In a criminal justice system that processes misery day in and day out, there is a question whether the new Bronx district attorney, criticized as a former judge in the Kalief Browder case, can truly bring reform. (The Undefeated )
Category: Neighborhoods
In Search of “The Lost Arcade”
A new documentary titled “The Lost Arcade” serves as a scorned love letter to the Chinatown Fair and all it once represented. (The New Yorker)
Can Training Programs Help Improve Police-Community Relations?
Advocates have renewed efforts to train residents how to avoid deadly encounters with police – while awaiting reform. (The Atlantic)
Doors often closed to transgender tenants searching for housing. Any protection against discrimination is patchwork at best.
For as long as Paola Ramirez has journeyed through her gender identity, she has been haunted by housing insecurity — first as a pained young boy living with her parents in Guatemala, then on her own as a gay man and, finally, as a transgender woman in New York. (Al Jazeera America)
In Harlem, Renaissance Theater Is at the Crossroads of Demolition and Preservation
The Renaissance Theater and Casino in Harlem has been vacant for more than 30 years. One Sunday morning, as churchgoers and tourists walked by, the preservation campaign was on full display, a man wearing a bowler hat bellowed a chant of three woeful words: “Save Harlem now.” (The New York Times) Update: A Piece of…
Neighbors Mourn A Squatter, Known Widely but Not Well
For as long as anyone can remember, Baruba lived on the lot on Park Avenue near 126th Street in Harlem — a makeshift home that included a worn house trailer, an electricity hookup and milk crates. To developers who for years had tried to dislodge him, he was simply known as the Squatter. To others he was the Man With the Dogs. (The New York Times)
Deciding Whether It’s Lights Out
This is the way a neighborhood ends. With a rush of freezing, grimy water, and a slew of decisions about whether it is better to stay and rebuild after a deadly hurricane, or to leave and start a new life elsewhere. (The New York Times)
As Tourists Come and Go, Harlem Churches Lose a 10% Lifeblood
Despite the draw of tourists, churches in Harlem are struggling. At the heart of the struggle is a contradiction: As the iconic neighborhood’s fortunes rise, tithing — the traditional source of the churches’ money — is fading away. (The New York Times)
All-Season Play for a Chess Crew in Harlem
Inside the storefront one cold evening, hands slammed on time clocks in a vigorous percussion, taunts lobbed between opponents – sounds reminiscent of combat. The games had been honed by years of chess matches at St. Nicholas Park, where regulars, hustlers and visitors played for hours on end, drawing crowds and creating street chess legends. (The New York Times)
Harlem Says Goodbye to the Lenox Lounge
The Lenox Lounge, where Billie Holiday had a table, Dizzy Gillespie played his trumpet, and James Baldwin soaked up the scene, Art Deco light fixtures and zebra-print wallpaper stir up memories of other eras, and where, even now, everybody knows everybody, is set to close. (The New York Times)
In Changing Harlem, a Mosque Struggles to Pay Rent
The mosque has been crammed into its run-down, rented space for about 16 years, serving the mostly West African congregation of more than 1,000. But after a persistent rent dispute with its landlord, the mosque finds itself in housing court facing eviction. (The New York Times)
A Watcher of the Police Says He Is Now a Target
Joseph Hayden is a familiar presence with his video camera on the streets of his native Harlem, ready to document interactions between the police and the residents. But Hayden, 71, recently found himself on the receiving end of police scrutiny, arrested on charges of weapons possession after a traffic stop. (The New York Times)
