By ALAIN GAILLARD
The soup kitchen starts serving food at 10:30 every morning. A few soup kitchen guests begin gathering outside the main entrance of St. John’s Bread and Life in Bedford-Stuyvesant, Brooklyn, a half-hour before the doors open.
After the doors open, the seats around the tables in the cafeteria start filling with guests who wait for their hot food in an atmosphere of familiarity. Everyone is engaged in a conversation; everyone seems to know one another.
One impact of gentrification in Bedford-Stuyvesant is that rising rent has caused more residents to turn to St. John’s Bread and Life for food, said Anthony Butler, the soup kitchen’s executive director.
The number of participants asking for hot meals has increased by about 5.5 percent over the last year, Butler said, while the number of participants in the food pantry and the grocery section has increased by 11 percent. “Folks are spending more and more money on rent and making choices between rent and food, so they are using our service because they don’t have enough money to make ends meet,” he said. “The cost of living, particularly housing, really squeezes everything, especially with the gentrification going on in Bed-Stuy.”
With a current population of 153,000, Bedford-Stuyvesant was named for Peter Stuyvesant, the last Dutch director of the colony of New Netherland before it was renamed New York. Before the gentrification process began in the early 2000s, the neighborhood was mostly inhabited by African-American and Caribbean immigrants, groups that moved in from Harlem in the early 1930s.
According to census data, the number of white residents increased from 2.4 percent in 2000 to 15 percent in 2010. Housing prices are also rising: for example, a tenant is paying $3,550 for three bedrooms in Bedford-Stuyvesant compared with $2,850 for three bedrooms in Flatbush.
Kenneth Gould, professor of sociology and earth and environmental sciences at the CUNY Graduate Center, explained that the first big gentrification push in Brooklyn was so-called bridge and tunnel gentrification. “This happened in places such as Williamsburg, which had good transportation access to points of employment or more affluent neighborhoods, but were not valued as much as those neighborhoods,” said Gould, who is also director of the Urban Sustainability Program at Brooklyn College. “From Williamsburg, people could access Manhattan faster than other neighborhoods.”
Sharon Zukin, professor of sociology at Brooklyn College and at the CUNY Graduate Center, has conducted studies on the type of restaurants that do business in Bedford-Stuyvesant. She suggested that the neighborhood’s cultural diversity is seen in the offering of restaurants and the changes in the retail corridor of Fulton Street, which is one of the main streets.
Zukin explained that Bedford-Stuyvesant residents are very proud of their neighborhood, which is why low-income residents want to stay there despite rising costs. “The suffering of people who stay in Bed-Stuy is mitigated by their pride that the neighborhood is coming up,” she said. “Some benefits have been brought by gentrification, but these benefits may be outweighed by the economic cost, the psychological cost, and the feeling that their neighborhood is not theirs anymore”
This is an opinion shared by Gould: “Sometimes, homeowners can stay longer and enjoy some of the amenities, too. Although, they have their amenities at the cost of losing their neighborhood, and they start to feel like more of an alien in their own neighborhood,” he said. “This is where I live but I don’t feel like I belong to the neighborhood anymore. This restaurant isn’t for me, this supermarket isn’t for me, the culture of the street isn’t for me.”
Gould said Bedford-Stuyvesant is a popular place “because of its attractive housing stock so that the white affluent population could identify with the neighborhood as a place they wanted to move into. The other thing is that this is a low crime neighborhood,” he said.
To resist gentrification, Gould suggested that communities be more organized. “Well-organized communities with pre-existing social institutions like Uprose in Sunset Park, for example, are able to intervene in the public process and stop the rezoning,” he said. “They are able to modify and fight proposals. A community that is not organized, cannot anticipate and is totally vulnerable.”
Gould also suggested that more public policy intervention should be implemented to retain affordable housing. “We need rent control, stabilized rates. We need more affordable housing built, we need affordable housing maintained, we need more public housing, and we need the minimum wage raised well beyond $15 to meet to average rent in the city,” he said.
