Bay Ridge-Dyker Heights-Bath Beach Council Candidate Bob Capano and his Campaign Chairman Curtis Sliwa participate in Saturday HOMELESS protest event for their Greenwood-Sunset Park neighbors

Capano & Sliwa support local communities’ protest in a nearby Brooklyn neighborhood  ---  lending their presence reacting to this plea:  “ATTENTION SUNSET PARK RESIDENTS: OUR TOWN NEEDS YOUR SUPPORT”

Candidate Capano unveils his own evolving homeless policy positions in response to Mayor de Blasio’s panicked & unlawful "Homeless Hotels" response to the recent explosion of homelessness throughout NYC

Southwest Brooklyn City Council Candidate Bob Capano and one of his better-known Campaign Co-chairmen appeared on Saturday at an anti-shelter protest  --  but pro-homeless event  --  in the Sunset Park-Greenwood neighborhoods including  the blocks near24^th Street and 4^th Avenue,  formerly known as South Brooklyn.   The protest-event was hosted by several local Sunset Park groups like The Village of Sunset Park, along with the Maspeth-Middle Village Task Force  Citizens United and Citizens Defending Libraries.   Featured at the protest-event were members of the Queens-based Juniper Park Civic Association based in Middle Village and Maspeth Queens. 

One speaker was Bob Holden, who’s  the President of the Juniper Park Civic Assn.,  now leading a movement throughout the city after de Blasio proposed turning a hotel into a homeless shelter in Maspeth with no local community notification or input.  He is taking these rallies/protests around the city to places like 24th Street and 4th Avenue, where NYC is now housing the homeless in one of the  new hotels, that have been built there recently.   

Holden  brought his folks to Sunset Park because de Blasio and the City homeless authorities have done much the same at the Sunset Park-Greenwood sight as had been done in Maspeth, Queens. Holden’s  message was balanced and well-reasoned ---  “We are not opposed to finding housing for the Homeless -- [BUT] -- we are opposed to the[ir] being warehoused in hotels with no community input or notification….” 

PRIOR RELATIONSHIP BETWEEN CURTIS SLIWA AND EVENT'S CITY-WIDE  ORGANIZERS  ---   CAPANO INTRODUCED AND STANDS SHOULDER TO SHOULDER WITH SLIWA AT EVENT

Sliwa has had Holden on his radio show on this issue several times.   Sliwa met with Capano when he arrived;  and along with Bob,  discussed the local nuances of the City’s unannounced dumping of the homeless in Brooklyn neighborhoods with several of the event organizers and participants.

CAPANO TALKS ABOUT HIS POSITONS INVOLVING THE HOMELESS

According to Bob Capano  ---   “ Brooklyn Community Board 7, which covers Sunset Park and Windsor Terrace, got no notification of the City’s plan to house the homeless in many of the hotels in South Brooklyn. These hotel rooms cost an extraordinary amount for taxpayers and as we heard directly Saturday from someone actually living in one of these facilities….” 

Capano then started to explain what might be the beginnings of his own  “homeless policy “  ---  “[N]o city services are being offered to help these individuals get on their feet. They are literally just being warehoused. They need to be re-integrated and again become a part of the communities where they have lived for years…”  --    and  --  “ [T]hat can only happen if the mayor and his administration works with the community, not just them showing up in the middle of the night with bunches of homeless people on buses….”

Capano then noted how, when he was Director of Community Boards under Brooklyn Borough President Marty Markowitz, COUNCILMAN Bill de Blasio always spoke about community notification and input when it came to anything Mayor Bloomberg's administration tried to do, now as Mayor he ignores his own words. "He is a hypocrite," said Capano referring to de Blasio, while noting that "... chants of  ---   'One Term Mayor' --- were prominent..."  at the Sunset Park-Greenwood protest-event.