Last week, the Urban Resource Institute in partnership with the Mayor’s Alliance For NYC’s Animals launched People and Animals Living Safely, a new initiative in which a New York City shelter will welcome the pets of victims of domestic abuse.

…

The Oneida Nation and New York Sign a Historic Agreement

In less than a month of intense negotiations, decades of animosity and contentious lawsuits between the Oneida Indian Nation and the state of New York were brought to a close in a historic agreement that, if approved by the state legislature, will resolve all disputes between the two sovereigns over land rights, tax issues, gaming exclusivity and profits.

Ray Halbritter, Oneida Indian Nation Representative, and New York Governor Andrew Cuomo (pictured above) announced the monumental agreement that will recognize the Oneida Nation’s reservation, settle all outstanding litigation and resolve all disputes over property and sales taxes, including cigarette and fuel sales, at a press conference in Albany, the state capital, on May 16. The agreement also entails payments of tens of millions of dollars from the Oneida Nation, and concession of a gaming exclusivity zone by the state.

“This is indeed a defining moment in the history of the Oneida Nation and New York state,” Halbritter said. “Together today we begin a partnership in our shared prosperity in our upstate region. It’s not unlike the historical relationship the Oneida Nation had in the historical time of the Revolutionary War, when we were all under the Treaty of Canandaigua. We recognize together with the United States that peace and friendship shall be perpetual between our Nations and we’re here in that spirit today,” he said at the press conference.

“This is a fair and reasonable agreement that will benefit all parties involved and the people of the Oneida Nation, Oneida and Madison [Counties], and all New Yorkers,” Cuomo said. The agreement “ends years of expensive and disruptive court battles for all parties involved and marks a new era of collaboration and commonality between the Oneida Nation and the state of New York,” Cuomo said.

Read more.

nativeamericannews:

Cooperstown Changes Mascot from Redskins to Hawkeyes

Athletes in Cooperstown, New York will no longer be known as the Redskins. On April 23 the Cooperstown Board of Education unanimously voted on the new nickname—beginning July 1, athletes at Cooperstown Central School will be the Cooperstown Hawkeyes.

Read more.

wired:

transportationnation:

This just in: New York City’s bike share program is now accepting members. The first 5,000 will get a discount on helmets.

The total cost of yearly membership is $103.43 with tax, which puts it just under the cost of a monthly Metrocard.

Next month’s system launch will include 6000 bikes at 330 stations in Manhattan south of 59th street and in Dumbo, Downtown Brooklyn, Prospect Heights, Fort Greene, and Bedford-Stuyvesant.

(Above photos: city transportation commissioner Janette Sadik-Khan dons a sporty helmet and uses a key card to unlock a bike from its dock in Brooklyn.)

For more: http://ow.ly/k59Ba 

Woot, bikes for everyone!

Estee Lauder heir donates $1bn worth of cubist art to Metropolitan Museum of Arts

Peace tartan, inspired by the Dalai Lama, set to appear on the New York catwalk

The World Peace Tartan has been used by the Edinburgh designer Judy R Clark to create a couture outfit, for the Tartan Week showcase, From Scotland With Love.

The tartan will also be worn as a kilt in a catwalk appearance by spiritual leader and political campaigner Arun Gandhi – grandson of Mahatma Gandhi – at next week’s event.

The design is the creation of Victor Spence, co-ordinator of the Dalai Lama’s visit to Scotland last year.

He said: “The Tibetan tradition is to greet someone by placing a white silk scarf, or khata, around their neck. I had the idea that I wanted to welcome the Dalai Lama to Scotland by putting a tartan scarf around his neck.”

Mr Spence, who designed the pale blue tartan himself, will be licensing it for use by others and using the profits for a charity to help Scottish children living in poverty.

Designer Clark, who has worked with Alexander McQueen and designed outfits for chart-topping Scottish singer Emeli Sandé, said she had been inspired to create an outfit with the new tartan.