One sign of poverty is households in which families are spending half of their income toward housing. The result is that many families rely on the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program, or SNAP, formerly known as food stamps, to eat. SNAP provides food assistance for nearly 1.8 million low-income New Yorkers.
Anthony Butler
Butler thinks the expansion of programs such as SNAP can be important to tackle poverty. “If they increase the SNAP benefits, they could really reduce the demand in places like this [St. John’s Bread and Life],” he said. “If they increase the SNAP benefits we could get to a point where only the folks who are using places like this would be very disorganized; the kind of classic folks like the homeless, folks with significant mental health problems, significant substance abuse problems. SNAP does work.”
However, a SNAP expansion is not at hand. President Trump’s budget proposal is asking for big cuts in almost everything. According to Butler, the president’s proposal, if passed, will not have a big impact on St. John’s Bread and Life activities because the organization is 90 percent privately funded and receives very little federal money.
The main concern for Butler is the reduction of the money available for food stamps. Unless the hunger problem is really addressed, he sees a bleak future with more large organizations like St. John’s Bread and Life. “The problem is we still don’t have a minimum living wage in this country,” he said. “The minimum needed to live on is creeping up, which is why so many people working for Walmart are on food stamps. A great number of fast food workers are also on food stamps.”
Video: Alain Gaillard reports for Brooklyn News Service on how rising rents in Bedford-Stuyvesant have led more people to soup kitchens.
Editor’s note: This story first appeared at Bklyner.com in collaboration with Brooklyn News Service.
By LISA FLAUGH
A former teacher at a Ditmas Park elementary school was found not guilty on all charges in Brooklyn Supreme Court on Friday after being accused of forcibly touching five girls.
Omil Carrasquillo, 38, waited solemnly to hear the jury’s verdict as his family, present for every court date he’d had, sat together on one bench in the courtroom. As the jury foreperson continued to respond “not guilty” to each charge as it was called out, Carrasquillo began to weep, holding a tissue up to his face and trying to remain silent. His relatives whispered to each other. “Oh my God,” one said as she leaned on another, and began to cry as well.
After Justice Debora Dowling dismissed the jury and told Carrasquillo he was free to leave, the family gathered outside the courtroom and Carrasquillo proclaimed through his tears, “This is justice! This is justice!” The family came together for a group hug, crying. They eventually looked up and found defense attorney Anthony LaPinta and someone said, “get in here,” and invited him in for the hug as well.
By PAUL FRANGIPANE
A Brooklyn judge revoked the bail Thursday of a suspect arrested in a shooting last July on Avenue X in Sheepshead Bay because of concerns about a Facebook post.
Joseph Ackwood, 20, had been released on $25,000 bail following his August arrest in the shooting of a 16-year- old boy on Avenue X near Brown Street on July 25.
He walked into Brooklyn Supreme Court in plainclothes on Thursday and left in handcuffs after Assistant District Attorney Sasha Pemberton brought to the court’s attention a Facebook post of two rat emojis. They appeared on the page of a man the judge said was a potential witness.
“The court considers this a serious threat!” Justice John G. Ingram said as he revoked the earlier bail. “This is a lockdown situation.”
A choked-up Ackwood mumbled something before court officers escorted him out of the courtroom.
“I don’t want to hear from you!” Ingram responded.
Ackwood’s attorney, Paul Beyder, requested a formal hearing on the evidence regarding the Facebook post, saying there were no clear answers from the post itself.
Beyder then dropped out of the case and the court brought in attorney Howard Kirsch to represent Ackwood for the future. When asked for comment, Beyder refused to give a reason for leaving the case.
Ackwood is charged with assault, menacing, reckless endangerment and gun possession.
Police used surveillance footage and a photo of Ackwood to link him to the crime. Authorities say the footage shows Ackwood walking down the sidewalk with a gun in hand and then fleeing on a bicycle.
The victim, who has not been named, was hit once in his left leg and once in his right buttock. He was treated and released at Lutheran Medical Center.
