*The Daily News reported that P.S. 150 has the longest wait list in the city, due largely to demand from Chinese families who have moved into Sunset Park in recent years.

*Police at the 72^nd Precinct think they may have caught the burglar who has been targeting and stealing from Chinese residents who live the 40s and 50s, and driving up the burglary rate, Inspector Jesus Raul Pintos said last week.

*The lack of Brooklyn-bound toll on the Verrazano has some people worked up, including local owners who have trouble parking in Sunset Park, the Eagle reported.

*The weekly park sweeps at Lets Clean Sunset Park! are back up and running. Want to join in? Check out the website to keep up to date.

*Thanks to the Brooklyn DA, Haitians in need of clothing after the earthquake will soon be sporting a load of designer knockoffs confiscated last year from a Sunset Park storage facility, according to the Post.

*Councilwoman Gonzalez held a leadership summit last week, the Eagle reports. She also brought together a group to talk about the somewhat contentious issue of legislation on vendors along Fifth Avenue. Details on that to come.

*Mayor Bloomberg and City Council Speaker Quinn last week announced the New York City Waterfront Vision and Enhancement Strategy (WAVES), “a citywide initiative that will create a new sustainable blueprint for the City’s 578 miles of shoreline.” Sunset Park obviously has a good bit of that waterfront. I haven’t had a chance to look through it carefully, but I’ll report back on the details of the plan.

*Picturing Sunset Park: Check out a kind of unusual shot I stumbled upon here, and good shot of Chinatown here.

*Frank of The Sunset Park Blog noted a couple of new Italian places in the neighborhood, and made a well-deserved plug for staying in (the neighborhood) when going out to eat.

*Things have been cooking, sprouting and…shopping…over at Sunset Parkour. Take a look out how her seedlings are progressing, and her note on Sunset Park’s recent meh ranking in NYMag’s list of “most livable” New York neighborhoods. Eh, they can keep Park Slope.

*Got any other news? Send it along…

*Did you make it to the Department of Transportation’s Brooklyn Greenway meeting on April 8? Streetsblog did, and brought back this report. Everyone agrees that the proposition of a waterfront greenway poses a challenge for the neighborhood, but also a huge boon in an area with little open space. Have opinions on the proposal? Leave a comment!

*The story of Michael Romero, 32, who was shot and killed by plainclothes police after a struggle over a gun, continues. Police now say they identified themselves as NYPD before Romero took out a gun. (He apparently said “You want to see my ID? Here’s my ID!” before taking out his silver .357 Rossi). Romero’s aunt says her nephew was “good” but “sick,” Gothamist reports. Romero was shot in the shoulder, and pronounced dead on arrival Lutheran hospital. Police found a second gun and a large bag of marijuana in the possession of the ex-con, who had 34 arrests on his record.

*The Sunset Park Rec Center has free baseball and softball leagues this summer. You can find more information here.

*State Senator Eric Adams cares about you—and your pants. The former NYPD captain has started a “stop the sag” campaign, advising those who rock their waistbands low to “raise your pants! Raise your image!” Indy Posted seemed like a fan, but kids in Crown Heights, where most of the billboards have gone up, were skeptical. Thoughts?

*Those of you rushing to the theater to see the new Liam Neeson movie After.Life but have an eerie feeling of déjà vu—Green-Wood Cemetery has a cameo in the drama that takes on age old theme of the the-not-quite-dead from the inside of a mortuary.

*The Village Voice’s Sarah DiGregorio chowed down at Wong Wong Noodles.

*Sunset Park Stills made good use of the recent night weather—there are some lovely new shots of the neighborhood on the blog.

This notice about the baseball and t-ball league at the Rec Center came over the transom this week. Seems like a great summertime activity for kids around the neighborhood:

Sunset Park Recreation Center has a baseball and t-ball league open for registration right now. Coaches are volunteers (if you’d like to help let them know that as well). The uniforms are also free. The only thing you’d have to pay for is the recreation center membership ($25-50). The membership includes axis to the gym, computer lab and other activities like yoga in addition to the baseball league.

