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NEW YORK: Co-Op Snub Is Bias: Protest
By LORE CROGHAN
DAILY NEWS STAFF WRITER
Monday, May 3rd, 2004

Holocaust survivor Chaim Indig can't talk - so dozens of supporters got loud for him yesterday.

Parkinson's disease robbed the 81-year-old Brooklyn man of the power to speak and put him in a wheelchair.

His hope of an easier life in a wheelchair-accessible building was dashed in March when the board of a Midwood co-op,
Premier House, shut him out.

Protesters marched outside the high-rise yesterday, saying the decision not to sell to Indig's son-in-law smacks of
discrimination.

"Parkinson's is a neurological disorder. It's not contagious," said Connie Cohen, whose father had the disease.

"Wasn't the Holocaust enough?" protesters chanted.

Indig lives as a virtual prisoner in a two-family home in Borough Park because he can't get down the 10 front steps.

His son-in-law Gary Sinensky had arranged to buy a unit in the building at 1401 Ocean Ave., but seven board members
unanimously rejected the application.

Days after the no vote, one of the board members, Solomon Rokowsky, bought the apartment.

The family has sued, and Indig is set to return today to Brooklyn Supreme Court.

Supreme Court Justice David Schmidt tried unsuccessfully to reach a settlement Friday, and has ordered Rokowsky to
appear today.

Rokowsky contends Indig was rejected because Sinensky wanted to sublet the apartment to him and take his father-in-
law's federal Section 8 subsidies as rent. "The Sinenskys are playing the discrimination card," Rokowsky's lawyer,
Lawrence DiGiovanna, said.

But neighborhood resident Jeffrey Grodko said the real issue is respect for Indig and his wife, Sara, who survived
Auschwitz.

"They suffered enough at the hands of the Nazis and came to America to have freedom to live in the building they want
and not be treated as second-class citizens," Grodko said.

SOURCE: New York Daily News
http://www.nydailynews.com/front/v-pfriendly/story/189728p-164036c.html

Reference:

Family of Elderly, Disabled Man Charges Co-op Board With Age Discrimination
He is an 81-year-old holocaust survivor who lived through Auschwitz. But this man from Brooklyn --
who is also battling Parkinson's disease -- is fighting a local co-op board.
 Video: Watch the Story
http://abclocal.go.com/wabc/news/video/wabc_042804_coop_video.html

B'klyn Co-Op Row Rages
http://www.nydailynews.com/front/v-pfriendly/story/189146p-163541c.html

NEW YORK: Pols: Give Him The Co-Op (81 Year Old Chaim Indig)
http://www.nydailynews.com/news/local/story/188466p-163142c.html

NEW YORK: Slam Door On Hope
http://www.nydailynews.com/front/v-pfriendly/story/188152p-162887c.html

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