There is to be a hearing for Ackwood next week. The date was not scheduled.
This story first appeared at Bklyner.com in collaboration with Brooklyn News Service.
Photo: Still shot from surveillance video, Bklyner.com.
By LISA FLAUGH
Filling almost two rows of seats in the courtroom, the family of young stabbing victims Prince Joshua (P.J.) Avitto, 6 and Mikayla Capers, 7, waited patiently Friday morning for progress to be made and justice to be served for their children.
Daniel St. Hubert, 29, is accused of fatally stabbing and killing P.J., and brutally slashing Mikayla in an elevator in East New York in 2014 and faces up to life in prison if convicted.
“I’d like to make a decision today,” St. Hubert told Acting State Supreme Court Justice Neil Firetog at a hearing in Brooklyn.
“No we do not want that today,” St. Hubert’s attorney, Edward Friedman, interjected. The case was adjourned until March 24 after he asked for a postponement.
St. Hubert was originally found mentally unfit to go on trial in October 2015, but the ruling was overturned and he is now considered fit. He allegedly attacked the two children in an elevator in the Boulevard Houses in East New York in 2014.
“It’s mentally draining, it’s physically draining, and it’s very disappointing. Every time it’s the same thing. A new court date. Now, this time, it’s March,” said Regenia Trevathan, 65, Mikayla’s great-grandmother. “It’s been two years, eight months and 16 days counting down to the day. It’s an emotional rollercoaster. He has been found fit, twice, by the New York State Psychiatric Facilities. Then today we were hoping for a court date. … How long does it have to go on? We just want this chapter to move on.”
“They were best friends,” Erika McClinton, 45, said of the two children. McClinton is P.J.’s mother.
St. Hubert has been diagnosed as a paranoid schizophrenic and has served five years in prison for the attempted murder of his mother. He has a tangled history of violent crimes and has been institutionalized in a mental health facility for his crimes.
Photo: NYPD sketch used in search for Daniel St. Hubert.
Vira Jones owns a construction and design firm.
The three rooms of the future Bedford-Stuyvesant Museum of African Art were filled with ancient and modern figures, statuettes, and headdresses, all waiting to be seen and savored by the public. The executive director of the museum, Vira Jones, is also the owner of A.J. Archer Construction and Management, which is to develop and construct the space for African art.
In an interview with Brooklyn News Service reporter Aleah Winter, Jones discusses how arts and culture can contribute to economic development. “I want to create the Lincoln Center of Bed-Stuy,” she says.
With her current project, Jones is bringing her two worlds together and hopes to create the museum attached to luxury apartments. While people have suggested that Jones take her project to downtown Brooklyn, she insists on staying in Bedford-Stuyvesant.
By BRENNEN JOHNSON
As State Sen. Martin Malave Dilan walked along Elderts Lane in Brooklyn’s Cypress Hills section, local people raised their right fists in appreciation for him.
Dilan, a Democrat heading toward a third term in the Senate, stopped by local Hispanic businesses, handed out political tracts, shook hands and posed for pictures with residents. For over a decade, the Brooklyn College alumnus has represented a district that covers some of the city’s most violent neighborhoods, including Bushwick, East New York, City-Line, Bedford-Stuyvesant and Brownsville.
Dilan easily defeated challenger Debbie Medina in the Democratic primary, and no longer needs to campaign: he has no opponent in the Nov. 8 general election.
Nonetheless, he is out in the streets, talking up his concern for rising rents, crime and education.
Ongoing problems with crime – which is down sharply over the past decade – remain a priority.
He wants to reduce the number of shootings and crimes related to gun violence. In January 2013, Dilan voted for the NY Safe Act, the most comprehensive gun control law in the country. The bill mandated universal background checks on buyers and stated the authorization of the transfer of firearms can only be done through a licensed firearms dealer. The gun reform bill banned the possession or manufacturing of assault weapons.
