Items tagged with 'albany'
The Giants Super Bowl license plate
You'll no doubt be heartbroken to find out that "ELI4EVER" won't fit on the Giants plate.
The state Department of Motor Vehicles unveiled a Giants 2012 Super Bowl Champions custom plate today. They're $60, plus a $31.25 renewal fee, non-customized. If you want to express your love for Eli with a custom plate number, that's another $60.
Speaking of this stuff: Will the city of Albany update those "Albany / Mayor Jennings welcomes you / Summer Home of the Super Bowl XLII Champion New York Giants" signs now? Maybe it's a good time to swap the signs for something along the lines of simply, "Welcome to Albany / Capital of the Empire State."
image via NY Governor's Office
Miss Albany Diner building sold to Matt Baumgartner and partners
Miss Albany Diner.
Matt Baumgartner posted today that he and business partners Jimmy and Demetra Vann have bought the Miss Albany Diner building. The name "Miss Albany Diner" and its recipes are not part of the deal:
Mrs. [Jane] Brown and her son Bill, are legally keeping the name "Miss Albany Diner" as well as their recipes, and they maintain the right to open another diner in another location, as well as having the right to sell the name Miss Albany Diner and it's recipes to an interested party at another location. As new owners of the property, we legally can not continue to operate the space as Miss Albany Diner or use their menu items. I'm only noting that because it is important to us that it is clear that we are not "closing down Miss Albany Diner". They sold us the property, and we are not legally allowed to re-open Miss Albany Diner in that space.
On a personal note, I would like to thank Jane and Bill Brown, for giving us the opportunity to care for a building that is considered by many to be one of the most iconic buildings in the capital region. I know the Browns hold the diner very dear to their hearts, and I promise we will respect the history, the memory, and the integrity of Miss Albany Diner.
Baumgartner told Steve Barnes they don't have immediate plans to re-open the place as a diner. [Table Hopping]
The diner had been for sale since 2009. Cliff Brown, who owned the diner with his wife Jane, passed away in 2010. [TU] [TU]
The diner was built in 1941 and is on the National Register of Historic Places. It's had at least three names prior to being called the Miss Albany. [National Register] [Wikipedia]
Of course, Baumgartner and his partners own Wolff's, which is just next door to MAD.
photo: UpstateNYer via Wikipedia
Parsons Corporate Trivia Challenge
Here's a chance to get the office nerds intellectuals together to have some fun and help out a good cause.
Parsons Child and Family Center is hosting its first Corporate Trivia Challenge on March 1st at Jillian's. You can register your office team of up to five people until February 8th. It's $15 dollars for an individual or $60 for a team.
Here's how it works:
+Teams compete in 20 rounds of questions, administered by Kevin Baker of Trivia Nights Live.+Questions range in difficulty, and also in point value. Teams receive positive points for every correct answer, but lose points for each incorrect answer. For the final question teams bid, up to their maximum point total, based on the final category (before hearing the question)
+The team with the most points at the end of 20 questions is the winner
Now, look around the office and choose your experts wisely.
(Thanks, Chuck!)
Severed dog head found along Route 85
Weird/disturbing story of the day: Albany police say a severed dog head found along Route 85 near the Harriman State Office Campus Monday morning. From the press release:
The Animal Control Officer located a pit bull's head that had been severed. It was on the roadway just before the Washington Avenue overpass. A search of the immediate area initially did not locate the body of the dog. ...
It initially could not be determined whether it's had been intentionally severed or if it was struck by a car.
A search was conducted late this morning and the dog's body was found in between the eastbound and westbound lanes in between the cement supports of the Washington Avenue overpass.
The owner of the dog, who lives in Albany, was located today and she told police the dog was acting strange this past Friday and it got loose from her and took off. She had put out flyers and posters for her dog and called the Mohawk Hudson Humane Society to report her dog missing.
APD spokesman Jimmy Miller told the TU today that the DEC pathologist who examined the dog called the case "very unusual."
Full press release after the jump.
Egg and Cheese Sandwich at Jack's Diner
Hard roll, two eggs, cheese.
