Background
Brown was raised in Hollis, a southeastern neighborhood in New York City's Queens borough, in a double that his family shared with his grandparents, who were immigrants from the Caribbean island of Montserrat. He grew up on 200th Street between 100th and 104th avenues and has several relatives in the area. As a Queens resident, he was a New York Mets and New York Knicks fan.
Brown's father rose from a job as a stock boy to one as an executive in the garment industry. He was a Boy Scout at Hollis Presbyterian Church in Queens and was also active in the Central Queens YMCA (now called Jamaica YMCA). In high school, Brown played the trumpet in the school band. Brown attended Public School 134 in Hollis, junior high school PS 109, and August Martin High School. Brown and his sister Andrea were the first generation in his family to go to college.
After graduating from August Martin High School Brown attended Buffalo State College, in part due to grudging admiration for Randy Smith. He played a year of Junior Varsity basketball as a 5-foot-11-inch (1.80 m) guard. While he had considered a potential medical career, Brown finished, in 1983, with a dual Bachelor of Arts in political science and journalism. He subsequently completed a certificate program for senior executives in state and local government at Harvard University's John F. Kennedy School of Government.
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