The center is located in the park 7th ave and 43rd street 718-965-6533. The best thing to do, however, is go there in person rather than call.

Here is a reminder about the Greenway meeting sent around by UPROSE.

The city wants your input on the plan–otherwise it will go forward without the neighborhood weighing in. What does this all mean for Sunset Park? Show up–and offer your opinion.

The workshop will be hands on and you will have a space to give your recommendations and opinions.
Attached is a map of the Community Based Sunset Park Greenway and the themes that will be discussed tomorrow.
If you have any questions feel free to contact me. If you can, bring someone from the community with you.
When: Today! April 8th 6:30-8:30pm
Where: St Michael’s Church Auditorium
371 43rd St (btw. 4th and 3rd Avenues)
(45th St. R Train Station)
———
Participa! Dejate escuchar! Ven al taller comunitario del Dept. de Transportacion sobre la ‘Via Verde’ de Sunset Park.
El taller sera interactivo y tendrás espacio para dar tus recomendaciones y opiniones.
Adjunto el mapa del plan comunitario para la vía verde de Sunset Park
Cuando: Hoy! 8 de Abril 6:30-8:30pm
Donde: Auditorio Iglesia de St. Michael’s
371 Calle 43 (entre la 3ra y 4ta Ave)
(Estacion de 45 del Tren R)

View Sunset Park Murders 2010 in a larger map
Click on the map above to see details of this year’s murders in Sunset Park

This story has received a ton of coverage in the local papers, including Crazed ex-con shot dead by NYPD officer Tara Hayes pulled trigger to shoot her partner first: police in the Daily News and Pistol-packing Brooklyn thug tried shooting at police before hero cop shot him in the Post. As you can probably tell from the headlines, the dailies have dug into the story of the gun-wielding Michael Romero, an ex-con who yesterday threatened three plainclothes officers with a .357 pistol and was ultimately to death by NYPD Officer Tara Hayes on the edge of Green-Wood Cemetery in Sunset Park. Sunset Park Chronicled’s original coverage is below, but rather than try to update the story with all of the details appearing in local papers, I’ve linked to them. In addition to its print coverage, the Post has video of the scene, as does NY1 (interesting that one of the men interviewed by NY1 said their were multiple shots. The NYPD said Hayes’ shot was the only one fired).

Police shot and killed a man in Sunset Park after he approached a car of plainclothes officers and waved a gun, according to Inspector Jesus Raul Pintos of Brooklyn’s 72nd precinct.

The shooting happened April 1 around 2:15pm as three plainclothes officers from the Brooklyn Anti-Crime Unit patrolled the area near Green-Wood Cemetery in Brooklyn looking for a suspect in a robbery investigation.

The officers were driving near 33rd and Fifth Avenue yesterday when they spotted a man who fit the description of a robbery suspect, police said. As they pulled the car over, the man, identified as Michael Romero,32 30, approached the driver’s side window with what was later discovered to be a loaded silver .357 Rossi pistol, according to police and the New York Times. When the male officer in the driver’s seat began to struggle with the man for the gun, the female officer in the passenger seat got out of the car and fired one shot, hitting the man in the shoulder, according to the Times.

The bullet traveled through his shoulder into his chest, according to the Daily News.

Romero was rushed to Lutheran hospital, where he was pronounced dead on arrival. Police say they recovered the pistol that sparked the struggle at the scene. The man was also in possession had a loadedHe had in his backpack a loaded .44 revolver and a gallon-sized of marijuana and “two wallets stuffed with cash,” according to the New York Post. police said, though it is still unclear if these were on his person when he was shot yesterday.

Police have not said if the man killed was the same who they had been seeking in connection with the robbery.

*The adult shops along Third Avenue have been a, well, touchy subject for a while now. A reader sent this Daily News piece around yesterday on a court decision that may make complicate the adult bookstore/movie store industry. The Brooklyn Eagle had an article yesterday as well.

*Lots of Greenway coverage this week, including a piece in the Daily News, and some live blogging here at Sunset Park Chronicled.

*Remember Federal Building No. 2? The Times did a multimedia package on the full-of-potentials-with-a-hint-of-problem piece of waterfront real estate this week. The photos have a touch of Nathan Kensinger’s style to them I thought. Take a look.

