Take a Bronx Street Art Tour and visit the latest TAG Public Arts Project outdoor murals. This special Tour grants visitors an insider’s view of the sites and details of the artist, The process used and country of origin. We share the history and community/business that serves as a backdrop for this unique art form.
Tour the finest TAG Public Arts Project murals, A street gallery of artists from around the world.
Based in The Bronx, SinXero (SX) is the Founder & Creative Director of “TAG Public Arts Project. TAG specializes in maximizing the exposure of artists it represents by showcasing their Fine Upscale Urban Art in gallery, non-gallery spaces and urban communities that embrace TAG’s concept of live art productions for installation in legal public spaces. TAG’s vision is to encourage fine artists to work together while “Enhancing The Visual Landscape of Urban Communities with art.” Endorsed by The Bronx Council on The Arts, Brooklyn Street Art, Street Art NYC, Art & Fashion Salon, as well as, XCIA.
About MCNY Tours:
Our goal at MCNY Tours is to collaborate in partnership with Bronx Small Business, Cultural Houses, Historical Landmarks to promote team building positive results, providing unique products & customized personal services, our mission is to continuously meet and exceed customer expectations, to help improve and boost our Borough’s image and outdated past perceptions, we are determined in keeping our Company’s philosophy, strong business objectives of always maintaining respect, reliability, integrity, fairness and trustworthiness for our Clients.
Our company MCNY Tours was established in June 2011 and the concept of the Bronx Historical Tours ® was created after working various years in the Marketing, Hospitality, Advertising and Retail industries, I put my diversified business experience to good use. It took long extensive hours of planning to get the new concept on the road. I felt in order to get some experience in Business and attempting to stay afloat I started selling Tee-Shirts on-line and street fairs breaking into the Business world, we prepared the extensive Times Square and Grand Central Terminal Marketing campaign and Social Media strategy to introduce our Neighborhood Tours into the marketplace. It took a lot of hard work and we faced unforeseen challenges but in the long run with our finish product as we help support our local Bronx Businesses and Historical Landmarks I realized it was all worthwhile, we are reinforcing to improve our image worldwide, build important business partnerships, also promoting in bringing positive awareness to our Borough.
I sensed there was an immediate urgency and need to show our Borough to those who had a misleading and unfair opinion of us. I’m very grateful for being able to accomplish this great Historical Tour and being able to show the Bronx
through my eyes and personal experiences. I find great intellectual gratification in meeting people from all over the world, including locals, It’s amazing to learn about their unique stories, triumphs, hardships and backgrounds, after every Tour I realize one thing: We all have something in common with our Guests; their own personal version of a Bronx Tale in a completely different part of the world.
I’m a Bronx native grew up near Yankee Stadium, then Edgar Allan Poe Cottage and spent the greatest part of my life near Woodlawn Cemetery, This unique trajectory connects me to all the places and it holds a very special place to my
heart, I’m extremely proud of our Borough we have come a long way from where we were as individuals and our families and neighbors came to this Borough as Immigrants to find the American dream, we respect these families for their
modesty, integrity, strong spirit, contributions and hard work.
This special place is very important for us, my family and our friends, we have Bronx natives who are life long residents call the Bronx their home, some of the past perceptions needed to change and that is why we are re-educating our
Tourists and Locals through our Tours of how much this Borough means to us and for those who have faced loss or destruction from the past negative environments. We can connect you to see a different side of the Borough and learning about our important History in time. We want to place the Bronx back on the map as a unique extension of New York City where creativity, talent and hard work was born and bred with perseverance as some Bronxites went on to become exceptional productive members of society.
Our Bronx people are very proud individuals and will continue to strive to improve, stabilize our social economic fabric and continue to chase the American dream. We are fulfilling those unique talents through your support of our Borough’s Small Business, Literature, National Landmarks, Music, Arts and Culture. We are grateful for taking the time to visit and show support on the return of our Beautiful Bronx movement, Our talented team and local business partners appreciate your loyalty and patronage.
Hundreds of FreshDirect trucks destroyed by Superstorm Sandy were dumped on the South Bronx Waterfront before the company even had (and still doesn’t) an official lease.
New York State Empire State Development Corporation and FreshDirect tried to pull a fast one last week and have a meeting which gave FreshDirect weeks notice to gather supporters (only 8) and only gave the majority of residents who oppose the deal less than 24 hour notice to gather residents. This resulted in MANDATORY PUBLIC HEARING for which we must be given, at minimum, 10 days notice to prepare. Please read below on how to prepare your testimony and all necessary details regarding this process. This is a major opportunity to once and for all kill this deal which the vast majority of residents have been against since day 1.
Friends, One of the moments for which we have been preparing for over a year is here – the public hearing on State subsidies for FreshDirect – and we need you to show up and provide testimony!
Last Wednesday, the relevant State agency (Empire State Development Corporation) held a directors meeting in regard to State subsidies for FreshDirect. South Bronx Unite got less than 24 hours notice. FreshDirect got weeks of notice and lined up 8 speakers with statements of support – from their CFO to several employees to SOBRO to BOEDC and the Bronx Borough President’s office. While that directors’ meeting was obviously stacked against us, it triggered a future mandatory public hearing for which we must be given at least 10 days notice. We have confirmed that the public hearing will be announced some time after Labor Day and that it will take place on a weekday evening in September in the Bronx at either Borough Hall or Hostos.
