NEW BROOKLYN CIVIC COUNCIL

image via Park Slope Lens

On Monday, a group of concerned, verbally precise and occasionally paranoid Brooklyners birthed a new alliance to advance the values of our fair borough. Behold! The Brooklyn Neighborhood Congress lives!

While a scenic pile of avocados looked on, about 40 members of various Brooklyn civic boards and advocacy groups gathered in Piramide in the Slope to construct the group.

A few things happened:

1) I, your intrepid FIPS representative, became bored enough to eat a second meal (seriously), as speaker after speaker pissed around their own little tree by fine-tuning the mission statement (I especially enjoyed the woman who repeated every one of her suggestions three times--you know, in case the brilliance didn't sink in the first two). It should surprise no one that a representative of Park Slope, home to so many wannabe writers (says the blogger), scored a hit with "advocate" as a central verb, securing murmurs of "that's the perfect word," and (probably) several civic council groupies. The provisional opening statement reads something like, "We have come together to advocate for the Brooklyn community" (That took about an hour to write. Kill me). A focus group will fine-tune the statement for next meeting.

2) They chose a name! Remarkably quickly, the crew unanimously approved, "The Brooklyn Neighborhood Congress." My nomination, "Brooklyn Justice League of Adventure and Friendship" never had a chance.

3) They kicked around their goals. Essentially, I gather, they want to help BK neighborhood civic councils accomplish THEIR goals. One guy got admirably (IMHO) specific: "I need help getting stop signs. I need to get kids into public  schools." There was a lot of concern about being co-opted by "THEM." ("If we say we advocate for a better city as a whole, THEY will use that against us.") Who is "they?" Developers, the Bruce Ratners of the world. Mayor Bloomberg. I guess, anyone from Manhattan. Space aliens? Let's say space aliens. They opposed endorsing candidates, but saw themselves bringing concerns directly to council members.

Another meeting comes March 28, when the plan is to hash out bylaws. If you want to add your voice to their concerns, and/or attend, contact Raul Rothblatt at rrothblatt@gmail.com to find out the secret location and the password.

Seriously, despite the amusing paranoia, raising voices against shitty development is probably a good thing. Helping civic group presidents get stop signs and shit? Sure, yeah. I'll buy into that. Speaking to council members with the volume of multiple, organized voices? Definitely. It's a good thing. Let them (or FIPS!) know what you care about.

Read more about the new civic group on NY1.