Protecting and improving the community for the people who live and work here

By Christine Chung, Rachel Holliday Smith, Claudia Irizarry Aponte and Greg B. Smith

Read full story here: THE CITY:

Excerpt: “… an alarming rise in 911 calls seeking police assistance with the emotionally disturbed. Citywide in every precinct, the number of these calls has climbed each year…as City Hall and the NYPD struggle to keep up. NYPD and city officials in charge of wrestling with the issue have noted a concentration of these calls in areas that host psychiatric hospitals and homeless shelters for the mentally ill…

“…As THE CITY reported last month, training for cops to deal with mental health calls has lagged, and special “co-response” teams of police and mental health workers formed three years ago were never connected to the 911 system.”

“…NYPD statistics show that about half off all these so-called EDP calls end up with a patient transported by cops or EMTs to hospital psych wards. And once they’re dropped off, they enter a system that is set up to eventually give them the freedom to come and go at will…”

Read full article here.

(This story published by THE CITY (www.thecity.nyc), an independent, nonprofit news organization dedicated to hard-hitting reporting that serves the people of New York)

Environmental Review

Environmental review documents for the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development-funded East Side Coastal Resiliency (ESCR) project are available below for download and review. The New York City Office of Management and Budget (NYC OMB) is the Responsible Entity for the grant funds, as well as the Lead Agency under the National Environmental Policy Act (NEPA) overseeing the environmental review for the project. Additionally, the New York City Department of Parks & Recreation (NYC Parks) has assumed the responsibility of Lead Agency under the New York State Environmental Quality Review Act (SEQRA) and the New York City Environmental Quality Review (CEQR).

Positive Declaration (October 28, 2015)
Draft Scope of Work (October 30, 2015)
Notice of Intent To Prepare an Environmental Impact Statement (November 6, 2015)
Early Floodplain/Wetlands Notice (February 22, 2019)

Notice of Availability (April 5, 2019)
Notice of Completion (April 5, 2019)
Final Scope of Work (April 5, 2019)

Draft Environmental Impact Statement (April 5, 2019)

The DEIS includes a detailed project description and a description of environmental impacts, including direct, indirect, and cumulative impacts, associated with a No Action Alternative, Preferred Alternative, and three other With Action Alternatives.

Comment on the DEIS.

ESCR DEIS Cover Page

By Jarrett Murphy City Limits

Tuesday, April 9th, 5-7 p.m. Location: Alexander Hamilton U.S. Custom House, 1 Bowling Green, New York, N.YT

“In a process initiated after the devastation of Superstorm Sandy, the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers has identified five strategies for protecting the city from waves and tides that are likely to become more destructive as sea levels rise… [including] a massive sea wall from Sandy Hook, N.J., to Breezy Point in Queens…”

…Doubts about massive tidal barriers are held widely. 

Annel Hernandez, associate director of the New York City Environmental Justice Alliance: “We’re investing heavily in a new climate adaptation economy. We have to make sure the infrastructure is providing other crucial benefits for communities, not just a wall out in the bay that is only activated during the actual emergency event. We would want infrastructure that would be useful and accessible on a sunny day,” like waterfront parks that absorb water and provide recreation…

“The problem with a sea wall is, it would have a lot of impacts on the health of the waterways which would in turn would have an impact on the ability for ecologically grounded coastal protections,” Hernandez added. Sea walls, for instance, can change how tides and sediments move, which can affect the health of wetlands that resist storm surge.”

POSTED APRIL 3, 2019

ERA BLOG Post

“…the mythic maze of subterranean streams under the East Village…are left off the City’s public visualizations of the East Side Coastal Resiliency project (ESCR) project that is meant to protect our community from flooding. This is a potentially disastrous oversight that will affect my neighborhood as the sea level rises and climate change delivers increasingly intense storms. 

Responding to my questions at public meetings, the Department of Environmental Protection says these subterranean streams are not under their jurisdiction, and they don’t know where they are. Why doesn’t the City have a Deputy Mayor for Infrastructure so agencies, adjacent projects and geography can be coordinated?

…subterranean rivers and tidal salt marshes extending nearly to 1st Avenue. The book “The Archaeology of Home” tells how the land was extended and filled in, and how docks and shipyards soon ringed the shore. Even today, people in the community know that willow trees are indicators that these ancient waterways still flow. This year, test bores for rain gardens are being made in the same area for the Gardens Rising project, and there are reports on progress mapping the underground. Can’t these shed light for developing the ESCR, too?”

Read More – with maps HERE.

‘A Shower Is Transformative:’

Lava Mae’s Founder on Feminism & Philanthropy

From ALMA

If you don’t think of homelessness as a feminist issue, you should. We spoke with Doniece Sandoval, Lava Mae’s passionate founder, on how being unhoused affects women differently and the challenges women social entrepreneurs face.