Substantive negative testimony received at the public hearing can cause the board to reject State subsidies for FreshDirect (just as the Empowerment Zone Board did in December 2013). As such, we must organize a very forceful lineup of testimony for the public hearing, and we have little time to do so. Attached is draft testimony we have prepared for all South Bronx residents, friends and allies with the core issues.
Use some, all or none of the draft, but please:
1) Prepare testimony against FreshDirect receiving State subsidies
2) Show up to the public hearing (date, time, location to be announced)
3) Publically read and submit your and/or your organization’s testimony
Over the next week, someone from South Bronx Unite will be following up with you to answer any questions you may have, to confirm whether you will be able to attend the public hearing and to collect a copy of your organization’s testimony. (EMAIL southbronxunite@gmail.com to confirm your attendance!)
We are winning, but we need everyone to cross the finish line!
South Bronx Unite
p.s. This has always been a David vs. Goliath struggle, but the facts are on our side, and this movement continues to grow. Mayor de Blasio and his team have received more than 400 phone calls and emails asking him to stop the deal. Litigation is ongoing (with appeals to the Court of Appeals and the Appellate Division). South Bronx Unite’s Mychal Johnson was selected as one of 38 global civil society delegates to the UN Climate Summit, bringing international attention to SBX environmental justice and the issue of FreshDirect, SBU is working with political theater group Papel Machete for a dynamic performance in the South Bronx and organizations from across the Bronx are working together on a unified presence during the historic People’s Climate March on September 21. Ask us about how you can get involved with any of this! Below is a draft of a sample letter of testimony against the FreshDirect deal which you can either use in its entirety, edit and add your own comments or simply use it as a template to write your own:
DRAFTStatement of [Name]On behalf of [name of org]Before the Empire State Development Corporation Public Hearing on the Proposed Subsidies to FreshDirect and FreshDirect’s Application for a Zoning Override
Thank you for the opportunity to testify today regarding the Empire State Development’s (ESD) proposal to subsidize FreshDirect’s move from Long Island City, Queens to the Harlem River Yard (HRY) in the South Bronx.
[Insert appropriate description (e.g. As a South Bronx organization/resident, City Council Member representing Mott Haven residents]/, [I/we] oppose the subsidy for this project because information made available by this and other agencies reveals that the FreshDirect project: (1) runs counter to the needs, desires and well-established development plans of the local community, (2) will have devastating environmental and health impacts on a community where one in five children has asthma, (3) would pay low wages with no guarantee of jobs to local residents (4) violates the constitutional requirement that HRY, as state-owned property, provide a public benefit and reduce truck traffic, (5) is inconsistent with efforts to protect the South Bronx waterfront flood zone in the wake of Hurricane Sandy, and (6) fails to justify the excessive subsidies being sought by FreshDirect and should be denied as a matter of public policy.
(1) FreshDirect’s Business Model Directly Conflicts with the Needs, Desires and Well-established Development Plans of the Local Community
In considering this project, under Section 16 of the Urban Development Corporation Act, this board must give primary consideration to the needs and desires of the local community and must foster local initiative and participation in connection with its planning and development.
The industrial and heavy manufacturing uses on Harlem River Yard are no longer consistent with the actual and contemplated use of the surrounding area, which has been repeatedly rezoned over the last 15 years to foster residential development, develop community access to the waterfront, and turn the area into a true pedestrian-friendly “Gateway to the Bronx.” FreshDirect’s truck-intensive business seriously conflicts with these local desires and plans and, as such, this board must reject the proposal.
In 1997, for example, a five-block area next to Harlem River Yards was rezoned as a mixed-use, residential district. The new zoning was a catalyst for strengthening the area’s antique businesses, along “Antique Row,” and for revitalizing the residential character of this historically mixed-use neighborhood. As a result of the rezoning, approximately 42 row and houses were rehabilitated, 36 new residential units were created or reactivated on upper floors of buildings, upwards of 100 lofts in a former piano factory were converted and new ground floor retail and exhibit spaces were opened. In 2005, under the Bloomberg Administration, the City rezoned an additional 11 blocks adjoining the Harlem River Yard and a section of the Yard itself from manufacturing to mixed use residential, permitting additional residential development. The zoning changed this area from M3-1 (heavy industry), M2-1 (medium industry) and M1-2 (light industry) to a new area zoned M1-5/R8A, M1-2/R6A and M1-3/R8. Developers and residents have taken advantage of the rezoning and have added at least 559 new residential units within the rezoned area.
Numerous small businesses have opened along Bruckner Blvd., including restaurants, gardening centers and cafes/bars, building on the residential character of the neighborhood. Our community has also dramatically increased its recreational use of the Harlem River and Bronx Kill waterways which run along the banks of the Harlem River Yard, and the community looks forward to the opening of the South Bronx Greenway/Randall’s Island pedestrian/bike connector linking the South Bronx to Randall’s Island – a link that runs directly through the Harlem River Yard.