She said: “I was drawn to the name of the tartan and its striking design. I approached Victor Spence and asked if he would like to collaborate on a piece for the New York show.”

As well as representing the Dalai Lama, Mr Spence has co-ordinated several of Arun Gandhi’s visits to Scotland – which is how the India leader came to be involved.

Mr Gandhi said: “The World Peace Tartan is beautiful.

“Wearing this tartan will be a daily reminder to commit ourselves to working for peace in the world.”

Read more.

nbcnews:

Following Hurricane Sandy damage, Statue of Liberty to reopen on Fourth of July

(Photo: John Makely / NBC News)

The Statue of Liberty, closed since Hurricane Sandy battered the Northeast more than nine months ago, will reopen to the public on July 4, officials announced Tuesday.

Read the complete story.

shortformblog:

In what could be a huge step for NYC, current City Council speaker Christine Quinn has officially dropped her hat into the ring to become the potential successor to Michael Bloomberg. This is a big deal—if she wins, she would be both the first female mayor of the city, along with the first openly-gay NYC mayor. Here’s her introductory video.

mothernaturenetwork:

For marginalized urban recyclers, a nonprofit with a can-do attitude

Earlier today, I saw a man rummaging through one of my building’s designated recycling bins.

He was new, not one of the regulars that I frequently encounter collecting bottles and cans in my neighborhood: the ruddy-faced lady in the red gingham apron behind the handles of a rattling shopping card filled with an amber-colored heap of beer bottles; the older Chinese gentleman who quickly moves away from the recycling bins and paces up and down the sidewalk or darts across the street whenever I enter or exit my building. His behavior suggests that I’ve caught him in the act of doing something illicit, something shameful. I know that once I’m out of sight and the coast is clear, he’ll return to scavenging. One day, I hope to express to him that there’s no need to act shady as I’m fully aware that he, like the new man that I spotted outside of my building earlier today, is nothing more than a canner.

He’s welcome to take whatever he wants.

In New York City, the act of “canning” — collecting other people’s empty beverage cans and bottles and redeeming them for $0.05 a pop — serves as the livelihood for a large segment of the city’s homeless and low-income population. Some New Yorkers see trash-combing canners as a nuisance. And sometimes they are. But ultimately, they’re performing a good and perfectly legal deed — recycling — while simply trying to survive. Some turn to canning not only as a means of supporting themselves, but their families as well.

That said, canning can be physically demanding and emotionally demeaning work made even more difficult by a host of logistical challenges and other set-backs: foul weather, safety issues, underpayment, and hostility from non-canners.

Enter Sure We Can, a nonprofit that hopes to alleviate the difficulties and indignities experienced by canners through the operation of the city’s only licensed, homeless-friendly redemption facility. The principal goal of Sure We Can is “to sponsor and coordinate the development of mutually beneficial systems with the City of New York and local environmental organizations for the collection and redemption of containers, with the ultimate goal of making recycling a way of life while removing the unnecessary hardships faced by those wishing to participate.”As the organization’s website explains, “at its very core, Sure We Can is not just for canners. It is the canner community.”

Sure We Can was founded in 2007 (I’m just hearing about it now with a hat tip toInhabitat) by legendary former canner Eugene “the King of Cans” Gadsden, a voluntarily homeless nun from Spain named Sister Ana Martinez de Luco, and a handful of other concerned citizens looking to provide support to New York’s marginalized yet vital community of urban scavengers. Sure We Can’s 12,000-square-foot redemption center opened in the Bushwick section of Brooklyn a couple of years later after the organization was launched with the help of a $10,000 grant from the Conrad Hilton Foundation’s Fund for Catholic Sisters.

Before the Bushwick location, there had been other Sure We Can redemption centers in both Manhattan and Brooklyn but those locations proved to be only temporary. “This is our fifth location since 2008,” de Luco explains to the Brooklyn Rail in a 2011 article profiling the Bushwick redemption center. “The first was in Manhattan, in the East 30s. Our neighbors persecuted us.”

