update: Manhattan Times and Crain's report that Guillermo Linares, who worked for the Bloomberg admin as city commissioner of immigrant affairs, has resigned to run for the now-vacant Martinez seat. Linares, who previously served on the Council in District 10, is expected to be named by the Martinez camp as a substitute candidate -- a development that at least one of his opponents, Ydanis Rodriguez, is already using to link Linares to the disgraced former councilman. (h/t @Carla Zanoni)

Miguel Martinez Resigns

From City Room:

In a terse one-sentence letter to city officials today, City Councilman Miguel Martinez submitted his letter of resignation, effective immediately. The resignation comes as federal prosecutors in Manhattan are preparing to file charges against him stemming from an investigation into a nonprofit group he funded in northern Manhattan, according to people familiar with the investigation. The charges are expected to be filed as early as this week.

The non-profit in question is Upper Manhattan Council Assisting Neighbors (UCAN), a group the Post says "no longer exists."

Manhattan Times, along with the Post, is reporting that the resignation is part of a deal to keep Martinez out of jail:

Martinez was considered the front-runner in a nine-person race for Council District 10, which roughly encompasses the east side of Washington Heights and Inwood as well as Marble Hill in the Bronx. His opponents include a formerly staunch ally, Manny Velazquez who chairs Community Board 12, and a long-time opponent, Ydanis Rodriguez, who lost races to Martinez in 2001 and 2003. Also on September's primary ballot is Ruben Dario Vargas, Martinez' lone Democratic challenger in 2005.

MT says it is unclear at this point what will become of the seat vacated by Martinez. Here's more on some of Martinez's would-be successors in District 10, including Rodriguez.

Related on Inwoodite:
• Martinez Directed Cash to Sister's NGO
• Martinez Fined for Campaign Violations
• Martinez Will Appeal Campaign Violation

Times Murder Map Paints a Grim Picture

Accompanying a July 2 story on the link, or not, between rainy weather and homicide rates, the Times put together another remarkable data map, this one depicting murder scenes across the five boroughs from 2003 through mid-2009.

By my count, Inwood, from Dyckman Street north, has 18 recorded homicides during this period (there were four more south of Dyckman to Hillside Avenue). Among those 18, the victims were overwhelmingly male (13) and Hispanic (14); the race or ethnicity of the perpetrators was often "not reported." A firearm was by far the most commonly used weapon.

It's important to keep in mind that, as far as murders go, Inwood is among the safest neighborhoods in the city. The 34th Precinct has one recorded homicide so far this year: Glendalis Pagan, 19, whose body was discovered last month in a vacant 204th Street apartment. The father of her child was charged in her death.

CB 12 EDC Tables Liquor License Applications

CB 12's Economic Development Committee took no action last night on two liquor license applications. Instead, according to a source, the committee tabled requests by Vida Mexicana and Vino Verso -- a wine bar planned for the basement of an apartment building on Henshaw Street. The committee reportedly lacked adequate input from the 34th Precinct to proceed, though members also said that the area, Dyckman west of Broadway, is already saturated with alcohol-serving establishments.

Reader Bradley Brookshire posted an extensive account of the meeting in the comments section of yesterday's post. Read it in full, along with commentary from another Inwoodite who attended, after the jump.