(2) FreshDirect’s Truck-Intensive Business Will Cause Additional, Irreparable Harm to South Bronx Residents’ Health
There is an asthma crisis in the South Bronx. Dubbed “Asthma Alley,” one in five children in our community has asthma, and asthma hospitalization rates in the South Bronx are 21 times higher than more affluent parts of New York City. These staggering facts were documented by a study entitled “South Bronx Environmental Health and Policy Study,” which was commissioned by Congressman Serrano and conducted by the New York University School of Medicine and the Graduate School of Public Service together with local South Bronx Organizations. The study found that the levels of asthma in the South Bronx were caused by diesel truck emissions from the area’s highway and industrial facility saturation, and that the solution was to reduce the already overburdened rates of truck traffic in the community and to provide for more open space.
FreshDirect is a trucking business. In its own application to the New York City Industrial Development Agency (IDA), the company disclosed that it would bring 938 diesel truck trips every day in and through the Mott Haven/Port Morris neighborhood. This number does not account for the additional car trips or company-expected rates of growth, which would bring the number of additional vehicle trips to upwards of 3,000 per day. Introducing into our neighborhood, and at taxpayer expense, the level of truck and other vehicle traffic that FreshDirect will bring is unconscionable.
To make matters worse, the lead agency for this project, the IDA, declined to fully assess the environmental impacts of the proposed relocation of FreshDirect’s truck-intensive business, instead relying upon a 20-year old environmental impact statement that was incapable of assessing the impacts that this project would have. For example, the 20-year old EIS does not analyze fine particular matter (P.M. 2.5), a leading cause of asthma and a host of other pulmonary and cardiovascular diseases. Twenty years ago, PM 2.5 was not a well-known public health issue; now, however, PM 2.5 must be studied as part of any environmental impact analysis. At nearly every turn, the IDA and FreshDirect underestimated impacts and ignored key changes to the community and the original project plan in order to avoid their obligation to perform a full envioronmental impact analysis. In addition to completely ignoring the rezoning from industrial to mixed-use residential, the IDA failed to conduct the requisite traffic, air quality, noise, zoning, greenhouse gas, NYC Waterfront Revitalization Plan Consistency Assessment analyses mandated by the State Environmental Quality Review Act.
FreshDirect claims that it will develop a “green fleet” at some point in the future, but it fails to explain why, when the company lost more than half its fleet in Hurricane Sandy last year, it chose to replace the damaged trucks with a complete set of new diesel trucks.
Moreover, Congressman Serrano, State Senator Serrano and New York City Council Members Mark-Viverito and Arroyo have asked the New York State Department of Transportation (DOT) for a moratorium on all new development at the Harlem River Yard until DOT audits its lease with Harlem River Yard Ventures and undertakes an investigation of the health and environmental impacts of the current and proposed uses taking place at the Yard, including with respect to FreshDirect.
Citing “deep misgivings about this [FreshDirect] project because of its impact on the health of Bronx residents,” Congressman José E. Serrano went on the stop $3.5 million in additional subsidies being sought by the company from the New York Empowerment Zone Board in December 2013.
(3) Low-Wage Jobs Despite an Enormous Subsidy, an Alarming Record of Discrimination/Unfair Labor Practices and No Enforceable Commitment to Local Hiring
This board has an obligation to ensure that subsidies go to good employers paying decent wages. That clearly is not the case for FreshDirect, a company which spent hundreds of thousands of dollars to be excluded from the living wage requirements of the city and which has a deeply concerning record of discrimination and unfair labor claims.
Last year, New York City Council overwhelmingly passed the Fair Wages for New Yorkers Act, which requires any private development project directly accepting $1 million or more in taxpayer subsidies to pay employees a living wage of $10/hour with supplemental health benefits or $11.50/hour without benefits. FreshDirect, however, angled to receive a pass on this “living wage” requirement despite seeking a subsidy more than 100 times the threshold. FreshDirect spent more than $300,000 lobbying to undermine this monumental legislation. Even Mayor Bloomberg criticized the speaker of city council for delaying the living wage legislation vote to exclude FreshDirect.
Moreover, in the past four years, FreshDirect has faced at least 27 discrimination complaints and has had nine unfair labor claims filed with city, state and federal agencies. As disclosed in its subsidy application, these include claims of unfair labor practices and claims of discrimination on the basis of race, national origin, age, disability, religion, and gender. The company is also currently being sued by current and former employees in a class action for violating federal and state law by withholding more than $23 million in overtime wages and tips per year from drivers.
In addition, FreshDirect signed an MOU with Bronx Borough President Ruben Diaz Jr. in which it merely commits to “make its best efforts” to hire Bronx residents for 30% of all new jobs. This is not a commitment to actually hiring Bronx residents, only an unenforceable commitment to try to hire them. There is no job commitment specifically for residents of the South Bronx.
The South Bronx needs employers who pay living wages and are committed to hiring South Bronx residents. (4) Siting FreshDirect at Harlem River Yard Would Further Frustrate the Lack of Public Benefit that Forms the Basis of DOT’s Lease of the Yard to Harlem River Yard Ventures The New York State Constitution requires that leases of public land first and foremost provide a public benefit. The land on which FreshDirect proposes to build is part of a 90+ acre waterfront lot owned by DOT and leased to a private developer that has been the subject of two prior audits by City and State Comptrollers and has subleased the land in a manner that has been exacerbating the health crisis in the South Bronx.