In a nutshell, Sure We Can strives to make the collection and redemption process more effortless and efficient, less demoralizing and difficult for New Yorkers who rely on canning as a steady source of income. At Sure We Can’s Brooklyn redemption center, an emphasis is placed on dignity as canners are offered a safe place to store and sort through their containers. They’ll also find clean bathrooms and communal areas to relax and congregate. Perhaps most importantly, the center offers full redemption value for recyclables — $0.05 for unsorted bottles and cans and six-and-a-half cents for sorted containers —while also promoting self-dependence and responsibility.

Describing herself as “a sister, a mother, a friend, and a companion to the homeless and nearly-homeless,” de Luco tells Brooklyn Rail:

Work is a very important part of our lives. If you have something to do when you get up in the morning it gives meaning to the day. Canning is not the type of work that makes you tired. It’s like treasure hunting. And it’s good for the environment. The three hundred or so canners who are part of Sure We Can bring in about 500,000 pieces a month. That’s 20 big truck loads of recyclables.

You can learn more, including how to donate or volunteer, about this unique grassroots organization over at the Sure We Can website. And on that note, Matthew O’Neill and Jon Alpert’s documentary about canning in New York City —  a film dubbed as “an unexpected and intimate look at post-industrial gleaners, struggling at the edge of our society” — has been nominated for an Academy Award in the Documentary Short category. The film’s title? “Redemption.”

Once-doomed, NY’s Grand Central turns 100 as celebrated landmark

It made its debut in the heyday of cross-country train travel, faced demolition in the era of the auto, and got a new lease on life with a facelift in its eighth decade.

Now Grand Central Terminal, the doyenne of American train stations, is celebrating its 100th birthday.

Opened on February 2, 1913, when trains were a luxurious means of traveling across America, the iconic New York landmark with its Beaux-Arts facade is an architectural gem, and still one of America’s greatest transportation hubs.

It is also the Big Apple’s second-most-popular tourist attraction, after Times Square.

“We are among the top 10 most-visited sites in the world,” boasted Dan Brucker, manager of Grand Central Tours at Metro-North Railroad, the commuter rail service that operates from Grand Central.

“Every day more than 750,000 people come through Grand Central Terminal - that is the entire population of Alaska that walks through here every day. It is the entire population of the state of North Dakota,” he noted.

Many are commuters who arrive on trains every 58 seconds at the peak of the morning rush, pouring onto the terminal’s dozens of platforms. Tourists gasp at the vaulted ceiling and sprawling 22,000-square-foot marble concourse, which has doubled as a film set for movies such as “The Fisher King” and “The Cotton Club.” And thousands from both groups eat and shop at any of the 103 restaurants and stores.

“There are a lot of beautiful old train stations in this country but none as big, and none as ornate, and none as elevated and well-known as Grand Central,” said Gabrielle Shubert, the director of New York Transit Museum.

The February 2 anniversary will mark the start of year-long celebrations commemorating the centennial with exhibitions, performances, promotions and public events.

Since its beginnings in 1913, when Grand Central was dubbed the greatest railway terminal in the world with an $80 million price tag, it has been an integral part of New York.

In its early heyday Grand Central was a center of culture, with an art gallery, theater and tennis court, as well as a commerce hub with travelers boarding trains like the Yankee Clipper and the 20th Century Limited for luxurious long-distance trips.

“As early as 1929 there were individually controlled air conditioning in the staterooms,” said Brucker, adding that chefs and hairdressers traveled with the well-heeled clientele.

But following World War Two, as government subsidies helped build airports and improve roads, the Golden Age of rail travel lost its luster, relegated to the status of dowdy old-timer as planes and autos took the forefront in travel, propelled by speed and lower prices.

During the ensuing decades Grand Central deteriorated, property prices in New York rose dramatically and plans were commissioned to demolish the terminal.

