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E d i t o r i a l sNo One Was In Charge Of This ElectionAs the spectacle of the vote counting in Community School District 15 has come to a close, neighboring District 13 is sponsoring a forum this week to examine issues surrounding the election of members of the city%u2019s community school boards. It%u2019s a subject that deserves plenty of discussion %u2014 now, while the experiences are fresh in everybody%u2019s mind.Perhaps the talk should begin with the step-child approach to the manner in which the elections are sponsored, promoted and administered. Issues of parent and voter participation, voter education about the boards themselves, and the publicizing of the election process and why it is so complicated are indeed important ones to examine. But we think one of the biggest problems this year was that no one seemed to be %u201cin charge%u201d of the process.The creation, delivery and promotion of candidates%u2019 nights so voters could see and hear those who were offering themselves for this public service was largely a a dismalfailure. So was publicizing an election day. And then there has been the long, laborous agony of the counting, removing the outcome so far distant from the act of voting. Everything about the process %u2014 from the announcement of the election to the availability of a forum for the candidates to the conduct of the election itself %u2014 has acted to keep the voting and hence the election of the members of the boards themselves confined to a too, too small handful of people.We don%u2019t think it has to be this way, even under the same kind of proportional voting scheme that school board elections are conducted. With three years to plan for the conduct of an election we should expect better than we received this year. The Board of Education seems to have left the responsibilty for the process in the hands of the local community boards %u2014 who actually have little interest in broad participation in the process - and the Board of Elections %u2014 which isn%u2019t equipped to trained to administer this voting and had no incentive to do so with the low turnout anticipated. Before we talk about the other problems surrounding the subject the popular election of community district school boards, we should examine and weigh the performance of those who were in charge of this one. We sure didn%u2019t get our money%u2019s worth this year.E O M M U N I T Y E O R U M v ie w s o f r e a d e r sOne Ft. Greene Resident Sings the Praises o f the Rose Atlantic Terminal PlanI would like to take this opportunity to thank you for your support of my candidacy for the School Board of District 13. As a friend of mine said, the Phoenix endorsement is toBrooklyn Heights what the N.Y. Times is toN.Y.C.It was heartening to win this election not only with the highest number of votes in the district but with the highest number of votes that I%u2019ve received in the previous two elections.I thank the Phoenix and the people in District 13 for their overwhelming show of support and pledge to continue to work for the district in the best interests always of the students. %u2014 Randy L. Ratner, BrooklynHeights, Member, Community School Board13.BY GORDON RUSSELLI am committed, as are many others to the continued revival of Fort Greene as a residential community of integration and mixed income residents. Downtown Brooklyn has been economically depressed since the Fifties because the types of commercial and residential ventures needed have always been constructed somewhere else. The economic base of manufacturing has eroded. For too many years, the space for ATURA has been a wasteland with not one substantial plan advanced by the private sector, or the city or state, for that matter.As a ten-year resident in Fort Greene, I see for myself and others in Fort Greene, and the surrounding communities an opportunity to return the streets to the people. To see our quality of life enhanced. We will no longer find it necessary to make trips to Manhattan or an outlying shopping mall to answer the requirements for day-to-day living and social involvement. The ATURA project means jobs for the citizens of Brooklyn - jobs previously non-existent for low and moderate income citizens of the area. Travelling to jobs in outlying areas is not economically feasible.The Rose concept of ATURA begins to address many of the needs of this area of Brooklyn. If Community Board II had had an opportunity to select from many builders (which they didn%u2019t) they would have been hard-put to recommend a better selection than Rose Associates. The commitment of this company to give back to the community as much as possible is self evident by their desire to blend in with a historic area. It is also noted the subsidized housing adds to the community with concern for those that willGordon Russell is a ten year resident of Fort Greene and lives near the ATURA site on South Oxford Street.reside there incorporating safe havens for the children to play in. It could have been soaring tenements adding nothing of charm or worth, let alone safety for the inhabitants.Constructive community suggestions can always