The stats on people experiencing homelessness in San Francisco can be overwhelming: About 7,500 people — including kids, families and people with jobs — are unhoused every night in the city. While the roots of this crisis are deep and wide, restorative experiences for people experiencing homelessness can be really simple, like the chance to take a hot shower. That’s what Lava Mae and its mobile showers have provided to more than 15,000 guests since 2013.

SUPPORT LAVA MAE

Why is homelessness an important issue for women?

Homelessness is devastating for all people regardless of gender, but for women the challenges are overwhelming. They are disproportionally escaping violence in the home, often single mothers and once unhoused are at greater risk of assault and sex trafficking. They also grapple with the realities of a monthly period and little access to safe, reliable bathrooms.

No one deserves to be unhoused but we must recognize the added risk and burden faced by women and as work to prevent and solve homelessness.

A shower, something so simple that most of us take it for granted, is transformative. It connects us with our dignity and self-worth. It also eliminates obstacles to opportunities like jobs and housing.

”To know that I have 15 minutes to myself, in a safe private space where hot water and wonderful soaps wash me clean is the highlight of my day. I reconnect with who I am; I feel hopeful, and find what I need to hang on another day as I wait for housing to open up.” — Lava Mae guest

The biggest challenge is around equal access to funding. One of the funders supporting us recently conducted follow-up research on the social entrepreneurs in its portfolio. They found that organizations lead by men were funded in amounts almost twice what women-led organizations received. When gender bias exists, it makes it supremely hard to sustain, much less scale, an organization that’s having a great impact.

The Stanton Parkhouse 

Thank you to the students in Pratt Institute’s Interior Design department for their proposals for the re-imagined interiors of the Stanton Building. The students:

Shreya Bhuraria, Vanwalee Chansue, Aastha Kothari, Erin Loffler, Erin Lutz, Mallika Mehrotra, Niyati Shah, Mahzad Soheili 

Thank you to the Keena for providing us with such a joyous evening with a look back at the history of Sara Roosevelt Park with the curated exhibition of historic images from the NYC Parks archives and for a look into the future of what we could be.

Thank you to Council Member Chin and Borough President Brewer for the words and all your support for moving our park to a better future.

Thank you to Ryan, Dakota and Emilio who generously helped with the space.

Thank you to the Parks Department Archivist.

Thank you to all our Task Force: Ryan, Wendy, Jennifer and the Sara Roosevelt Community Coalition.

Thank you to Thelma Pridgen, Bob Humber, Debra Jeffreys-Glass, Ted Glass, K Webster of the Coalition.

Thank you to Felicia Gordon Tenant Leader of Rafael Hernandez Housing.

Thank you to our local businesses Ceci Cela and Roni-Sue’s Chocolates.

photos Lee Elson

DID YOU KNOW: 100 New Yorkers are evicted every day.

It’s now or never for housing justice. We need universal rent control.

• Expand rent regulation to every county
• Pass good cause eviction
• Eliminate loopholes like vacancy bonus, vacancy decontrol, preferential rent and MCIs (major capital increases) /IAIs (individual apartment improvements)

Doors open at 5:00PM

The East River Alliance is meeting on Wednesday, April 10, 6:30 p.m at the Educational Alliance, 25-29 Avenue D, bet. 3rd & 4th street. Join us to learn more about the recently released #ESCR Environmental Impact Statement.

Talking Points from the just released Environmental Impact Study on East Side Coastal Resiliency Project

PARKING

An inventory of on- and off-street parking within a ¼-mile radius of the project area showed approximately 70 on-street parking spaces available near Project Area One (Montgomery St to 13th St)and 30 on-street parking spaces available near Project Area (13th St to 25th St.) Two. The off-street survey showed approximately 60 spaces available near Project Area One and 800 spaces available near Project Area Two. Construction under the Preferred Alternative is anticipated to generate a maximum parking demand of 92 spaces for Project Area One and 52 spaces for Project Area Two. The Project Area Two demand would be fully accommodated by the large inventory of available on- and off-street parking spaces near the project area. The Project Area One demand would not be fully accommodated within ¼-mile and could result in a parking shortfall of up to approximately 35 spaces. It is expected that excess parking demand within Project Area One would need to be accommodated by on-street parking or off-street parking beyond a ¼-mile walk from the project area. Alternatively, motorists could choose other modes of transportation. As stated in the CEQR Technical Manual, a parking shortfall resulting from a project located in Manhattan does not constitute a significant adverse parking impact, due to the magnitude of available alternative modes of transportation. Therefore, construction of the preferred Alternative would not result in any significant adverse parking effects. 

Transit 

Construction of the Preferred Alternative would generate 144 transit trips (total of Project Area One and Project Area Two) during the peak hour of the peak construction period, below the CEQR Technical Manual analysis threshold of 200 transit trips. Therefore, construction of this alternative would not result in any significant adverse transit effects.

Spring Awakening this Sunday, April 14, parade at 11:45

(SEE MAP below).

Wednesday April 10th at 6:30pm

70 East 4th Street