Update: Details on the full Tour de Egg Sandwich are now available at fUSSYlittleBLOG.
All egg sandwiches are not created equal.
And I'm not even talking about different forms of egg sandwiches that can be enjoyed all around the country. Like in Philly where they scramble the egg and put it on an Amoroso hoagie roll. Or in New Jersey it comes with Taylor ham and saltpepperketchup. In New Mexico you will find scrambled eggs in the form of a burrito stuffed with green chile. Here, we put flattened fried-eggs and American cheese on a grilled hard roll, which I've recently discovered is decidedly not hard.
In the Capital Region almost every diner, deli, convenience store, bakery, and cherished institution produces a version of this sandwich. So, to better understand what makes our egg and cheese so special, I recently went on a Tour de Egg Sandwich along with 17 other likeminded eaters.
The competition among the five places was close. Very close. In the Tour de Egg Sandwich voting, Jack's Diner in Albany edged out McCarroll's in Delmar by a nose, with Famous Lunch in Troy nipping at their heels.
So what sets this diner apart?
An Albany aquarium?
From the National Aquarium in Baltimore's Inner Harbor area.
Rob (@paintaneight) pointed out a recent letter to the editor in the TU calling for the construction of an aquarium in downtown Albany instead of a convention center. From the letter by Lino Verelli of Slingerlands:
... An educational center to see, feel and be able to interact with the creatures and beauty of the oceans.
Open seven days, it would provide jobs for a dedicated staff of professionals and the countless support services necessary to its maintenance.
If managed correctly, this center would generate jobs, sales taxes, hotel taxes, visitors' fees and something totally unique to the fabric of this city.
Rob was curious what people thought about this idea (we get the sense he likes it, but we're just reading between the tweets) -- and so are we. So, aquarium -- yes/no/maybe?
We re-tweeted Rob's question yesterday and there were a handful of responses -- they're after the jump. Update: We've also embedded comments from AOA's Facebook page.
Our initial reaction to the idea: skeptical. It seems like an urban planning cliche, a possible white elephant (or maybe "white whale" is more apt).
photo: Flickr user seannaber
An alleged inside job -- by an 11-year-old
Albany police say they've arrested an 11-year-old boy for allegedly breaking into cars near Washington Park -- and running an inside job robbery on a Lark Street store. From the APD press release:
Officer Michael Geraci was following up on a burglary report last Thursday with the owner of Frame Workshop at 215 Lark Street. The owner stated that someone had entered the business through a unlocked window between Wednesday night and Thursday morning and stole $240 from the cash register. Several picture frames, which were in front of the window, were also damaged when the suspect climbed in.
The owner told Officer Geraci that a young boy, who he had befriended, had been hanging around the business over the last couple of days and was inside on several occasions. He believed that the boy had intentionally unlocked the window while he was inside the shop so he could get inside when the business was closed. The owner gave Officer Geraci the boy's name and showed him a picture of the boy on Facebook.
The full press release is pasted after the jump.
This is at least the second recent arrest that's resulted from Geraci noticing something on his Center Square beat (the other: the man who allegedly posed as a detective). Both cases point to the potential payoff of having beat cops and community policing (and admittedly, it's a tiny sample). Would those arrests have been made without it? Sure, maybe. But having an officer out in the neighborhood, talking to people, making connections couldn't have hurt.
Albany High School: An alum's perspective
Some people I've met have found it hard to believe that I'm a graduate of Albany High School.
When I was in high school I worked at a store in Stuyvesant Plaza. An older customer once asked where I went to high school, so I told her. She subsequently went on to tell me how she, too, was an Albany Academy girl and what a fabulous education I must be receiving. I hated to correct her, as she was so happy to reminisce, but I said, "No, no -- I go to Albany High."
Her response? A rather deflated, "Oh."
I attended Albany High from 1995 through 1999 and the perception of the school hasn't changed much in 12 years. And while I can't attest to the student experience today, I've always been appreciative of my time at Albany High and am proud to be a Falcon.
Let me tell you why.