Education is also a priority for Dilan, who served 14 years on the local Community School Board 32, including seven years as chairman.
“As Senate leader of this district, I vow to continue building the economic and academic infrastructures of the communities I serve so minorities can have access to the affordable housing market and their children can receive a quality education,” Dilan said.
Yanet Ramirez, 37, a small business owner and mother, embraced Dilan as he approached her outside of her La Estrella Dominican beauty salon. Dilan played a pivotal part in bringing funding to P.S. 89, the school her 8-year-old son, Manuel, now attends, she said. Ramirez spoke about how additional funding helped P.S. 89’s efforts to offer instruction with digital media. “The schools in this neighborhood only had a few outdated computers and suffered from a severe lack of funding,” Ramirez said. “Everybody kept complaining about our district being under resourced at Community Board meetings.”
Ramirez recalled the atmosphere she encountered when she first saw Dilan speaking at a meeting after she dropped Manuel, who was 2 years old at the time, off to the babysitter in time to hear the news.
“Dilan’s voice was drowned out by massive cheers as he announced we had just received funds to make the necessary changes the city promised for years but failed to deliver,” Ramirez said.
Dilan has represented the Northern Brooklyn district for three years and is at the end of his second term in the New York State Senate. He has continued to receive favorable support from minorities who’ve watched gentrification change the ethnic make up of their neighborhood.
Thomas Robinson, 38, a Jamaican barber who emigrated to New York nearly two decades ago, works in Dominican Cut. He said he has watched demographic changes take place as immigrants from Eastern Europe and the Middle East have opened shops in Cypress Hills.
“There are so many new small businesses in the health care industries and ties to international trade services in this area now,” Robinson said.
The district’s mix of Hispanic and African American/Caribbean communities have transformed into a culturally diverse population that includes Russian Jews and Bangladeshis.
In line with his constituents’ concern that gentrification will lead to higher rents, Dilan’s Facebook page informs residents of their tenant rights, provides links to laws that help with housing disputes, and gives pertinent information on ways to seek affordable housing. He remains focused on matters related to environmental causes and the preservation and beautification of parks, such as the Greenpoint Eco Fest and Sanitation Department removal of garbage from vacant lots. He wrote a law that fined violators for illegal dumping. https://m.facebook.com/MMDilan?ref=page_internal
Dilan has advocated for tenant rights, sponsoring legislation that protected loft tenants and mandating housing standards to improve fire safety, prevention, and maintenance.
Records show Dilan received 629 donations which total $68,245, especially from donors in the law, unions, business and real estate.
Raul Santiago, 33, a single father of a newborn girl, lived in an apartment that had no heat or hot water, leaky holes in the ceilings, and a busted pipe under his kitchen sink, until he was told how to exercise his tenant rights at Dilan’s district office. Office staff told him to call the city Department of Housing Preservation and Development, where he received assistance.
“The Section 8 worker I met with helped me file a complaint against the landlord. After a few months, HPD fixed up my apartment and cut off rent payments to his account,” Santiago said.
Photo: State Sen. Martin Malave Dilan at the podium. He faces no opposition in this year’s general election.
By MARK SULEYMANOV
Brooklyn commuters can use Uber’s uberPOOL service to get around the borough for less than $8 per ride for the rest of the year, the company has announced.
UberPOOL, which allows commuters to share their rides with other passengers for a smaller fare, is priced to be cheaper than most yellow cab rides.
Trips must begin and end within eight miles in Brooklyn to be eligible for the promotion. As Uber’s announcement outlined, many common trips in Brooklyn – such as going from Greenpoint to Red Hook ($7.95), Cobble Hill to Fort Greene ($7) or Bushwick to Bedford-Stuyvesant ($6) – will set riders back less than $8.
“A lot of people who are out there have a greater need for some form of an affordable transit,” said Uber’s chief spokesman in the northeast, Matthew Wing. “Especially if they’re in an area which is really far from a subway station or which isn’t connected to a good bus line. We think it’s a good alternative to help connect you to that mass transit network.”
