THE WEEKLY NEWSPAPER OF LOWER MANHATTAN | Volume 19 Issue 27 | Nov. 17 — 23, 2006

Editorial
No bus plan is no answer
Seasoned observers of World Trade Center redevelopment progress or lack thereof have learned long ago to take with a grain of salt talk of schedules and timetables. Delays have been one of the few certainties, and milestones end up getting reached whenever they get reached.

Under Cover

Letters to the editor

The Penny Post
Electoral visions as the pendulum swings back
By Andrei Codrescu
Even as I stood on my tiptoes applauding the Democrats taking over Congress, I kept thinking how ridiculous I looked. Here was an old guy wrapped in a silk brocade robe with a healthy portfolio clapping for a bunch of wealth confiscators. No, start that again. I am not that guy.

In briefs

A Tribeca staple

Bouncer tries to remove judge

Pace students to perform AIDS benefit

What’s cookin’ Downtown?

In Pictures

Autumn in Soho

Sports
African children to get soccer uniforms from Downtowners
By Priya Idiculla
A soccer uniform is what bands players together and makes a soccer team, well, a team. Many schoolchildren in southern Africa cannot play on a team with this simple necessity for fear of ruining their only outfit that they play in, a school uniform.

Soccer-packed weekend as season nears end

Downtown Express photo by Jefferson Siegel

Yen Ngai is an auxiliary police officer in Chinatown, where police rely on people like him to translate.

Chinatown cops get help from those who speak the languages
By Tina Shah
Like on every Wednesday evening for the past 20 years, Yen Ngai drove four miles from his Midtown office to the police station in Chinatown. Dressed in slacks and a polo shirt, he carried a red duffle bag on his left shoulder and walked toward a rusted green locker in the basement.

Pols: No to Roach Motels -- tenants must check out
By Albert Amateau
The city, with local elected officials and neighborhood preservation groups, is negotiating with the Trump Organization for a restrictive declaration to insure that the proposed 45-story condo-hotel that Trump is building in Soho really operates as a hotel.

Downtown school joins Broadway stars for Darfur benefit
By Lori Haught
The students at Elisabeth Irwin High School felt called to action when they started learning about the genocide in Darfur, Sudan.

Jewish pre-school program to expand in Tribeca
By Lori Haught
The Jewish Community Project is gearing up for a move to a new Tribeca location next fall.

Public hearing on W.T.C. tour bus and security center
The Port Authority will have a public hearing Nov. 28 to listen to concerns of Downtown residents about the impact of a tour bus parking and vehicle security screening center.

Brad Will gets a loving, raucous, anarchist sendoff
By Lincoln Anderson
A memorial service for Brad Will last Saturday filled St. Mark’s Church in the Bowery with a crowd of about 250 people.
Arts and Entertainment

Linda Stein’s defensive armor
By Ellison Walcott
In a world where many people feel the ever-looming threat of terrorism and violence, Linda Stein has created sculptures that symbolize strength, but also represent the ongoing feeling of vulnerability.

Disquiet on the home front
By Steven Snyder
“Home Front’s” world premiere at La Mama Experimental Theater couldn’t be more timely. Debuting the same week as a sweeping midterm election, in which the Iraq war was a lightening rod for change, Daniel Algie’s bleak play suggests just how far removed we as a nation remain from the very topic we claim to care most about.

Take my wife — just kidding
By Jennifer DeMeritt
You love her, you need her, but she’s cold-storing your seven-year-old son’s placenta in the back of the freezer. How do you stay married? James Braly explores this and other domestic dilemmas in his solo show “Life in a Marital Institution,” which runs for a limited engagement at the Ars Nova Theater on November 21 and 28.

Greenwich Village Orchestra celebrates 20 years
The Greenwich Village Orchestra has an invitation for you, or perhaps it’s a dare: “Visit us online at www.gvo.org and find out how we continue to put the ‘cool’ back into classical.”

News
Residents fight dangerous change to highway crossing
By Skye H. McFarlane
Plans to revamp the southern section of West St. came under fire twice last Thursday, as one group of community members rallied for intersection safety in the morning before another group barraged the New York State Department of Transportation with concerns at an evening meeting.

Y not a Tribeca center, 92nd St. asks
By Skye H McFarlane
After years of false starts, the 92nd St. Y may finally be on its way Downtown. Based on communications between Community Board 1 and the Y, the cultural and community programming center is planning to set up a satellite location in Tribeca near the Holland Tunnel.

Tighter pollution restrictions for many construction projects
By Skye H. McFarlane
Soon, residents of construction-choked Downtown neighborhoods will be breathing just a little bit easier.

Soho high school brings its newspaper back to life
By Lori Haught
The students at Chelsea Campus High School are quickly learning that putting out a newspaper is a full-time job.

Frank who? C.B. 1 favors Corner’s plaza over Gehry’s tower
By Skye H. McFarlane
For two years now, residents of the South Street Seaport area have been delivering commentary about the upcoming 75-story Beekman St. residential tower

In ‘Office Semaphore,’ it’s business as unusual
By Harry Newman
For the next two months, visitors to Chase Manhattan Plaza in Lower Manhattan may be surprised by a bright blue tourist telescope — complete with observation guide — standing at the northeast corner of Liberty and William Streets.

Santa’s second life on stage
By Vivienne Leheny
It should come as no surprise that Santa is a Song and Dance Man. Anyone who can command the national stage — nay, the world stage! — for a full month of festivities has to be a real showstopper.

Communication breakdown
By Scott Harrah
Traveling abroad can be either a culturally enlightening experience or a disorienting ordeal, depending upon one’s interest in jetting overseas to encounter strange foods, unfamiliar customs, and foreign languages.

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10TH ANNIVERSARY CELEBRATION The theater ensemble Universes is celebrating their anniversary with the premiere of “Sweat & The Last Word,” a portrait of artists and the vibrant culture, traditions and personal experiences they bring to their work. Fri., Nov. 17 at 7:30pm. $20. “Slanguage,” on Sat., Nov. 18 at 7:30pm, features the sights and sounds of NYC with storytelling, poetry, rap, gospel, jazz, blues and more. $20. Abrons Arts Center, Henry Street Settlement, 466 Grand St. 212-352-3101. www.henrystreet.org/arts.

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