News Columnist: 'Shameful' Crown Heights Homeless Plan
This Sunday, the Crown Heights Revitalization Movement will hold a rally near the armory at Bedford and Atlantic where the city wants to import a homeless intake shelter from Manhattan. According to Daily News columnist Errol Louis, the event will draw a diverse group—”Young and old, black and Jewish, rich and poor”—of Crown Heights residents,…
This Sunday, the Crown Heights Revitalization Movement will hold a rally near the armory at Bedford and Atlantic where the city wants to import a homeless intake shelter from Manhattan. According to Daily News columnist Errol Louis, the event will draw a diverse group—”Young and old, black and Jewish, rich and poor”—of Crown Heights residents, since the city’s plan has united the notoriously divided community in dissent. Louis argues that the “shameful plan” is “outrageous” because the men’s shelter at the armory is already one of the worst in the city, allowing, as it does, Level-3 sex offenders to roam the neighborhood’s streets during the day and allegedly turning blind eye to to all manner of violence underneath its roof. Louis argues that instead of bringing the Manhattan homeless shelter to Crown Heights, the city should completely shut down the Bedford facility: “After a quarter century of effort, DHS has brought disgrace upon itself and crime and violence to a struggling neighborhood that deserves better. Instead of compounding its failures, City Hall needs to stop the relocation plan dead in its tracks and focus on cleaning up the mess it has already made.”
Shut Down This Nightmare [NY Daily News]
Crown Heights Doesn’t Want Homeless Intake Center [Brownstoner]
Photo by ambr0sia2003.
Nostalgic on Park Avenue; wonderful post (as usual).
Every neighborhood – it’s a big city, you know- should do its fair share. Like it or not. there’s plenty of places in Manhattan that aren’t completely residential, and Harlem should not be the dumping ground. And rich neighborhoods should have social services too. Unfortunately I don’t see our elitist mayor allowing that to happen. The nimbyism of the “moneyed elite” has a lot of power behind it.
The only reason Crown Heights has been so over saturated is because of everyone else’s nimbyism- not ours.
bxgrl
Ok, if not Crown Heights- then where? (floating barges not included. 😉
11:04, well said. And nothing like a good game of Marco Polo to make one feel better about one’s situation and optimistic about the future!
Brownstoner:
When Crown Heights neighbors have their march, I hope they bring their kids, which is what parents did when I was a boy in the area during the 1950s and early 60’s. It’s a great way to introduce youngsters to community activism and organization.
Back then, protests were against blockbusters, predatory landlords, and the City’s planning department who, respectively, fanned racial fears for profit, turned family buildings into boarding houses, and loosened restrictions to enable liquor stores to open on residential corners.
One march I remember well was held on St. Marks Avenue, probably because it’s a wide street that can accommodate a crowd and is lined with big apartment houses where the neighbors could come out and join us.
The march was noisy, spirited, racially mixed, and combined kids, parents, and elders. There were drums, banners, and speakers. Fun for us kids, but also serious. All these people, including parents of our friends, distributing leaflets and taking turns to speak at the corner of Brower Park. All this activity responding to the conditions we heard discussed around the dining table. And, of course, there was the surprise and pleasure of watching our parents act in public. Who knew they could be so vigorous and outspoken?
The Armory a question of NIMBY? Not when Crown Heights is saturated with social services. (I can imagine what my Manhattan neighbors would do if anything like a homeless shelter were proposed in one of our blocks. Now that would be NIMBY — not that Bloomberg would even consider it!)
Good luck on Sunday. And thanks for helping to bring the old neighborhood — and its spirit — back.
Nostalgic on Park Avenue
Some of the comments on the Daily News website were spot on too. I’ve long believed Bloomberg sees Manhattan as an idyllic spa for the rich serviced by the outer boroughs who only exist to serve Manhattan. He’s not the first to act that way, but he seems to be the most determined. Well, what else can you expect of a man (aided and abetted by the head of CB1)who fought to make sure the memorial at the WTC be as un-memorial like as possible because he felt the residents of Battery Park City would be upset looking out of their expensive windows at a cemetery. And yes- the head of CB 1 actually said that.
bxgrl
You only need to walk by this place {quickly, I might add} to see how dirty and scary it is because of the drifters hanging around it at all hours with nothing to do. This plan to increase the population of men just let out of prison in Crown Heights is *atrocious*.
Crown Heights is struggling, and importing yet more of these types of men, who have absolutely no stake in the place, into the neighborhood is a disaster.
I will be at the protest.
Hey, Biff, don’t rule out Karka’s plan, because stranger things have happened in this world. As long as the barge offered a clean, secure environment with a comprehensive range of mental health, substance-abuse, and case management services, it would probably function quite well. Plus, holding 12-step meetings “on deck” would surely increase sobriety!
I am so glad to see the community talking about this place. It’s truly horrible and absolutely needs to be shut down. How long will the rally last? I can’t get there until 3.