The Bronx Ink

Jose Webster had just turned 16. He didn’t have a rap sheet and affiliated with gangs and, by all accounts, was a smart kid. But last Thursday, he’d barely started walking his girlfriend home when 15 bullets killed him, New York Daily News.

His wake will be held on on Sept. 22 at the Parkchester Funeral Home.

Webster’s mother, Lesly Arzu, a Honduran immigrant told the Daily News all about her son, who liked to read and play video games.

Messages had been scrawled on the concrete walls of the lobby of the building where Jose lived with Arzu and three siblings, the Daily News reports.

Marble Hill is a complicated place. By land mass, it sits in the Bronx. But by legislation, it’s actually part of Manhattan. City Hall news provides a history lesson about why the anomaly exists.

In 1895, city engineers wanted to connect the Hudson and East rivers to aid shipping efficacy, so they dug a canal beneath Marble Hill.In 1912 when Bronx County was created, and Marble Hill was part of it, reports City Hall.

But in 1984, a Marble Hill resident called in for jury duty in Manhattan tried to get out of it by claiming she was a Bronx County resident. The case never went anywhere, but the judge made the decision that Marble Hill was part of the Bronx. Afterward, then-assemblyman John Brian Murtagh sponsored a resolution making Marble Hill part of Manhattan, City Hall writes.

So, Marble Hill is part of Manhattan and New York County, but is physically part of the Bronx. It has a Bronx area code, zip code and services like sanitation, but elects its officials from Manhattan.

According to new numbers from the 2010 Census and the American Community Survey, New Yorkers were hit particularly hard by the most recent recession, reports the New York Times in an analysis of the data.

Bronx County remained the poorest urban county in the nation. Nearly three in five Hispanic single mothers in the Bronx were living in poverty, reports the Times.

Citywide, single mothers, blacks and adults without a high school diploma were the worst off.

Between 2009 and 2010, an additional 75,000 New Yorkers became impoverished, pushing the poor in the city to more than 1.6 million.The percentage of city residents living below the federal poverty line is now at the highest level since 2000. The increase appears to be the most dramatic jump in nearly 20 years, reports the Times.

Police got involved in a shooting a East 187th Street and Prospect Avenue just after midnight Wednesday, WABC news.

Two groups of men got into a shootout with each other before officers reportedly also opened fire, according to WABC.

One person was wounded in the leg and fled. A man showed up at St. Barnabas Hospital with a similar injury later.

No arrests have been made, and no officers were hurt, reports WABC.

Seventeen Bronx cops, investigated for everything from perjury to larceny to records tampering, are waiting for a decision from a grand jury Wednesday, New York Daily News.

It’s the culmination of two years of probing, gathering evidence on more than 500 cops, including wiretaps, the Daily News reports. Precincts mostly involved include the 40th, 41st, 45th, 48th and 52nd, according to the Daily News’ sources.

Sen. Kirsten Gillibrand (D-N.Y.) focused on the Bronx’s “food deserts” during Tuesday’s annual Farm Day, calling for more fresh fruits and vegetables in impoverished areas, New York Daily News.

Gillibrand sits on the Senate Agriculture Committee and is pushing for “food hub infrastructure” funding initiatives into the 2012 Farm Bill. The Daily News reports that such funding would help places like the Hunts Point Terminal Produce Market.

The Bronx is the worst borough in the city when it comes to obesity and diabetes, according to the city Health Department.

Farm to Fordham, a farm-share program at Fordham University for the last year and a half, ended last week after a battle with security personnel at the school, New York Times.

The program has been struggling since April when security refused to open gates for vegetable delivery, the Times reports.

The program’s founder, Michael Zimmerman, a law student, tried to work with the system to reopen, but instead received notice from the university’s lawyers saying that the program couldn’t continue.

Bronx Borough President Ruben Diaz Jr. announced a new plan to transform an underused parking garage near Yankee Stadium into a hotel. The project will be in conjuction with the Bronx Overall Economic Development Corp, the New York Daily News reports.

The site renovation, at E 153rd Street and River Avenue, will not only create jobs and offer tourists a more upscale place to stay near the stadium, Diaz said at a press conference, but will also bring in revenue for Bronx Parking, the nonprofit parking firm.

The parking garage in question was empty during the news conference, the Daily News notes, even though it was only two hours from the first pitch.

Development Corporation President Marlene Cintron said she expects a hotel to create more than 125 jobs and kick start other development in the area. The group is accepting building proposals until mid-November, writes the Daily News.