Emily F. Keller: Journalist

Dock Workers Respond to Economic Development Corporation

    Red Hook port workers held a press conference to demand an apology from the city’s Economic Development Corporation for calling their work “low-rung” earlier this year. Instead, the EDC reaffirmed its assessment. Published in Courier-Life Publications. Read the story.

Stories Shed Light on Workers

    Author Esther Cohen has put together a book of stories written by employees around the country about their work, leisure, community and family lives, called "unseenamerica." Published in Courier-Life Publications. Read the story.

A Half Century of Independent Living

    The Brooklyn Center for Independence of the Disabled celebrated its 50th anniversary at Buckley’s Restaurant. The center is run by people with disabilities. It serves several thousand people annually.

    The center assists people with socialization, personal grooming, housing, employment, voter registration, job training and transportation. Tasks include helping people obtain adaptive equipment at work sites, instructing people with disabilities about where to buy specialized cars, and representing clients in court. Services are free although contributions are accepted. Annual membership costs $5 to $20 per person.

    Published in Courier-Life Publications. Read the story.

 

Tenants of Tivoli Towers Safe At Home Until 2024

    The State Supreme Court in Manhattan has ruled that the landlord of the 320-unit Tivoli Towers housing development in Crown Heights must maintain the development's Mitchell-Lama status through 2024. Published in Courier-Life Publications. Read the story.

Special Cheer For Hard-Pressed Kids

    Dozens of children with formerly or currently incarcerated parents celebrated Christmas early at the Church of Gethsemane in Park Slope. A church deacon played Santa Claus, and members of the Fifth Avenue and Madison Avenue Presbyterian churches in Manhattan donated about 200 gifts, including one toy and one piece of clothing for each child. Published in Courier-Life Publications. Read the story.

Umoja Founder Visits Brooklyn

    Rebecca Lolosoli of Samburu, Kenya visited the Brooklyn Society for Ethical Culture to talk about how she created a village for women raped by British soldiers and rejected by their families. The event was organized by the international women’s rights organization MADRE. Published in Courier-Life Publications. Read the story.

Taking Back the Streets: Activists Mobilize Against Crime

     Activists and members of the the 79th Precinct Community Council in Bedford-Stuyvesant, Brooklyn (pictured) discussed anti-violence outreach in the neighborhood following a summer marked by a spike in violence.

    This article was published in the Bedford-Stuyvesant edition of Courier-Life Publications in October 2006.

Read page one.

Read page two.

Disappearing Businesses Leave Many Tenants In the Lurch

    Residents of Walt Whitman and Raymond V. Ingersoll Houses are bracing for long walks through the snow this winter following a developer's shutdown of their neighborhood supermarket, ninety-nine-cent store, laundry and cleaning services. The business are being demolished to make way for a new development project on Myrtle Avenue from Flatbush Avenue Extension to Ashland Place, where the only remaining business is a Duane Reade drug store.

    Published in Courier-Life Publications. Read the story. Read about the supermarket shutdown here.

Myrtle Associated Supermarket Closes Up Shop

    The ice cream and beer sold out first and the carrots and celery were among the last to go during a 50 percent off sale at an Associated Supermarket in Fort Greene that ended August 27 with the store's closure. The shutdown is part of a developer's afford to clear a strip of businesses on Myrtle Avenue to make way for a new development.

    Published in Courier-Life Publications. Read the story.

    Read more about the development's impact on the neighborhood here.

Underground Railroad Came Through Here, Duffield Street Advocates Say

    Joy Chatel (right) and other property owners on Duffield Street are asking the city to cancel plans to demolish their homes for a development, saying the buildings were part of the Underground Railroad that African American slaves traversed to freedom.

    The homes could be seized by eminent domain and turned into an underground parking lot and public open space as part of the Downtown Brooklyn redevelopment plan. City Council Members Letitia James (above) and Charles Barron have joined the preservationists fight, along with the activist organization Families United for Racial and Economic Equality (FUREE).

    Chatel says sub-basement structures, described in a press release as “several unexplainable architectural abnormalities in the sub-basements” prove that her building, which is between Willoughby and Fulton streets, was part of the Underground Railroad.

    Published in Courier-Life Publications. Read the story. Read a related story.