Marty Markowitz’s summer Coney Island concert series will move to a West 21st Street lot once used by the Ringling Brothers and Barnum & Bailey Circus this year after being ousted from its performance space of 20 years. According to the New York Times, the Brooklyn borough president, who had held the free concerts at Asser Levy/Seaside Park since 1991, announced a one-year relocation deal yesterday with site landlord Taconic Investment Partners. The concert series was kicked out of Asser Levy earlier this year, when the city’s corporation counsel ruled in favor of two synagogues across the street from the stage that had sued over noise violations. The synagogues and other locals had also opposed a new $64 million amphitheater being planned at the park because they said it would bring too much traffic to the area. [more]

Following last week’s remarks by Brooklyn Borough President Marty Markowitz on the structural distress of the Manhattan Transportation Authority’s old Downtown Brooklyn headquarters, an MTA spokesperson told The Real Deal that the MTA is still trying to figure out the future of 370 Jay Street.

“We’re working with the city of New York to explore potential uses for the site. Right now, our first priority is making sure the building’s infrastructure is protected,” the spokesperson Jeremy Soffin said. TRD [more]

Government officials are quickly washing their hands clean of indicted developer Aaron Malinsky, who was accused of bribing Brooklyn State Sen. Carl Kruger earlier this month in exchange for his support on two key projects. According to the Brooklyn Paper, Sens. Charles Schumer and Kirsten Gillibrand are each returning the $250 in campaign donations they received from him last August, and New Jersey Sen. Robert Menendez said he plans to donate $10,500 of the $33,000 he received to charity. But Brooklyn Borough President Marty Markowitz appears to be the odd man out, and he’s now coming under fire from government watchdogs for delaying his decision about some $21,550 in Malinsky-tied campaign contributions until after he sees the outcome of the bribery case. [more]

From left: Corcoran Director of Sales Tresa Hall, Brooklyn Borough President Marty Markowitz and Brooklyn Sales Director Frank Percesepe

[Update 1:08 p.m.] The Corcoran Group has doubled the size of its Park Slope office, the firm announced today, after inking a deal for an additional full-floor space at 125 Seventh Avenue, where it has been operating out of the first floor over the past decade. The office, which currently houses more than 60 Corcoran agents, is now 3,800 square feet. The firm celebrated the location’s expansion this week at the ribbon-cutting ceremony that included Brooklyn Borough President Marty Markowitz. Frank Percesepe, a Corcoran regional senior vice president serving Brooklyn, said that the expansion was in “response to the ever-rising demand” in the area. TRD [more]

Brooklyn Borough President Marty Markowitz and Pathmark at 3785 Nostrand AvenueA Pathmark at 3785 Nostrand Avenue in Sheepshead Bay will close in the next two months, to the surprise of employees and customers who said the store had the lowest prices in the area, the Daily News reported. A&P, the bankrupt grocery company that owns Pathmark, said that the supermarket will close because it’s one of the company’s worst-performing stores. However, workers said store managers assured them as recently as a few weeks ago that the store was in good shape despite the company’s financial problems. [more]

Brooklyn Borough President Marty Markowitz; John Rhea, the chairman of the New York City Housing Authority; and MaryAnne Gilmartin of Forest City Ratner Companies

Within the year, Brooklyn may see the start of construction on the first residential building at the Atlantic Yards, the opening of a new outdoor market in Downtown Brooklyn and sales commencing at new residential condominium 20 Henry.
Members of the real estate community received these and other development updates yesterday at the first installment of the 2011 Brooklyn Real Estate Roundtable series.

Speakers at the event, held at the Brooklyn Historical Society in Brooklyn Heights, included Brooklyn Borough President Marty Markowitz; John Rhea, the chairman of the New York City Housing Authority; and MaryAnne Gilmartin, executive vice president of commercial development and leasing at Forest City Ratner Companies, who gave an update on the Barclays Center Arena. David Ridini, managing director of Canyon-Johnson Urban Funds, discussed the firm’s investments in new condos Isabella and 20 Henry, and Paul Travis, managing partner at developer Washington Square Partners, talked about the City Point project in Downtown Brooklyn. [more]

The city’s Conflicts of Interest Board has fined Brooklyn Borough President Marty Markowitz $2,000 in a settlement, after he was charged for using his top aide as a lawyer for a home closing. When Markowitz and his wife Jamie bought a $1.45 million semi-detached home in 2009 in Windsor Terrace, Markowitz’s chief of staff, Carlo Scissura, was listed in property records as the lawyer who handled the transaction, an apparent violation of rules barring public officials from using their employees for personal business, the Daily News reported. [more]

Marty Markowitz and the Loews King TheaterFlatbush’s Loews Kings, which once employed Barbara Streisand and Sylvester Stallone as ushers and was the largest movie theater in Brooklyn before it closed in 1978, is set to become “the next Apollo” by 2014. According to the Post, Brooklyn Borough President Marty Markowitz is expected to announce in his State of the Borough address tonight that preparation work for the city’s $70 million restoration plan has already begun at the 82-year-old site, with full-on construction slated to start next year. Comments

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Dumbo developer Jed Walentas ran into some hot water this morning when the Brooklyn Paper published a year-old e-mail exchange in which his language sounds somewhat less than politically correct. “The opposition is clearly panicked and turned out 75 or so folks,” he wrote to Brooklyn Bridge Park President Regina Myer, recapping a public hearing on his controversial Dock Street project, set to include residences and a public middle school. Fort Greene Council member Tish James and Marty Markowitz “agreed to not turn out dozens from the projects and make it a total racial mess… I got very good vibes from Marty and his staff,” he added. [more]

Brooklyn Borough President Marty Markowitz has officially thrown his support behind a proposed “Skyscraper Historic District” designation for Downtown Brooklyn, according to the New York Post, with a handful of modifications. Markowitz said he would omit the 75 Livingston Street co-op building from the district, as the co-op owners have requested, and also said he’d continue a planned retail conversion for a portion of the Borough Municipal Building, one of the protected structures in the landmark plan. Community Board 2 has already voted in support of the plan, which would protect several of the neighborhood’s most notable buildings, including Borough Hall. [Post] [more]