On Wednesday morning, at 12:01 a.m., Montefiore Medical Center officially acquired the bankrupt Our Lady of Mercy Medical Center in the Wakefield section of the Bronx. It will be renamed the Montefiore North Division.

Gooseberries, Japanese turnips, baby dandelion, and red Russian kale all made their debut at the opening of the Norwood Farmers Market two weeks ago.

Local residents and politicians are locking horns as the city’s Department of Environmental Protection (DEP) pushes ahead on a controversial and widely disparaged new plan to use explosives for a looming construction project at the Jerome Park Reservoir.

While local activists rev up their arguments for a potential lawsuit to stop the city from blasting at the Jerome Park Reservoir (see main story), they also are considering suing the city for not having a buildings permit to construct the water filtration plant in Van Cortlandt Park.

In the trees behind the Shandler Recreation Area at the southeast corner of Van Cortlandt Park, 20 Bronx teens with gloves and shovels work around a growing circle of cleared brush.

In the midst of the bustle on Gun Hill Road has emerged an urban oasis – a new garden, right in front of the main entrance of the Mosholu Montefiore Community Center (MMCC). Teens in the Summer Youth Employment Program (SYEP) have revamped what one participant called a "dirty, disgusting" plot into a thriving patch of greenery.

It’s hard to believe, but this coming October marks the 20th anniversary of the Norwood News. Mosholu Preservation Corporation, a not-for-profit support corporation of Montefiore Medical Center, launched the paper as a monthly in 1988 so that neighborhood residents and organizations could communicate, raise issues and have a source of information for the news that matters most – local news!

Despite a zillion cable channels and four daily newspapers, most city neighborhoods are starved for local news they can use.

Just take a gander at the newspaper in your hands from front to back. Imagine there were a farmers market in a part of the neighborhood that you don’t usually frequent and nobody told you about it. Or what if there was a hearing about blasting at the reservoir and there was nowhere to find out that it was even happening? Ditto a hearing about the fate of a massive vacant landmark like the Kingsbridge Armory. And speaking of the Armory, the Norwood News has been covering the Armory relentlessly since it was vacated by the National Guard in 1993.

Think a developer would have ever been selected if a newspaper hadn’t held the city’s feet to the fire all that time?

With this issue, the Norwood News takes a brief summer hiatus. We skip one issue and return to publication on Aug. 21. During that time we will still be hard at work providing you with daily news updates on our West Bronx Blog – westbronxnews.blogspot.com.

I am writing in response to the editorial in your July 10-23 issue, “Circular Firing Line at Armory?” I was puzzled by your characterization that the Northwest Bronx Community and Clergy Coalition is trying to shut out Community Board 7. We agree that the Kingsbridge Armory Redevelopment Alliance (KARA) and CB7 must work in common purpose or risk being divided and conquered by the Armory developer. KARA, made up of over a dozen community stakeholders including churches, unions and community groups shares with CB7 a common vision for responsible development at the Armory calling for living-wage union jobs and community space,

Read More