The first time Xavier Harris, 21, visited the new skate park in Jersey City, N.J., it was July, and the course was still being built. So he scaled a temporary fence to get inside. The second time, Mr. Harris, who started skateboarding when he was 9, crawled under a chain-link fence.

Just after it officially opened in August, he rode his skateboard through the open gate, rolled down a ramp, maintained his momentum and finished by bounding over a blue recycling can.

?I just want to flow around,? said Mr. Harris, a garbage collector from East Orange, N.J.

From New Jersey across the Hudson River to New York, skateboarders are now enjoying many more places to flow at a time when outdoor space has become more coveted with the coronavirus resurging. ...

?If you?re really going to be a world-class city and you?re going to invest in recreation, you need to think beyond traditional sports,? Steven Fulop, Jersey City?s mayor, said. ?Thus, we?ve invested in our first skate park and we?re probably going to be doing more.?...

In New Jersey, the debut of Jersey City?s inaugural skate park was the culmination of years of struggle by local skateboarders, who had grown accustomed to working on their boards on the steps of a post office or in abandoned lots.

One of the more popular spots was nicknamed the ?Junk Spot,? a remote area next to the New Jersey Turnpike. But as Jersey City has gentrified, developers have claimed many of these lots, squeezing out skateboarders.

The skaters tried to create their own dedicated space, but funding was a challenge. City officials eventually took up their cause, and with the help of private grants the skate park project, which took seven years and nearly $900,000 to complete, took shape at the end of an industrial block not far from the Liberty State Park.

Fulop said the new facility will make up for the loss of a number of makeshift skateparks that local skateboarders had set up but were closed or relocated over the years.

?From a demolished local DIY skatepark in 2007 to an effective partnership with the skaters, municipality, and the JCRA, it?s great to see the Berry Lane Skatepark finally open,? said Programs Manager for The Skatepark Project Alec Beck. ?Support from the community has brought this space from untenable soil to a rich experience for action sports enthusiasts of all ages and schedules.?

Steven Lenardo, a local teacher and owner of NJ Skate shop in Jersey City, was a strong advocate for a local skatepark, according to Fulop.

?This is for my students, to offer them an alternative activity to more traditional sports and keep skateboarding alive and hopefully give it to new people to enjoy as I have my whole life,? Lenardo said.

Council President Joyce Watterman said the new skatepark provides new opportunities for youth to get out, exercise, and remain socially distanced in a safe environment.

Hondo202 wrote:
Update: https://jerseydigs.com/jersey-citys-sc ... gets-10-million-donation/

Denver, Colo., Nov 2, 2018 / 03:13 pm (CNA).- After years in decline, Catholic clergy sex abuse could be on the rise again, warns a professor-priest?s analysis of relevant data.

The professor?s report sees a rising trend in abuse, and argues that the evidence strongly suggests links between sexual abuse of minors and two factors: a disproportionate number of homosexual clergy, and the manifestation of a ?homosexual subculture? in seminaries.

?The thing we?ve been told about the sex abuse is that it is somehow very rare and declined to almost nothing today is really not true,? Father D. Paul Sullins, a Catholic priest and retired Catholic University of America sociology professor, told a Nov. 2 press conference.

?I found that clergy sex abuse did drop to almost nothing after 2002, but then it started to creep up,? he continued. ?It?s been increasing. And there are signs that the bishops or the dioceses have gotten complacent about that.?

?It?s not at the great heights that it was in the mid-1970s, but it?s rising. And it?s headed in that direction,? he added.

Clergy sex abuse incidence is today about one third as common as in the late 1980s. While sex abuse by clergy is ?much lower? than 30 years ago, it has not declined ?as much as is commonly thought.? Most of the decline since the 1990s is consistent with ?a similar general decline in child sex abuse in America since that time,? Sullins? report said.

Stressing that the situation in the underworld was quickly spiraling out of control, Satan, the Great Tempter and Father of Lies, announced Wednesday that he would not allow any more Catholic priests to enter hell.

brewster wrote:
It's pathetic we have to become a city of speed bumps because the police have abdicated traffic enforcement. We now have speed bumps on blocks with stops at either end! Short blocks!

This past Saturday, Green Villain and Writer?s Bench hosted a buoyant block party at the site of the former 2015 landmark Demolition Exhibition. The hundreds of folks who attended the massive celebration were treated to live painting and music, along with food provided by local vendors. Pictured above is Newark-based Mr. Mustart. What follows are several more images captured Saturday by David Sharabani aka Lord K2.

jcneighbor wrote:
Priceless! Best laugh all day. Including Yvonne's response...

brewster wrote:

Here's LSP with Washington Park up on Patterson Plank dropped in. Washington Park has 3 ball fields, a football field, 9 tennis courts, 3 basketball courts, Volleyball court, playgrounds, has several roads running through it, and is still nothing dropped into the LSP "wilderness".