A DECLARATION IN FAVOR OF FREE & SAFE OUTDOOR TENNIS AT MCCARREN PARK IN BROOKLYN, NY

The bubble over the tennis courts in McCarren Park is still up, which is a violation of the Parks Departments' concession agreement with the private operator of the courts (the "McCarren Tennis Center" or "MTC"). In addition, the MTC has failed to install free outdoor lights, which was required four years ago. Enough is enough.

When in the course of public tennis play in Brooklyn, it becomes necessary for People to deflate the political Bubble which has made unnatural alliance between the Parks Department and the for-profit McCarren Tennis Center, and to assume the rights to which the Community is entitled, a decent respect requires that the People should declare the causes which impel them.

We hold these truths to be self-evident:

• The Parks Department awarded a Private Concession to the McCarren Tennis Center in 2013, granting a private, for-profit entity the right to erect a tennis Bubble and thereby Profit from public NYC tennis courts;
• That Concession requires the MTC to take the Bubble down on the last Friday in April each year.
• That Concession also requires the MTC to erect Outdoor Lighting within one year from their first year of business, which was in 2017.
• The MTC, with the support of the Parks Department, has failed to remove the Bubble as of July, 2020.
• The MTC, with the acquiescence of the Parks Department, has failed to install Outdoor Lighting as of July, 2020, Three Years after the deadline in the Concession agreement.
• The operation of the Bubble, in violation of the Concession terms, increases the risk of COVID Transmission versus Free Outdoor Play.
• The operation of the Bubble without A/C increases the risk of Heat-Related Injury versus Free Outdoor Play.
• The failure to remove the Bubble, with COVID surging around the Nation, increases the risk that the Courts will be closed again if COVID rates increase in New York.

In every stage of these Oppressions, we, the tennis Community of North Brooklyn, have petitioned for redress in the most humble terms, but our repeated petitions have been answered only by repeated injury. Now, therefore, in the Name, and by Authority of the good People of North Brooklyn, we do solemnly declare, that:

1. The McCarren courts must be made available for Free Outdoor Play by no later than August 10, 2020;
2. The lights necessary to allow Free Night Play must be installed by no later than August 13, 2020; and
3. Any political connection between the Parks Department and the MTC is and ought to be totally dissolved, such that Parks does its Job and enforces the Terms of the Concession in the future.

The History of the present McCarren Tennis Center is a history of repeated injuries and usurpations, all aided or tolerated by the Parks Department, and having in direct object the establishment of a For-Profit Tyranny over these Public Courts. 

To prove this, let these facts be submitted to a candid world.