More on the boxing movie being filmed at the TU Center
Here's a little more background on the film being shot at the TU Center next month. The Challenger, was written and directed by Kent Moran(that's his picture on the right), who says they signed Smallville's Justin Hartley for the film today. It will also star Moran and Ernie Sabella.
Moran says the film is an inspirational movie about a kid growing up in the South Bronx "He has to turn to boxing to win his life back. It's his journey of finding himself and getting confidence back and rekindling relationship with his family."
If you come to the TU Center for the February 4 fight, you'll have the opportunity to stay and be an extra in some of the crowd shots. That shoot will start around 10 pm and run through the night.
We spoke with Moran today and he says there will be a few other opportunities for locals to be a part of the film. They're looking to get a crowd to show up at the TU Center during the day on February 27, when they'll be filming scenes with some of the leads. That shoot may bleed over into the 28. He says it's a family film and they're looking for all types and all ages. Anyone who shows up will have a chance to take part.
The TU Center is the only Capital Region location being used in the film. The rest of the movie will be shot in The Bronx. Moran says he found the TU Center after a scout, but had heard the Albany was a supportive place to make films.
There are also a few small roles that remain un-cast and Moran says he may look to local actors to fill some of those.
A few years ago he wrote a film called Listen to Your Heart, which starred Cybil Shepard and Ernie Sabella. That film was distributed in limited theatrical release, then on-demand and then picked up by television. Moran describes The Challenger as "a low budget indie" and expects that it will be more of a festival film which will then make its way to theaters.
Albany Distilling Company
John Curtin and Matthew Jager, founders of the new Albany Distilling Company.
Almost every guy thinks about it at one time or another, says Matthew Jager. The "manly dream" of owning a bar. And that's how it all started out.
Matthew, who teaches at The College of Saint Rose's business school, and his buddy John Curtin, a leadership trainer and former English teacher, were hanging out at the Albany Pump Station, having a couple of drinks, when one of them said, "Hey, you know what we should do? We should open a bar!" And the other one said, "Yeah!"
Eighteen months and $300,000 later, they do not own a bar.
Instead, they own a distillery -- The Albany Distilling Company -- in a building right next door to the Albany Pump Station. A few months from now they're hoping to put their white whiskey on the shelves of bars and restaurants around the region.
Have they ever made whiskey before? No. But this little hitch doesn't seem to worry them.
Left on red
The light that wouldn't turn.
Choose your own adventure time: You're at the traffic light at the end of the I-90/Route 9 off-ramp at Northern Boulevard in Albany. There are four cars waiting to turn left at the red light. You wait. You wait. You wait. Minutes pass. The light doesn't change. Do you...
1. Turn left on red.
2. Go around one of the cars ahead of you so you can turn left on red.
3. Move to the right lane so you can turn right on red.
4. Sit there and hope that the light will change. Someday.
I'm curious about what you would have done in that situation. Because this happened to me the other day -- and the choices made by the other three cars in line surprised me. It made me wonder I had missed some memo about community standards regarding slow-cycling/possibly broken traffic lights.
Here's how it shook out.
A co-working space for Albany, and an update for Troy
A coworking space called Beahive is scheduled to open in downtown Albany. The company opened its first coworking space in Beacon in 2009, and has another one in Kingston (that's a pic of the Beacon space on the right). From its page for the Albany space:
Our third hive should be open in the Capital Region at 418 Broadway (Downtown Albany) by March 2012.
We'll have a mix of work and lounge areas, meeting space, desks and tables, sofas and armchairs.
We expect to have members not only from Albany but also surrounding towns -- Troy, Rensselaer, Colonie and beyond.
Our space will also be available to rent for events, parties, workshops and group meetings, with flexible rates depending on the use.
There's an open house for the Albany space February 8.
The Biz Review had an article about the space today, and reports it's a partnership with the real estate agent Tracy Metzger.
Collar Collective
There have been a few attempts to get co-working spaces started in the Capital District. The Collar Collective is currently setting up in Troy. Its founder, Brian Corrigan, told us the plan is to start small with about 10 desks. And in order to keep the crowd more or less focused on tech, it will be nerds-only by application. Brian says it's very much open to nerds at-large, so if you're interested, contact him.
photo: Beahive
What is the oldest business in Albany?
