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Page Six, PHOENIXWe Need ANew High School!The stories which are seen elsewhere in the PHOENIX this week in advance of the meeting set to press for construction of a new South Brooklyn High School to relieve the overcrowding at John Jay provide graphic evidence indeed of the long-felt need for the new facility.It is ironic that this new high school might have been available to the community years ago, but for the very parochial attitude of a handful of community residents. The idea of building a new school on the old Gas Company site adjoining the Gowanus Canal is nothing new; it has been around for years. So has the problem of overcrowding at John Jay. What is new is what appears to be the determination to do something about it.At a time when municipal government seems less able to deliver on its responsibility than ever before because of burgeoning demands on available funds, we must not forget that even if agreement on a site can be achieved there will be a major task involved in ever getting any construction going.We need a new high school and we need it now. Let discussion about where be free of petty considerations and focus instead on a desperate need that must be filled as soon as humanly possible. Conditions in John Jay right now might lead a rational mind to wonder if it makes more sense in the interim to just dismiss school until relief is accomplished.Talk or Action ?The study committee on the Gowanus Canal appointed by Mayor Lindsay last week is a desirable recognition of a serious and growinglv desperate problem which has faced South Brooklyn for decades now. What it will mean remains to be seen.The tendency to %u201c study a problem to death\all levels of government and is something that lurks in this decision. Over recent years, there has been no scarcity of expert talk and educated potential solutions offered to the problem of the Canal. Over the past six or eight years there have been both citizen groups and public agencies alike involved in a search for action on this problem. In fact, this writer remembers a visit by Mayor John Lindsay to the first major citizen presentation on the Canal (of the current round) back in 1968 where he expressed deep concern and anxiety over the problem.So now we have our official committee. We urge all those officials and community Workers invited to participate to accept the Mayor's offer of hope. But we caution ail the group, and most particularly Donald Eliott, the new chairman, to pledge the pursuit of very specific objectives. Study the obvious alternatives, then move. Outspoken action is the best evidence of concern. We expect to see action both from the committee and the Mayor.Do you have something to say?W%u00ae w %u00ae lcom %u00ae you r contributions toPHOENIX Community F o ru m Pag%u00aePr%u00aef%u00abr 5 0 0 -7 5 0 w ord length.Send Your M aterial to: Editor,PHOENIX,,132 Clinton St., Brooklyn.Robert Burke Jones, PresidentM ichael A. Armstrong, Publisher132 CLINTON ST.,BROOKLYN 11201TEL. 6 4 3-1 032THINGS ARE LOOKING UP DEPARTMENT: Demolition of these under-utilized buildings along Flatbush Ave. Ext. at DeKalb Ave. is being completed this week prior to the start of construction of the second new office building in the Brooklyn Center Urban Renewal Project. The second structure, companion building to the just-opened Con Edison Building across the intersection of Flatbush and Fulton, will be only seven stories tall, but because of the size of the plot, with 400,000 square feet of space, will be the largest private office building in the borough. Plans include a shopping arcade around the building at ground level, a second-level pedestrian area with a bridge across Flatbush, and reconstruction of the DeKalb Ave. subway station. Sponsor is George Klein of Barton%u2019s Candy Co., whose principal factory is located on an adjoining block.ALBANY REPORT: Theft InsuranceBY SENATOR CAROL BELLAMYMany constituents of Brooklyn%u2019s 23rd Senatorial District have complained to me about the unavailability of insurance against theft or similar crime. A great many cases have been reported to me involving the arbitrary cancellation by a commercial insurance carrier of burglary or theft insurance. Sometime ago the New York limes described a federal program operating under the Department of Housing and Urban Development which provides crime insurance for both commercial and residential properties. This brief report will describe the program to you.Under the program, a resident of the State of New York can obtain crime insurance from the Federal Insurance Administration of the United States Government. This can be purchased through anylicensed property insurance agent. Applications may also be obtained from Aetna Casualty and Surety Co., which is the servicing company for the state of New York.Residential crime insurance varies according to the crime rate of the area; however, the government schedules indicate that the cost of coverage is within the limits found in the table belo ANNUAL RATESCoverage Min. \\vg. Max.