By Rachel Holliday Smith – DNA Info
The city is aiming to make this year’s J’Ouvert celebration “safer than ever,” the mayor said Wednesday.
Less than a week before the annual pre-dawn Caribbean festival, Mayor Bill de Blasio held a press conference with the NYPD in Crown Heights to assure the community the event will be safe and organized.
“This year I can say you’re going to see the most extensive security ever at the J’Ouvert celebration,” de Blasio told a crowd just inside Prospect Park on the J’Ouvert parade route on Flatbush Avenue, near Empire Boulevard.
The NYPD plans to double its presence at the event this year, bringing in “several thousand” officers, according to Chief Steven Powers of Brooklyn South.
More than 200 light towers will also be installed at the event and the official parade has been permitted — a first for the loosely organized event whose name means “day break” and which celebrates the beginning of carnival.
“We all appreciate spontaneity, but an event of this importance and size needed to be more structured,” de Blasio said.
The new security comes a year after the death of Cuomo administration attorney Carey Gabay, who was killed by a stray bullet during a gang shooting that took place outside a Crown Heights apartment complex during J’Ouvert.
Gabay was one of many victims of violence that marred the Caribbean holiday in recent years, something organizers and participants of the event want to change.
“J’Ouvert does not have violence. Our culture has no part of violence,” said Yvette Rennie, an organizer of the official J’Ouvert parade.
In the run-up to the event, local leaders and police have aggressively pushed that anti-violence message. Last week, the NYPD, the Brooklyn district attorney’s office and several community groups hung signs in the neighborhood with a blunt warning: “Do not shoot anybody.”
As they went up, some residents took offense to the message, while others cheered the NYPD’s attempt to crack down on those who do harm at an otherwise peaceful event.
The mayor’s office declined to comment on the posters Wednesday. But at the J’Ouvert event, de Blasio made clear who the NYPD was targeting: “A few bad apples.”
“Thousands of people — good people, law-abiding people, people who love their community — participate in these events each year,” he said.
“We are not going to let a few bad apples destroy something that’s so important to hundreds of thousands of good New Yorkers.”
PUBLIC NU..!?! To the best of my recollection, a generation ago, though the participants were not up to our standards in tnius, there was no outright nudity.
But you can blame that on the “Supreme Court,” including some of our people. If gay is okay, so what’s wrong with public nudity? If it bothers anyone,” just don’t look.”
“Holy place of worship?” Well yes, for us who know the truth. But some of ours – no TOO MANY of ours – boast and glorify gay sinagogues and the like.
Cultural norms are relative, and seem even more so when you don’t understand how they developed or can’t relate. No one in the West Indian day parade is deliberately thinking “let me put on this traditional costume so I can force my pritzus onto others.” And, from the outside, Simchas Beis looks kind of awful- men dancing, visible, visceral joy until the sun comes up, while women stand on the sidelines, behind a barricade. We know where we’re coming from, so it makes sense. And none of us like the lines we all can agree get crossed with so much… Read more »
Playing loud music for several nights, might be annoying to some who do not know about or care about Jewish traditions and holidays. But it is not sick, disgusting, or vulgar. This parade on the other hand is full of nudity and disgusting perverted gestures on the part of many of those who are in the parade. Further it goes right in front of a holy place of worship (770), and those going to daven or learn in 770 have a very hard time, not seeing the vulgarity while at the same time still seeing where they are going so… Read more »
I don’t think you have a solid grasp of numbers or how petitions work.
Some one should create this and get 10000 signatures they will then have to move it
The organizers and supporters of the Labor Day parade will tell you something like: “We don’t stop you on your holiday.” So, if we’re allowed to block traffic and play loud music (for them – some like, some don’t like the music) for SEVERAL nights, then why complain for the ONE day they want?
As far as violence, unfortunately, you have that all the time – parade or no parade.
I Loooove myself. And I don’t hate this community but I think it’s time we all admit that we turn a blind eye to some of the less than pleasant aspects of our neighborhoods best time of year and judge truly harshly against our neighbors.
It’s not right.
All those ‘atrocities’ you believe are committed happen predominately on Kingston Ave and the small area that is mostly Jewish. The parade on the other hand rather than being in an area that is predominately black, occurs right in front of 770. Which is intentional rather than accidental. It’s your anger that is blinding you to the obvious.
Unbelievable.
The Rebbe says if you want to be close to the rebbeim of Chabad then you should invest yourself in his community.
Such disloyalty – really amazing.
so true!
Hamayvin yovin…
Obviously u are an idiot an apologist and a self hating jew.
Most of us do not view Tishrei as a “nightmare”, but this so-called Labor Day Parade is a big display of pritzus and is full of wild participants who do not belong on OUR streets.
Move the parade to Manhattan and then let them “celebrate” there for three nights and three days.
A month from now there will be a week when there is an influx of rude foreigners, loud music, vomit in the streets, thorofares shut down at random times, multiple corners that smell like chicken feces for a whole day. and YES! Public urination.
Tishrei can be a nightmare, but because it’s your community you over look the obviously disgusting parts of it.
Take a look at yourselves before you start pointing fingers.
Go way for the weekend and if you can’t just avoid eastern parkway. Stop complaining.
” Our culture has no part of violence “
” A few bad apples.”
I live on the parkway! The entire parade is based on nudity, shmutz, blasting noise from something trying to resemble music, There are no good apples! The respectable shvartze who live here, are totally against this ‘shaidim tantz’
Where is our community ??
This should be moved to Atlantic Av.!!!
Why Eastern Parkway???
Why does the main part of the parade stop at Kingston and EP right in front of 770 and the heart of the Jewish community and hold forth there for most of the day? I would have thought they would want to ‘celebrate’ mainly in midst of their own community and houses of worship. Choosing that particular spot to highlight the whole parade makes it seem as if the main focus of the parade is to get attention from the Jewish community.
if a big rain storm comes, then it will be very safe. maybe we will get lucky and there will be a big rain storm that day
““J’Ouvert does not have violence. Our culture has no part of violence,” said Yvette Rennie,” yeah right…
what is she smoking?
Hanging up sweet “don’t shoot anybody” signs does nothing to prevent the types of people who shoot from acting. Gangs don’t care much for those sweet signs
bunch of shtus. the mayor has decided to remove police barricades that usually guard 770.
now the parade-goers will be able to use the front steps as a public urinal.
thank you for your concern, mr mayor!
How much is all this costing in tax payers money?
Translates as I open. Anyway. Glad safety is improving. The early morning music volume needs to be adjusted to low. Then the situation of garbage left around needs to change. Safety first, and I hope it will lead to better things 🙂
Question: Are there any floats dedicated to ‘labor.?’ If so, why not?
BS”D The ones who shoot cannot read