Parents fuming after toys removed from Brooklyn playground
Parents fuming after toys removed from Brooklyn playground: Brooklyn parents are furious that toys they donated for years to a beloved playground in Prospect Heights were removed just days after the playground was featured in a campaign commercial for Mayor de Blasio.
“The toys have been here for years” and shortly after the ad airs “they’re gone? C’mon on?” said Wendy Atterberry, who has been bringing her kids to the Underhill Playground for 6 years.
“It makes me want to vote Republican,” she joked.
In the commercial, smiling kids are briefly shown playing at the playground surrounded by toys as a moderator praises de Blasio for “making neighborhoods safer by bringing police and communities closer together.”
Both Atterberry and her friend, fellow mom Leslie Covitt, said if the toys were good enough for the mayor to use in his ad they should be good enough to remain in the park.
They also questioned whether Parks Department officials spotted the toys through the ad and finally decided to enforce a rule prohibiting people from leaving behind unattended personal belongings in a city park.
While some of the toys were older and dropped off by parents after their children outgrew them, others were brand new.
Parents interviewed said the toys served multiple purposes, including teaching their kids how to share and giving them a chance to play with toys that might be otherwise too big to store in their apartments.
Some kids are heartbroken.
Emmanuel Ackaouy said his 17-month-old daughter Camille knew immediately something was amiss when they arrived at the park early on Oct. 24.
“I didn’t even notice at first, but she was acting really confused and walking all around looking for the toys — but they were missing,” he said. “She’s still looking for the toys. It’s very sad.”
He and other parents said they would be willing to volunteer their time to oversee any future donated toys if allowed by the Parks Department.
Parks Department spokeswoman Maeri Ferguson said the agency “understands the desire to bring toys to Underhill Playground, and we appreciate the intention. However, it is against our policy to leave such items behind in our playgrounds.”
Ferguson declined to respond to emails asking whether the toy dump was connected to the campaign ad.
However, De Blasio spokeswoman Natalie Grybauskas said they are “unrelated.”
This isn’t the first time the Parks Department removed toys from a playground.
In 2012, agency workers yanked toys at Chapin Playground near the Brooklyn Heights Promenade, where they had accumulated for decades, leading to some parents nicknaming it “Island of Misfit Toys” from TV’s “Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer.”
Source:- http://nypost.com/2017/11/01/parents-fuming-after-toys-removed-from-brooklyn-playground/