In 1991, the NYSDOT and Harlem River Yard Ventures entered a lease for the Harlem River Yard whereby Harlem River Yard Ventures agreed to provide the public benefit of an intermodal terminal at the Yard to reduce regional truck traffic through increased rail use. As part of this arranged public benefit, in 1994 ESD approved a $3.5 million loan to Harlem River Yard Ventures to develop the intermodal terminal, yet to-date, not one intermodal lift has occurred at the Yard. Harlem River Yard Ventures has instead, for the last 20 years, subleased the waterfront property to diesel-intensive, heavy industry applications, including a FedEx hub making over 1,400 daily truck trips through the neighborhood, the New York Post printing and distribution center, and a 5,000 ton per day waste transfer station, one of four waste transfer stations located within a 1/8 mile radius.
Harlem River Yard Ventures is now proposing to lease to FreshDirect, which plans to build one of its facilities (as part of its plan for a 500,000 square foot warehouse and truck parking lot and fueling station) directly within the 28 acres reserved for the intermodal terminal – amounting to a complete abandonment of the public benefit required by the lease and previously funded by this agency.
Adding insult to injury, Harlem River Yard Ventures has profited to the tune of $61 million since the lease commenced. It collects approximately $500,000 per month in rent from its subleases, while paying only $43,000 per month in rent to DOT for the entire 94 acres.
(5) Subsidizing FreshDirect’s Relocation to a South Bronx Waterfront Flood Zone is a Misuse of Taxpayer Money, Particularly in the Wake of Superstorm Sandy, Where Exisitng Open Spaces are now being Preserved to Absorb Inevitable Storm Surges
In February, 2012, the IDA contemplated FreshDirect’s application for more than $80 million in subsidies to move to a South Bronx waterfront flood zone. Nine months later, Superstorm Sandy hit, taking the lives of 43 New Yorkers and wreaking unprecedented damage to homes, businesses, and communities along the coast, in the tune of $19 billion worth of damage.
FreshDirect now appears before this agency seeking tens of millions of dollars of taxpayer money to build a 500,000+ square foot warehouse, parking garage and fueling station in a South Bronx flood zone that sustained significant damage during Superstorm Sandy. Upwards of three and half feet of water swelled Harlem River Yards at Lincoln Avenue, leaving a trail of destroyed businesses and a concerning toxic-appearing residue along the streets. The foundation of the former East 132nd Street pier, which abuts the Long Island Sound and is adjacent to a fossil fuel power plant, was forcefully ripped out of the ground from the pressure of the storm. FreshDirect’s proposed site is on the other side of that power plant. In fact, most of the borough’s electrical grid infrastructure is in and around the site on which FreshDirect proposes to build, which lines the Bronx Kill waterway feeding into the Lond Island Sound.
In response to the devastation of the storm, Mayor Bloomberg laid out a high priority plan for “A Stronger, More Resilient New York” to protect New York City from the threat of rising sea levels and powerful storm surges in the future. A central component throughout the plan is to study how natural areas and open space can be used to protect adjacent neighborhoods. Indeed, the plan calls for a study, to be completed by 2014, of waterfront open spaces and natural areas to direct and store excess floodwaters.
Already, the New York City – Region 2 Advisory Committee (RAC) for the New York State Open Space Conservation Plan recommended for priority status a community developed and driven Mott Haven-Port Morris Waterfront Plan that would preserve as open space seven inter-connected waterfront projects lining the South Bronx shoreline, including the site on which FreshDirect proposes to build its warehouse. The recommendation came in May 2013 following a series of meetings led by the New York State Department of Environmental Conservation and the New York State Office of Parks, Recreation, and Historic Preservation together with the New York City Departments of Parks and Recreation, Environmental Protection and City Planning and representatives from all five New York City borough presidents’ offices.
Subsidizing FreshDirect’s plan for the South Bronx waterfront would be a severe misuse of taxpayer money and would thwart city- and state-wide efforts toward coastal protection in light of climate change.
* * *
Finally, and importantly, there has been no analysis as to why FreshDirect is unable to remain in its existing, city-subsidized location. In fact, documents submitted to the New Jersey Economic Development Authority from FreshDirect, show that the company has the ability to expand in its current Long Island City facility. Moreover, there has not been a cost-benefit analysis to consider the impact that this subsidy would have upon existing brick-and-mortar grocery stores – a tremendous oversight. There has also been no analysis on the impact this move would have on FreshDirect’s current employees in Long Island City. Could taxpayers be subsidizing the loss of jobs for Queens residents? Given the needs of the South Bronx, allocating tremendous resources to one company is irresponsible. This is particularly the case when subsidizing FreshDirect so heavily will harm other grocery stores in the city, and in the South Bronx in particular, and when the food offered by FreshDirect is priced at levels beyond the means of most South Bronx residents. For these reasons, as well as the reasons elaborated above, including that the FreshDirect project runs counter to the needs, desires and well-established development plans of the local community, would exacerbate the health crisis in the South Bronx caused by oversaturation of diesel trucks, would reward circumvention of living wage requirements and back track records of unfiar labor claims, would further subvert the public benefit legally required of state land, and is inconsistent with efforts to protect the South Bronx waterfront flood zone in the wake of Hurricane Sandy, we ask that ESD deny FreshDirect’s application for subsidies and for a Zoning Override. Respectfully submitted,
Located on 152nd Street and Wales Avenue just beyond Melrose and Mott Haven you will find Piraña’s delightful truck. For years my friends and I have frequented this place and it definitely one of our favorites so we’re surprised that Gothamist actually even included a Bronx food truck!
