NYC NOW - January 23, 2024: Midday News

Episode Date: January 23, 2024

Government and community based organizations say New York's latest effort to redraw congressional district lines needs more public input. Also, New York City agrees to change how it allocates affordable apartments in housing lotteries after a lawsuit says current policies perpetuates segregation. Finally, residents in Greenpoint, Brooklyn say a serial litterer is flooding their streets with magazine pages for the second time since last year. WNYC’s Bahar Ostadan has more on the strange sequel.

Welcome to NYC Now, your source for local news in and around New York City from WNYC. It's Tuesday, January 23rd. Here's the midday news from Michael Hill. Government and community-based organizations say New York's latest effort to redraw congressional district lines needs more public input. Last year, a judge said the state's bipartisan independent redistricting commission needed to redraw the map used in 2022. Elizabeth Uyang is from the Asian Pacific Americans' voice redistricting task force. The public needs to know how the IRC arrives at its proposed maps. It must have an opportunity to comment on proposed maps before they are sent to the legislature for approval.

A draft of new proposed congressional alliances due to the state legislature by the end of February. New York City is agreeing to change how it allocates affordable apartment. that are up for grabs and housing lotteries. The move settles a fair housing lawsuit that claim the current policy perpetuates segregation. By 2029, the city will reserve just 15% of the below-market rate units available in a neighborhood for local residents. That's down from the current 50% and it'll make it easier for applicants outside of a neighborhood to move in. Plaintiff's attorney Craig Gurion says the settlement is a win against segregationist, old. and new. We are moving away from the idea of racial turf and telling applicants and potential

applicants that every neighborhood should belong to all of us, regardless of where we come from. Mayor Eric Adams says he was glad to preserve a critical tool for building new affordable housing in the city. 38 with rain out there now, chance of mid-afternoon sprinkles as well with clouds and a high today of 42. Tomorrow, 50-50 chance of midday rain, cloudy and 41. And then on Thursday and Friday, here come the high temperatures in the 50s. Stay close. There's more after the break. Residents in Greenpoint, Brooklyn say someone is littering their streets with pages from magazines. Again, this comes after residents worked around the clock to nab a different serial litterer last year.

W.E.MIC's Bihar Ostadon has more on The Strange sequel. On a recent morning, John Himmellman stepped out of his building onto his quiet street to find glossy photos of women's derrierees all over his sidewalk. I walked downstairs. The first thing I see, like butts magazines all over the block. And this wasn't the first time. Himmellman's the vice president of a condo development on Huron Street. He's woken up to Japanese manga, erotic novels, cartoons, and now vintage pornography. The magazine C. Throes, it's usually more written text. So, you know, when you see just butts, literally butts down the entire block, it's just like, I don't know.

Himmellman's story is stunning enough on its own, but this is the second incident of its kind. Just a few blocks away on Noble Street, residents spent four years hunting their own serial litterer. A private security firm led overnight stakeouts and found the culprit was an NYPD sergeant littering before sunrise. Neighbors from that block were just as stumped. Molly Fitzsimons put it this way. Maybe there was a message in those books that we never cracked. This new litterer appears to be someone else, maybe a copycat. Himmellman reviewed his security camera footage and spotted a man walking by his building every few weeks at around 5.45 in the morning, tossing pages on the sidewalk. One early morning, Himmellman was awake and saw it happen in real time.

I see this guy I just walk past my camera and I'm like oh my God this is actually happening the guy is actually he's showing up I couldn't believe it

Himmelman rushed to get dressed and sprinted out the door while his wife Kelly was watching from the balcony So I look up at the balcony and like where this guy go and Kelly's like oh that way that way

and then I just take off running Yeah Himmelman recorded the whole thing on his phone Hey are you the guy? Are you the guy? The two stared at each other in awkward silence.

Are you the guy who's been with the papers? The guy then tried to grab Himmellman's phone. At that point, we had this little tussle in the middle of McGinnis Boulevard. So we had oncoming traffic just stopped with the light watching us. The litterer then walked away and Himmelman trudged home. Residents still don't have answers. Who is this guy? And what's his gripe with this block?

And what about the NYPD starting? who trashed the neighboring street. Himmelman's neighbor, Lucas Cornfield, has his own theory. I wonder if they're in cahoots, doing it together. I asked psychiatrist Peter Kramer his thoughts. He says, litterers like these could be sending their neighbors a message, but exactly what they're trying to say is hard to figure out. To them, it's not littering.

It's, you know, spreading the gospel. He says it's hard to believe this is a coincidence. It sounds like a copycat because what are the odds that, Two people in the same neighborhood have the exact same impulse to do something which is not generally done. Since Himmelman confronted the serial literer a couple weeks ago, there's been no religious text, no erotica, and no buts. But the mystery continues. Bajar Ostadon, WNYC News. Thanks for listening.

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