R.B. Wing and Son once had a claim to the title.
Over at Hoxsie I recently unearthed a 1905 ad for Danker Florist, which is still going strong today. And that led to the question: What might be the oldest business still running in Albany?
There are a few contenders.
PCRM wants Albany to cut cheese
Pass the pepper jack, please.
If you travel Route 378 near 787 you might have seen the billboards that went up this week. One shows the stomach of an obese man with a caption that reads "Your abs on cheese." There's also one at the intersection of Route 9 and 20 that features a woman's cottage cheese thighs and reads, "Your thighs on cheese." A group called The Physicians Committee for Responsible Medicine sponsored them. [WTEN] [TU]
Recently the group's president, Dr. Neal Barnard, wrote a letter to the president of the Albany city school board, urging the district to reduce the number dairy products on school menus . [TU]
It sometimes helps to know where the message is coming from, so here's a little bit about Physicians Committee for Responsible Medicine...
A quick scan of Andrew Cuomo's 2012 budget
Let me show you some PowerPoints...
Updated Tuesday at 6:30 pm.
Andrew Cuomo and his administration presented their proposed 2012-2013 budget this afternoon. The budget is a big deal for the state, because it's the Cuomo administration putting its money (actually, all our money) where its mouth is.
This year's presentation was less dramatic than last year -- there was no declaration of the state being "functionally bankrupt." Cuomo touted the measures taken in last year's budget for helping to make things easier this year. "We regained the public trust," he said, "That is a great gift and an awesome responsibility. Let's build on it this year, even higher, together." (pause for applause)
So, we watched the address and skimmed through the budget briefing docs so you don't have to. Here's a quick overview of Cuomo's proposed budget...
APD: man was responding to police calls, identifying himself as a detective
Weird: Albany police say a 19-year-old man has admitted to responding to "several dozen" police calls over the past year, representing himself as a detective.
From the APD press release:
On Tuesday evening just after 5:00 p.m. officers investigating a person with a gun call were involved in a brief foot pursuit that led to a arrest for criminal trespass at 273 Third Street. Officer [Michael] Geraci was one of the officers who responded to the call and he located a handgun on Thornton Street. Several minutes after the call went out [Ryan] Mann showed up to the scene on Thornton Street. ...
Mann was wearing eye glasses, had on a blue fleece jacket, dress shirt and tie, khaki pants and shoes. He had a bullet proof vest on and was carrying a portable radio, similar to one that police officers carry.
Officer Geraci initially questioned him at the scene and Mann was brought to the detective division to be interviewed. Mann admitted to responding to several dozen calls over the past year, mostly in the Center Square area. He monitored police calls through a phone application that scans police transmissions, carried a police badge from Oakland, California and would identify himself as Detective Ruff when he encountered people in the public.
The APD says Geraci nabbed Mann after recognizing him from responding to other police calls in the Lark Street area.
There is no indication at this time that Mann specifically targeted anyone or anything for gain or that he was a threat to anyone. He was scheduled for a mental health evaluation.
Mann has been charged with criminal possession of stolen property, but for the moment, not impersonation. APD says it's still investigating.
More details in the full press released pasted after the jump.
All Good Bakers moving
All Good Bakers announced yesterday that it's moving from its first storefront on Quail Street in Albany to a bakery space on Delaware Ave (or, the DelSo, as you also like to call it).
Write owners Britin and Nick Foster over on their blog:
[The spot] that has been calling our names for years, 540 Delware Avenue, was vacant, and offered a multitude of improvements: Three times the square footage, 10 parking spaces, a slightly larger retail area, reasonable rent, fully-installed fire-suppression system (with fans and hood - a huge expense!), better quality finishes, on a main thoroughfare, accessible to our Delmar customers (but still in Albany) and we could walk to work in good weather! ... We've lived in the DelSo neighborhood since moving here in 2003 - having our bakery here will be an absolute dream come true for us. We'll start acquiring equipment and navigating the city permitting process next week. We're hoping to open sometime between mid-February and mid-March, and will operate on Quail St. until then.