Here’s what they had to say:
Via Foursquare
LECHONERA LA PIRAÑA: As the name suggests, this Mott Haven food truck serves some fierce lechon asado, a Puerto Rican-style roast suckling pig dish. Proprietor and chef Angel only blesses The Bronx with this dish on Saturdays and Sundays, but when he does, it makes for a sumptuous $8 feast—he slices the slow-roasted pork with a machete and sticks the dry-rubbed meat, skin still intact, on a bed of rice and peas. Pork aside, you can sample Angel’s pastelillos, or fried empanadas, along with some super-cheap alcapurrias, plantain-based dumplings stuffed with meats.
Lechonera La Piraña is located at East 152nd St. near Wales Ave in The Bronx on Saturdays and Sundays.
Gabe Pressman, A senior correspondent for NBC came to The Bronx, the borough of his birth and where he was raised, to do a segment on Port Morris. The 90 year old award winning journalist took a tour of the area an local businesses such as Port Morris Distillery, Charlie’s Kitchen, and Jamie Jones’ The Shoppe Bx.
Check out the video below and tell us what you think? This journalistic segment further solidifies why FreshDirect does NOT belong in a residential neighborhood like Port Morris with over 3,000 truck trips daily plus extra vehicular traffic.
“Community activists and residents alike, along with politicians, were (and still remain) upset at the sale of a landmarked building which is a heart and pride of the South Bronx and the borough overall.
Young Woo & Associates was one of the bidding firms for the Kingsbridge armory who lost out to the ice-skating rink proposal and who had an idea to turn the Bronx General Post office into a market just like their original idea for the armory. Welcome2TheBronx proposed that the market could be a Chelsea Market / Eataly style market with a Bronx twist that would celebrate the many ethnic groups which call the Bronx home making us the most diverse borough in New York City (read all about what a Bronx Chelsea Market/Eataly Hybrid would be like).
According to the Daily News the post office will remain operating in the building:
“The Postal Service will maintain a retail presence at the site along with responsibility for the murals’ preservation regardless of what Youngwoo & Associates plans for the site, the spokeswoman said.
The actual sales price of the post office has yet to be confirmed and we now await from official word from Young Woo & Associates as to what will be developed at the building.
Meanwhile, check out a segment on BronxTalk with host Gary Axelbank where Young Woo & Associates discussed their original market concept for the Kingsbridge Armory (which aired in August 2012) and may very well end up being their plan for the post office:
Gabe Pressman, A senior correspondent for NBC came to The Bronx, the borough of his birth and where he was raised, to do a segment on Port Morris. The 90 year old award winning journalist took a tour of the area an local businesses such as Port Morris Distillery, Charlie’s Kitchen, and Jamie Jones’ The Shoppe Bx.
Check out the video below and tell us what you think? This journalistic segment further solidifies why FreshDirect does NOT belong in a residential neighborhood like Port Morris with over 3,000 truck trips daily plus extra vehicular traffic.
We’re excited to learn that the popular and 3 time Emmy winning and 12 Emmy nominated Netflix original show, Orange Is The New Black, will be filming on location for their 3rd season this coming Monday, September 8th on City Island.
The show has several Bronx connections including one of the main characters, Gloria Mendoza who is played by Cuban born and Bronx raised actress Selenis Leyva and the popular opening song is written and performed by Moscow born and Bronx raised Regina Spektor.
According to the notices given about the filming of the scenes, it is for a funeral scene (wonder who dies?) and will be using Pelham Cemetery in the scene along with other locations on City Island.
We’re definitely looking forward to seeing our Bronx in the 3rd Season of Orange Is The New Black!
Intro to Orange is The New Black, ‘You’ve Got Time’, by Regina Spektor:
The residents of the South Bronx have been battling the FreshDirect deal to move into our waterfront which would pollute our roadways with heavy truck traffic aggravating an already dire asthma situation.
Now we have one our own residents on his way to the United Nations Climate summit where he will be able to represent the united voices of South Bronx residents and more than 50 community based organizations against this careless and deadly deal.
Mychal Johnson / Image Credit: Adi Talwar for City Limits
Arthur “Mychal” Johnson of South Bronx Unite Selected to Attend Historic United Nations Climate Summit with more than 100 Global Heads of State and 37 Civil Society Representatives
Brings International Attention to the Asthma-Plagued Community’s Ongoing Fight to Stop the Subsidized Relocation of FreshDirect’s Diesel Trucking Operation and Broadens Awareness of Bronx Climate Justice Movements
On Friday, August 29th, Mott Haven/Port Morris resident, co-founder of South Bronx Unite, and member of the Board of Directors of the Bronx Council for Environmental Quality, Mychal Johnson was selected from among 544 civil society applicants from 115 countries to attend the historic United Nations Climate Summit, taking place on September 23 at the United Nations.
UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon has organized the Climate Summit to bring together more than 100 global Heads of State and other world leaders to galvanize and catalyze climate action through bold decisions to reduce emissions, strengthen climate resilience, and mobilize political will for a meaningful legal agreement in 2015.
