Upper East Side Patch

Lander alongside Council Majority Leader Laurie Cumbo and Councilman Ben Kallos co-sponsored a four-bill package which aims to provide protections for essential workers. This so-called "Essential Workers' Bill of Rights" will be the subject of Council hearings starting Wednesday.

The bills call for premiums of up to $75 a shift for essential workers for large employers, prohibiting firing without just cause, paid sick leave for gig workers and to reclassify certain types of independent contractors as employees.

Community Corner

Volunteers Deliver Meals To UES Public Housing Senior Center

Local City Councilman Ben Kallos and workers with Wildcat helped deliver food to seniors at the Stanley Isaacs Center.

By Brendan Krisel, Patch Staff 

May 1, 2020 2:56 pm ET

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Volunteers led by City Councilmember Ben Kallos handed out 200 meals to seniors at the Upper East Side's Isaacs Center. (Google Maps)

UPPER EAST SIDE, NY — A team of volunteers led by Upper East Side City Councilmember Ben Kallos handed out meals to neighborhood seniors on Thursday.

Kallos and workers with Wildcat Services — which partnered with the councilmember for 2018 on a street cleaning pilot program — distributed 200 meals at the Stanley M. Isaacs Neighborhood Center. The center, located on the campus of the New York City Housing Authority's Stanley Isaacs Houses on First Avenue and East 93rd Street, had previously expressed a need for healthy volunteers to deliver meals to its seniors forced to stay inside during the coronavirus pandemic.

"In this moment of extraordinary crisis, and in alignment with all appropriate health and safety guidelines, we are proud to maintain critical operations to provide meals to isolated, homebound, and medically fragile older adults," Isaacs Center President and Executive Director Gregory J. Morris said in a statement.

Wildcat Services agreed to divert some of its workers from street cleaning to meal deliver after being approached by Kallos, who noted that a reduction in foot traffic due to social distancing measures reduced the need for street cleaning. Wildcat workers went door-to-door at the Stanley Isaacs Houses to drop meals at seniors' homes. Seniors, who are especially vulnerable to severe cases of the coronavirus, are being urged to avoid meal pickup locations due to the risk of infection.

In March, the Isaacs Center suspended all of its services except for meal delivery and case management to reduce the potential for exposure for the seniors who rely on the center. Before the coronavirus outbreak, the center served as a place for neighborhood seniors and children to socialize.

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Wildcat Services employs New Yorkers experiencing homeless, chronically underemployment and other hardships in an effort to provide people with the means to economic well being, according to the organization.

"Our neighborhood facilities that feed our seniors and house NYCHA residents needed help with getting meals to the community," Kallos said in a statement. "I knew I could not do it all myself so I called in reinforcements. My friends over at Wildcat pounced at the chance to help, today is a win for everybody involved."

NEW YORK CITY — Ydanis Rodriguez stands next to San Francisco's Golden Gate Bridge. A cat licks Ben Kallos' forehead. Chaim Deutsch is upside-down. This is Democracy's new normal in New York City.

New York City Council held Wednesday its first remote stated meeting — as Gov. Andrew Cuomo's stay-in-place order put the five boroughs on pause — with members live-streaming from their homes, offices and cars.

UPPER EAST SIDE, NY — The New York City Council held its first-ever remote meeting using the videoconferencing service Zoom on Wednesday and an unlikely star emerged from the municipal proceeding — Upper East Side Councilmember Ben Kallos' cat.

The local lawmaker's furry friend, a gray short-haired feline named Pandora, was perched atop a shelf near Kallos for nearly the entire hours-long council meeting. Pandora received numerous pets, an Eskimo kiss and at one point in the meeting appeared to be holding hands with Kallos.

Reporters and New York residents tuning into the meeting praised Pandora on social media.

"Ben Kallos' cat wins the day!" one Twitter user posted.

Kallos revealed on Twitter that he adopted Pandora — originally named Tigger — more than one decade ago, putting that cat's age at nearly 20 years old. Pandora's adoption profile labeled her as "shy" and "independent" but Wednesday's meeting is proof that the feline has warmed up to the Upper East Side lawmaker over the years.