The space is the strip of storefronts next to the recently opened Mingle. The last tenant in the space was also a bakery, called In the Mix.
AGB says they were able to make the move thanks in part to financing from the Community Loan Fund of the Capital Region.
We can only hope they're taking the toast with them.
Earlier on AOA:
+ Interesting in 2011: Britin and Nick Foster
+ Eat this: Grilled cheese at All Good Bakers
APD chief Krokoff to councilmen and others: Shame!
Albany Community Television has posted the video of last night's Common Council caucus in which police chief Steven Krokoff recounted how the department viewed the events involved with the removal of Occupy Albany from Academy Park -- for example, he explained that department didn't want to all the tent to parade around the streets again, stopping traffic.
And then he went off on a few members of the council. Here's a transcription of part of his statement:
Shame on a very small group of people in the Occupy Albany movement who chose not to take their frustrations to the court, and translate those frustrations into legal action.
Shame on a small group of people who defied common decency and demonstrated a lack of respect for their fellow human beings.
Shame on a group of people who chose to convolute their own organizational message by conducting themselves without dignity and without concern for their fellow citizens.
Shame on councilman [Dominick] Calsolaro, a leader in this city, who lacked the internal discipline to keep from getting caught up in the emotion and frenzy of those moments. When your department needed your leadership, you were not there.
Shame on councilman [Anton] Konev and councilman [Lester] Freeman, who at every turn seemed to be so willing to distort the truth of any situation, no matter how tragic, and use it for their own personal gain. Shame on them for being too weak to stand for the truth. Shame on you both for mattering so little to yourself and your community that you have to create hate and further half-truths just to feel some sense of relevancy. This entire city has seen the content of your character and I pity you both.
It's remarkable to see a public official call out other officials like that during a public meeting. Later in the meeting Konev called Krokoff's remarks "distasteful" and accused him of using "selective hearing." Calsolaro said he had been asked by constituents to be at the park, and he felt like he was doing his job. Calsolaro also said he had been asking people in the crowd to stay away from the police horse. (It was the mounted officer who ended up using pepper spray during the struggle over the tent.)
The whole video includes responses from the council members, and discussion with Krokoff about the events that night. Krokoff's opening statement starts at the 6:30 mark.
(And be sure to read JCE's tweets from the meeting.)
Earlier on AOA: The eviction of Occupy Albany
screengrab: Albany Community Television
The new Lark Tavern opens
The new Lark Tavern reopened quietly on New Year's Eve.
Eighteen months after fire closed the Lark Tavern, a new version of the popular bar/restaurant on Madison Avenue in Albany has opened.
When you walk in the door you'll recognize it. Sort of. You might get that sense of wait, I've been here before -- haven't I?
The new owners -- Ryan Hancox, his wife Mary Silverstein, and their partner Laura Bianchino -- have redesigned a bit. There's a brand new kitchen and a nook for a piano bar that used to be a storage closet. And the structure itself has pretty much been rebuilt on the inside. Overall the new Lark Tavern looks like a modernized version of its former self.
We stopped in to check it out and meet the new owners.
Ice skating at the Empire State Plaza
Fun.
The ice skating rink at the ESP re-opened this past Saturday for the first time since 2008. So, of course, we had to take a few turns.
Here are a few details if you decide to go. (And you totally should.)
Interesting in 2011: Laura Glazer
"I can only really be myself..."
All this week we're highlighting some of the interesting people we've gotten to know over the past year.
Laura Glazer's voice has a breathy, tiny, childlike sweetness about it, but it's not the kind of voice you're used to hearing on the radio. Still, since 2003, she's been introducing the Capital Region to all kinds of fun and interesting music on her radio program Hello Pretty City.
A little over a year ago HPC moved from its morning slot on WRPI to Sunday nights at 8 on WEXT. With that move, Glazer pretty much doubled her audience, and in the last year we've noticed her hosting live shows, appearing with WEXT at shows like Larkfest and curating the music line-up for events like the Local Harvest Festival.