But a reprieve, spearheaded by former first lady Jacqueline Kennedy Onassis, led to its designation in 1976 as a National Historic Landmark, a decision upheld by the U.S. Supreme Court.

By 1991 long-distance trains had stopped serving Grand Central, and Metro-North Railroad, which had been created a decade earlier to consolidate operates four lines into the terminal, had become the country’s largest regional railroad.

A two-year restoration began in 1996 that returned the terminal to its former glory. Every detail, from the acorn motifs emblem of the Vanderbilt family who built it, to the marble walls and floors, and chandeliers, was meticulously replicated. More than $1 million was spent cleaning the black-stained ceiling.

“This place was redone perfectly to the way it looked in 1913,” according to Brucker.

But just as impressive as its public face are the secrets of the terminal: the underground tracks; unmapped cellar, which is the largest in New York; the secret station, hidden staircase and crosswalks in the massive east- and west-facing windows.

“It was the power source for all the buildings around. Underneath Grand Central is steam production and electric production that powered not just the building itself but all the buildings around it. That’s unique,” said the Transit Museum’s Shubert.

On Grand Central’s lower level, the famous domed whispering gallery transmits soft sound across the arc of the ceiling, enabling visitors to whisper to each other from diagonal corners.

“Here is this country we don’t have piazzas and plazas where people congregate,” Shubert said. “We have Grand Central. People seem to amass themselves in Grand Central to mourn, to celebrate, to get news when there is a crisis going on.

“This is the only indoor space where people gather to share many moments of humanity.”

nativeamericannews:

NYC Mayor Bloomberg Signs Law to Assist Minority and Women Owned Businesses

Monday Mayor Bloomberg signed into law Introduction 911-A, groundbreaking legislation to improve opportunities for Minority and Women-Owned Business Enterprises (M/WBE) in New York City.

The new law eliminates the $1 million cap on program eligible contracts set forth by Local Law 129 of 2005 and calls for increased city procurement contracts in areas of goods, professional services, construction, standard services, and architectural and engineering services.

According to the US Census Bureau there are some 13,700 Minority and Women-Owned Business Enterprises in New York state.

This is estimated to triple the total value of contracts from $433 million to a projected $2.2 billion. The legislation also calls for the establishment of a tracking system for contracts, tighter procedures to weed out noncompliant M/WBE firms, and more on-site visits for pre-certification while allowing cross-certification from other governmental agencies. An accountability program will be created with mandatory meetings for agency leaders to discuss their progress towards achieving M/BE goals and their efforts to increase participation, and capacity building throughout the M/WBE community will be encouraged through joint ventures.

City Council Speaker Christine Quinn and members of the New York City Council voted to pass Introduction 911-A on December 18 with 48 affirmative, 2 abstention, and 2 negative. Speaker Quinn was a champion of the legislation, which rose out of an unprecedented conference held by The New Agenda coalition and City & State newspaper last June. Never before had all of the mayoral candidates gathered together prior to the election to discuss issues relating to Minority and Women-Owned Business Enterprises and how they would be addressed by their administrations were they to be elected.

The Reverend Jacques Andre DeGraff, First Vice President of 100 Black Men and Co-Chair of The New Agenda, said,

“Local Law 911-A marks a bold step for the rights of Minority and Women-Owned Businesses. This far-reaching legislation will set the standard for increased opportunities for M/WBEs, not just in New York City but in the nation.”

“Today will be remembered throughout history in the M/WBE community,” said Sandra Wilkin, Co-Founder and President Emeritus of the Women Builders Council and Co-Chair of The New Agenda. “As a woman who owns a construction firm in New York, I am both proud and elated to say we have broken the concrete ceiling with this legislation.”

The New Agenda is a broad-based coalition of longstanding leadership organizations in the Minority and Women-Owned Business Enterprises community.

Charities in New York state have raised more than $400 million for Hurricane Sandy relief efforts, the state attorney general said.

