Brooklyn Bridge Park has been open for three days—which is apparently long enough for newspaper editors to demand a negative stories about it. In a classic hit piece, the Daily News blasts the greenspace for using money from a condo building on premises to pay for nine security officers, while other Brooklyn parks without such condo deals share a mere 15 officers.
While largely skirting discussing the divisive plan to build more condos in the park, the article attacks the large number of security guards and tries to make the case it's unfair to the rest of the city's parks. "Our government is supposed to be providing services for all our neighborhoods, not just the wealthy ones," said New York City Park Advocates President Geoffrey Croft. However, Park Enforcement Patrol officers' union VP Joe Puleo says putting officers at Brooklyn Bridge Park doesn't take away from other parks. "We have no problems with these officers being at Brooklyn Bridge Park. We just think it's sad the rest of the city doesn't have this luxury."
"There is nothing but good in this arrangement, because it doesn't take away any resources from the other parks," said Parks Commissioner Adrian Benape. "We'd love to have lots and lots of security and gardeners and things for all the parks, but there is a limit to the budget." For what it's worth, the Daily News story isn't the first broadside against the greenspace—the first section of which finally opened this week after more than two decades of planning. In fact, the Brooklyn Paper slammed Brooklyn Bridge Park for only allowing dogs on paths—not on its lawns—the same day the park opened.