*The Village Voice’s Sarah DiGregorio put out her list of the top ten spots to fill your belly in Sunset Park.

*The New York Time’s Fernanda Santos has a piece (with graphics, video, etc) tracking the 2010 Census. Convincing people to fill out and return the forms is still proving a hard sell it seems. Do it! It’s how you get money for schools, transpiration, hospitals–and we reporters love us some census data.

This landed in my inbox this week, and I thought, especially in these strapped times, it worth passing along. Most of the jobs are for the “enumerator” position, I’ve been told, which pays $18.75 an hour and offers flexible scheduling, including nights and weekends. The local district also covers Cobble Hill, Carroll Gardens, Brooklyn Heights, Ft Greene, Boerum Hill, Borough Park, and Park Slope. Job applicants take a basic 28-question multiple choice test with basic math, map reading, and literacy skills. No computer skills needed, and there are local testing sites right in the neighborhood. Brokelyn’s checked it out.

Cyclist making his way through west Brooklyn via Sunset Park's busy Third Avenue.

I’ll be covering the tonight’s forum on the new Brooklyn Greenway planned to run from Greenpoint to Sunset Park. It takes place at UPROSE tonight, Wednesday, March 31 at 6:30pm at 166A 22nd Street in Brooklyn. Come out to participate in the forum, or tweet a question with the hashtag #spgreenway and I’ll try to pass it along.

digenger captures another side of parking...

Here are some of the goings-on with the Sunset Park politicos…

City Politics:

Councilwoman Sara Gonzalez has been elected Brooklyn’s budget negotiator for the third year in a row. Budgetary gloom and doom abounds at the state or city levels this year, and Gonzalez recognized the climate in a statement she released, saying, ““I will continue to seek innovative ways to ensure my constituents, as well as all New Yorkers, feel as little negative impact as possible as we navigate through the twists and turns of these troubled times.”  Affordable housing, jobs, and education topped her list of priorities.

Gonzalez last week introduced a bill to limit alternate side of the street parking days in many residential districts to two days per week. The community board has been vying for this for a while, feeling it an onus on local residents to have the rules in effect four days each week. In fact, I heard a resident griping about just that as she walked out of the subway last week. The limit has already been implemented in Park Slope, Fort Greene and other neighborhoods northward.

Lastly, Gonzalez was one of several members to float another idea–making March 31 a national holiday honoring union-organizer and farm worker César Chávez.

In Albany:

Assemblyman Félix Ortiz is back the news, this time stumping for legistlation to requires skiers to don helmets when they before hitting the slopes, the New York Times reported. Though no salt ban, this too might face some opposition. The legislation, originally introduced in 1998 after the deaths of Sonny Bono and Michael Kennedy, would penalize slope operators for bareheaded patrons.

Representative Nydia M. Velázquez made the news this week in a NY Times article on the March for America immigration rally in Washington. She’s not the only one from Sunset Park speaking up on the issue–La Union and it’s youth arm Y-ACT also made the trip south for the march.

(7:07 p.m.) A 35-year-old home health care worker in Brooklyn was arrested on Thursday on charges she fatally beat with her fists or an object the 67-year-old woman she was supposed to be caring for, a law enforcement official told the New York Times.

Read more below…

(3:25pm) A home home health aide has been charged with the murder of the 67-year-old Sunset Park woman in her care.

Aide Yamilette Hidalgo had on ongoing dispute with patient Maria Torres, neighbors told WABC.

Hidalgo, 33, called police at about 11am on March 24 to report she had found her patient dead on the bathroom floor in Torres’ apartment at 558 50th St. Hidalgo told officers a man had burst through the door and knocked her unconscious. Hidalgo said she found Torres after coming to. But police charged Hidalgo with the murder after investigation “revealed that Mrs. Hidalgo’s story was…fabricated,” Deputy Inspector Jesus Raul Pintos wrote in an email.

Police told WABC the frail Torres fell in the course of the dispute Wednesday morning and subsequently died.

Hidalgo confessed yesterday evening, according to police.