Red Bank's Two River Theater will be the host of the all new documentary about the homeless of Lakewood's Tent City. On August 7th at 7 pm Destinys Bridge will make its big screen debut.
The following is a basic overview of the film:
A homeless minister leads a community living in the woods who are demanding fair housing from a New Jersey town that filed a lawsuit to evict them. When the Judge rules in favor of the homeless, a temporary stay gives the visionary preacher time to present his ideas on a shelter that instills dignity and self-worth to the homeless as they try to put their lives back together.

Dynamics shift when police raid the wooded area known as Tent City and take the camp’s leader out in handcuffs. After posting bail, the minister claims harassment against the township, suggesting the false charges are in retaliation for his outspoken views against unfair housing in the town. New concepts in housing the homeless are explored in the film while learning that homeless people are very much like ourselves, maybe even too close to home for some.

The film is directed by Jack Ballo who has been filming the homeless camp saga for the past few years.

Forward

Six more people have come forward with accusations against Yeshiva University, days after 19 former high school students filed a $380 million suit charging that Y.U. covered up decades of physical and sexual abuse.

Mike Reck, an attorney representing the six, said his clients are disappointed they have been unable to reach a settlement with Y.U. and are poised to file lawsuits.

If the impasse continues, “the survivors have no choice but to avail themselves of the court system,” said Reck, an attorney with the New York office of Jeff Anderson and Associates, a Minnesota firm that specializes in abuse cases.


So far, two former Y.U. high school staff members and a former Y.U. student have been accused of abuse in the lawsuit already filed. Reck says his clients’ suit could reveal three additional people as accused molesters.

His clients, the attorney said, include people who were abused by Rabbi George Finkelstein, a former principal of Y.U.’s Manhattan boys high school. Most say they were assaulted between 1969 and the early ’80s. But Reck says he also represents a woman who says she was abused by Finkelstein during the 1990s, when Finkelstein was dean of the Samuel Scheck Hillel Community Day School, in Florida.

The woman blames Y.U. for failing to warn the Florida school about Finkelstein even though administrators knew he posed a threat to children when he took up the post in North Miami Beach in 1995.

More than a dozen former students at Y.U.’s Manhattan high school have told the Forward that Finkelstein had inappropriate sexual contact with boys under the guise of wrestling.

Rabbi Norman Lamm, who was president of Y.U. from 1976 until 2003 and just retired as chancellor, told the Forward this past December that Finkelstein was forced out of Y.U. because of his wrestling with boys. Lamm said Y.U. did not inform the Florida school about Finkelstein’s wrestling because “the responsibility of a school in hiring someone is to check with the previous job. No one checked with me about George.”

Finkelstein was alleged to have abused 16 of the former students named in the lawsuit filed July 8 in U.S. District Court in White Plains, N.Y. The suit alleges a “massive cover-up of the sexual abuse of [high school] students… facilitated, for several decades, by various prominent Y.U. and [high school] administrators, trustees, directors and other faculty members.”

The assaults are alleged to have taken place during the 1970s and ’80s, at a time when Y.U. faced severe financial problems.

Y.U. said in a statement that it would not comment on ongoing litigation. A spokesman told The New York Times that Y.U. hoped an investigation it commissioned to look into the abuse allegations would be finalized in the coming weeks. “We will address the findings publicly once the report is issued,” the spokesman said.

Rabbi Haskel Lookstein, principal of the Ramaz School, a respected Orthodox day school in Manhattan, said the abuse allegations had not had “any effect on parents’ decision to send, nor do I think it should have any effect on parents’ decision to send, their children to [Y.U.’s] high school or the college.”

Shmuel Goldin, a leading Modern Orthodox rabbi, said Y.U.’s response to the allegations has been “prompt and thorough.”

Goldin added, “There is a sadness that everyone feels when people have been hurt, and a sense of solidarity with the victims and a hope this will reach a resolution that will bring peace and healing to all involved.”

But one of the survivors, who is a plaintiff in the lawsuit, does not see it that way. “What’s really crazy about the Jewish community is that nobody cares,” said the survivor, who asked to remain anonymous. “There is a complete lack of interest in this whole thing.”

From Daastorah.blogspot

Just had a long conversation with some insiders of the Kolko case. The simple question raised was, "What is the way to change Lakewood's approach to dealing with child abuse?" It is obvious that they don't respond to halachic arguments and it is also clear that the rabbis lack the moral backbone to stand up for what they feel is right. They can't even muster the courage and decency to apologize from driving Rabbi "S" out of Lakewood - on a mistaken belief that he was a moser.

Appeals to stop the suffering of children doesn't carry any weight - because their insistence that following the directive of a beis din is paramount even when children are being destroyed by molesters. They claim, mistakenly, that without a psak from a beis din that a person is a moser for going to the police. However the beis din system is incompetent and impotent.