But we were first introduced to Laura through her wonderful photography. For the last few years she's been photographing Phillip Patterson's efforts to transcribe the entire King James Bible by hand -- a project that was featured in the The Wall Street Journal earlier this week.
In addition her fun pins and drawings, Albany wallpaper and other art projects help make the Capital Region a more fun place to live.
Laura came to the Capital Region about ten years ago after having lived in Virginia, New York City, Minneapolis, Texas and a number of other places, but she's made a home in Albany. As she preps for the first Hello Pretty City of 2012, we talked with her about music, art, Albany, pinball and the party at Sponge Bob's house.
Interesting in 2011: Britin and Nick Foster
Nick and Britin Foster, with their daughter Katie.
All this week we'll be highlighting some of the interesting people we've gotten to know over the past year.
Britin and Nick Foster took a big step this year when they opened a storefront for All Good Bakers, their organic bakery that had previously only sold at the Delmar Farmers' Market and via a community supported bakery arrangement. And they've seen success: the storefront on Quail Street in Albany has been one of the bright spots in a neighborhood that's needed a lift.
It's been interesting to watch Britin and Nick build their business -- both because of the way they seem to conscientiously make decisions about ingredients and operations, as well as their savvy use of social media to spread the word about their products.
And we get the sense they're baking up bigger things in 2012...
Interesting in 2011: Samson Contompasis
Living Walls Albany creator Samson Contompasis
All this week we'll be highlighting some of the interesting people we've gotten to know over the past year.
Drive around the city of Albany these days and you're likely to feel the influence of Samson Contompasis. He's the guy responsible for most of the large scale mural art that's been popping up on walls all over the city. He didn't paint it, but he made it happen.
It's likely you've heard of Samson before -- The Marketplace Gallery founder and operator is pretty well known on the Capital Region arts scene. But this past fall he brought the first Living Walls Conference to Albany. The event attracted internationally-renowned mural artists to Albany, and before they left, they transformed walls all over the city into public art. Some people like the work, others... not so much, but either way, it definitely got people talking. The conference also had workshops on sustainability and lectures, all of which Samson says were meant to create "an open dialogue between the people and city."
We caught up with Samson a few weeks ago while he was curating the mural art at Art Basel, an international art show in Miami.
Interesting in 2011: Mike Guidice & Jen Pursley Guidice
Hounds on the Hudson owners, and Albany chickens proponents, Mike and Jen.
All this week we'll be highlighting some of the interesting people we've gotten to know over the past year.
We've known about Hounds on the Hudson Mike and Jen for a while, but this year the owners of the local dog walking company became known more for chickens than for dogs.
When the city of Albany took away the chickens they'd been raising for years in the backyard of their Grand Street home, Mike and Jen, along with councilman Dominick Calsolaro and a group of dedicated volunteers, worked to amend a 10-year-old law that prohibits farm animals from being kept in Albany in order to allow for small urban chicken coops.
Word spread quickly through social media, and for a while it seemed that everywhere we went someone was talking about urban chickens. But the issue sparked other conversations about participation in local government and what it really means to be a progressive city. Regardless of the outcome, it was interesting to hear the various opinions.
The Albany chickens group campaigned, refined their ordinance and finally got it passed by the common council, but in the end Jerry Jennings vetoed the law and there were not enough votes on the council to override.
So after all of their efforts, Mike and Jen did not get their chickens back. We've been wondering what they did get out of the whole experience, and what, if anything, is next for Albany chickens.
The eviction of Occupy Albany
Occupy Albany took its protest on the road. Literally.
Updated Friday evening
Following the expiration of its permit Thursday morning, Occupy Albany was evicted from Academy Park that afternoon. City of Albany Department of General Services employees dismantled and removed tents as police watched.
Then things went a bit crazy -- Occupiers took their last tent on a tour of the city's streets before returning to the park. That's when police grabbed the last tent, the scene became chaotic, there was pepper spray, and a few arrests.
Here's a photo log of what we saw.
... said Jenna about The quintessential Capital Region food?