Raising Weeksville

A cohesive family unit is important, just not at gunpoint:

A Brooklyn man enraged that his ex-girlfriend wouldn’t let him see their infant daughter kidnapped the child at gunpoint Tuesday, police said.

Shawn Fariera, 20, and a friend busted into Melissa Fyffe’s Weeksville apartment about 5:40 p.m., saying they had some clothes for 3-month-old Shamiece, cops and witnesses said.

“He bum-rushed the door,” said Fyffe, 21, who has a protective order against Fariera. “He grabbed her off my mother’s bed. While he had her in his arms, he pulled a small black gun out of his back pocket and put it to my face.”

Fariera’s friend grabbed some baby blankets from the bed, and the duo escaped through a back door in the building, Fyffe said.

All Press Is Good Press . . . And All English Press Is Totally Irrelevant, So Muckrake Away, Sucker!

So I guess Viva New York is chopped liver to this asshat:

The Flamingo is famed in its Queens neighborhood as a place for lonely men to dance with scantily clad beauties for just $2 a song.

But several former dancers at the Jackson Heights night club allege they were treated like virtual slaves — forced to work hundreds of hours a week without pay and to endure abuse and humiliation by the owners.

In a multimillion-dollar lawsuit expected to be filed today, several former dancers, bartenders and waiters contend dance hall owners Edith D’Angelo and her husband, Luis Ruiz, violated labor laws and treated them inhumanely, according to Make the Road New York, a community organization representing the employees.

“[Ruiz] would insult the women by calling us ‘whore’ or ‘prostitute,’ and he would throw drinks and alcohol on our bodies,” a former dancer said in an affidavit obtained by the Daily News.

The dancers also say they were:

Not allowed to sit down, eat or drink water during shifts of 10 or more hours.

Made to change in rooms that were under video surveillance.

Ordered to have bar managers inspect their toilets after each use to make sure they didn’t use too much toilet paper.

Forced to repeat humiliating statements about themselves during meetings, such as, “I am fat and ugly. I am the reason that Flamingo is losing business.”

. . .

Dancers at the Roosevelt Ave. hot spot have to pay the house to work there — $11 each night. They are fined $10 for each half-hour they’re late and are forced to pay $70 if they call in sick, former dancers said.

Each night, the young women dress in different outfits – sometimes only in bikinis or lacy pajamas — and offer to dance salsa, bachata or cumbia with men for $2 a song or $40 an hour.

. . .

Outside the club yesterday, bar manager Aridio Herrera was unapologetic.

“We didn’t do anything wrong,” Herrera, 29, said. “Our customers don’t speak any English, so we don’t care if it’s in the paper.”

Nothing Gentrifies A Neighborhood Like A Closed Laundromat

The thing about neighborhood amenities is that you really, really only need one thing — a laundromat:

Hundreds of residents of a public housing project in Vinegar Hill have been forced to walk nearly a mile to do their laundry ever since the on-site Laundromat closed last year.

Farragut Houses, the city-run, 10-tower complex of 3,440 residents, has zero laundry facilities within a nearly 20-block radius.

“It is almost a year since we’ve had a Laundromat,” said Ines, 64, who declined to give her last name.

So at about 7 am last Friday, there was Ines, setting out from the intersection of Navy Street and Flushing Avenue with a cart piled high with laundry, making the first steps of a 25-minute walk to a Laundromat on Myrtle Avenue.

“It’s terrible,” said Ines, who added that the trip was especially difficult thanks to her respiratory problems.

. . .

The weekly march to one of the two Myrtle Avenue Laundromats — one at North Portland Avenue, the other at Carlton Avenue — would not be necessary if the city found another operator for the basement laundry space at 191 Sand St., which was closed last year because it “was not up to code,” said Howard Marder, spokesman for the New York City Housing Authority.

He added that there “is no immediate plan” to put a new laundry facility into the Farragut Houses.

. . .

Some residents, like tenants association President Deborah Stewart, have their own washing machines. But many others, she said, make the “long and very inconvenient” walk to Myrtle.

Or, like her neighbor Deborah Ansley, they rely on relatives to drive them out of the neighborhood.

“I have a daughter who lives out in East New York, and she comes and drives me,” said Ansley, who has two herniated discs so she cannot make the trek to the Laundromat.

Unlike other gentrified neighborhoods, DUMBO, which borders the Farragut Houses, has no Laundromats — though there are plenty of coffee shops and restaurants and no less than two modern design shops.

In part, that’s because all of the new luxury developments have a washer and dryer in each unit.

Circumstances aren’t much better at neighboring housing projects, according to Ed Brown, the president of the Ingersoll Tenants Association in Fort Greene.

Ingersoll hasn’t had a Laundromat in more than 11 years. Meanwhile, the Laundromat directly across the street from the project has been demolished to make way for John Castimatidis’s luxury residential development — one that the Gristedes owner has put off indefinitely, thanks to the credit crisis.

Either Proof That Staten Islanders Have A Wicked Sense Of Humor . . .

. . . or yeesh:

Staten Islanders are so reluctant to give up their cigarettes that one in five pregnant women still light up, alarmed city health officials said Tuesday.

. . .

The Staten Island smoking rate has held at about 27% since 2002, even as other New Yorkers have given up the deadly habit. Nearly 20% of Staten Island moms reported smoking in their third trimester of pregnancy, according to a fresh look at a 2004-05 survey.

The Post is less polite:

Even when they’re knocked up, Staten Island’s Marlboro moms refuse to put their cigarettes down, according to disturbing figures the city released yesterday.

Ignoring common sense — and the advice of doctors — 19 percent of expectant Staten Island mothers admitted to smoking through their third trimester, compared with the 5 percent of pregnant women who smoke in the other four boroughs, city health officials said.

. . .

City officials are trying to understand why Staten Island women are more willing to turn their babies’ umbilical cords into hookahs.

Things You Don’t Want In Your Personnel File Include . . .

. . . a note saying you lied about inspecting something you were supposed to inspect but didn’t and then that thing you were supposed to inspect ended up killing several people:

A city inspector, charged with ensuring the safety of the giant crane whose catastrophic collapse killed seven people last Saturday, admitted that he lied about checking the equipment, authorities said yesterday.

Edward J. Marquette, 46, of Hell’s Kitchen, was arraigned in Manhattan Criminal Court yesterday on counts of falsifying business records and filing a false instrument that could bring a four-year prison term.

. . .

Marquette was released without bail.

He was assigned to inspect the crane at 303 E. 51st St. on March 4 after a retired building contractor reported to 311 the crane did not appear to be properly attached to the building.

“Caller states crane does not appear to be braced to the building. There are only tie-backs on five or six floor[s], but upper part which is 100 feet up is unsecured,” a Buildings Department complaint form said.

Marquette filed a report stating he inspected the crane and found it safe.

“No violation warranted for complaint at time of inspection,” he reported.