Housing Oppertunities in East Harlem
Address
333 and 342 East 119th Street New York, NY
Managing Agent
The Palm/RioP.O. Box 610523Bayside, New York 11361(212) 348-1261
Total Units(including superintendent's unit)
111
Initial Sales Price
**
Status
Construction completion expected October 2005. Contact managing agent regarding availability.
Project: Olga Mendez Apartments
Address
1652 Park Avenue & 91 East 116th StreetHarlem
Managing Agent
Cornell Pace, Inc.P.O. Box 949Yonkers, NY 10704
No. of Units
66
Average Estimated Initial Rents
1 BDR - 3 BDR $660 - $920
Status
Construction completion expected May 2005. Application process complete. Contact the managing agent at the above address for information on apartment availability.
posted by Durandal @ 11:08 AM
3 comments
3 Comments:
Poor, struggling Hispanic immigrants are being victimized by their own people. Sham groups such as the Movement For Justice In El Barrio and its notorious leader, Juan Haros, aided and abetted by a citywide umbrella group of like movements called Housing Here And Now, are systematically sucking the life out of their countrymen under the guise of organizing them against their landlords. One has only to go to the Housing Here And Now website called www.nycworstlandlords.com to see that it is nothing more than a total rant against all landlords and they will support any group that claims to be fighting against their landlord. The manner in which these people are victimized is shameless. They are packed 15 - 20 people at a time into tiny apartments meant for a few people, children and all. What’s worse is that, even though it is illegal and dangerous, the city of New York tacitly sanctions the overcrowding. Landlords are complaining to HPD, DOB and the FDNY with no response. Inspectors from all of the city agencies refuse to issue violations for overcrowding and judges refuse to give evictions without the violations. It’s a vicious circle that leaves the poor tenants sitting in the middle, with no place to go. Instead of ranting against landlords, the legitimate groups should condemn the people who rent the apartments and then sublet them illegally to a dozen or more others. All they are trying to do is deflect the blame from themselves and direct it at the landlords, who make a convenient target. What is even worse, the people doing this, like Juan Haros, are being legitimized by their misguided councilwoman, Melissa Mark Viverito, who is under pressure from people like Sister Kathy Maire, from St Cecelia’s RC Church, to back their schemes. Instead of helping the poor immigrants find decent housing of their own, they are perpetuating the overcrowding by rallying them against their landlords. Who in their right mind would condone herding people, like animals, into tiny packed apartments, except someone who had something to gain by it; something like votes or donations or dozens of rents from each apartment.
On August first, the New York Times had a special supplement covering Harlem Week. It was a glorious celebration of.....Gentrification. Parts of Harlem, which is generally inclusive of West, Central and East Harlem, seem to have embraced gentrification zealously. The reasons are obvious; there has been no real displacement, most of the development has been vacant buildings and the residents are benefitting from the influx of working people, professionals and developers into the area. Unfortunately, the east side has been noticeably lacking in enthusiasm and, although it has been gentrifying, the pace is slower than in other sections of Harlem. If you try and build anything other than low income housing in East Harlem, there is a public outcry. Yes, there is a place for low income housing but in moderation. Why would we want to import large numbers of low income and public dependent people when we already have an extremely large indigenous population? We obviously wouldn’t, unless we were a local politician and dependent on maintaining the status quo. Melissa Mark Viverito, the council member for East Harlem, made preventing gentrification one of the key elements of her campaign and her constituents bought into it. In one of the Times articles, they trumpet the success of the Auto Mall on East 127th Street and it is described as housing several of the largest black owned dealerships in the northeast and the first new car dealership in the area for 40 years. But, wait a minute, this is on the east side, commonly referred to as Spanish Harlem, so why not the largest Hispanic owned dealerships? The answer is that the Hispanic population on the east side keep getting in their own way while the black population on the west side is accepting change. They are working together, bringing in capital, developing political muscle and solving problems while we beg for money to keep our low income population intact. There is no real difference in the gentrification process on the west side or the east side; for both it involved renovating empty buildings and developing vacant lots into livable space. However, our narrow minded councilwoman and her narrow minded constituents seem to want to turn back the clock to a time when crime, rape, drugs and gangs were rampant and El Barrio was a dirty word. Melissa Mark Viverito has gone on record as decrying the fact that building a Home Depot in the East River Mall would be a boon to building owners and hasten gentrification of the neighborhood. This is being built on the site of the old Washburn Wire factory which has been vacant and falling down for decades, and will create hundreds of jobs for local residents. How about banding together instead and insure that there will be some Hispanic owned stores in the mall? That’s the west side mentality....and the mentality of the far sighted people who came in when East Harlem was a ghetto and began the gentrification process that led to the nice neighborhood that it is today. It could be nicer if we re-zoned Third Avenue, our Main Street, and allowed it to gentrify instead of maintaining the present eyesores. That probably won’t happen until enough open minded people come here to live and vote for change. Then, maybe, we will have East Harlem week and publically celebrate our gentrification.
When will people understand that you cannot "prevent" gentrification?
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