The Stink At Flushing Bay:
The Slow Flow Of Studies,
Money And Answers

By TAMARA HARTMAN

Someone gave Flushing the finger forty years ago and a heated Borough Board was still hurt, angry and demanding action this week.

“I just can’t believe what I’m hearing . . .This is an outrage,” Borough President Claire Shulman told the board members as she listened to an update from the Army Corps of Engineers about their progress on a three year study to determine what needs to be done with Flushing Bay and the breakwater, or “finger,” that stops its natural circulation of water.

“There has to be a better way to do this,” she insisted and her words were exclamated by an animated Councilwoman Helen Marshall, who insisted that the bay is filling in more each day because of the finger and “pretty soon you’ll be able to walk across the bay.”

But even as the elected officials began to yell with their frustration and Councilwoman Karen Koslowitz blurted out “that’s absurd!,” Army Corp of Engineer Civil Engineer Peter Blum maintained his study is on schedule, he is looking for community input, and it would take “an act of Congress” to remove the finger until after his study is done.

It was called a “finger” and a “dike” at this week’s heated Borough Board meeting, but Army Corps of Engineer Civil Engineer Peter Blum explained that the structure in question is a “breakwater” built about the same time of the 1964-65 Worlds Fair to protect boats in the marina from the crashing of the tide. It’s purpose was to create a “safe harbor.”

The “dike” shown in this map is stopping Flushing Bay’s natural circulation of water, resulting in a lack of tidal flow. Map provided by the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers

However, Marshall maintains that according to her research, the Corps only wanted to build a 1400 foot dike, but City Planner Robert Moses had the “finger” extended to touch land at LaGuardia Airport.

However as it creates a “safe harbor,” water flows with more force toward the shore than it does back over the dike, and so it drops silt, dirt and whatever else it is carrying on one side . . . effectively increasing the size of the dike over time.

“You could drive a truck out there at one time, only the Port Authority would stop you and send you back saying you were on airport property,” Marshall said.

The result over time has been a lack of tidal flow in Flushing Bay. “We need a nice flushing Bay . . . the verb, I mean,” Marshall said.

The lack of water circulation becomes a greater problem with the additional lack of a sewerage retention tank. During a “weather event” – which generally is taken to mean a heavy rain – there is nowhere to store the extra rain water and sewage and so they are released together, without treatment, into Flushing Bay.

The end result, as silt builds up in the bay because the tidal action is not strong and the breakwater acts as a filter, is at times a low tide with stranded sewage.

Adding to the controversy, according to Marshall, is the issue of how much of the finger remains in tact. When the Port Authority expanded its runway 13 overrun for safety purposes, they got a permit from the Corps to remove the dike down to “3.2 feet above mean water level.”

“To this day, I still can’t get anyone to tell me why they had to bring it to 3.2 feet above mean water level,” Marshall lamented, but explained that the result was the dike is visible at low tide and hidden at high tide. Following Monday’s Borough Board meeting, Marshall and Shulman expressed hope that a confusion of permits at the time when the Port Authority did this work could allow the Corps to go around their current feasibility study and jump right to the removal of the dike.

Marshall maintained that although she does not have a completed environmental impact study to prove it, she does have a new and modern method of breaking the water to make the harbor boat safe already in place and removing the dike completely can only help the problem.

Crowley’s office pointed out that “Navigation, as well as environmental problems, besiege the bay. The authorized level of depth for the Federal Channel at Flushing Bay and Creek is 15 feet, but in many locations it is far shallower. The Army Corp project will fully re-open the channel and allow increased commerce and jobs in the area."

Blum explained that the mandate of the Army Corps of Engineers has been expanded and refined so that they now look at “environmental restoration” wherever they are requested to study . . . not just were the federal government has had some hand in the problem.

He explained to the Tribune that the Corps is currently in the middle of its three year  “cost-shared feasibility study” expected to be completed by the Fall of 2002. The study is actually a joint project between the Corps, the Port Authority, which has brought money to the project, and the City of New York, which has put its Department of Environmental Protection (DEP) engineering expertise into the mix. Blum added that the city DEP is scheduled to have their model study for the area completed this summer.

So far, the Corps work has identified the following “opportunities” present in the Bay and creek area: “Tidal wetland restoration, freshwater wetland restoration, hydrologic modifications – dredging, dike removal – partial or total, reorientation of Federal navigation channel, bank stabilization and debris removal.”

Blum explained that the current study includes more than just the bay. The Corps is doing reconnaissance and evaluation for an area that includes Flushing Creek, Willow and Meadow Lakes, and Flushing Airport.

But what course of action needs to be taken to help the environment and the complaints about Flushing Bay will only be decided and the permit process put into place when the current study has evaluated all the possibilities and proposed its best solution for the ecosystem and the neighborhood.

The Corps has also been approached by the New York City Economic Development Corp. about possible cost-sharing partnerships in the future at other city sites.

Over the past two years, Crowley has secured “a little over two million dollars in hand” to the Army Corps of Engineers which has provided the money to make the study of the bay, the creek, and the lakes possible.

This year, Crowley’s request for an additional $4.4 million to complete the study and dredge 150,000 yards of bay material passed the House of Representatives in June and is now awaiting review by the Senate. Crowley got the funding included in the Fiscal Year 2002 Energy and Water Appropriations bill, and included a million dollars more than President George Bush’s budget request had allowed. He hopes to see dredging in the Bay “late in 2001,” according to his statement announcing the progress.

Crowley described the progress in Congress as “great news for residents of Queens and the Bronx, especially those living near Flushing Bay and Creek . . . A cleaner Flushing Bay and Creek will lead to the future economic development and jobs, and a better quality of life in our waterfront communities.

“My goal is the total clean-up of Flushing Bay,” Crowley pledged.