Mychal is one of 38 civil society delegates from 25 countries, each chosen because of their proven track record of effective advocacy and implementation of community based solutions for climate change mitigation or adaptation.
Since 2012, under the banner of South Bronx Unite, Mychal has helped lead a broad based coalition of residents and organizations against a proposed $140+ million government subsidy to FreshDirect, which aims to relocate its diesel trucking operation to a South Bronx waterfront flood zone, documented with evidence of a Native American burial site. The company would bring 1,000 daily diesel truck trips through the predominantly African-American and Latino community, where one in five children suffers from asthma and where asthma hospitalization rates stand at 21 times higher than other NYC neighborhoods. The company is refusing to perform a meaningful environmental review and is instead relying on a 21 year old environmental impact statement.
Mayor de Blasio campaigned strongly against the deal while running for office in 2013 but has not yet acted to stop the pending transfer of subsidies. Over the last month, upwards of 400 emails and phone calls have been made to Mayor de Blasio and his team to stop the deal, but there has been no response from his office.
The issue of FreshDirect and other Bronx-wide priorities such as “redlining green,” the protection of climate migrants, food sovereignty, clean air, and climate education will be highlighted at several events throughout the Bronx under the banner “Bronx Climate Justice” taking place during the weeks leading up to the UN Climate Summit.
Tea Party Republican Senator Ted Cruz of Texas / Image Credit: Reuters
Tea Party Republic Senator Ted Cruz from Texas, in an attempt to mock Senator Chuck Schumer of New York, bashed The Bronx as a dangerous place when he said, according to Business Insider, “Now, I understand that Manhattan is very concerned with their security with the Bronx, but it’s a little bit different on 2,000 miles of the Rio Grande.” Senator Cruz said these remarks during a meeting of the conservative Americans For Prosperity’s Defending The American Dream Summit in Dallas, Texas. Guess he doesn’t know his own state and that The Bronx is safer than its 3 largest cities.
Here’s a little lesson for you, Senator Cruz, courtesy of a little digging Welcome2TheBronx did:
The following is data compiled by the FBI via their Uniform Crime Reporting Statistics utilizing the latest dataset as well as data from the NYPD for The Bronx:
Crime Rate of The Bronx vs Dallas and Houston
Violent Crime Stats as of 2012
As you can see from the data Dallas, which was the location of the meeting where Senator Ted Cruz made his disparaging remarks about The Bronx, has a much higher murder rate and almost double the incidents of rape. In the robbery and assault categories, The Bronx and Dallas are roughly on par with The Bronx slightly higher in those categories. Houston’s crime rate is also significantly higher across all major violent crime categories.
Crime has continued to drop in all the above cities but The Bronx is still ahead of the game with a murder rate of 5.9 and 16.7 rapes per 100,000 population according to NYPD stats for 2013. Also now that crime stats from Riker’s Island will no longer be counted with The Bronx, you can expect the numbers to drop even more drastically for our borough.
Furthermore, the popular data site, Neighborhoodscout.com (used by such sites as The Huffington Post, The New York Times, CNN, Wall Street Journal) lists the Bronx as safer than Dallas and Houston. In fact. NeighborhoodScout gives The Bronx a rating of 22 out of 100 (100 being the safest) with Dallas receiving 3 out of 100, Houston 5 out of 100, and San Antonio got a 3 out of 100 making our borough over 7 times safer than Dallas and San Antonio and over 5 times safer than Houston — all 3 which are the largest cities in Texas with a population of over 1 million.
So Senator Cruz, hope you learned something: Think before you speak. You try and disparage our home and we will come for you with irrefutable evidence of how wrong you are.
Here’s what our local elected officials had to say about Ted’s fear-mongering:
Baron Ambrosia announced yesterday that the episode will air on October 5th. On his Facebook page he said, ” THIS JUST IN! THE BRONX will be on Anthony Bourdain’s PARTS UNKNOWN on OCTOBER 5th at 9 PM on CNN. Appearances by Grandmaster Mele Mel, Afrika Bambaataa, Kool Herc, Grandmaster Caz, Clyde BigLord Cochran, Geddy Rock, Desus, POPMASTER FABEL, Floor Royalty Crew, Lloyd Ultan, & Baron Ambrosia. Plus many more! Get ready.”
I cannot wait to see what this episode has in store for us!
Florence was dead. Josh cried at the cemetery. He even said Kaddish, the Jewish prayer for the dead. Josh’s family wasn’t religious. He’d never even been bar-mitzvahed, so saying Kaddish was a lot. Josh later said he’d wanted to do the right thing for his mother.
We went back to his house in New Jersey from the cemetery. Florence’s sister Anna was there, now in her nineties, feeble and almost blind. “Why couldn’t they take me,” she wailed. “She was so good.”
Josh, almost fifty, his eyes puffy from crying, took me down to his basement playroom. “I’m an orphan now, Bobby,” he said, his voice breaking. He’d been holding it in all day except for the time at the cemetery. I hugged him.
I looked over at the mantle of his fireplace. “Hey, you’ve still got the elephants.”
Josh smiled. “Yeah, and the chairs, too. Come back upstairs and I’ll show you.”
Burch and Florence
They lived in a stoop apartment at 1353 Sheridan Avenue, three short steps up from the sidewalk. Their living room windows were about six feet above street level, and fronted Sheridan Avenue. On nice days Burch and Florence opened the windows wide and leaned out on the sills. From there they could see all the way up and down the block.
