The 52nd Precinct’s new commanding officer, Deputy Inspector James Alles (pronounced like bowling "alleys" he told his audience at a community precinct meeting) is installing a new patrol dedicated exclusively to addressing issues like noise and public drinking.

After two months of negotiations with a Bronx advisory group, city officials withdrew a controversial confidentiality agreement that would have prevented group members, including prominent elected officials, from speaking publicly about the Kingsbridge Armory redevelopment proposals.

About a month ago, the Police Department shut the restaurant down in another attempt to thwart the blatant drug dealing by using the Nuisance Abatement law that targets crime-riddled commercial properties. The law debuted in New York City in the 1970s and was used primarily to shut down brothels.

By next week, the city will owe the federal government over $1.5 million in fines because it has failed to award the contract for building the water filtration plant in the giant hole in Van Cortlandt Park.

As the weather warms up and the end of the school year is in sight, kids, dog walkers, joggers and baby strollers are beginning to stream into local parks and playgrounds. As they do, many park users will find their favorite green spaces either markedly improved or looking like a construction site, and maybe a little bit of both. That’s because $200 million in park improvement monies, allocated as a result of a controversial political deal to build a giant water filtration plant in the Norwood section of Van Cortlandt Park, has begun transforming local parks.

Despite the mayor’s impressive environmental master plan, the city Water Board’s executive director told the few people assembled at a recent hearing that one of the main reasons for the hefty hike this year, was that people were cutting down on their water use.

Last week, Schools Chancellor Joel Klein parachuted into the northwest Bronx to promote and explain his ambitious overhaul of New York City public schools. Also known as the Children’s First Initiative, the plan has been met with national accolades, local opposition, and often, just plain confusion.

The ballroom dancing program comes to schools like PS 340 from the American Ballroom Theater’s Dancing Classrooms program, which began in 1994 and is based in Manhattan. Sessions last 10 weeks and meet for two 45-minute classes a week during the school day.

Inside the Children’s Hospital at Montefiore Medical Center, the press, various guests, and hospital associates eagerly awaited the arrival of formerly conjoined twins Carl and Clarence Aguirre. That Friday, April 20, the boys celebrated their fifth birthday, almost two and a half years since the unprecedented surgery that successfully separated them.