A standard New York City cab fare starts with a $2.50 flat rate and increases based on distance traveled. According to the Taxi Fare Finder service, trips from Greenpoint to Red Hook ($30.25), Cobble Hill to Fort Greene ($14.48) or Bushwick to Bedford-Stuyvesant ($12.44) – cost more but don’t require customers to share their ride.
Uber continues its expansion as standard taxis try to expand their services to include similar options of sharing rides. Smartphone apps such as Arro, and the Brooklyn-based Bandwagon, are experimenting with customers sharing riders for smaller fares in yellow cabs – something they expect to fully implement by the end of 2016, according to The Verge.
However, Matthew Daus, former commissioner of the Taxi and Limousine Commission, told Slate last year that TLC’s attempt at shared rides in 2009 during rush hour did not work and is not a feasible method of providing cheaper fares.
“I knew right away that the stands that were being set up in well-trafficked areas were not going to work,” he said. “It’s a chicken-and-egg thing. New Yorkers want to go somewhere real quick, they don’t want to wait two seconds for another passenger, and the cab drivers don’t want to wait—time is money.”
Wing noted that most Uber trips – especially outside Manhattan – begin one-eighth of a mile from a subway station. So for the rest of the year, commuters who rely on busy subway lines in Brooklyn like the L and the G, will have an alternative to the subway.
The L Train serves 300,000 customers a day, according to MTA data. As of 2015, the G train served approximately 150,000 customers each weekday. However, both lines were damaged by Hurricane Sandy in 2012 and are in a constant state of repair.
“Ideally, Uber can be a complement to mass transit and not a competitor,” Wing said.
Over the summer, Uber offered commuters in Manhattan, for a limited time, a Commute Card that permitted unlimited rides using uberPOOL during commuting hours (Monday-Friday, 7 a.m. to 10 a.m. and 5 p.m. to 8 p.m.). Among the four price tiers, a four-week pass came ($79) came out cheaper than a monthly unlimited MetroCard ($116.50).
The expansion raised the question of whether Uber was trying to undercut the MTA.
“It’s a good thing that the market is responding,” Paul Steely White of the advocacy group Transportation Alternatives said to The Gothamist, adding that the subway’s constant issues with repairs have frustrated consumers. “But the city has a role to play in keeping this from becoming a free-for-all on our streets”
However, Uber maintains it does not compete with the MTA and that this has not changed.”
“The comparison of the number of people that use Uber compared to the Subway …it’s like an apple that shrunk in `Honey, I Shrunk the Kids’and an orange the size of the Empire State Building,” Wing said. “We’re not even in the same ballpark. They move millions of New Yorkers every day, we move tens of thousands, [sometimes] a little over 100,000 people every day.”
After selling out of Commute Cards in Manhattan, Uber’s focus was to expand uberPOOL in other boroughs with Brooklyn at the top of the list. Uber ran a test of uberPOOL in Brooklyn over Labor Day weekend last month, allowing riders to use the service for just $5 anywhere in the borough.
“We want to expand our availability and affordability of uberPOOL,” Wing said. “And then have a quicker, easier, painless, and affordable commute.”
Photo: Uber.com.
Richard Anderson reports on how the planned shutdown of the L train for lengthy repair work will hit residents of Canarsie, where the line starts. Coverage has often focused on Brooklyn neighborhoods much closer to Manhattan, especially Williamsburg. But Canarsie residents, who face the longest commutes, would be hit the hardest.
By SOPHIE DWECK
On the outside, Brooklyn’s James Madison High School looked empty and quiet—after all it was a Saturday night. Who would be going to a school at that time?
But on the inside, it was quite the opposite. The energy was high and the place was bustling. You could feel it, the excitement in the air. The chattering echoed around and against the marble lobby floor. There were warm embraces and all sorts of flowers and gifts. Students, glammed up and adorned in different colored costumes, rushed around to get where they needed to be.