Florence, usually dressed in a housecoat, talked to the neighborhood women or to her sons’ friends as they passed by; or held a running conversation, window to window, with one or both of her sisters, who lived in the building directly across the street.
Often, still dressed in her housecoat, a pocketbook dangling from her wrist, she’d wheel her wire shopping cart down the hill to Bollinger’s Grocery, or to Leo’s Fruit Store (around the corner on 170th Street). Florence was a heavy-set woman of fifty then. Her protruding stomach made it seem as though she were perennially pregnant.
Burch, whenever he was home, was at the window in his undershirt (the type with two narrow straps across the shoulders), with the uppermost part of his very hairy chest exposed to view, and the ever-present dark brown twisted Brazilian stogie between the index and middle fingers of his right hand, or tightly clenched between his teeth. He was a dancing bear of a man, about five-foot-five, bald, squat and muscular. His icy blue eyes seemed always to scowl. They were alert to every movement on the street. His face was round and full, his lips thick, his nose surprisingly straight and narrow for such a face. His arms and forearms were short and powerful, his neck thick, his chest as broad as a barrel. He looked like a man you wouldn’t want to mess with.
Burch would stop the neighborhood men, or his sons’ friends, as they passed in front of his window. ”Hey, Chief,” he’d say, in his gruff voice, “C’mere, I wanna talk to ya.”
They were my best friend Josh’s parents. I spent more time in their apartment than I spent in my own. If Josh wasn’t at home, I’d spend the time with them. Burch and Florence were considered permissive parents in those days. When Josh was five he was still out on the street after midnight. By the time he was eight he was allowed out until two or three in the morning as long as he stayed around the neighborhood. At age ten or eleven it was all right for him to cross the George Washington Bridge to New Jersey on foot.
As teenagers Josh and I often came into his house at two or three in the morning. Everyone was awake. Burch, if he was home, Florence, and Josh’s older brothers, Rube (who was my brother Herb’s friend), and Zeke. Florence would walk us into the kitchen and cook for us. I remember the delicious aromas of fried onions and other delectables trapped in that small kitchen in the rear of the apartment. Florence was always there, always ready to cook regardless of the hour; a sweet, gentle, soft-spoken woman whose life revolved around her family.
In 1947, Burch began a new career as a cook on a merchant marine ship. He was out at sea for up to six months, home for three or four, and then he shipped out again. When he came home he brought gifts for the family. One of those gifts, from Ceylon, was a hand-carved set of eight miniature mahogany elephants with ivory tusks. It sat atop the piano in the living room. The elephants were linked trunk to tail and seemed to be constantly on the move.
It was always an event when Burch returned from one of his trips. We’d all sit in their living room while Burch, his blue eyes full of life and his gruff voice animated, delighted us with descriptions of the places he’d been and the experiences he’d had this time out.
“In Singapore,” I remember him saying one time, “we got a little boisterous in a restaurant. This little Chinese cook started chasing us through narrow winding streets with a meat cleaver. We got back to the ship by a whisker, but until we did, y’know, there were a few minutes when I thought we’d bought the last bit of the breath of life. ‘Course, on the plus side, we ended up saving the price of a great dinner, and had the exercise of runnin’ it off.”
Their apartment had two bedrooms, a living room and an eat-in kitchen. Burch and Florence slept in one of the bedrooms. The three boys shared the other. There were two twin beds in the boys’ bedroom. Josh and Zeke were both slight of build, so they shared one of them until Zeke, the first to leave the house, moved out. . It was in that bedroom where I, in my early teen years, developed my love of jazz from Josh, when he spun a record called “This Here” played by Bobby Timmins.
Every room in the house was in complete disarray. Not dirty, because Florence always cleaned. I remember her dressed in a housecoat, wielding a dust mop. But it always seemed as though they had an agreement, conscious or not, that there was no sense making up a bed. Someone would only sleep in it the next night and muss it up again. Nor would it do any good to return things to their former places because they’d probably be moved again anyway.
Their furnishings were likewise helter-skelter. They had a wonderful set of chairs in the living room. There was a lathed-back mahogany chair with hand-carved open-mouthed lions’ heads at the end of each armrest, and a matching rocker. Aside from those chairs, in an era when it was a mark of good taste to have each room appointed just so, Burch and Florence’s apartment did not have two of anything that looked remotely alike in style or color. Pretense just wasn’t their thing.
Whenever I walked into their apartment, Burch would come to the end of the long, narrow entry foyer that faced the front door. He’d call out to his son Rube, “Hey Rube, Robbie’s here. It’s sandwich time.”
Rube would join his father in the foyer. He was a carbon copy of Burch, except that he was younger and wasn’t bald. They’d give me their traditional greeting (which, according to Josh, they only gave to people they really liked). Rube pushed his fist into one of my cheeks and Burch pushed his into my other cheek. They tried to make their fists meet in the middle.
My part in this ritual was not to exhibit any sign of pain. I never did. After a respectable period of time they’d release me.
“You’re all right, Robbie,” Burch would say. “but you’d better behave or I’ll give you a shot in the mahoska.” Then he’d fake a punch to my stomach, pulling up an inch or less short of the “target”.
