Out & About

Editor’s Pick Free Fitness for Seniors City Parks Foundation offers free seniors fitness classes including yoga and fitness walking through Oct. 30, at Van Cortlandt Park’s Woodlawn Tennis Courts, Jerome Avenue and East 233rd Street. Walking schedule is Tuesdays and Thursdays and yoga schedule is Mondays and Wednesdays; both at 9 am. For more information, call (718) 760-6999. Onstage Bartow-Pell Mansion Museum, 895 Shore Rd., Pelham Bay, presents Eugene Marlow’s Heritage Ensemble performing multicultural jazz on Oct. 2 from 5:30 to 8:30 p.m. For more information, call (718) 885-1461. The Bronx Library Center, 310 E. Kingsbridge Rd., presents Sonido Costeño

By DAVID GREENE & DAVID CRUZ

Questions are still lingering over the safety of a sprawling Kingsbridge street that was the scene of four children and two adults struck by a livery taxi cab Wednesday morning. The accident happened during the rush hour. Police say the driver of a taxi cab was traveling southbound on East Kingsbridge Road when he lost control and hit the pedestrians before crashing near a storefront. All victims were rushed to a nearby hospital. Pieces of the vehicle, along with a child’s umbrella, were left behind at the scene. The section of East Kingsbridge Road, leading towards Fordham Road, does

COMMUNITY BOARD 7 will hold its general board meeting on Oct. 20 at 6:30 p.m. at the North Central Bronx Hospital, 3424 Kossuth Place, at 6:30pm. CB7 committee meetings are held on the following dates at the board office, 229A E. 204th St. at 6:30 p.m. unless otherwise noted: Public Safety & Quality of Life, Oct. 1; Education/Libraries & Youth Services Oct. 1 at 7:30 p.m.; Executive Committee, Oct. 6; Traffic & Transportation, Oct. 8; Veterans, Oct. 8 at 7:30 p.m.; Environment & Sanitation Oct. 13; Health & Hospitals Oct. 13 at 7:30 p.m.; Senior Services, Oct. 14; and Parks

Like the Nationalist Party protestors in the streets of Puerto Rico during the 1950s, a band of some two-dozen protestors, many of whom were of Puerto Rican descent, marched from Lehman College to El Grito de Lares, a street dedicated to Puerto Rico’s 1868 uprising against the nation of Spain. They commemorated their protest on Sept. 23, a day before the anniversary of the uprising. For the People Power Movement, a group calling for all-around equity and independence for Puerto Rico, their list of grievances was broad, and at times loaded–outrage over school funding, substandard housing, low-wage jobs, and the assassination

By DAVID CRUZ

Greetings, loyal readers! As expected, the digital edition of the Norwood News is out with, as you guessed it: Plenty of Community News You Can Use! We begin with a story that’s 25 years in the making: pilot access to the Jerome Park Reservoir, long a source of majesty for the Bronx, yet only experienced by a handful. Advocates are pushing, step by step, to grant access to parkgoers who have yearned to take a stroll around the man-made reservoir. Worth a read from our own Adedamola Agboola. Inside, you’ll find a story 76 years in the making: the closing of Freilich

By JASMINE GOMEZ

I was always a fan of the current Pope, El Papa Francisco. Everything I read about him somehow always made me like him a little more. Stories about him getting out of his Popemobile to be among the people despite security concerns, and his statements of compassion towards the gay community made me feel proud to be a Catholic. When I heard Pope Francis was coming to New York, I didn’t intend to take part in the official events, preferring the flawless view I could probably get on my TV of his New York travels. But then, my father

City To Grant Jerome Park Reservoir Access on May 20 and 21

By ADEDAMOLA AGBOOLA

The Jerome Park Reservoir, which has been closed off to the public, will be opened for a trial run in November. The massive reservoir, bordering Goulden, Sedgwick and Reservoir avenues, has been cordoned off with two chain-link fences by the city’s Department of Environmental Protection (DEP), which holds joint oversight of the reservoir with the Parks Department. The DEP has long cited security concerns and operational costs as one reason why it has kept the reservoir closed. “Within the last 20 years, the only time the public has been allowed access beyond the fences was for a one-day event called

By DAVID CRUZ

One of Norwood’s crown jewels is slated to close after 76 years. Freilich Jewelers, a business fixture in the neighborhood and one of the Bronx’s oldest jewelry shops, is expected to remain open until Dec. 24. For Allan Freilich, who’s owned the East 204th Street store for decades after inheriting it from his father Norman, the decision to close did not come lightly. Retirement age certainly weighed into the decision. So has been the question on whether to renew his lease. Though he professes no belief in superstition, he made an exception this time around. “This is a message being sent that

By DAVID CRUZ

Longtime Bronx District Attorney Robert Johnson ended his 27-year run as the borough’s top prosecutor, accepting the nomination as a state judge in what many deemed a plot by Bronx Democrats to deliberately replace Johnson with an appellate court judge. Johnson secured an easy primary win for reelection as DA in early September, only to relinquish the seat just a week after. This left it up to the Bronx Democratic County Committee (BDCC) with a legal obligation to find a replacement, which it did at the party’s judicial convention with party favorite Darcel Clarke nominated to replace Johnson. Many political