The Daily Newarker

The Glocallynewark.com launch looks like it was a smashing success — congratulations! It’s exciting to see the level of dialog rising in this city.

Not too long ago, a commercial blog about Newark would have been a non-starter. What a difference a few years makes.

Behind the big events are the small ones. Stories like this show the city is transforming, one changed life at a time.

Booker, who has long supported projects by Integrity, a nonprofit corporation focused on addiction rehabilitation, said the new Integrity Women’s Outpatient Services would help women, and as a result benefit whole communities.

“If you support women, you can transform a village,” he said during a brief speech held in the foyer of the building. “When a woman rises up, she lifts all of us up.”

Impressed by Newark’s energetic mayor, media icon Oprah Winfrey donated $500,000 to Integrity to build the center. Money from other private donations and funding from the city of Newark also helped transform the modest three-floor house on Martin Luther King, Jr. Boulevard into what its founders hope is a haven for women recovering from drug addiction.

The Ledger shares reactions of MJ’s death from Newark’s streets. This morning as I stepped out of my apartment at 7:30am, a red van pulled by, windows rolled down and the music up.

It only took a few seconds for me to recognize “Billie Jean” playing as the driver and I shared a solemn nod and he drove past.

If you spend enough time watching and talking to the Mayor, you get the sense that he’s a sincere, compassionate, and motivated individual…with a really quirky sense of humor.

Twitter has been a wonderful window into the life of the Mayor, whose tweets range from inspirational quotes to meeting notices to calls to action for citizens local and beyond.

And every once in a while, you get a window into the Cory Booker that isn’t being quoted in the Ledger on the Colbert Report.

Booker’s staff does an excellent job reigning him in (the Mayor has said as much himself), but last night’s comment was just too classic to not share.

If I could offer a caution to the Mayor: be careful with that dark, caffeinated mistress. She may be sweet in small doses, but too much time with her and the paranoia really begins to set in.

Amazing story about the work being done at the Newark Comprehensive Center for Fathers, a service provided to struggling Newark dads by local non-profit, Newark Now.  It’s organizations like this that are transforming the city, one life at a time: Dads Rediscover Rites of Passage

The program is an extension of the National Comprehensive Center for Fathers in Philadelphia.  The program targets fathers, but the underlying goal is to make them whole men. During the eight weeks the men are in a class setting where they learn how to handle everything from family dynamics, relationship conflicts and parenting skills to the math and reading basics.

When Robinson came to the center, based at Essex County College in Newark, not only was he going through the challenges of divorce, but he also had trouble reading. He is now working on getting his General Equivalency Diploma and he reads everyday.

“I had never been around black and Latino men who really knew about how to achieve the things they wanted to achieve. They made me feel special and they were really here to help me,” Robinson says.

June 24, 2009 Details on the new city parking laws recently put into effect to cover the city budget gap for next year.

Some of the hikes actually don’t sound unreasonable. Parking during certain prohibited times and parking during street cleaning will jump from $10 to $45. (Seriously? Only ten lousy bucks? Newark needs parking tickets with gravitas, people.)

Having been an Ironbound resident for a few years, though, I love this woman’s complaint.

Ironbound resident Carol Costa, who has difficulty walking because of arthritis, has a handicapped-parking space reserved by permit for her Buick outside her home on Green Street. But others often illegally park there, she said, including people from the city’s municipal court, spectators from the Prudential Center, commuters headed for Newark Penn Station and patrons of the Ironbound’s restaurants.

“It’s getting ridiculous down here,” she said.

People triple-park here for breakfast.

June 23, 2009 Clever and beautiful comic commentary from Ninapilar at Glocallynewark.com about the new parking ordinance. 

Let’s hope the officers are incentivized to discourage shenanigans, too. Cars on our street are regularly papered over for being there more than four hours—whether they have been or not.  

June 23, 2009 The Times writes about the weekly, free outdoor concert series at NJPAC. The event draws thousands every week with performances that span a variety of musical genres. Worth checking out!

Two of this summer’s 10 Thursday-night installments will include house music. Opening night, June 25, will deliver the D.J. Duce Martinez of Montclair, host of the Internet show “Axiom Sessions.” Later in the evening, when the corporate crowd trickles out and a less buttoned-up one trickles in, Kenny Bobien, also of Montclair, will take the outdoor stage to sing his underground dance hits. “I’m not saying corporate people can’t dance, but usually the dancing types come out later,” Ms. Wray-Spirito said.

The series’ second-to-last installment, on Aug. 20, will be heavy on house, featuring the D.J.s and singers of Brooklyn’s Melting Pot Global collective, whose music is also flecked with funk and jazz.

Shows start at 5 p.m. and run until 10 p.m.