In the distant background, the diffused sounds of an orchestra played. The drums thumped and set the beat, and the string instruments whined, all while the woodwinds released their jazzy, sultry timbres around the building.
It was the start of another SING!—a popular performance competition that has thrilled high school students for some seven decades. But this time spectators saw New York City Schools Chancellor Carmen Fariña at center stage in the Sonia Lerner Auditorium.
That’s because SING! is catching on: She was there to promote the expansion of the student musical program to an additional 10 high schools, making it 20 all together throughout the city.
“There’s joy in the building, which what all schools should have,” the schools chancellor said, while the words “BROOKLYN SINGS!” were projected above her head. She said the judges were principals who would have the competition in their schools the following year.
Created in 1947, SING! was conceived by music teacher Bella Tillis of Midwood High School, Madison’s rival. The traditional musical competition between various grades allows students to showcase their creativity by writing a script with original lyrics put to popular tunes—and then to perform it and do behind-the-scenes work like lighting, set and costume design. Singer-songwriter Carole King, a Madison alumna, noted in her autobiography “A Natural Woman: A Memoir” that she volunteered musically in the annual SING!
Starting in 2014, the three main high schools in the Midwood area of Brooklyn—James Madison High School, Midwood High School, and Edward R. Murrow High School—expanded the concept through an inter-school performance competition called InterSING!
The expansion began thanks to country and pop music megastar Taylor Swift. While promoting her fifth album, “1989,” she announced on ABC’s The View that she’d be donating all the proceeds from her hit track “Welcome to New York” to the arts program in New York City public schools.
“The fans were wonderful enough to make it number one on iTunes,” Swift said. “It’s selling really, really well, which is good because I’m donating all of my proceeds to New York City public schools.”
Subsequently, Fariña chose to allocate Swift’s $50,000 in donations toward the expansion of the SING! program. All together, $122,000 in contributions has been donated to the program for the 2015-2016 school year, according to a city Department of Education press release.
“It’s so much more than what [the students] are doing for the production and what they’re doing when they’re in high school,” said Murrow’s SING! coordinator, Bonnie Shapiro. “They learn so much from it that they take it with them in other aspects of their life.”
The students learn leadership skills by working with their peers. Sometimes, friendships need to be set aside for the good of the show, helping students to understand professional relationships and responsibility.
“It’s important because sometimes this is where they realize what skills they have, what talents they have, what their interests are,” Shapiro said. “Whereas they didn’t know that before just from their academic classes alone. This gives them an opportunity to open up to other experiences.”
Shapiro, who has been teaching Italian and Spanish for almost 17 years, participated in SING! when she was a student at Midwood, which led to her role as a coordinator. “I oversee the production,” she said. “It’s more administrative. It’s not on the creative end.”
Just as the show was about to start, Fariña exited the stage, remarking, “Hopefully no one will break a leg, but break a leg.”
The lights suddenly went out and then abruptly shined on the student orchestra—the Freshman-Seniors, (also known as Senior-Fresh), of Murrow were up first.
Immediately the 60-student orchestra started its own version of Sugar Hill Gang’s “Rapper’s Delight.” Everybody already knew it was going to be a good night ahead.
The plot was a modern-day twist on classic ’80s flicks “Fame” and “Footloose.” The students of Senior-Fresh Prep High School, a school dedicated to the arts, were revolting against their new, evil principal who was trying to get rid of the program. The students find out that the principal actually works for another arts school and expose him.
Next up was Madison’s Freshmen-Juniors team. They spun a tale of two materialistic teenage girls who join their grandparents at alumni night at Madison High School, but end up taking a faulty elevator and going back in time. After getting lost in many decades, the girls realize there is more to life than social media and technology.
Midwood’s Seniors told the story about a young tourist from Hawaii lost in New York City, trying to find her way to Times Square. She comes across a director, under cover as a homeless man, who takes her around the city on the subway and in taxis—normal touristy things—and subsequently makes her into a Broadway star.
