My new feature story for The Bronx Ink about Eddie and Evelyn and their fellow Stella D’Oro workers who are now out of a job due to the closing of their cookie factory that had existed in the Bronx for 78 years is up now. Read it here.

My new piece, for The Bronx Ink, can be read here.

The poll was very informal, but Riverdale looked like it was going to Mayor Michael Bloomberg. More importantly, more than half the people I polled were registered democrats that went for Bloomberg.

Elsewhere in the Bronx, William Thompson Jr., the Democratic candidate was dominating. In the end, he took 51 percent of the Bronx vote. Our class broke down all of our polling into an excellent summary piece, which can be read over at The Bronx Ink.

I headed down to the Hilton in Midtown for Thompson’s and the Democratic party’s election night party. It was my first political event. Basically, its a lot of hurry-up-and-wait. Supporters from across the city trickled into the third-floor Trianon lounge where a podium was set up for Thompson to deliver his speech. As I wandered the room, interviewing supporters and snapping photos, I saw a young man stationed off to the side with two laptops. As I walked behind him, I saw two screens. One labeled “Victory,” and the other, “Concession.”

The crowd watched the TVs on the sides of the lounge as the first poll results trickled in. The pundits had been calling a Bloomberg blowout, but many of these supporters had hope after witnessing firsthand a strong showing at the polls.

The air became electric as the early reports showed that Thompson was only trailing by one percentage point. Disbelief and excitement mixed as strangers embraced, fists were pumped and even a few tears were shed.

A series of whos-who from the New York City Democratic Party pumped the crowd up as the polls continued to roll in. Highlights included, the Bronx’s own Ruben Diaz Jr. who delivered a rousing three-minute speech in the manner of a Latin American populist, Reverend Al Sharpton, whose speech made my fellow classmate say, “I hope they didn’t pay him for that two-minute air fart that he called a speech” and Governor David Paterson, who, despite his awkward stage presence, spoke powerfully and directly to the crowd.

Bloomberg started to pull away from Thompson in the polls and word went around that Bloomberg was declaring victory.

at 11:40 p.m., Thompson took the stage to much fanfare and announced his concession. His speech was brief and positive. I’m not much of a gambler, but I might put money on Thompson being the next mayor in four years.

He put an excellent spin on the evening. The Democrats had much to celebrate with the election of John Liu to Comptroller and Bill de Blasio for Public Advocate.

Afterwards, I spoke with assemblyman Jeffrey Dinowitz, whose district includes Kingsbridge and Riverdale, both neighborhoods where most of my stories from the Bronx originate.

“It’s pretty obvious that $100 million dollars made a difference,” he said, referring to Bloomberg’s personal spending for the 2009 race.

Not exactly, a positive approach to the night’s outcome, I went to find someone with something nicer to say.

“If Bill Thompson can spend $6 million against $85-100 million and come as close as six percent (it was actually five), not all is lost,” Reverend Clinton Miller from Brown Memorial Baptist Church in Brooklyn told me.

Good call, Reverend. I bet a lot of the city’s Democrats are wishing they hadn’t counted Thompson out. That’s a lot of money to spend for just a 5-point margin.

Please read my Bronx Ink story, for which all of this party-going was necessary, here.

So after the party, I hopped back on the 1 train and headed home. I got in around 1 a.m. and my evening was only just beginning. My classmate Maia and I put together the story via google docs and at 4:45 a.m., I finally laid my head on the pillow, only to awaken hours later to start on the next story. Oh, J-school.

My RW1 class Web site is up and running. You can check it out here.

The story I did on the Marble Hill Youthmarket is currently up on the site. I hope to get more of my stories up to publishable form.

I’m looking forward to working in Kingsbridge. I hope I can do the people and the place justice with the work I produce.

232nd St. & Irwin Ave.

The 1 train runs above Broadway. This strip of Broadway called “the BID” (Kingsbridge Business Improvement District) is where all of the shopping happens. I haven’t spent much time in Kingsbridge on the weekend, but when I was there today it was bustling.

Just waiting for my train back to Manhattan.

I love getting on the train up here because its always empty. By the time I get off at 110th, it’s standing room only.

I’ll be back tomorrow.

Munching on a bag of Peanut M&Ms, he pointed to the tightly packed array of food establishments along the stretch of Broadway near the project where he lives.

“They’re missing a couple of main stores: a KFC, a couple of Spanish joints,” he said. “I get tired of Mcdonald’s, Subway, the deli and Chinese food.”

Although the South Bronx is home to some of the city’s worst obesity rates, Kingsbridge and the Marble Hill neighborhoods to the north aren’t exactly an oasis of health either. The Bronx as a whole had higher obesity rates for every age group than in New York City overall, according to a May 2007 New York City Department of Health and Mental Hygiene report, “Obesity in the South Bronx: a look across generations.”

The study found 13 percent of high school students in the Bronx were obese, compared to 12 percent in New York City overall. For 18-44 year olds, 22 percent were obese in the Bronx compared to 18 percent in the city. For 45-64-year-olds, 32 percent were obese in the Bronx compared to 26 percent in the rest of the city.

So why the discrepancy? Ruchi Mathur, program associate at Bronx Health REACH, a community health coalition, said there are several factors, including access to healthy foods and most importantly, apathy.

“From our point of view, a lot of people tend to accept what they’ve been given,” she said. “A big issue is access, but I think a bigger issue is powerlessness.”

Tony Rivera, a 51-year-old cook who lives in Marble Hill, reflects the attitude Mathur described.

“It don’t even make no sense to complain,” he said when asked if he had any problems with the grocery stores in his neighborhood.

Rivera, who said he most frequently eats out at the Applebee’s across the street from the Marble Hill project, had no problem with the food selection in the area.

Of 10 on-the-street interviews along Broadway and Bailey Avenue in Kingsbridge and Marble Hill, only a single individual expressed a forceful complaint. Abraham Bari, a 77-year-old manager of a real estate company, pays almost $2 more for his favorite soy yogurt at the local grocers in Kingsbridge than if he made the trip to Fairway in Manhattan.

“I don’t shop here,” he said. “But If I go once, amazingly the prices are higher here.”

Marble Hill and Kingsbridge lie on the border between a poorer neighborhood with less access to healthy foods like fruit and vegetables and a more affluent set of communities like Kingsbridge and Riverdale that have better options.

Quinones pointed across the street to C-Town, where he shops for food. “The further down [up Broadway] you go, the more expensive they get,” he said.

C-Town has weekly coupons on their Web site. This week’s coupons are for cookies, frosting, cake mix and whipped cream.

Up Broadway into Kingsbridge, C-Town gives way to higher-end markets like Garden Gourmet and Stop & Shop. The coupons this week for Stop & Shop include watermelon, red peppers, Campbell’s Select soups and Kashi Pizza.

Provi Monchek, a 55-year-old Riverdale resident loaded her groceries from Stop & Shop into the back of her car. She said she was very satisfied with grocery stores in her neighborhood. “I wish they had a Trader Joe’s, though,” she added.

Monchek, said she frequents Japanese restaurants in Riverdale and purchases “only organic milk” at Stop & Shop, a significant difference in food habits from her neighbors like Quinones and Rivera down in Marble Hill.

Mathur sees hope for those who are unaware of the unhealthy lifestyles they are practicing. “I think we need to invest in the community and empower the people to demand for better,” she said.