One rainy evening I came into their house with a splitting headache. Burch was waiting for me in the entryway.
“Please,” I begged, “no sandwich, my head is killing me.”
“I hear you, boy.” Burch affectionately tousled my hair, put his arm around my shoulders, and guided me into “his” chair, the lion-mouthed rocker. He began to massage my temples. Within five minutes my headache was gone.
“I learned that technique,” he said, “from a barefoot, baldheaded little priest in Punjab.”
Burch and Florence often drove into Manhattan at one or two in the morning to eat. Whenever I was around, Josh and I went with them. Their favorite restaurant was Sam Wo’s in Chinatown, on Mott Street at the end of Pell. It was a small, narrow restaurant with a row of perhaps six tables on either side wall. The atmosphere was hectic. Four or five waiters ran around serving each table. Even at that hour of the morning, people lined up in the tiny vestibule, and out onto Mott Street, waiting to get in.
There were no knives or forks brought to the table. Burch patiently taught me how to use chopsticks. Whenever I dropped a piece of food, he’d tweak my nose with his chopsticks. Because he was so adept with them, that tweaking really hurt. I quickly learned how to use those chopsticks.
Almost every time we went to Sam Wo’s, there was a celebrity or two there. I imagine that because of the late hour they were less cautious of being bothered. Among others, several times we saw Woody Allen and Anthony Quinn. What a thrill for a young kid!
The boys, especially Josh, who was the baby of the family, had very close relationships with Burch and Florence. Josh often brought his dates home to meet them. He felt that if they met his parents he’d have a better chance of scoring. It often worked. There were a few girls who maintained a relationship with Burch and Florence long after they’d stopped dating Josh.
By the mid-1960’s, things had changed. Zeke was away from home getting his doctorate in psychology. Rube had married and moved out. Josh got an apartment in Manhattan. With their sons out of the apartment, Burch and Florence decided it was time that they, too, leave the neighborhood. They moved to Far Rockaway, near the ocean that Burch loved so much. I didn’t see them very often after that.
In 1975, Rube had a heart attack in his sleep, and died suddenly and unexpectedly. He was forty. I went to Rube’s house on Long Island to pay a condolence call. I hadn’t seen Burch and Florence for eight or ten years. They’d both aged dramatically.
Burch’s face was lined and his shoulders were stooped. The hair that ringed his bald pate was disheveled and gray. He looked like an old man. Florence’s hair had a lot of gray. Her face was worn and haggard and she, too, looked very old.
I went out to the back yard with Burch. He put an arm around my shoulder. “I’m glad to see you, Robbie. My boy is dead, y’know.” He started to sob and wept unashamedly. There was nothing I could say. I hugged him, and I cried also.
Burch died in October, 1979. Florence died in April, 1989. Sometimes I see them when I close my eyes.
Josh died in June, 2003. I still talk to him.
About Bob Grand:
Bob Grand was born in the Bronx in 1938. He lived at 1348 Sheridan Avenue until 1959. For the outlandish rental of $ 65 per month they had a three bedroom one bath apartment in which, for the first ten years of his life, Bob lived with six other people – his Mom’s two sisters, his mom and dad, his older brother, and his widowed grandfather.
He went to P.S. 88, P.S. 90, JHS 22, Taft H.S., and then Hunter College in the Bronx (now Lehman). He mostly attended Hunter at night, graduating in 1966. When he started at Hunter, it cost $25 per semester.
In 1959 he and his family moved to 2325 Morris Avenue. It was an elevator building, something they had longed to live in for many years. It would have been a “step up” if not for the fact that, after all those years of waiting and longing, the apartment was on the ground floor of the elevator building.
He left the Bronx in 1967 to move to Manhattan, feeling very much at home in a 6th floor walkup (remember, he was younger then) studio apartment in the east 60’s for which he paid the huge sum of $ 135/month.
Bob now lives in Monticello, NY, but the Bronx will always be his home. He visits the Bronx often, and is thrilled to see a new generation of Bronxites enjoying living and raising their children there (he has five children and five grandchildren of his own). He wishes they were able to share the joy of neighborhood movie houses and candy stores and what they meant to the culture of his youth and his experience of growing up Bronx.
We’ve had a great month so far, so make sure not to miss our closing event for the urban fiction novel Pure Bronx this coming Saturday. Come meet other writers and mingle with authors Mark Naison PhD and Melissa Castillo-Garsow. See below…great things coming for the fall!
Charlie Vázquez
Director, Bronx Writers Center
Via Bronx Council on the Arts
Saturday, August 30 – Mark Naison PhD and Melissa Castillo-Garsow book presentation for Pure Bronx, A Novel
2700 E Tremont Avenue – 4 – 6pm – Free (#6 train to Westchester Square)
Authors Mark Naison PhD and Melissa Castillo-Garsow will join the Bronx Writers Center for a special presentation for Pure Bronx, a novel that follows the journey of a young South Bronx couple, Khalil and Rasheeda, who struggle to make it out of the ghetto. Filled with a realistic cast of characters from hustlers to wealthy Wall Street moguls, Pure Bronx is an action-packed drama that moves with the speed of a rush hour express train. We will close this presentation with a Q&A where participants can ask the authors questions about writing and the publishing process.
Books will be available for purchase/signing by the authors…
