By Thomas Tracy By Helen Klein
Cops and school administrators may say that the problem with out-of-control children from Roy H. Mann Intermediate School in Mill Basin has been “handled,” but that’s not what residents are seeing in the streets. And, when it comes to these kind of problems, perception is not everything — it’s the only thing. During last week’s Mill Basin Civic Association meeting, residents were still complaining that, when the dismissal bell rings, students at Roy H. Mann Intermediate School in Mill Basin run rampant on Avenue N and wreck havoc in local stores. Most recently, residents recall witnessing streams of cop cars racing to Ralph Avenue and Avenue N to quell a fight between a group of youths. Still, despite this recent turn of events, Lt. Molinari said the past few weeks has been very quiet on the streets surrounding Roy H. Mann. “Things have been very quiet over the last month,” he said, adding that the police and the school administration have put together a plan that will “get the kids to the bus routes.” “Right now, dismissal is a bit disjointed,” he said. “The new plan will get them on the bus quicker.” Terri Cadet-Donald, the PTA co-president of Roy H. Mann, said that the children’s behavior at school dismissals is the subject of a lot of assembly talks. “We can bring them to the bus, but we can’t force them on the bus,” Cadet-Donald said. “We do speak to the children about it, but they [the students] are going to want to walk where they want to walk and be kids.” Cadet-Donald reiterated that once the children have left the school, they’re not the administrators’ responsibility. “They may not be legally responsible for these kids when they leave school, but technically they’re morally responsible,” said Alan Maisel, a representative of Assemblymember Frank Seddio. Speaking as a retired teacher and assistant principal, Maisel said that he would make sure that teachers and administrators were at key dismissal routes to make sure that the kids didn’t cause trouble. “At the very minimum, the school should put an assistant principal out there or have a supervisors out on the street watching the kids a block or two away.” School officials said that they are already out there at dismissal, along with officers from the 63rd Precinct. “We are not going to be able to stop every fight,” added Deputy Inspector Kevin McGinn, the commanding officer of the 63rd Precinct, when contacted by this paper. “But the school is working with us much better and things are going to get a lot better.” Late last year a dozen merchants attended a meeting, located at the Floyd Bennett Post 1060 at the corner of Avenue N and East 56th Street – the same spot where last week’s Mill Basin Civic Association meeting was held — to discuss the problem with crazed kids running rampant on Avenue N. School officials were on hand to listen to the complaints from the dozen storeowners who claim that they’re quality of life is greatly diminished once 3 p.m. rolls around. Merchants said that they have to lock their doors for close to 40 minutes as the school children slowly disperse. One of the most persistent problems is when B41 bus drivers deposit unruly kids from Roy H. Mann on Avenue N as they make their way toward Flatbush Avenue. “I can’t really blame the bus drivers,” said local businessman Tom Votto. “The kids are just out of control. They go nuts on the buses. I’ve actually seen them jump out of the windows and the roof. I don’t blame the drivers when they pass them up.” Merchants complained that the kids overrun the street, ducking in and out of traffic. They kick over garbage, throw soda at each other and, sometimes, even attack each other. “It’s like 40 minutes of havoc,” Votto said. “The day before Thanksgiving I had to run out of my store because a group of kids had surrounded this other kid. They were kicking him in the head,” Votto said. So, what does the zoning in the Fraser Square area currently allow? According to Winston Von Engel, deputy director of the Brooklyn office of the Department of City Planning (DCP), who addressed members of the Fraser Civic Association gathered at Yeshiva Tiferes Yisroel, 1271 East 35th Street, the zoning through much of the Fraser Square area is fairly restrictive. “In general,” he told his listeners, “this area is a lower density residential area in terms of zoning.” One zoning designation that the area has, R4, “Allows for about two to three story rowhouses,” said Von Engel. “So you can have a detached home, or you can have a semi-detached or a rowhouse under that zoning.” The other predominant zoning designation in the community, said Von Engel, is R5, which, he noted, “Allows slightly more density, up to three stories in general. There is a height limit in both of those districts.” The dividing line is in the middle of East 35th Street, said Von Engel. A key piece of information for determining the size of a building is floor area ratio (FAR), which Von Engel described as, “A function of the size of your lot that regulates how much house you can build. A floor area ratio of one would mean that if you had a lot that was 1,000 square feet, you could build a house that is one times the lot area, 1,000 square feet of house. “There are other regulations that come into play,” he went on. “Often, there are requirements for rear yards, front yards and side yards, so the house gets squeezed onto the lot.” In the example he gave, said Von Engel, the 1,000 square foot house on a 1,000 square foot lot would probably be two or three stories high. With R5 zoning, said Von Engel, the FAR is 1.25, “With a height limit of about 32 feet.” In R4 areas, the FAR is .75, with an additional 20 percent of floor area within a sloped roof.
