ON THE MARCH! The grand marshals for this year’s N.Y.U./Community Board 2 Children’s Halloween Parade include some real newsmakers. The trio includes John W. Sutter, The Villager’s former publisher; David Gruber, chairperson of C.B. 2; and Malina Webb, the head of the university’s Student Senate Council. Who knows what these three will be talking about as they lead the march. Maybe by the end, they’ll have worked out answers for everything from saving Pier 40 and the Hudson Square rezoning to what to do with N.Y.U.’s controversial Chick-fil-A franchise. The parade will be from 3 p.m. to 6 p.m. on Wed., Oct. 31.
WITH FACEBOOK FRIENDS LIKE THESE…: Are the Friends of Hudson River Park on the same page as the Hudson River Park Trust? One thing we do know, the Friends’ executive director was recently on our page — as in “The Villager Newspaper” Facebook page. Tom Fox, the former head of the Hudson River Park Conservancy, the Trust’s predecessor, wrote a talking point (“Let’s return to the vision of the Hudson River Park”) for The Villager’s Sept. 13 issue in which he blasted the Trust’s latest idea of building residential housing on Pier 40 to generate revenue to save both the crumbling pier and the whole 5-mile-long park. On our Facebook page, A.J. Pietrantone, the Friends’ director, clicked “Like” under Fox’s talking point. Of course, this follows developer Douglas Durst, chairperson of the Friends, roiling the waters by pitching an alternative Pier 40 plan with parking and a high-tech campus, while saying that residential would never work on the pier. However, after our Sept. 6 article on Durst’s alternative plan, he and Madelyn Wils, the Trust’s president, wrote us a joint letter the next week say- ing, “The Durst Organization and the Hudson River Park Trust are both working to ensure that Pier 40 will remain open and generate necessary revenue not only for the pier itself, but for the entirety of the Hudson River Park. We are studying a range of possibilities for Pier 40 — including the viability of housing and other uses — and look forward to working with the community in the weeks and months ahead.” Now that we think about it, though — while the letter mentioned Durst’s company, it never mentioned anything about the Friends of Hudson River Park, which is the Trust’s chief private fundraising arm. Maybe the best thing to click under all of this is “Confused.”
CANNABINOID CORRECTION: Following our lat- est article on Dana Beal’s imprisonment and trials in the Midwest for transporting felony-weight pot cross-country, Doug Greene, a longtime friend of the Bleecker St. legalization activist, sent us the following correction: “Dana Beal does not have 18 months left on his Wisconsin jail term. I spoke with Bryon Walker, his Wisconsin defense counsel…. Dana’s Wisconsin jail term will be over by early May 2013 at the latest, and he can probably get his sentence adjusted so he can be released in late February 2013. Dana has asked that a correction be printed.” Beal continues to maintain that the pot was “medicine” for medical marijuana buyers clubs.