In response to Shulman’s challenge at the board meeting that monthly update meetings on Flushing Bay were essential for the project to move forward, Crowley’s office is scheduling its first such meeting for Sept. 4 at the Congressman’s Jackson Heights office.

Shulman told Crowley’s Legislative Director Kevin Casey, that in long-agonized situations like Flushing Bay “you never reach a conclusion unless you demand movement from month to month” and she recommended that the regular checkups include someone from Borough Hall, someone from the City Council, the Port Authority, the DEP, the Department of Environmental Conservation (DEC) and a representative of Wildlife & Fishery.

In January of 1989, the Queens Tribune reported on a Borough Board meeting that echoed some of the issues addressed this week.

“Something about Flushing Bay stinks and some civic leaders say it is not just the odors that notoriously emanate from the waterway,” the story by David Oats read. It went on to say that although the Borough Board approved of “an environmental impact study” for the creation of a  “40 million gallon sewer tank” to stop raw sewage from overflowing into the bay in the rain, some civic leaders were still concerned about the impact of the project on the neighborhood.

The update at this week’s Borough Board meeting from the DEP was that the “43 million gallon facility,” which includes 15 million gallons of in-line storage in the way of “retro-fitted sewers” and 28 million gallons off-line storage, is scheduled for completion in November of 2004. The facility will have three new, permanent ball fields and a parks facility on top of it and the only place where air will escape from the storage tanks will have a state-of-the-art filter system, even though the DEP told the Borough Board that in their studies, an air filter system has never been needed at these kinds of facilities.

Guardian Angel Group:
Helping Kids With Cancer

By LIZ GOFF

Patricia Manning was nine years old when she first joined other young cancer patients at a holiday party sponsored by Tony Mazzarella, proprietor of the Waterfront Crabhouse in Long Island City, and a group of concerned volunteers.

Patti was an immediate favorite at the parties – a bubbly, happy child with a sense of understanding far beyond her years.

When Patti failed to show up at the 1986 party, the volunteers and others at the Crabhouse hoped that treatments for her illness kept her away. Those hopes were crushed when, late into the party, Patti’s father and sister walked into the room.

Patti, then 11 years old, had lost her long battle with the disease. But before she passed away, the young girl wrote a letter to Mazzarella and his volunteers – a letter she asked her family to read at the party.

In her letter, Patti thanked everyone involved for their efforts, year after year, to improve the quality of life of young cancer patients. She thanked the volunteers and the staff at the Crabhouse for the “love and happiness” they brought to her and the “other kids.”

Children’s parties are among the ways that the Patti Fund raises money to help children battling cancer.

In early 1987, Mazzarella mustered his “troops” and created the Patricia Manning Memorial Fund in Patti’s name. Their mission was clear – to raise as much money as possible for direct support to the families of kids with cancer. The group attached itself to the American Cancer Society for guidance and patients’ information, then set off to achieve its goals through a series of annual fundraisers.

Since its inception, the group – now dubbed the “Patti Fund, Inc.,” has distributed a half-million dollars to patients, families, hospitals and children’s organizations in the New York metropolitan area.

The Patti Fund is operated by a staff of dedicated volunteers who meet at least once each week to determine which youngsters have the greatest immediate need. Funds collected by the group do not pay for salaries, overhead, or any of the “normal” override expenses incurred by such organizations. The only expenses paid for by the fund are postage, advertising and food or services needed at the fundraisers that are not donated.

Santa visits the Crabhouse party each year.

Otherwise, every cent collected for the children goes directly to the children and their families to override medicine, travel expenses (trips for treatment), special food, prosthetics, wigs, home medical and home care products, and other items required for the care of the kids.

“We make special grants to pediatric oncology centers for equipment and supplies which are not covered in the organization’s annual operating budget.

We provide in-kind donations, including television for children’s hospital rooms and treatment areas, VCRs, video libraries and games.

We sponsor artists to transform bleak treatment areas. Daybeds that double as reclining chairs are donated to hospitals so parents may retain some level of comfort when they remain at their child’s bedside at all hours of the day and night,” Mazzarella said.

“When patients receive chemotherapy treatments, hair loss is quite common.

The Patti Fund, Inc. designs and distributes a wide selection of hats that encompass the latest styles of sports, animation and children’s interests. The hats are provided to hospital staff at no cost, and we fill special orders for children whenever requested,” he said.

“The Patti Fund, Inc. sponsors annual amateur boxing fund raising events in concert with the United States Amateur Boxing Association.

Other annual events include our famous ‘Jail and Bail’ fundraiser, Annual Golf Classic, 50s Dance, Halloween Costume Ball and Italian Night,” Mazzarella said. “Our July 4 Block Party is our calling card for fun and entertainment.

More information about the Patti Fund is available on the group’s website at www.pattifund.org.

People from all over New York come to this event, which coincides with Macy’s spectacular fireworks display. Attendance has swelled to over 7,000 each year as more people are eager to help children with cancer and secure a prime waterfront view for the show.

The July 4 bash is simulcast over FM radio stations, from its opening time until ‘til the last firecracker fizzles over the East River.” The most recent July 4 was a success, according to organizers.

Most recently, the Patti Fund donated $2,000 to the Yale Pediatrics Cancer Center for training of teachers on dealing with children with cancer who returned to school, $4,000 for the Annual Holiday/Christmas Party at Columbia Presbyterian Hospital for 200 youngsters with their siblings, and $10,000 to the Bone Marrow Foundation for the screening and testing of children requiring bone marrow transplants.

For more information on the fund, contact the group’s web site at Pattifund.org, call 729-4862, or write to the Patti Fund at 2-03 Borden Ave., Long Island City, NY 11101.

The Patti Fund, Inc./Care for Childhood Cancer is a not-for-profit organization.