Bizarrely the beis din that Lakewood had to deal with child abuse has been disbanded. Mickey Rottenberg claims that he was told to disband it because it was too sensitive to the claims of the victims. He said in an interview with Jewish Week 12/06/11 that he was told to do this by Rav Malkiel Kotler. However Rav Malkiel Kotler denies the truth of this statement. So who is running Lakewood - Rav Malkiel Kotler or Mickey Rottenberg? Apparently the Lakewood rabbis are too embarrassed or chicken to answer that question.

In sum, Lakewood is a society that while giving lip service to halacha is in fact concerned with one thing - the fear of being called a sheigetz.

Nineteen former students at Yeshiva University High School have filed a bombshell $380 million lawsuit against the prestigious Jewish institution claiming horrific acts of sexual abuse that went unchecked for two decades at the Manhattan school.

"Yeshiva University High School held itself out as an exemplary Jewish secondary school when in fact it was allowing known sexual predators to roam the school at will seeking other victims," said attorney Kevin Mulhearn, who filed the suit on behalf of the 19 plaintiffs. "Childhood sexual abuse in the Orthodox Jewish community can no longer be condoned and excused.”

One victim claims administrators ignored his protests when he told them a Judaic studies teacher sodomized him with a toothbrush. Other victims — the children of Holocaust survivors — say a former principal persuaded them not to tell their parents after he sexually assaulted them because their mothers and fathers had already suffered through so much.

The 148-page lawsuit, filed in U.S. District Court in White Plains, claims Yeshiva officials ignored and covered up the complaints because they feared the sexual abuse allegations would damage fund-raising efforts and bruise the school's reputation.

Member of Knesset  Uri Ohrbakh was in Lakewood today with Binyamin Hoffman, who was taking him on a tour to see all the sights.

MK Orbakh is a member of a party being criticized for trying to get  all Yeshiva Bochrum out of Yeshiva and into the IDF.

  He was at Four Corners  eating lunch  prior to touring BMG & other places in Lakewood. Some said he may be here looking for potential recruits.

Gov. Chris Christie's strong support of school vouchers today earned him the endorsement of Bishop Reginald Jackson, one of New Jersey's most influential black ministers.

Jackson, the executive director of the New Jersey Black Ministers Council and a Newark community leader, described himself as a Democrat and noted that he endorsed Democratic Gov. Jon Corzine in 2009 when Christie first ran.

But Jackson today said state Democratic lawmakers have disappointed him by refusing to pass the Opportunity Scholarship Act, a bill that would give children in low-performing urban schools a publicly funded scholarship to attend a private school or another public school instead.

State Sen. Barbara Buono (D-Middlesex), the Democratic candidate for governor this year, opposes the bill. Jackson called Buono a "wonderful, warm and genuine person," then launched a scathing critique on her party.

"A quality education is a civil right, and it is sad for me to see my party, which embraced the Civil Rights movement, now in New Jersey blocking low-income and minority children from escaping the slavery of failing schools," Jackson said at a Statehouse news conference, standing next to Christie and a group of black ministers from across the state.

Democrats who have thwarted the bill so far, including Assembly Speaker Sheila Oliver (D-Essex), have said the state's top priority should be improving public education, not using public funds to fund private schools. The state's largest teachers union, the New Jersey Education Association, says there's no evidence supporting the use of vouchers.

Jackson said he agreed that public schools should be fixed, but that vouchers are crucial in the meantime as an "emergency exit" because hundreds of thousands of mostly minority students in low-performing schools have not received a quality education for more than 30 years and "tens of thousands more have dropped out of school."

"(Buono) does not recognize the basic unfairness of making low-income parents wait without a choice for their children," he said.

Jackson said he waited to see if, in the absence of the full bill, Democrats would approve a $2 million pilot program for school vouchers that Christie proposed in this year's budget. But Democratic leaders removed the program before passing the $33 billion budget last month, which Christie then signed.

The minister said he endorsed Christie despite his veto last year of a minimum-wage increase proposed by Democrats, and despite the high unemployment rate among blacks during the Republican governor's first term. He described it as a "personal endorsement"; the nonprofit Black Ministers Council, a tax-exempt religious group, cannot by law endorse candidates.

Former Republican governors Thomas Kean and Christie Whitman both won Jackson's endorsement while battling Democrats. In later years, Jackson threw his support behind former Democratic Gov. James McGreevey and then Corzine.

"I've heard the cries of those who criticize this governor about unemployment, increasing poverty and the minimum wage," Jackson said. "But I also know that the problems they speak about are exacerbated by thir policies, particularly regarding education."

He added, "While I agree the minimum wage should be increased, a good education to get a good paying job is the best way to live above the minimum wage."

Christie said Democrats won't send him the voucher bill and removed the $2 million pilot program because "they're caving in to the special interests who fund their campaigns and who provide boots on the ground for them in their elections" -- a veiled shot at the teachers' union.

"I absolutely believe it is immoral, an absolutely immoral position to say that children have to wait for us to fix the public schools for them to have an opportunity for a better education and as a result, an opportunity to reach their highest potential," Christie said, adding later, "The fact is I think we need to have a revolution at the polls. Candidly, I think the Democratic Party takes inner-city votes for granted."

