Tag Archive | "Leanna Orr"

When Playtime Noise Annoys

Posted on 11 May 2012. Tags: , , ,

The Ascension School on West 107th Street (Photo/Leanna Orr)

A leafy little block of west 107th street is pretty quiet 22 hours day of the day.

But around noon on school days, weather permitting, the street closes to traffic and opens to children on recess.

It’s all over in a couple of hours, but some block residents say the students’ playtime is no fun for them.

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HOST: A leafy little block of west 107th street is pretty quiet 22 hours day the day. But around noon on school days, weather permitting, the street closes to traffic and opens to children on recess. It’s all over in a couple of hours, but some block residents say the students’ playtime is no fun for them. Leanna Orr reports.

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NARR: The Traffic barriers were put up just after 11 am on a sunny day earlier this week. Safe from traffic, the kids come out to play.

SOUND: Bring up rapidly so it if full by the word “play”. warm under transition from quiet ambi to kids playing uphold 2 seconds, fade under

NARR: The kids are sixth graders from the Catholic Catholic Ascension School. They are neatly dressed in white and navy uniforms. Ten minutes are already up, and two teachers hustle the students into a line, back inside. It’s peaceful for a moment, and then the sixth graders file out… Seventh graders are next  [describe the play, then lining up and being replaced by another group. Keep the noise hot. Describe how close Rosen’s house is before transioning to her complaint. But why start with a complaint about another person’s inconvenience instead of her a complaint about noise?] …and residents a half block walk from their doors

ROSEN: It’s been so loud that you can hardly hear yourself think.

NARR: The play street has become contentious ground. Carol Rosen’s third floor apartment faces the stained glass windows of the Ascension Church across the street. She wants recess to happen elsewhere—anywhere other than right below her window.

ROSEN: My work involves writing and I need peace and quiet when I’m able to write. And some of my work involves being on Skype and if the kids are out at the time I can’t hear the other party.

NARR: For Rosen and other outspoken neighbors noise isn’t the only issue. Rosen’s neighbor Samantha Burden says the barriers block out trucks and trap in cars.

BURDEN: Deliveries can’t come down the block until one o’clock. And there’s also alternate side of the street, which means we have to move it by 11:30, and they close it at 10:30 until 1:00.

NARR: Burden says she knows she is labeled as anti-children by her pro-play street neighbors. But she insists she is  looking out for the students, too.

BURDEN: There’s no need for them to play in the middle of the street, where there’s dead rats that we see all the time.

NARR: Connie Sanchez used to be a teacher at Ascension School

SANCHEZ: and actually we have a petition, and we had close to 1,000 people sign the petition saying that it didn’t bother them.

NARR: To Connie Sanchez, the conflict involves more than noisy children.

SANCHEZ: The people who complain about the children also complain about the church, and the fact that they have masses and funerals. So, the church and the school can’t disappear.

NARR: Ascension School’s principal Chris McMahon takes a diplomatic approach to the two-year squabble.

MCMAHON: It’s those little inconveniences that have been piling up for a while. And we do understand the residents’ frustrations, and we’re doing everything we can to try and alleviate those stresses.

NARR: Now, something even louder and messier than noisy kids is coming to the block. Construction on a new building begins in a few weeks, and 107th street will have to remain open all day for work vehicles. That means no more play street for the time being. Rosen is grateful for the respite, even if she’s not getting a quiet street in the bargain.

ROSEN: I’m not looking forward to the construction noise. It may be one problem replaced with another. But I can’t speak to that now because it hasn’t happened yet.

NARR: It probably won’t make the block any quieter or student-safe, but it just might bring peace among the neighbors.

Leanna Orr, Columbia Radio News.

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FBI and NYPD Resume Search for Missing SoHo Child 33 Years Later

Posted on 20 April 2012. Tags: , , , , , ,

Police and FBI agents surround the dig site. Photo by Leanna Orr, Columbia Radio News.

