NYC NOW - Midday News: Elderly Woman at Nursing Home Faces Murder Charges, No Casino in Times Square or Hudson Yards, and a Push for a Community Center in Brooklyn

Episode Date: September 17, 2025

Police are charging a 95-year-old woman with murder after she allegedly hit and killed a fellow resident at the Seagate Rehabilitation and Nursing Center on Coney Island. Plus, there will not be a casino in Times Square or Hudson Yards after committees tasked with reviewing proposals rejected Caesars Palace's plan and the Avenir Casino in Hudson Yards. And finally, a coalition of residents in Canarsie, Brooklyn, are pushing for a new community center. The push comes as the city is funding a feasibility study on the project, but advocates say officials need to do more.

Welcome to NYC now, your source for local news in and around New York City from WNYC. Here's the midday news from Michael Hill. Police are charging a 95-year-old woman with murder after she allegedly hit a fellow resident over the head and killed her. Authorities arrested Gleina Smirnoff, who is also facing a criminal weapons possession charge in the death of 89-year-old Nina Kretsov. NYPD officials say they both lived at the Seagate Rehabilitation and Nursing Center in Coney Island. Attorney information for Smear Nova was not immediately available. The nursing home has not yet responded to a request for comment. There will not be a casino in Times Square or Hudson Yards.

The committee's tasked with reviewing proposals rejected Caesar's Palace's plan in the Avenir Casino in Hudson Yards. The Cesar's casino had big opposition from the Broadway League, which said the rejection would protect the magic of Broadway. The State Gaming Commission plans to award three downstate casino licenses by the end of this year. Some students are urging New York City officials to expand journalism classes and publications at public schools. Parks Club collegiate senior Autumn Wind says she's thrilled her school launched a new journalism class this year. She says she's been bitten by the journalism bug and is now considering it as a career. Journalism isn't only hunting over a desk in writing. Journalism is interviewing, understanding the community, and so much more.

But she says her school doesn't have a newspaper. Studies show only about a quarter of the city's public schools have a publication. The City Council, CUNY, and the Rebson Foundation funded 30 new journalism classes last year. 68 with some clouds now, chances of showers may be in mid-afternoon thunderstorm, cloudy, a high of 70 winds gusting to 21 miles an hour. Shows and thunderstorms likely by midnight at a low around 64. Stay tuned for more after the break. A coalition of residents in Canarsie, Brooklyn, are pushing for a new community center.

They say will help keep young people busy and out of trouble. This comes as the city is funding a feasibility study on the project, but advocates say officials need to do more. WNIC's Brittany Crichtstein is here to tell us all about it. Brittany first, tell us about Canarsie and the public safety challenge it faces right now. Sure. So good morning, Michael. And if you've never been to Canarsie, it's tucked away.

in Brooklyn's southeast corner. It's a ways away. It's famous for its historic fishing pier and park on Jamaica Bay and now, of course, for its large Caribbean population. It was also home to rapper Popsmoke, who, you might recall, was fatally shot in L.A. in 2020. But gun violence also plays out locally in between, you know, the neat brick houses and restaurants serving up roti. And even though police data shows that gun violence in the precinct covering the neighborhood has dropped about 40% since last year. There have been seven shootings in Canarsie so far this year. Two of those were fatal. And last year was even tougher with four people, including three teens fatally shot in the precinct. So community activists like Jibril Jallo are trying to put pressure

on the city to pour more resources into Canarsie. He leads a non-profit advocacy group called the Flossie organization, which is a nod to the neighborhood's nickname. Without having the investment that we've been climbing for over the past couple years, we know there's only a matter of time before violence strikes again. So Jallo and other advocates say Canarsie residents have been pushing for more investments for a long time. So the city recently funded, as we said, a feasibility study on building a new community center in the neighborhood. What does that mean? Right. So that basically means they're going to research the community and potential benefits of the center, figure out where to build it, how long it will take, how much it will cost, etc.

But local advocates and elected officials say, of course, they're glad $500,000 have been allocated for the study, but they want to see tangible progress quickly. Local council member Mercedes-Narces fought to get the money allocated in the city budget and says her work on the project is far from over. We're on a right track and I'm not going to let go. My foot is on the gas. I'm And I'm going to keep on pushing to get it done ASAP. Community centers, why do they matter for public safety? What's the connection there? So we've done a lot of work on this.

And studies have shown that community centers are crucial resources in the fight against crime and gun violence, Michael, especially among young people. By providing a safe place for teens to get involved in different activities after school, they keep kids off the streets. When I spend time in neighborhoods that struggle with gun violence, One of the main things I always hear from residents is that young people need more places to go. Natasha Christopher works for the Canarsie branch of an anti-violence nonprofit called Enough Initiative and says she hears the same thing from young people in the neighborhood.

Her own son was gunned down in Bushwick in 2012 when he was 14, so she knows this well. Most of the time, all they're asking for is to have a safe space to go. I also spoke with longtime Canarsie resident Kareem Griffith, who said he feels the same way. What do you think about having a community center here for young people? That would be great. Like a big place where they could go and just stay there. You could watch them. Kids get into trouble when, you know, they get to be alone unsupervised.

For comparison, Michael, we did a lot of reporting in East Harlem last spring that showed their cornerstone community. centers, which are located within public housing complexes, were one tool that helped drive down gun violence there. It also took a lot of coordination between residents, police, and community leaders to rain in shootings following a spike in the pandemic. So these facilities are just one part of the public safety puzzle and in Canarsie as well. So, Britt, tell us, how has the Adams administration responded to all this? Well, City Hall says the mayor is dedicated to investing in accessible community spaces for all New Yorkers, but they did not provide a timeline for the Canarsie Project. And Jibril Jallo, the activist I spoke with, sent two different letters to the mayor's

office since June, asking them to expedite the feasibility study and at least update the community on a timeline for building the center. But he says he hasn't gotten a direct response. He says adjacent neighborhoods like East Flatbush and Brownsville have free public community centers, but they're just too far away from the heart of Karnarcy to be useful. WNYC is Brittany Krikstein. Brittany, thank you. You can read more about Brittany's story here on our website, Gautamas. Thank you so much, Michael.

Thanks for listening. This is NYC now from WMYC. Check us out for updates every weekday, three times a day for the latest news headlines and occasional deep dives. And subscribe wherever you get your podcasts.