Cheers mingled to the point that by the end of each show, it was hard to decipher who was there for whom, but either way the cheers for each school were equally as loud. The night was filled with dancing, acting, and singing.
Finally, the results were in. The stage was packed with each of the casts cheering and singing to the Beastie Boys anthem “No Sleep Till Brooklyn.”
“The winner of the 2016 three-in-SING is…Midwood High School,” one of the judges yelled.
The stage and audience erupted in cheers and rounds of applause. For the first time, Midwood had beaten the unbeatable Murrow.
And it was all for a good cause.
In 2014, Joe Gillette, who runs Relay For Life in nearby Bergen Beach, Mill Basin, and Marine Park, approached the Madison, Midwood, and Murrow principals and SING! coordinators to see if they’d be interested in a three-school competition to raise money for cancer research.
“Being that the three schools are some of the best large high schools in New York City and we do a lot of charitable work for different organization, we jumped right on it,” Shapiro said.
Over the past three years, InterSING! has raised about $50,000 for Relay For Life, according to Shapiro.
She said that ultimately the students don’t care who wins because they’re raising money for a good cause. “It becomes more than just the competition and they realize the true value of something like that,” she said.
By AMBER ALEXANDER
Flatbush Avenue is home to a cool cultural space dedicated to preserving and showcasing Caribbean heritage. The CaribBeing House, as it’s cleverly titled, is the brainchild of Shelley Worrell, a Trinidadian American and life-long resident of the neighborhood.
The space lies inside a red trailer situated in the Flatbush Caton Market, a place where local merchants in Flatbush have sold their goods for over a decade. While the market itself has multiple booths with vendors selling items such as West Indian jewelry, flags, food and skincare products, CaribBeing House has a more modern and artsty vibe.
To the right of a plank leading to the entrance is a square wooden sign that says “Be social.” Inside, a blue neon light that says “I am CaribBeing” hangs against the wooden wall. There is pop art with symbols that represent Caribbean and New York culture. There are also tote bags emblazoned with the CaribBeing logo and more art work for purchase and a giant sheet in the back for visitors to sign.
“I chose the Caton Market because it’s in the heart of the community,” Worrell said. “I see Flatbush as one of the most important cultural centers of the Caribbean and the Caton Market is a Caribbean market—it is situated right on Flatbush Avenue. “So, when the opportunity presented itself to us, we decided that we couldn’t turn it down.”
CaribBeing House offers the annual Flatbush Film Festival, art exhibitions, different types of cultural presentations, artist talks, dance performances, trunk shows. “The space is going to be constantly changing and we could even have a dinner party here if we wanted, so the whole concept is that the space will continue to evolve overtime,” said Worrell, who conceived of the organization in 1999 while studying at Brooklyn College.
Worrell was born three blocks from the market and has lived in Flatbush for most of her life. It was not too far away, at the library on Linden Boulevard, that the organization began to take shape.
“I think that’s another reason why I wanted to have a presence here,” she said. “We started CaribBeing at the Flatbush branch of the Brooklyn Public Library so, for me, this particular corner and this particular neighborhood has a lot of cultural significance but also, it’s very personally significant to me as well,” she said.
The name CaribBeing came to be when Worrell was an undergraduate. “It was like a play on words,” she said. “We didn’t have a definition back then. The definition actually just came about in the last six months as we’ve just gotten deeper into our work but it was just something that I thought about back then and I didn’t know what it would be. I didn’t know that it would become a viable non-profit organization.
As Brooklyn undergoes a transformation due to gentrification, ethnic communities such as Flatbush are changing rapidly. Worrell is confident that CaribBeing will continue to thrive.
“I think, right now, it’s about preservation and presentation of Caribbean cultural heritage as Brooklyn is changing very quickly,” she said. “I do see CaribBeing as one of those gatekeepers and preservers of our rich cultural heritage as well as our contributions to New York City and the United States.”
Photo: Shelley Worrell helps preserve Caribbean culture in Flatbush. (Amber Alexander Photo)