 

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This week investigators began following new leads in the disappearance of six-year-old Etan Patz. He hasn’t been seen since 1979, when he left his family’s SoHo apartment for the school bus stop. Investigators have never come up with physical evidence, and no one’s ever been criminally charged with Etan’s disappearance. But Leanna Orr reports that this week, a police dog indicated the presence of remains in a SoHo basement.
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Members of the NYPD and FBI are now excavating the concrete floor in a building at at Wooster and Prince Streets. They’re carrying drills and jackhammers are going down the covered passage to the basement [bring up drill sound] and bringing out chunks of concrete. [concrete into dumpster sound]The site is halfway between the building Etan lived in and the bus stop he was heading to. But FBI spokesman Tim Flannelly is reluctant to give more specific details.

TIM FLANNELLY: This is one of many leads that we’re covering, but we are cautiously optimistic. (0:05)

ORR: This is now a buys block occupied by a handful of designer clothing shops. But at the time Etan vanished, the space was used as a workshop by handyman at number 127B Prince Street.

Authorities are working on a theory that the handyman, Othniel Miller, killed the boy and buried him there, according to one law enforcement official. But the building’s manager and long-time resident, Steve Kuzma, says Miller never struck him as suspicious:

KUZMA: He was a nice fellow, a jolly round fellow. He did work for a lot of people around here. (0:07)

ORR: Kuzma admits he’s flustered by the commotion  has often done maintenance in the basement, where forensic teams are now searching for Etan’s remains.

KUZMAN: It’s a little shocking. It gives me a feeling of disturbance.  (0:10)

ORR: This latest development has rekindled attention into a case that’s struck a chord with parents since it first happened.

LISA COHEN: There was what I called the ‘Before Etan,’ when kids played in the streets and you just said ‘be home before dinner.’ After Etan, everything changed. (0:10)

ORR: Journalist Lisa Cohen is the author of a book on the disappearance, and has been close to the case since 1990. Cohen spoke to Etan’s parents yesterday, and says they’re not getting their hopes up.

COHEN: They’ve been through this so many times before, there have been so many times they were told, we have him, we know who he is, this is going to break the case. And it just didn’t. (0:11)

ORR: Sean Sweeney is a friend and neighbor of the Patzs, and watched the entire case unfold. He’s hoping this latest development will lead to some closure for Etan’s parents.

SWEENEY: I think they’re really looking for justice. It’s bad enough to lose a child, but the guy who did it gets away with it. (0:06)

ORR: Authorities expect to continue excavations throughout next week. Leanna Orr, Columbia Radio News.

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Newscast – Top of the Hour

Posted on 23 March 2012. Tags: , ,

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News at 4 p.m. brought to you by Leanna Orr.

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Girl Scout Cookies a la New York

Posted on 09 March 2012. Tags: , , , ,

Girl Scouts fill out order forms for Girl Scout cookies. Photo by Matt Slocum, AP.

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BY LEANNA ORR

HOST INTRO: Thin Mints, Samoas and Do-si-dos hit the New York market on Monday when the city’s Girl Scouts begin selling cookies. But the annual sale doesn’t work the same way here as it does in the rest of the country. Leanna Orr reports.

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On a glorious Saturday in suburban Stamford, Troop 50060 is doing is brisk business. The members are set up outside a Dunkin’ Donuts and a Stop & Stop, siphoning off customers as they come and go.

SCOUT: Four dollars a box!
CUSTOMER: OK, can I do four actually five boxes of the Tagalongs and two of the Thin Mints?

SOUND: Tinkling of coins into box (0:03), fade to black under narration

Inventory dwindles as girls make frequent runs to the SUV parked out front for extra stock. The trunk and table are bare after just a couple hours.

OLIVIA: We sold a hundred and sixty boxes. And how many did you come here with? A hundred and sixty.

Troop 50060 knows how to cater to Stamford suburbanites, so the girls almost always sell outside grocery stores and coffee shops. One mother who was there had gone to a country music concert and saw a New Jersey troop with a different approach.

MOTHERS: We’re pulling into the parking lot and a mother was out there selling at the concert– Oh I betcha she did well there, that would be a good place to sell–Oh yeah, tailgatin’.

