Our goal is to develop diverse leadership and address local community issues in collaboration with the neighborhood associations, institutions and residents of the neighborhoods of the Southern Region, including Crotona, Mt. Hope and University/West Burnside.

In 2007

The past year in the Southern Region of the Northwest Bronx has seen the continuation of collective organizing among established community institutions as well as new leadership in growing areas of our community. Working with the Northwest Bronx Community & Clergy Coalition, the Crotona Community Coalition along with St. Martin of Tours organized a housing town hall on October 24th to address the many housing concerns in the community.  Parishioners, tenant association leaders, housing advocacy groups, local management corporations and elected officials, including City Council Majority Speaker Joel Rivera, all participated to make a successful public meeting.  The Housing Committee of the NWBCCC, which is comprised mostly of leaders from the Southern Region, played a part in planning this and many other events in the borough and throughout the city, which are described in further detail in the Housing Committee’s Annual report. 

Earlier in the year in March, 300 members of the Bronx Muslim community gathered in P.S./I.S. 218 to hold an educational town hall regarding the need for recognizing two Muslim holidays in our public school system. As members of a city-wide campaign, the NWBCCC, along with New Settlement Apartments, worked with mosques in the area to highlight the importance of these holidays in Islam.  We also worked to expand recognition of the bills passed in the New York State Senate and Assembly that prevented scheduling statewide school exams on any and all religious holidays as well as allowed for excused absences for students on those days.  While these bills were introduced by Bronx elected officials and eventually passed as state laws, they do not address the greater concern of NYC’s Muslim students having to choose between missing two days of the school year because the system does not recognize their religion or attending school on days that are as important to them as are the days of Christmas or Yom Kippur to Christian or Jewish students.

Victories in 2007:

• January 2007 - State Bill goes into effect preventing state testing on holy days, as well as allowing for excused absences for students on those days
• March 31st, 2007 - Coalition for Muslim School Holidays’ Bronx Town Hall is held in P.S./I.S. 218
• Management company for 60 E. 177th Street is removed by Tenants Association, HPD and New York Community Bank; Tenant Association is currently working with new company to follow up on progress made in building
• October 24th, 2007 – Crotona Housing Town Hall is held in St. Martin of Tours Parish

In 2008

The Southern Region is already hard at work in preparation for the coming year with plenty of exciting actions and public meetings currently being planned by community leaders.  In late January, a Mt. Hope community meeting will take place to address the safety and quality of life concerns of residents in an area long known for it’s struggles and victories in organizing around both of these critical issues.  The campaign for Muslim school holidays will also be a topic of discussion as the Mt. Hope community given that Mt. Hope boasts one of the largest concentrations of Muslims in New York State.   The Mt. Hope Organization will be part of this effort along with local mosques, churches and schools in the area.  A Crotona Quality of Life Town Hall will take place shortly after, and may even involve some joint work with the Mt. Hope institutions around the persistent problems of violent crime, infestation of rats and air pollution in these communities.  The NWBCCC will continue to connect the local housing work of our tenant associations to city and state-wide work that ranges from the Mitchell Lama Task Force and the Rent Guidelines Board to sub-prime lending and the foreclosure crisis.  A community meeting in the University/West Burnside neighborhood will follow over the summer and will also deal with sanitation and housing issues.

For more information, please contact:

Orlando Torres, orlando@northwestbronx.org

(718) 584-0515 and (917) 213-7529