A survey of 88 nonprofit groups by the office of Attorney General Eric Schneiderman found that as of mid-December, the fundraising for storm victims had been dominated by five charities, led by The American Red Cross at $188 million, the Robin Hood Foundation at $67 million and the Mayor’s Fund to Advance New York City at $45 million.

The Empire State Relief Fund raised another $15.4 million, and the Salvation Army’s eastern U.S. division raised $14.3 million.

Donors can go to the attorney general’s website to see how those organizations and 83 others say they intend to spend that money.

Schneiderman said regulators will be following up with the groups to get more information about the services they have provided.

“The generosity of the public and the hard work of charities in response to Hurricane Sandy is inspiring. As we continue to monitor charitable activities related to Sandy relief, it is essential that nonprofit organizations operate in the most transparent way possible,” Schneiderman said in a statement Thursday.

The list of groups that responded to the survey included small groups that recruit volunteers to gut damaged homes, food banks, and agencies that distribute medication.

The Stephen Siller Tunnel to Towers Foundation, named for a firefighter killed in the Sept. 11 attacks, said it had raised $4 million as of Dec. 5 and anticipated spending $2.5 million of that money on home supply store gift cards for people with damaged homes.

The American Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals, which had been involved in rescuing animals from flooded neighborhoods, and then boarding hundreds of displaced animals, said donors had given it $1.3 million by the end of November.

Red Cross officials told the attorney general that as of Dec. 10, the organization had distributed more than 8.7 million meals and snacks in the disaster zone, provided 81,000 shelter stays and distributed $30 million in relief supplies. The Red Cross said it anticipated that it would have spent $110 million on the storm response by the end of December.

Anonymous donor gives $500K to help repair Hurricane Sandy-damaged South Street Seaport Museum

New York City breaks tourism record for third straight year

Some 52 million visitors traveled to New York City in 2012 in a third straight record-breaking year for tourism, the mayor’s office and the city’s tourism organization said on Monday.

More than a million additional tourists visited to New York in 2012 than in 2011, a 2.1 percent increase, Mayor Michael Bloomberg’s office and NYC & Company, New York’s tourism and marketing organization, said in a news release.

New York received 41 million visitors from elsewhere in the United States, and 11 million traveled from a foreign country. The tourists spent $36.9 billion directly and generated an estimated economic impact of $55.3 billion.

The city set a goal of welcoming 55 million visitors by 2015, Bloomberg said on Monday in a news release. The old goal of attracting 50 million visitors by 2012 was surpassed a year early, according to Chris Heywood of NYC & Co, the city’s tourism and marketing organization.

New York has seen a record number of tourists each year since 2002 with the exception of 2009, Heywood said.

The record-breaking figures were announced on a day when more than 1 million revelers were expected to ring in the New Year by packing Times Square to watch the famous ball drop, according to cable television news station NY1.

The growing number of visitors to New York also reflected the current boom in tourism across the globe. A record 1 billion travelers visited a foreign country in 2012, according to the World Travel & Tourism Council.

New York ranks among the top five destinations in the world, along with Paris, London, the Turkish resort of Antalya, and Singapore, according to the United Nations World Tourism Organization.

One in three overseas travelers to the United States visited New York, another new record, Heywood said, citing U.S. Department of Commerce figures.

In 2011, the United States ranked first in international tourist receipts, with $116.3 billion spent by tourists that year, and second in international tourists with 62.3 million, according to UNWTO. France ranked first in international tourists with 79.5 million.

**TW: Islamophobia**

huffingtonpost:

Terry Jones Drowned Out In Times Square By New York City Crowd Singing ‘All You Need Is Love’

The video, filmed on Sept. 10, 2011, but only recently published, begins predictably: Jones standing in the square, advocating intolerance and hate. Several passersby attempt to argue with him to no avail. Soon a man begins reading out loud, then singing, “All You Need Is Love,” the iconic classic by The Beatles.