When P.S. 209 principal Jacquelyn Cannon died in May, parents, teachers, and community residents realized they wanted to make sure the school retained the spirit of its much-loved leader.

Now, they’re hoping to go one step further — in renaming the school and a portion of 183rd Street on which the school sits in her honor.

“She was the mother of the school,” said Niya Mitchell, whose third-grade daughter, Ny’Rayah Mitchell, attended the school and whose first-grade son, Charles Fields, is in his second year there.

Read More

Saving a few hundred dollars on heating oil is no small thing for a single mother of three scraping by on a social worker’s salary. Thanks to a Citgo Corporation heating oil discount program, Camille Pow has stashed away some much-needed cash the last two winters.

“I got a deduction of $26 to $30 every month last year, which means $300 more you can look for in your pocket,” said Pow, 45, who rents one of the 1,250 apartments owned by Mount Hope Housing Company, which receives a 40 percent discount on oil from Citgo, then passes the savings on to tenants through rent breaks.

Now the two-year-old program could potentially benefit Pow and other low and moderate-income residents of the 32-building complex in ways they never expected.

Read More

Adam Brock wants to keep his Williamsburg neighborhood green. That’s why the 21-year-old New York University student challenged two mega developers’ plans for the landmark at Community Board 1′s last full board meeting.

Read More

Ida Ortiz-Colon swam in the LaGuardia Bathhouse five decades ago.

“It was awesome,” said Ortiz-Colon, who has lived on the Lower East Side for 52 years. “They had lifeguards and basketball courts. It was great.”

Now Ortiz-Colon wants kids in her neighborhood to have the same opportunity she did. The city closed the three-story building during the 1970s financial crisis and never reopened it.

Read More