$1,000 $20 $30 $403,000 30 40 505,000 40 50 607,000 50 60 7010,000 60 70 80Commercial insurance %u2014 forstores and places of business %u2014 is more expensive but is available in forms which include coverage for robbery only, burglary only, or a combination of the two.The information which I haveprovided above comes from bulletins which have been issued by the federal government. I call it to your attention so that you may take advantage of this program. It was, apparently, so under utilized during its first year of operation that a rate reduction was put into effect last August. I am told that commercial insurance brokers have not been active in pushing the program and that they have not even let their customers know of its existence after commercial insurance has been cancelled or not renewed. A significant feature of the government program is that coverage will not be cancelled or non-renewed because of losses.If you have other questions about the program, you can secure information directly from: Federal Insurance Administration, U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development, 451 7th St., S. W. Washington, D. C. 20410. Telephone: (202 ) 755-6555The winds of tomorrow are blowing through the land and if only we could tell their direction and strength we could plot our course to a safe harbor. There is no hiding place anywhere and even though the only security and peace is in ourselves, few people know it so they feel lost and frightened, cut adrift from their moorings in a strange sea. It%u2019s no wonder the young (and I guess the old, too) are busy with seers, astrologers, taro cards, and drags, all looking for meaning in life. Everywhere one looks one sees death and destruction, starvation and sickness, killing and beating, all in the midst of a lush green world. It%u2019s like the sailing ship becalmed in the ocean. Unable to move the entire crew and passengers were dying of thirst and fighting over the last few precious drops of water. When everyone had given up hope a motor ship came by and noticing the distress signals on the mast pulled alongside.%u201cW ater!%u201d , the dying men pleaded.%u201cWater?%u201d the captain of the motor ship questioned, %u201cPut down your buckets, you%u2019re floating in fresh water! %u2019 %u2019 They were becalmed off the mouth of a great riverw h f K P C U / P P t u / a t p r u ; a c n a r r i o H R Amiles out to sea.We, too, are floating in a sea of sweet water and are dying of thirst. We have a heritage of a Judeo Christian ethic which plots the way, charts the course to peace, to plenty, and we are too blind and ignorant to drop ourbtICketc umtnre r\\C I fr*Window onBrooklynB y BERNARD HUGHES ATKINSInstead we are killing each other over drops of water while floating in a sea of plenty. Christians bombing Christians in the name of Christ, Jews and Arabs killing each other in the %u201choly land.%u201d Did you know that Jerusalem means City of Peace and there has never been peace there? Jesus is the Prince of Peace but you would never keep your sanity if you knew one thousandth of the horror perpetrated in His name. Frankly, I don%u2019t really think there%u2019s much hope. Maybe there shouldn%u2019t be since it seems that life on this plane of existence (and I believe there are many other planes) is meant to be an obstacle course, a training ground for souls. If this were not so then His coming should have brought peace and love But there is too little love and I don%u2019t believe there will be peace. War is nrftFifoKlo n n n / %u00ab A i c--%u00bbSo let%u2019s start to practice a little honesty. Close the Bible and stifle the brave souls in the Church by calling them Communists and let%u2019s write a new Bible worshipping death and let%u2019s stop calling ourselves Christians and Jews. Too many of us are haters, destroyers and punishers. Let%u2019s raise the skull ariu crossbones as our flag and atoppretending that as Americans we are nobie. Once our aspirations were noble and they could be once more but we have to learn to put down our buckets into the sea of living waters.And don%u2019t blame the government or the President. We, the people and our majority opinions monitored by the poll takers are the winds which blow our country toward moral leadership among the world of nations or toward the precipice of oblivion. It is we, not %u201cthey%u201d who create the prevailing attitudes to which our %u201cleaders%u201d are sensitive and play upon. It%u2019s as simple as that; either we stop, now, and change our emotional direction, stop hating anyone or anything, change our attitude toward the people on welfare, the ouuiu, uic muggci, uic prisoner, the Russians, the Chinese, the Vietnamese, the students, the liberals, the conservatives, the old and the young, the rich and the poor, ad infinitum%u2014or be quiet. You make the world you want and you%u2019ve made this one. To change it start with yourself%u2014and me and maybe together we can blow a li'esn breeze through liie world.