Daily News columnist Denis Hamill rhapsodizes about arena construction

Daily News columnist Denis Hamill, who thinks the Brooklyn Nets can give Brooklyn a soul and who swallows Forest City Ratner promotional spin, today salutes Forest City's head of construction, Bob Sanna, "Park Slope native, also the son of a Local 3 worker."

The online headline: Denis Hamill tells why there is so much union pride in building Barclays Center in Brooklyn: Construction boss Bob Sanna is behind the Nets new basketball arena.

Sanna, to Hamill, credits developer Bruce Ratner for having the event level level "25 feet below grade," and describes the role of union workers:

“Then comes a parade of 40 trades,” Sanna says. “Local 20 guys pour concrete on the 250 steel footings, held together with metal straps, making foundation walls, forming a big fat concrete pontoon if you will, that keeps our main foundation from penetrating into the ground. The whole arena sits on this structure.”

...Under which will perform an urban symphony of plumbers, steamfitters, painters, carpenters, electricians and all the rest of the 40 trades that Brooklyn-born Bob Sanna oversees in the construction of the first major professional sports venue in Brooklyn in 55 years.

OK, it's parade, or a symphony, but shouldn't Hamill have mentioned Forest City's hardball treatment of construction unions regarding its modular plans? Or maybe that Sanna's statement that "politics played out" to clear the site is a euphemism (as per DDDB) for a political fix.

Or maybe that Sanna's not a Brooklyn resident any more, but is fiercely defending his New Jersey home town from... overdevelopment.