The Rev. Kenneth Saunders of Piscataway and the Rev. Ronald Owens of Metuchen responded on behalf of Buono's campaign today in a joint statement, saying Christie was only reaching out with "empty rhetoric" to black and Latino groups this year because he needs their votes.

"Governor Christie has done almost nothing to revitalize our cities, leaving nearly 400,000 people looking for jobs, our schools in desperate need of repairs, and little action to reduce gun violence," they said. "Throughout her career, Senator Buono has stood on the side of helping the people underserved by this administration. She has pushed to ensure that all children, no matter where they were born, have the same chance to receive a quality education and has fought tirelessly to stop the damaging consequences of gun violence."

Jackson was a co-signer, with 42 others, of a letter to Christie last month urging him to speed up the pace of school repairs and construction in Newark. The state's Schools Development Authority, which Christie has control over, has moved too slowly in the last three and a half years, they wrote.

"I'm always for enhancing and improving school facilities," Jackson said today. But in the end, he made his endorsement based on the vouchers, and said he was disheartened by black Democrats whose districts house failing schools.

"My disappointment is that every day, they see children who are not getting a quality education, and that doesn't seem to move them," he said. "There's not a single African-American legislator who has had or who has a child of school age whose child goes to public school."

Nytimes

A majority of people worldwide believes corruption has worsened in the last two years and they see governments as less effective at fighting it since the 2008 financial crisis, a survey by Transparency International organization showed on Tuesday.

The "Global Corruption Barometer" is the biggest ever conducted by the Berlin-based watchdog, with 114,000 people responding in 107 countries in the survey of opinions on corruption and which institutions are considered most corrupt.

The survey found that on a worldwide basis political parties are considered to be the most corrupt institution, scoring 3.8 on a scale of 5 where 1 means "not at all corrupt" and 5 means "extremely corrupt."

Only 23 percent of those surveyed believed their government's efforts to fight corruption were effective, down from 32 percent in 2008.

"Politicians themselves have much to do to regain trust," Transparency International said in a release. "(The Barometer) shows a crisis of trust in politics and real concern about the capacity of those institutions responsible for bringing criminals to justice."

The second most corrupt institution on a global scale is the police with a score of 3.7. Three categories of institutions - public officials/civil servants, parliament/legislature and judiciary - followed with equal scores of 3.6.

"It is the actors that are supposed to be running countries and upholding the rule of law that are seen as the most corrupt, judged to be abusing their positions of power and acting in their own interests rather than for the citizens they are there to represent and serve," Transparency International wrote.

The media did not fare as badly, coming in at the ninth place out of twelve with a score of 3.1, but it was seen as the most corrupt in Australia and Britain. Some 69 percent said it was the most corrupt institution in Britain, up from 39 percent three years ago.

"This very sharp jump is in large part due to the series of scandals around phone hacking, the Leveson Inquiry and the concentration of media ownership," said Robert Barrington, head of the British unit of Transparency International.

The Leveson inquiry into the ethics of the British press was set up in the wake of a scandal over phone-hacking at one of the newspapers of Rupert Murdoch's media empire, which has a strong grip on the media in both Australia and Britain.

The survey showed the business/private sector and the medical and health services scored 3.3 on the corruption barometer, while the education system came in next at eighth place with 3.2.

The military was seen as the 10th most corrupt institution worldwide with a 2.9, followed by NGOs in 11th place at 2.7 and religious bodies as the least corrupt institution with a 2.6 score.

Transparency International noted that even though religious bodies fared best of the 12 major institutions overall, in some countries they are nevertheless as being "highly corrupt". In particular in Israel, Japan, Sudan and South Sudan, religious bodies scored above four on the scale of 1 to 5.

Transparency International is a global organization that campaigns against corruption. It has 90 chapters worldwide and tries to raise awareness of the damaging effects of corruption and works to develop and implement measures to tackle it.

Hurricane Sandy is responsible for reducing property values by $4.3 billion in New Jersey.

The plunge in property tax assessments in Monmouth and Ocean counties are primarily responsible for that statewide loss, according to The Press of Atlantic City.

The total ratable base in Ocean County plummeted by $3.6 billion. In Monmouth County, the loss was roughly $511 million.

In Mantoloking -- where Hurricane Sandy washed away 58 homes and caused damage to every residence in the oceanfront borough -- the assessed value of properties in town dropped by one-third.

The newspaper, citing data from the state Department of the Treasury, said that is a loss of $530 million from the borough's $1.6 billion total assessment in 2012.

When The Star-Ledger analyzed preliminary county data on property tax assessments in March, Mantoloking Mayor George Nebel said, “we only have two-thirds of what we had.”

“We hope people will rebuild to bring the town back,” he said then.

And in some cases the reductions in property tax assessments may only be temporary.

“If they got a reduction, and if they made repairs, they could end up going back to full value at the start of the year,” George R. Brown, Cape May County’s tax administrator, told the Press of Atlantic City.