be beneficial to a developer. Positive input by the community has caused many changes to evolve, and more changes will likely be forthcoming. We cannot, however, afford the luxury of nitpicking a basically sound plan into oblivion. Our main concern must deal with the depression of downtown Brooklyn and its environs. We must again become economically prosperous as a city in our own right.To address the pressing need for additional low income housing is paramount. The need does not, in my opinion, lie in the direction of creating large projects of only low income housing. It has not proven successful for those who live in such projects, or for those living adjacent to them. Where would these citizens seek employment? What would be their incentive for progress and change? The answer must be in the direction of low, moderate, and upper income (mixed) residential areas. Such a change is evolving in Fort Greene, (I might add, without the benefit or help from surrounding communities) the subsidized row houses built to fill in vacant lots on brownstone streets in downtown Brooklyn (Fort Greene) between DeKalb and Fulton Street, and the row houses under construction on Fulton Street near Cuyler Park (part of ATURA) are good examples of mixed housing. There is additional land in this area which could be developed as low and moderate income housing.As concerned citizens, we should encourage Die continued building of low and moderate income housing where vacant lots exist on residential blocks. We should also support, as should The ATURA Coalition,other dissenters and the local and city newspapers %u2014 the 1700 family units envisioned by Bishop Francis Mugavero of the Brooklyn Ecumenical Cooperate (BEC), in conjunction with Mayor Koch. Such support would be positive and make a substantial constructive difference. The BEC plan would afford a mix of low, middle, and upper income residential units by remodelling and restoring city-owned apartment buildings for low and middle income residences in Prospect Heights, The Atlantic Terminal Area, Bedford-Stuyvesant, South Williamsburg, Fort Greene and Clinton Hill.The Rose Associates%u2019 ATURA plan, coupled with restoring blighted buildings for lowincome people, would insure the revitalization of local business strips, wherever they are, for the convenience of the neighborhoods involved.Fort Greene has been doing its share foryears in advancing low and moderate income housing. The 640 units in place at ATURA, plus an additional 640 units proposed by Rose, would double the number of original residences in that area. Also Fort Greene has over 21 social programs currently, can any like-sized community match that record?To deny ourselves what is at hand and available, will insure a continuation of blight, low employment, and a lack of economic growth. To expect the city, state, or federal government to completely subsidize ATURA is far-fetched, to say the least. At some point we must do for ourselves and others what the government cannot do for us. It is time to give all the citizens of Brooklyn an economic break %u2014 to give them secure, mixed residences and increased opportunities for employment. It is time to nurture people, instead of weeds.Thanks for SupportLeave Us AloneAssemblyman Jim Brennan is quoted in your May 8th issue as saying that he hopes the Rivieccio properties are turned back to the people who had them. (%u201cSlope Real Estate Boom Fueled by Stolen Money; Feds Want It Back%u201d ).Well, Mr. Brennan you can do what you want in your district but we on Berkeley Place certainly don%u2019t want 15-15A turned back to the drug pushers and bums who used these buildings for 7 years before they were bought and developed.I personally am tired of being kept awake at night and having to wade through drugdealers and users all night. We are fighting in the North Slope for our survival and certainly don%u2019t want anything to stop us from winning the war against drugs. We%u2019d like to let our buildings continue to sell as co-ops and get back to being a nice block.You do what you want in your district but leave us alone on Berkeley Place.%u2014LewSmith, Berkeley Place.Must Challenge PremiseThank you for having published my letter and the letters of other Brooklynites in favor of extending the B51 bus experiment.As a result of our combined efforts, we now have an extension of the run with a November deadline.The time has come during this hiatus to challenge the premise of Messrs. Kiley and Gunn that the B51 bus must support itself. We must espouse the principle that Brooklyn needs and must have the B51 as the only surface transportation link to Manhattan period!Of course, we shall all work to satisfy the required 70 percent ridership but, willy-nilly, the borough of Brooklyn is entitled to bus transportation to Manhattan. As Mary Ann Crotty, the Governor%u2019s representative, suggested in her Solomon-like decision to recommend the extension of the run, people before statistics. The humanistic approach is the way to go.%u2014Ethel H. Godin, Plaza Street.Mayor Ed Koch at the groundbreaking for the Pierrepont Building last week. (Phoenix/Kirk Photo)Page 42, THE PHOENIX, May 29,1986