SOUND: Fade remaining conversation under narration (0:08), crossfade with ambi

Across America Girl Scouts depend on tried and true strategies: door-to-door sales, community events and booths outside the supermarket. But most of these just don’t work in New York City. It’s tough to go door-to-door when you have to get past security and up an elevator. Many troop moms don’t even have a tailgate. Plus, subway turnstiles are a real pain with an armload of inventory. So the New York scouting community gets creative.

RABINER: We have what we call ‘pop-up shops’ opening across the city.

Dina Rabiner is the director of marketing and communications for the Girl Scouts of Greater New York. She’s in charge of spreading the word about these five temporary stores. They’ll operate like normal retailers, with some paid staff and large inventories. You can even find them with your smartphone. The Cookie Locator app pinpoints the closest Do-si-do or Trefoil vendor from any Android device, iPhone or iPad. More than thirty thousand New Yorkers downloaded it last year. Rabner expects to double that number with some high-profile promotions.

RABINER: There’s not many councils out there that can advertise on 42nd Street and Times Square.

She thinks the ad will raise awareness about city scouts in general.

RABINER: People don’t always associate New York City with Girl Scouts, for some people Girl Scouts is a suburban activity.

Troops here might not be as visible, but they have one advantage over scouts in the suburbs. There are a lot of rich people here, and four dollars seems like a bargain to most of the city’s residents. Twelve-year-old Nicole belongs to Manhattan Troop 3175 on the Upper East Side. She’s learned that when it comes to customers, it’s quality, not quantity, that counts.

NICOLE: So I went to my mom’s office to sell cookies.–What office is that?–Merrill Lynch, the World Financial Center. And we were selling, and someone bought 125 boxes of cookies.

That’s $500 worth of cookies, and the buyer donated them all to American troops overseas. Cookies are available in the pop-up shops from March 12 and until April 3.

Leanna Orr, Columbia Radio News.

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HOST BACKANNOUNCE: You can find a link to the Cookie Locator app on Uptownradio.org.

Posted in City Life, MoneyComments (1)

Department of Labor Numbers Hint at Improvement

Posted on 02 March 2012. Tags: , ,

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BY LEANNA ORR

HOST: Numbers out this week from the Department of Labor show that just over one and a half million people applied for unemployment in February

That’s a four-year low.

These numbers are the latest in a string of optimistic reports that suggest the US labor market is gaining momentum.

But not all New Yorkers are seeing much improvement.

Leanna Orr reports.

ORR: The Workforce One center is on the corner of 149th and Courtlandt Avenue in the Bronx, and the waiting room is full. Addy Casta is outside looking through the glass door. She’s new to this. For the last 21 years, she worked in customer service at a major car rental agency.

CASTA: I’ve been disabled since July, and when it was time for me to come back last month, they just decided not to hire me back. (0:09)

ORR: Casta thinks her employer acted dishonestly, but she thinks the economy is mostly to blkame. She’s even thinking of changing her vote in November.

CASTA: All my life I’ve been Democratic, but I’m thinking of going Republican. This is just getting too ridiculous. (0:08)

ORR: New York State Department of Labor economist Elena Volovelsky admits that in these conditions, companies like Casta’s do try to get away with more.

VOLOVELSKY: Obviously when the unemployment rates are higher, we’re seeing high incidents of employers taking advantage of individual cases…where something should not have happened. (0:09 )

ORR: There may be fewer people applying for unemployment now, and even Addy Casta isn’t planning to apply yet.   She may not need to. Volovelsky says things have actually been improving in the city for the past two years:

VOLOVELSKY: We didn’t experience as deep of a recession as the rest of the US economy, and we came out of the recession a little bit earlier than the rest of the country as well. (0:12)

But the problem for people like Casta is how long they remain unemployed.

Speaking to Congress this week, Federal Reserve Chairman Ben Bernanke said there are hazards of long-term unemployment:

BERNANKE:  People who are out of work for six months or more will be starting to lose skills, and they’ll be losing their attachment with the labor force they won’t know what’s happening in their field or industry. (0:09)

ORR: Bernanke says that urgent job creation for these people is the best way to get the labor market back to normal.

In the Bronx, Addy Casta is starting to look in her field, customer service, and isn’t sure what kind of openings she’ll find there. Casta says she’ll basically take anything at this point.

Leanna Orr, Columbia Radio News.

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