For those of you dreaming about brownstone Brooklyn, here's your stinky wake-up call: The "Mad Crapper" that has been leaving poop all around Boerum Hill is an actual person, versus a dog wanting privacy. Someone emailed Curbed and Brownstoner with a crazy account:I just spent my morning cleaning poop off of my stoop. For the second time in two weeks I got pooped on. This time I saw her. I live on Dean St between......

We've written a few pieces about the Khalil Gibran International Academy's attempt to find a physical home. The dual-language Arabic public school that has declared itself non-religious is, nonetheless, having trouble finding and sharing space with educational neighbors, who fear that they'll be hosting a terrorist academy. The fact that Khalil Gibran was an American-educated Christian poet seems to have drifted off into the ether of historical irrlevancy. The Department of Education initially wanted to......

Some 30 years after Landmarks Preservation Commission officials first explored landmarking Crown Heights, the Commission has granted landmark status to the architecturally-rich neighborhood. The Commission voted unanimously today to protect 472 buildings in Crown Heights North. The new district will run from Pacific Street to Dean St., Prospect Place and St. Mark’s Ave and from Bedford to Kingston avenues. The buildings in the district were built from the 1860s to the 1930s and the......

The organizers at Develop Don't Destroy Brooklyn are planning a protest for this upcoming Monday in reaction to a judge's ruling that allows Forest City Ratner to proceed with its demolition plans, refusing a group of 26 co-plaintiffs' request for a temporary restraining order. The protest will begin at 8 a.m. in front of 191 Flatbush Ave. between 5th Ave. and Dean St. The state lawsuit maintains that an environmental impact study of the......

When we first read that the Landmarks Preservation Commission was taking steps to preserve the stately mansions, row houses and churches of Crown Heights North, we weren't all that surprised. After all, the area's 19th and 20th century architectural gems span at least four distinct styles: Georgian/Federal; Renaissance/Baroque Revival; Romanesque Revival and Modern/Art Deco/Art Moderne. When we visited recently, the day was clear, if hot, and the streets were quiet. First, we took in......

THEATER: The Ohio Theater is the site of two of summer's best play festivals, and the first, Clubbed Thumb's eleventh Summerworks, started yesterday with Anne Washburn's I Have Loved Strangers, "in which true prophets, false prophets, and non-prophets battle for the salvation of ancient New York." On the company's website http://www.clubbedthumb.org/ you can do some "research" before going, via various eyebrow-raising links; or you can just rely on the winning trifecta of excellent track records:......

It's not too late to change your plans for tonight and head to either of the evening' stellar literary offerings, is it? Better yet, if you don't have any, consider this: KGB Bar (84 E 4th St) is hosting a reading of non-fiction that should kick off Black History Month with style - Elizabeth Gardner Hines, Rebecca Carroll, Kathy Y. Wilson, and G. Bell. Then, heading uptown to the 92nd St. Y (Lexington Ave. and......