"Its been over a decade since I adopted Pandora (born "Tigger")," Kallos said in a Twitter post. "She had to make an appearance today for [Earth Day] and we finally get to vote together in the City Council."

Kallos' office partnered with the Horticultural Society of New York to install planters on "bike islands" at the intersections of Second Avenue and East 91st, 92nd, 93rd and 95th streets, the local lawmaker announced this week. The $50,000 public-private partnership was approved by the city Department of Transportation.

"We're greening bike islands that were previously empty with planters to beautify our streets," said Council Member Ben Kallos. "Thank you to the Horticulture Society of New York for their partnership and help beautifying our streets.

UPPER EAST SIDE, NY — Upper East Side City Councilmember Ben Kallos isn't planning to let social distancing measure get in the way of constituent outreach.

Kallos will be holding his customary "First Friday" meetings — where residents of his district can drop in to his office to discuss neighborhood issues — via video conference as New Yorkers are encourage to stay home to help curb the spread of coronavirus.

The Upper East Side lawmaker is planning to host at least 100 constituents on Friday, April 3, via the video conferencing service Zoom, according to a spokesman. Upper East Siders interested in attending should RSPV on Kallos' website.

Kallos' conference will go live around 8:15 a.m. on Friday.

UPPER EAST SIDE, NY — More than 200 students played in an online chess tournament funded by an Upper East Side lawmaker over the weekend, marking the first time the annual event was played virtually.

A total of 235 student participated in this year's Council Member Ben Kallos Chess Challenge, a spokesman for the lawmaker told Patch. The tournament, originally set to take place at the Upper East Side's Eleanor Roosevelt High School, was played online because New York City school are shut down as the city deals with the outbreak of coronavirus.

UPPER EAST SIDE, NY — An Upper East Side lawmaker is asking neighborhood residents to lend a helping hand to a local senior center that has its hands full aiding those who are most vulnerable to the serious effects of coronavirus.

Councilmember Ben Kallos asked healthy Upper East Siders to reach out to staff at the Isaacs Center — located on the campus of the New York City Housing Authority's Stanley Isaacs Houses on First Avenue and East 93rd Street — to volunteer at the center in a tweet sent Monday. The center is helping seniors deal with the coronavirus outbreak by delivering meals to seniors who ar being advised to stay in their homes to reduce contact with people who may be able to transmit the virus.

The Isaacs Center has suspended all of its services except for meal delivery and case management to reduce the potential for exposure for the seniors who rely on the center, according to a statement released by the center's executive director Gregory Morris.

UPPER EAST SIDE, NY — The New York City Department of Education will launch French dual-language education programs at an Upper East Side pre-k facility to promote bilingual education at an early age, local City Councilman Ben Kallos announced Wednesday.

Two French dual-language pre-k classes will open for the 2020-2021 school year at the recently-opened East 76th Street and First Avenue pre-k center, Kallos said. The local lawmaker urged city education officials to launch the dual-language program by holding two community meetings with education officials and French-speaking families in December and March where 200 families signed a petition in favor of the programs.

New York City families have until March 16 to apply for pre-k for all programs. Families that have already applied can update their applications to include the French dual-language program by searching for the program code 02Z128 on the DOE's "MySchools" website.

"I hear so many languages spoken in my district from every corner of the world and now we are working with the Francophone community to address a need in the neighborhood as we hope to increase the overall diversity of our schools," Kallos said in a statement.

UPPER EAST SIDE, NY — A recent court ruling that could force Upper West Side developers to chop floors off of a controversial Amsterdam Avenue development may have a ripple effect on the other side of Central Park, according to new reports.

Upper East Side City Councilman Ben Kallos may use the ruling as the basis of a challenge against the super-tall development planned for 430 E. 58th St. in the small Sutton Place neighborhood, he told the New York Post. The building has long been the bane of neighborhood preservationists, who proposed and passed a Sutton Place rezoning plan to implement strict building height limits.